Conversion Marketing 101

"You can't market to people who don't want to be marketed to"

A number of years ago these words in Seth Godin’s book Permission Marketing opened up a whole new way of thinking about advertising and marketing.  Gone were the days of finding new ways to interrupt a prospect's day to build awareness for your product.  New marketing wars were being fought on the prospects turf.  New marketing technologies now made it possible to approach prospects on a more individual basis.  Now prospects could tell us what was important to them, and allow us to tailor a conversation with them to this information.  

Today there are proven ways to allow prospects to choose their own marketing paths and to guide them along the trail from prospect to customer.

The chances of a prospect being ready to buy when you’re ready to sell are slim.  This explains why typical conversion rates for traditional direct mail are one-quarter of one percent.  But what would happen if you could focus more attention on the people most likely to want your product or service?  Suddenly response rates approaching 8% and conversion rates exceeding 60% become the norm.

Matching a prospect’s eagerness to buy with your desire to sell

Most sales take patience.  However at a time when sales teams are stretched thin and budgets tight, it is hard to stay in contact with prospects while they consider their options.  Marketing automation programs have enjoyed a recent growth spurt due to their ability to allow prospects to select the marketing path they want to follow.  This is the equivalent of having a prospect tell you how to sell to them.  Amazing, but it works.

However, all marketing automation software really does is lay out the paths to follow.  It takes creativity to move prospects along those paths on their journey to becoming customers.  Typical sales-oriented e-mails are not up the job.

Story Magnets are compelling pieces of information that move prospects along their chosen paths.  Some of the more common forms of story magnets are eBooks, e-newsletters, webinars, online games, custom publications, surveys, books and micro-sites.  Each is designed to creatively package helpful information and attract interest from prospects.  This attraction is what makes them serve as magnets to prospects and often leads them to other paths as their interest grows along with their ties to the marketer.

Coordinating with your CRM

As prospects move along their chosen marketing paths, their movements can be tracked by most CRM systems.  When they are finally turned over to sales, a salesperson can instantly see what information they have downloaded and the sales points that captured their attention.  There is no longer a need to waste time on hit-and-miss cold calls.

Scoring interest

At the heart of the Conversion Marketing System is the ability to know when to involve salespeople to make the most efficient use of their time.  At every step of the process prospects are able to indicate that their interest level has changed.  In this manner, the sales team is always following up at the most opportune time.  If you have ever been forced to listen to salespeople gripe about the leads they are provided you know the value of lead scoring.

However, another benefit is the ability to spot when a prospect needs an Accelerator to either get them moving along the path, move them to another path or remove them from the prospect database.

Bringing Sales and Marketing together 

Conversion Marketing is the acknowledgement that in today’s harried business environment the old wall between marketing and sales has to come tumbling down.  Over 80 years ago, Claude Hopkins, one of the fathers of modern advertising, first described advertising as salesmanship in print.  The technologies have changed and marketing automation has now replaced hot type … but the idea is the same.

Advertising finds prospects.   Then it is the job of a sales-oriented marketing program to move these prospects through the marketing funnel to become customers … as many as possible.

Conversion Marketing is the key.

Call Mark Spaner today at 330-452-5594 x203 and let us start you down the Conversion Marketing path.