I'm sure you've seen it before.
A company will go to great lengths to sell their company "service" or a "product", and yet their audience doesn't have the slightest idea what they're actually selling.
This is no accident. In today's marketplace the biggest challenge a company faces is building Trust.
The absence of trust is just a lack of clarity.
Buyers are either trying to come up with a reason to buy from you. Or, they're not really interested in knowing what you're offering. When you break this down that means there is no trust.
Or, it could be that they're just plain ignorant at the moment and have no idea your product or service even exists. Again your company has built no Trust.
Regardless, the end result is that the marketplace is unclear what your offer is or doesn't know what you do. Or, your offer is simply not properly defined up front. Maybe your company is making an offer in vague terms, which again does not instill Trust.
The days of the ignorant buyer are gone.
Understand the importance of Trust when starting your Digital Strategy to grow and scale your business.
Being the most trusted voice in your industry is critical to ensure success. As a business owner, you can't just expect people to come to your business. You have to go out and get them. One of the most effective ways to build trust is by creating content that answers questions for your existing customers or target audience.
Trust is built on consistency, reliability & execution. But how do you build this trust with your audience? Your prospects? Your customers? And how do you ensure your business delivers on this trust?
There are 5 main ways that you can build trust in your business through content creation. Marcus Sheridan the author of They Ask, You Answer calls this laser-focused content strategy The Big 5.
Cost and pricing.
Problems (theirs and yours).
Comparisons and versus.
Best of lists (best in class, best practices).
Reviews.
The bottom line is that people don't like to be sold. They do like to be inspired, educated, and entertained. And guess what? Most prospects want to learn more about your business before they buy from you.
The best way to win buyers over is by providing them with quality answers to their questions that they can use to make better buying decisions about your products or services.
You’ll also want to make sure your content is easy for potential customers to find through search engine optimization (SEO) and other factors. Don’t think of SEO as a tactic; it’s an integral part of your inbound marketing strategy.
If you want people to find you online, you need to make sure your website is optimized for search engines. If you aren’t getting results from SEO, don’t give up; just try a different approach. Start writing about The Big 5 in your organization.
Your marketing, sales and content needs to change to grow and build Trust.
When you're not open and transparent with your customers through content and video on your website - addressing The Big 5 - they don't know how to trust you.
Being open and transparent with your customers provides them with the confidence they need to buy from you. They also trust you to provide excellent customer service, which is key to growing your business.
But there's a huge difference between earning trust and just being a business online with a website.
People don't buy from businesses they don't trust. In fact, recent research shows that a lack of trust is one of the main reasons people choose not to buy from an online business. And in the age of Internet reviews, it's easier than ever for customers to avoid businesses they don't trust.
It means you're honest about who you are, what you do and how you do it — including what could go wrong as well as what goes right. You have to answer the question you buyers are asking as thoroughly as possible on your website and through the content you produce.
It means sharing information about your company culture, your company variables in pricing and cost, and how your team operates every day that is different from your competitors. It means taking risks by showing people exactly how you do things so they understand how you can help them. It means creating content that helps both potential and existing buyers.
Creating a video and articles on your website is a great way to build trust with your customers. People naturally feel more confident and connected to a company when they can actually see the people behind the scenes, hear their voices and witness the passion for their work.
Before you start your online business, here's what the proper Digital Strategy foundation looks like.
Everyone knows that leads are the lifeblood of your organization, and most companies employ a variety of systems to capture them. The problem is that as soon as you get one - you have to do something with it.
To be successful in lead generation you need to be able to capture leads, nurture those leads in a way that makes them more eager to engage with you and ultimately convert them into customers. Ideally, you want the process to be smooth from start to finish.
What if you could spend less time on sales calls and more time closing deals? It's possible, with a well-defined digital strategy.
In every sales call, the same old questions come up. "How much does it cost?", "How long does it take?", "What if I don't like it?". In every sales call, companies will be asked these same old questions over and over again.
What if there was a way to answer all of those questions before the sales call even happened? What if you could set yourself up for success on every first contact? That would save you a lot of time. It would also give you more data to use to improve your results.
One of the most overlooked parts of the sales process is setting your foundation for success before you ever meet with potential customers. Marcus Sheridan and the They Ask, You Answer digital strategy framework calls these The Selling 7.
7 components of the perfect Digital Strategy for your website.
1. 80% videos
Once you've identified the most common questions, answer them all in one place, and then make it easy for prospects to find.
Your website should include a link to the 80% video, and your sales team should encourage prospects to watch it before they schedule time with a salesperson.
It's important that you don't make the same mistake most companies do, which is to create more than one 80% video. This doesn't fit into the buyer's decision-making process as well as a single 80% video would.
The alternative leads people down a rabbit hole of videos that lead nowhere.
Instead, present just one video that delivers on the promise of answering the top 7-10 questions and moving people forward in your sales process.
2. Employee bio videos
Video is a great way to help your prospects better connect with your company and the people behind it. By creating video content featuring your team members, you'll not only be improving their visibility, but also strengthening the connection they have with your audience.
Employee bio videos allow you to showcase the skills, expertise and personality of your employees in a more meaningful way than just their social media presence or even the text on their bio. They're also a great way to help make your team members' online profiles more prominent within search results.
Given that videos are more engaging than text-based content, you’re more likely to get viewers to stick around from start to finish and learn about your company culture – which is ultimately what you want them to do.
3. Product or service page videos
Videos are a great way to communicate the value proposition of your products or services to potential customers.
