Today on Inbound Academy we’re going to cover the latest and greatest ways to reach your customers. No, carrier pigeons and smoke signals are not on this list! 

Episode Transcript

Jeff Lambert:  Today on Rizen Academy, we're going to cover the latest and greatest ways to reach your customers. We're not going to talk about carrier pigeons or smoke signals, but we're going to talk about modern ways that you can reach your customers. So hang on, we're about to get started.

Jeff: Good morning, afternoon or evening, everybody, wherever in the world you are. Thank you for tuning into Rizen Inbound Academy. My name is Jeff Lambert. So we've been listening and talking about in previous episodes how the inbound method can help grow your business and build meaningful relationships with your customers. Last episode we talked about the modern customer and how they think and what they find important in a business, and today we're going to talk about some ways that you can reach them using modern tools and techniques. So to discuss those. I'm joined today by Nicole Mena, who's the Creative Director at Rizen. Nicole, thanks for joining us today.

Nichole Mena:  Thank you so much for having me on Jeff.

Jeff Lambert:  Absolutely. Nicole. I'd like to start off by letting our listeners get to know you a little bit. Can you talk about how you came to get involved in the marketing industry?

Nichole: Of course. So, as creative director at Rizen, I oversee the web design and development process as well as some of the written content creation process. But I started my career in the nutrition field. I made that dramatic change to marketing mostly because of Will and Rod, my current partners, I've known them for many years. When they were just starting an eBay business back in the day, I had very minimal design skills, but they asked me to help design their Ebay listings for them. And little did I know what a foreshadowing that might be. A couple of years later when they started their own business, the marketing company, I was asked to come on board basically to write and edit content. And as the company grew, I really learned more about the marketing process and became Editor-in-Chief for the business, managing the content creation process for all of the clients.

And although I liked the content creation process, I really enjoyed the design aspect of it. So I started taking design courses, which led to taking web design and coding courses. And I was able to apply that, what I learned right away in the company. So that was really great. And I really honed my skills in that sense. So when they decided to call it quits with that company, the three of us opened Rizen. I've learned a great deal from Rod as the "Grand Visionary" and, from Will as the "Operations Master", and together with my creativity and organization skills, we grew the agency to what it is today and I'm very proud of what we've accomplished and I'm excited to share that knowledge with everyone.

Jeff:  So since you've been here since the ground up with this business, when Rizen adopted inbound in your role as creative director, what did you see in terms of benefits? What did that do for your company? Just making that switch in terms of philosophy?

Nichole:  Well, I think the biggest thing that I saw and continue to see and what I feel is most important to clients is the quality of traffic leads and sales, because that's what's most important to them. And we saw that with our own business, and we did that by of course, following the inbound methodology. Creating consistent, relevant content for a target audience. And promoting that content in the right channels. Not only did we attract quality customers, we've also been able to build solid relationships, not only with prospects that really have that information coming into the company are, or when they, when they, um, when they talked to us because of the, all of the relevant information that we put out there. We get to replicate that now with our clients. And I'm using the same techniques that we've used over the years growing our business and now we get to grow our client's business. So it's really rewarding.

Jeff:  And you know, we're talking about relationships. That's really what, what inbound is all about, creating those meaningful, lasting relationships with customers. But the way to reach customers has changed. Right?

Nichole:  That is true. That is true. So customers are engaging less and less with traditional types of "interrupted marketing" techniques. And we call it that because people aren't really looking for information about your products or services, but they still are getting bombarded with your advertisements. Right? So the landscape has changed in the sense that customers want to do their own research, and solve for their own problems online. So companies really need to make that shift to attract customers, not trying to push themselves into their mind.

Jeff:  So things like radio ads, TV commercials, billboards, things like that. It's not to say that they're not effective. Is that a fair statement?

Nichole:  That that would be a fair statement.

Jeff:  So Nicole, that's, that's a great point. Can you explain a little bit more about if those disruptive traditional marketing trends are not working as well...then what ways can I bring the customers to me?

Nichole:  Yeah, sure. So the short answer is creating content that's consumer focused. It starts with developing a buyer persona and having a website that is easy to navigate and is optimized for the search engines.

Nichole:  Then you want to create different forms of content. This can come in the form of blog posts, white papers, ebooks, infographics, videos, even podcasts. You need to have a social media presence. So having that outlet to be able to distribute that, that quality content is imperative. And then email nurturing is also very important. So creating content for prospects and sending them through a funnel so that they have all of the information that they need leading up to the sale. And then also link-building. So things like writing a piece of content for another site that links back to your website.

Jeff: So really all those methods at the core of it, the customer can choose whether they want to interact with that or not. I'm not placing it in front of them. They're going to find it?

Nichole: That's correct.

Jeff:  Okay. I mean, this sounds so common sense, you know, in terms of how we shop today using search engines and using the internet as a whole. Why isn't everybody doing this?

Nichole:  Well that's a good question. Well...it's a process, right? Inbound marketing is its own science. It involves, you know, keyword ranking, testing, linking to make sure that your content is there to be seen for those that can use it, learn from it, and start engaging with your company. And really the first step is to make that commitment to being a valuable resource for the customer, as they search for the solution online.

Jeff:  So if you build it, they will come?

Nichole:  Yes!

Jeff: Well, Nicole, thank you for taking some time to sit down and discuss some of these new methods today and to our customers. Thank you for tuning into another episode of risen inbound academy. Remember, we're putting out new episodes every weekday, and they're never longer than 10 minutes, so it fits into your day, whether it's a lunch break or a commute time, or even just a little downtime at work. We're making this to be able to fit into your life and to help improve your business.

Jeff: If you'd like to get a little bit of help when it comes to marketing, consider Rizen. They're focused on long-lasting customer relationships and they produce results as well. You can find out more about them at gorizen.com. You can also interact with them on social media. They're available on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook at Rizen_inbound. Again, that's Rizen_Inbound. One word. Thanks again for joining us today and we'll see you on the next episode.