When I started marketing back in 2010 it was relatively easy to generate leads that converted to sales. I would send bulk campaigns to a non-targeted list and the result would be a great success. I would be able to generate hundreds of leads on Facebook by only targeting people in South Africa. My leads were great and converted well until about 2 to 3 years ago when the slump started…
My open rates were declining, and I had a drop in engagement with my email message. It felt like no one was listening to what I had to say. My Facebook traffic became more expensive. Leads coming in cost more to generate but the traffic was not converting. More and more people who replied to our advert were not our target market.Our market was LSM 8-10 and we would attract more expensive leads for lsm 3-6.
It was a marketing disaster. I couldn’t understand how a strategy that worked for years stopped working overnight. I was stressed out and not sure where to turn until one Sunday morning. I woke up and decided to go onto Facebook and the first thing I saw was an advert that spoke to me. It was an agency offering to train people how to generate leads for people in South Africa. They had my attention and before I knew it, I had signed up to a free webinar and parted with money to start their course.
Their marketing was so good that they managed to get me to part with money on a Sunday morning which is not me. But their strategy was so effective that I had to learn exactly how they managed to find me and sell to me. I needed to understand what changed so I could fix my response rate.
As I worked through the course, it became clear to me what I was doing wrong. The landscape in the online world had shifted and dramatically changed our marketing.
I will highlight some key points that I discovered that may help you pinpoint your own areas for improvement:
Digital & Social Media marketing is now a necessity
In the past my campaign objectives were to cast a wide net to try catch the right client. I would send thousands of emails with good open rates and a fantastic response. If we were covering a massive database and audience, we would do well. But as the digital space has grown, the way your prospect responds to marketing has changed. Social media platforms like Facebook, Linkedin and Instagram are now pivotal to business success. These sophisticated software platforms collect thousands of data points of information about their users. This has made it possible for the social giants to up their game and dominate the marketing industry.
My best way to explain to how powerful their systems are is to recommend that you watch the Great Hack. It’s a documentary on Netflix about how President Trump used the power of Facebook marketing to swing votes in his favor. If Facebook can help you win an election you can understand how powerful it is for your business.
The algorithms they use make it possible to show more relevant content to their users. This creates a better user experience and keeps people engaging on their platforms.
More people are now connected to the internet
Over the past 7 years we had more people connecting to the internet in South Africa. More people are also using the internet on smart phones, so we must adjust our marketing strategy to accommodate for mobile users.
We now have a more culturally diverse online audience on the same platform. If you do not know who to target your advert will be shown to just anyone in South Africa.
The result is you will end up paying more for leads that target the incorrect audience like we experienced with our campaigns.
The way people respond to marketing has changed
Your prospects are consuming content 24/7. Email, sms, whatsapp, google, and social media keep us busy non- stop with adverts so people have lost interest in the sales message.
They have moved on from traditional sales pitches and insist you deliver content of value instead. They don’t want to just buy from you, they want you to engage with them and build a relationship before they commit.
Engagement is now a necessary step that every business need to close sales in a digital market.
So as you can see the changes in the trends are directly impacting our marketing efforts. If you want your business to thrive now you need to align your marketing strategy with current market trends.
How do you fix your marketing strategy?
The first step you need to take is to identify who your ideal client is.
This is important so you that you can position yourself to provide content of value to them and build trust.
If you are speaking to everyone now, no one will be listening to you. The key to success now is to refine your audience and focus on one market segment that you can engage with.
You want to find your niche inside your niche industry so you find clients that will listen to you.
Since we adapted our strategy to speak to our ideal market our results and response has improved. We generate fewer leads that are better quality, so our conversion rate has increased while our customer acquisition cost has reduced. It’s a winning recipe for success.
How to identify your ideal client
Your ideal client is your client that aligns with your core values. You know exactly who I am talking about. It’s that one client that always stands out or those 5 clients that pay 80% of your income.Can you imagine how your business will improve if you only deal with clients that resonate with you? You will spend more of your time fulfilling your purpose than dealing with hassles from clients that may not be a good fit.
If you are not sure who your ideal client is, a good place to start is your existing client base or past sales. You want to gather as much information about who your existing clients are so you can find more like them.
The goal is to find similar information between all your sales (or majority) that you can use as data points. For example, you may discover that most of your sales come from people who live in Gauteng. Or all your clients may be entrepreneurs or between age 35-60.
This exercise will help you build a demographic profile of where you are likely to find your client. The next step is to now find out what makes your ideal client tick? You want to gather as much information about what happens in their lives. What are their interests, who do they follow and what books do they read? Are they married with children? What is their profession and what does their work day look like?
The more specific details you can find the better because you can use the information to understand your clients problems and needs so you can provide content that will help them.
Your client avatar will be your blueprint for your marketing strategy. Once you know who you are looking for you can better align your message and strategy to speak to that person. This will help you to stand out from your competitors and cut through the noise, so your prospect pays attention to you.
Here are some resources that you can read for a better understanding of how to the client avatar works.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/henrydevries/2019/09/25/what-is-an-ideal-customer-avatar/#f737c877327e
https://ryanbattles.com/post/defining-customer-avatars
https://www.digitalmarketer.com/blog/customer-avatar-worksheet/
https://optinmonster.com/how-to-create-a-concrete-buyer-persona-with-templates-examples/
https://www.hubspot.com/make-my-persona
I hope that my blog has provided you with more insight into why your marketing may be failing you. Sometimes a new perspective is all you need to see where you are going wrong and what you need to do to fix the problem.
Thank you for sharing your time with me. If you have any comments on my blog, please reach out to me at judy@jkms.co.za