4 mins read - : These keys are mainly intended for managers wishing to introduce a marketing automation practice within their organization. Each step will appear over time in a separate publication. Enjoy your reading. As we all know, marketing has become over time a practice where educating your prospects and informing them is an essential part of building your offer. This education passes through a common thread that can easily be named: the Relationship. Investing in a marketing automation tool is investing in your customer relationship. You give yourself the means to build a healthy, beneficial, informative and personalized relationship. Here is the first strategic step on which you must focus to successfully implement your marketing automation strategy: Validation of your target's objectives.
Why validate your target's objective before yours?
You may have met this individual in a networking event, a conference or even in your family, who keeps talking about his or her aspirations, goals and challenges over time. Although you are two, he manages to make this conversation his. Imagine for a moment this individual browsing the Internet alone. We can believe, with reasonable doubts, that uses his computer, his session, searching for his subject, to satisfy his needs. So, how do you manage to place a sentence, even a word? To intensify the question; how to successfully place a product or service offer? Well, as you probably did in person; carry on the discussion about his needs, his choices and about him. Support his quest to find the answer to his question. If he discusses it and feels the need to share it, then you need to listen and be ready to help when the time is right. As Oprah Winfrey mentions:
“I’ve talked to nearly 30,000 people on this show, and all 30,000 had one thing in common: They all wanted validation.”
The main reason to validate your target's objective is to save time. More precisely, you want to avoid attracting unqualified prospects to your offer, but also avoid polluting your salespeople's activities with opportunities that are ultimately consigned to the department that is showing the highest growth to date: the Status-quo department. (read: Your Competitor Isn't Your Real Competition: Status Quo Is
Methods for validating clients objectives
There are several methods to validate your target's objectives. One thing remains certain; just like Oprah does, you will have to ask questions.
A- Interview your clients
At Parkour3, we work with experienced strategists who master the art of interviewing. Their mandates consist of designing a discussion guide that is shared with future interviewees. How to choose them? They must be part of a market segment with strong growth potential for your organization according to their needs and your ability to meet those needs with your service offering. In the end, you will have Personas representing the stakeholders with whom you usually do business.
B- Chat with your colleagues
Your salespeople and business developers are indeed an excellent source of information to learn more about the needs and objectives of your target market. It's even more interesting to talk with your customer service team, production department or any other departments having face time with your customers. They will mainly inform you about the needs expressed following the purchase, which will become a tremendous asset to your organization. In the near term, you will learn your next customer's needs before they even know it. As you can read in "The Challenger Sale":
“But what if customers truly don’t know what they need? What if customers’ single greatest need—ironically—is to figure out exactly what they need?”
― Matthew Dixon, The Challenger Sale
C - There's a digital tool for that.
It's good to be in a marketing department in the digital age. Indeed, a multitude of tools are there to help you achieve your goals. Some are paid and others free. Using these tools will allow you to automate your approach supported by historical data or market trends. Here are some tools that can help you better understand your clients' objectives.
- Keyword.io - This tool will help you create a comprehensive list of highly relevant keyword suggestions to create and enhance your message and better communicate with your audience.
- Google Correlate - Google Correlate finds search patterns that match real-world trends.
- Google Trends - Explore what the world is looking for by entering a keyword or a topic in the exploration bar.
- Trendhunter - Discover content trends and discussion opportunities
- Keyword Tool - A tool similar to Keyword.io
Wrapping step 1 of 10
There is a multitude of ways to identify the objectives of your targeted audience. Unveiling those objectives will guide you in making the right decisions when you invest your time and ideas in creating an automated campaign. Thus, you are sure to maintain a high level of relevance in your interactions with your target audience to increase the return on investment of your marketing automation campaigns, while ensuring significant time savings for your marketing department.
Have a good marketing automation week!