A video is more engaging than text, and people take action after watching a video, like making a purchase or signing up for a subscription.
Aside from being very engaging, video is also the most effective medium for telling a story in the shortest amount of time.
You can break down the value of your product or service and create a call to action by explaining how other customers have benefited from it.
Video makes sense for your website. When creating your product or service video ask yourself:
1. Is my product something people would benefit from seeing in action?
2. Will my website visitors be able to get enough information about my product by reading text alone?
For most companies the answer to both of the questions above is yes.
4. Landing page videos
Landing page videos are a subtle, but powerful way to help your visitors convert on your site.
They’re an engaging way to tell your story and quickly address any concerns they may have about trusting you with their information.
Plus, they encourage higher-quality leads since the people filling out your forms are genuinely interested in what you have to offer.
The best landing page videos are short, maybe 30 seconds or less, since you don't have time for your audience to get distracted.
5. Cost videos
Many of us have been in the situation where we’re trying to find out how much something is going to cost, and we can’t find the information. When we run into that kind of situation, what happens? We get frustrated.
And why do you think we get frustrated?
Because we just want the facts. We don’t want to talk to someone for 30 minutes, or go through five different links on the website, or read through pages and pages of content. We just want the facts.
The more clarity you can provide your customers about the factors impacting pricing and cost of your product or service, the better your chances are at closing that sale and getting a customer who will stay with you for years to come.
You need to be willing to share the information that people come to you looking for. In many cases, this means sharing the price of your products or services. Or, at minimum explaining why "it depends" by giving the details of the variables that impact pricing and cost.
Now, I know what you’re thinking: “Our prices are really a trade secret!”
Well, maybe it’s time to rethink that one.
It’s true that the cost of a product or service can be a sensitive topic, but the more you hide your prices from potential customers, the more you run the risk that they will go somewhere else to find them.
And if they do find them elsewhere…well…you know how it goes. You lose the business!
There is an exception to this rule. If you don’t want to show a price-list on your website, then make sure you are completely up-front about this factor that makes pricing a "it depends" situation. Deeply explain all the factors that go into price not being a one-size fits all.
When you talk about pricing in this way you build trust.
6. Social proof and testimonial videos
There's a reason why so many successful businesses have videos of their customers talking about them. Social proof is one of the most powerful psychological forces in business.
Social proof is a blanket term that describes any means by which people are persuaded by the actions or opinions of others. The principle of social proof in marketing is to take advantage of the way potential customers will be influenced by the actions of other potential customers.
It's hard not to be swayed by what other people think, and if you can show prospects that other people have used your product and loved it, it'll help you convert more leads into sales.
Telling your own story through video is a powerful way to both humanize your brand and personalize your business to potential clients.
People don't want to just know what you're selling, they want to understand why your clients are buying from you, and how your product or service helps them solve a problem. Stories are one of the most powerful ways to capture people's attention, and get them emotionally invested in your brand.
It's easy to say something like, "Hey, look at all these other people who've had great results," but it's a lot more powerful when you hear it directly from your happy customer's mouth.
This is why testimonial videos are so effective in persuading people to take up your offer.
7. “Claims we make” videos
I bet if I asked you to make a list of the products, services and features offered by your company, you could do it in less than 5 minutes.
But what about the claims you make?
I’m not talking about generic marketing-speak like “best in class” or “uniquely different.” What are the specific claims you make that differentiate your company from all the others?
One of the most effective ways to demonstrate that you're telling the truth is to show it with video. A customer who has a problem with a product would rather see a video showing how it's supposed to work than read descriptions and explanations.
Explain what makes you different and why your customers should choose you over your competition by showing it in video. At the end of the day, words aren’t enough. It’s just noise until you show it.
Make a list of all the claims you make, and see how many you can show to your audience. Anything you can do to demonstrate your value will go a long way towards building trust.
You can start by following one of these two paths.
1. What are you dream customers asking about the most?
Getting started with The Big 5 can seem like a heavy lift.
For some it may be. But here's the secret: The Big 5 digital content strategy is the best way to identify which subjects you should be answering directly within your website's articles and videos. Because these answers produce better - more educated - customers which means more profits and repeat customers who truly understand the value you provide.
We promise that if you follow the steps above, you’ll know exactly how to find and create topics based on real buyer questions—the ones that are unique to your specific industry and your organization.
The idea behind The Big 5 is to give you a framework for crafting effective articles that address a common issue and then build upon it. But it’s also important to note that this process can be used for all types of content like social media, whether it’s written or video-based.
The Big 5 is a great strategy, because you’re not only getting to know your potential customers better, but you’re also boosting the value of your content. This means that you’ll be creating more customers calling you, as well as more sales.
2. You can start by writing about cost.
The basic concept at work here is not a groundbreaking one. Your content should always be focused on one goal: sales.
But the question is, how do you produce content that drives sales for you?
The answer might be somewhat counterintuitive, but it has to do with talking about price and cost.
Writing about the cost of your product or service makes it easy to attract customers and make sales.
If you have a particularly strong sale running, or have a discount you plan on offering, getting content out there quickly is crucial. Even if you don’t think you’ll be offering these kinds of sales in the near future, releasing content on the topic can help you establish yourself as an authority and make it easier to attract sales when you want to start doing more marketing-minded content creation.
Prospects want information about your products, services and offerings. They want to know what your price and costs are and now it will make their lives easier.
So if you want to make an impact on your sales, start by creating cost content. Yes, it’s a lot easier said than done and there are other factors to consider, but this is the best way to drive sales from the front end of your funnel.
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