In the offline world your selling time is restricted by one key factor – Time. Time, and probably to a lesser extent, energy and enthusiasm, stand inbetween you and your potential ‘hot prospects’ or future clients. This applies whether your business is within a B2B or Retail environment. On the shopfloor, the sales assistant can only deal with one customer at a time. Within the sales office, the Sales Executive can only spend time in one meeting, or in one phone conversation at a time…
However… no matter how devoid of time slots your diary maybe, we always find the opportunity to develop little openings within our daily schedule to cater for the VIP customers. Those that require a little personal care as the perceived revenue opportunities, long term or short term, are there to see. They’re the retail customers hovering over the cabinets clearly signed ‘Look, But Do Not Touch’, or the B2B client that can make or break your monthly revenue expectations.
The opportunity to spot your ‘big buck’ customers or prospects face-to-face is far far easier than online. Your summations are built through intuition and visual perception. Online… you don’t know the difference between a hot-prospect and a time waster from Adam.
Or do you?
Site analytics packages give you an insight into exactly which terms people search for through Google to find your particular website. Whilst, for a successful site, there can be 1000s of terms for you to datamine or make simple observations of, buying signals are there to be viewed and extracted.
Any business where there’s a perceived value to a particular product or service offering will see their website visited by the individual who’s simply researching. They’re at the earliest stage of your sales funnel. They are making their initial observations, building an understanding of their requirements and further down the research chain looking at costings.
The best description for these individuals, and we’ve all been their at one stage or another in both our personal and business lives is, “those that think they know what they want, they’re just not sure of what it is or where to get it“.
I’m at this stage in my personal life. I’m looking for a good quality compact camcorder. I understand the outcome of my purchase, my needs that the purchase will fulfil, I simply need assistance in the path to find that particular product.
Translate that particular scenario to your business. As a perspective client of yours, can I easily find out what your offering is ? also… a key aspect overlooked by so many online businesses… your understanding of my needs? Do you sell me the features, without an afterthought for the benefits your offering will provide? This methodology does not simply apply to the retailer, it applies to all business looking to achieve results online. Do NOT make assumptions regarding your site visitors.
For all you know, I may be in the market for your most expensive, high margin product. If it suits my needs, then don’t put obstacles inbetween my research and my potential purchase of that product. Similarly, I may well become the leading client for your B2B business. You don’t know who I am until I introduce myself.
I will only introduce myself once I feel comfortable with the fact you can offer what I’m looking for…. not just the end result, but the advice and consideration that sits inbetween. It’s called a Sales Funnel for a reason. There’s a beginning, a middle and an end. Don’t overlook this within your site content.
Distinguish yourself from your competition by setting a clear goal of ‘authority‘ within your industry. Just like the offline retail scenario described above, don’t simply lead me to your glass cabinet without understand what my intentions are. I may well be researching (more than likely this will be the case with a large percentage of your online traffic) so give me the time and display to me your authority and I’m sure we’ll be discussing pricing shortly.
Build your content marketing strategy with your prospective clients in mind. Too often business’ content appears as an after thought – the final completion stage prior to the launch of a new website. Content is a critical factor in the deliverability of your online marketing goals. Take care to create content which engages potential clients across the sales channel – from the researcher through to the decision maker.
..I'm the one on the left.
About The Author;
Ian’s career within the Search Marketing industry spans longer than Google’s! Since 1996 Ian Rhodes has worked with a wide range of UK and International businesses developing strategic online marketing campaigns that deliver winning results.
Prior to his consulting career, Ian worked for one of the UK’s first online retail businesses delivering cost-effective online campaigns centred around SEO and Affiliate Marketing. His success led to him being recruited as the European Marketing Director for the world’s largest online travel company. In 2004 he practiced what he preached setting up, from scratch, his own highly successful online retail business turning over £2mill in the first 4 years of trading…purely through a mixture of SEO and Paid Search Advertising.
If you’re looking to build your online revenue or lead generation techniques simply click Contact Ian and see how you can work together to start building your online business today.
