Creating a meaningful buyer journey is one of the most critical aspects in lead generation, but sometimes it can be a long process with a lot of challenges along the way.
In this guide, we take a look at the five main ways that marketers can influence the buyer journey and leverage techniques that form better relationships with their prospects.
Personalized Content
Personalization is the key to almost every single B2B transaction today, and there’s a lot of reasons why it works – people respond well to content that resonates with them.
For marketers that are looking to gently nurture their leads through the pipeline, personalized content is the way to go.
However, this is not just about creating content that appeals to prospects from a particular industry.
It also has to match with where the buyer is currently at in their journey.
At the start of their journey, marketers can create general industry-based content that tries to tackle common problems. As they progress further in the pipeline, they become more open to more in-depth pieces and technical pieces.
This type of targeted lead nurturing can make all the difference in subtly guiding prospects.
Related: Crafting the Perfect Personalized Email
Personally Checking Up on Warm Leads
Apart from personalized content, a great way to build rapport with a client is to personally check up on them and ask them how they are.
It could be in the form of a message, email or even a phone call.
At this stage in the buyer’s journey, the marketer should refrain from trying to close but rather use it as a chance to check on the challenges that the prospect is facing and how they are dealing with their pain points.
Fostering a real personal connection with a prospect is one of the best ways that a marketer and a lead can build a true relationship.
Marketers can use this opportunity to understand the mindset of their prospect, and even adjust their lead nurturing campaigns accordingly.
Trust Signals
Before a lead decides to buy a solution or move forward from the awareness stage of their journey, they first need to trust the solution provider.
Building trust online can be a massive feat, but it isn’t impossible.
Organizations can employ a number of trust building elements in the things that they publish.
Here are a couple of examples:
- Showing logos of previous clients – this builds trust by association since prospects will want to work with providers that have worked with similar clients or captains of industry. This suggests expertise from the provider and it helps the client feel that they “belong”.
- Showing logos of third-parties – this is mostly used on payment portals. It helps build trust as a third-party assures prospects that they are overlooking transactions.
- Testimonials, comments and reviews – this is the most classic example of a trust signal. They’re easily relatable, they come from real clients that have experienced the provider’s services, and they’re a preview of things to come.
If a marketer can nail down a couple of these elements, then they’re on the way to building trust and securing a conversion.
Passive Lead Nurturing
Apart from sending your buyer lead nurturing material like personalized content, make sure that there’s also effort being spent on passive lead nurturing.
Here’s what this means.
Platforms such as Facebook or LinkedIn allow marketers to interact with their prospects as long as they’re connected with each other.
They can do this through the posts that they put out and through retargeting campaigns that subtly show ads about their services to boost brand awareness.
This is a great way to market to prospects indirectly without having to accidentally “spam” their inboxes unnecessarily.
Additionally, marketers can also adopt the thought leader approach – especially on LinkedIn – by making sure that they’re actively publishing new ideas and content that resonates with their target audiences.
A prospect doesn’t even have to interact with the post, but seeing regular content from a marketer subtly ensures that the brand is ingrained with the prospect.
Another great benefit of this is that it also helps with passive lead generation as their content can also be tweaked to become lead magnets.
Related: 3 Tips To Engage and Nurture Prospects that Say “Not now”
A Special or Custom Offer
Sometimes all a prospect needs is a little push for them to buy into the solution that you’re offering and one way to do it is with a special offer.
Now, this doesn’t mean that marketers should slash their prices.
The offer has to be personalized.
It could be anything from a proposal for customized solutions that are built exactly for the needs of the prospect, a special discount if they sign-up at a particular time (to move them along quickly), or a free upgrade to the next level of the solution.
Being personalized, the prospect knows that it was made just for them, and this helps push for deeper and more meaningful relationships.
Understanding and respecting the buyer’s journey is important. This is where a marketer truly gets to understand their prospect, which is critical not only for a conversion, but for real relationships to be made.
Relational lead generation and nurturing are the ways to move forward in an increasingly competitive B2B landscape.
