You create marketing content for one purpose - to attract customers. We know customers reach this destination by going through different stages. Do you have content that appeals to people on each step of their journey? Find out more in today’s episode!
Jeff Lambert: 00:00 Hello and welcome to Inbound Academy, brought to you by Rizen. I'm your host, Jeff Lambert. So you've created content, you've planned it out on your compass and you have it logged in your content audit. Good work. But there's another important step that you should not overlook. Mapping out where in the buyer's journey that content fits best. To discuss how to do that, Will Avila is here from Rizen. Will, thanks for coming by again.
Will Avila: 00:37 Thanks for having me.
Jeff Lambert: 00:39 So to our listeners who may be unfamiliar or haven't gone back to previous episodes, let's talk about the buyer's journey. That's a term we use a lot in inbound marketing and sales. What is the buyer's journey?
Will Avila: 00:51 Sure. The buyer's journey is that. Yes, that's a good word. A buyer. A persona. A process anyone goes through whenever they're trying to search for something, to solve a problem, to help them reach a goal.
Will Avila: 01:10 So we're going to start off with first step in the buyer's journey, which is "Awareness." "Oh, I have a problem. What do I do? Let me Google it." How do I? What do I? Those are the typical searches, "how-to." And then this person that has a problem, they are going to eventually go to the "Consideration" stage. So in the consideration stage, the kind of searches are more, "should I hire a plumber or do it myself?" "Use a software or try and do it manually?" Right?
Will Avila: 01:59 The next step would be the "Decision" stage. So let's say, "Oh, I want to do this with a software." Software saves me time, right? "Which software do I use?" "Do I use software A?" "Do I use software B?" "What is the cost of software A versus software B?" "What is a case study of this software versus that software?" "Which is easier to use?" So you start going through this kind of process. Everybody does it naturally -where they research something, they consider their options, and they make a decision. So all we're doing with the buyer's journey is helping people go through this journey and hopefully our product or our service.
Jeff Lambert: 02:46 So content should really look different based on where I am in the journey, correct?
Will Avila: 02:50 Yeah. If it's discussing a problem, I would say it's more in the "Awareness" stage. If it's a solution, it's soon to be more for the "Consideration" stage. And if you're discussed seeing next steps, I would say that's more in the "Decision" stage.
Jeff Lambert: 03:11 Okay. So as I'm planning out my content and entering that into the content compass, I really have to make sure that I'm appealing to wherever the buyer is on their journey as we say.
Will Avila: 03:22 Absolutely.
Jeff Lambert: 03:22 So can you give our listeners some ideas of what types of content fits best based on the stage of the journey? Let's start off with "Awareness." What's a good piece of content to put out for someone in the "Awareness" stage?
Will Avila: 03:35 Yeah. "Awareness" stage can be things like an ebook, a guide, even checklists can be used in the "Awareness" stage. As long as you're addressing that concern.
Jeff Lambert: 03:47 Okay. So it really should be simple - something digestible that they can just hit the ground running with?
Will Avila: 03:52 Yup. Absolutely.
Jeff Lambert: 03:53 Okay. And once they've passed through the "Awareness" stage, they're in the "Consideration" stage, The content should be a little bit different, right?
Will Avila: 04:01 Yes. You know, in the "Consideration stage" maybe they're looking at a case study. Checklists are once again used during the stage as well. Something so they can kind of, I guess you could say, think about what solution is best for them.
Jeff Lambert: 04:17 Okay. Maybe narrow down the choices?
Will Avila: 04:19 Yeah, absolutely.
Jeff Lambert: 04:20 Okay. And once they move out of the "Consideration" stage and are in the "Decision" stage, and again, the content should look a little bit different, do you have some ideas on effective content for this stage?
Will Avila: 04:30 Yeah. Um, you know, at the "Decision" stage, they probably want to have a call with you. So a free consultation or a chance to book a meeting. It could be a demo, it could even be a free trial as well. So those are decision-level types of offers that you can have.
Jeff Lambert: 04:50 So would you say it's important to make sure that you have a diverse library of content across each stage?
Will Avila: 04:58 Absolutely. You know, you don't know where that persona is and what stage they're at. So you want to make sure that you're covering every angle so that your product or service is accurately represented.
Jeff Lambert: 05:11 And this ties back to an earlier episode, but how consistently should I be planning on putting out content?
Will Avila: 05:19 Um, you know, that's a good question. You know, you definitely want to be frequent. You don't want to do it sporadically. I think for some, I think a key goal for most organizations is about 8-10 a month. A lot posts, for example. But you know, within those blog posts you can have different offers. So you're going to have a checklist on one, you can have an ebook on the other. And the energy required to create an ebook versus a blog post is very, very significant. You know, any book takes much more time, but you want to make sure you're consistent. You don't want to have 2 or 3 months of having no posts or just, you know, being random about it.
Jeff Lambert: 06:08 And planning. Really this entire episode is about making sure that your content fits a goal, correct?
Will Avila: 06:14 Absolutely. Yeah. Planning is key. You know, you want to plan everything to help you reach your goal.
Jeff Lambert: 06:19 So again, to our listeners, I'd like to remind you that if you're unfamiliar with the buyer's journey and you want to learn more about it, please check out our previous episodes so you can familiarize yourself with the journey that every customer takes and that will allow you to really think more effectively about the content that you're putting out. Will, thanks so much for coming by and talking about this topic a bit more.
Will Avila: 06:38 Thanks for having me.
Jeff Lambert: 06:40 And thank you for tuning in for another show, everybody. You can expect a new episode every weekday, always no longer than 10 minutes and always filled with advice that's going to help you grow your business. I remember if you're looking for an experienced, friendly and results driven team to help you checkout, risen by going to go Rizen.com. That's Rizen with a "z." You can also follow them on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or Linkedin by searching for the username Rizen_Inbound. That's one word, Rizen_Inbound. And remember you can also help us reach new people by leaving a review on your podcast app of choice. Thanks for your support and we'll see you in the next episode.
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