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Like many other industries, SEO (Search Engine Optimization) moves extremely fast. But where is the future of SEO going?

What does an effective, organic digital marketing strategy need to look like in the next few years?

While not too long ago, everybody was totally focused on keywords and backlinks (links from other websites). Today, we hear search and SEO more and more in the context of machine learning and artificial intelligence within a collection of hundreds of ranking factors. But there is much more to the future of SEO!

However, before we dive deeper into where the search industry is heading (based on my point of view), I would like to make sure you, as a reader, can see Google through somewhat different eyes.

What does Google want?

For digital marketing specialists, and in particular, in search marketing, Google plays a very special role—not only because of their market share (more than 92% in 2020) but also due to their incredible focus on user experience.

The search engine was the first company to focus on what’s best for their users—after all, a happy user will come back for more. This should be enough to shift our view of Google from the “evil giant” to a giant that aims, above all other things, to do what’s best for its users.

Artificial Intelligence

Digital marketing is getting more and more automated: automatic bidding, programmatic marketing, tracking, email marketing automation, hyper-segmentation, cross-platform promotion.

All these are only possible due to the vast amounts of data points big platforms have gathered about each and every internet user. Those masses of data then need to be analyzed so that algorithms can make sense of it and leverage information for higher returns on investment.

Companies like Google, Facebook, or Amazon have more information stored about us than we can possibly imagine—and one of their main goals is to obtain even more.

The reasoning couldn’t be clearer: the more information they have, the better they can make us happy. While “happy” could mean product suggestions on Amazon, for Google, it refers to ads and organic search results.

Already today, answers to search queries are personalized based on your location, preferred websites, previous searches, and more. What a person sees in Sydney on many searches isn’t going to be the same result someone would see in Melbourne.

A good example would be a Google search for “pizza delivery.” The search engine would understand local search intent and bring up results geographically near the respective user. But personalization goes much deeper than that.

The massive amount of data requires machine learning tools to process and artificial intelligence in order to identify patterns that can then be fed back into the algorithm. Google “learns” with every single search.

On a given day, by the way, thousands of searches are being executed by users all over the world for the very first time. Google has never seen them before but will still try to “understand” the underlying search intent to serve a relevant result.

So, for your site’s SEO, how could you beat Google’s AI engine? The answer: with AI itself. From early on, machine learning tools have received a very special place in our toolbox: link research, content brief creation, content optimization. Wherever machine learning tools can be used in SEO, their results should definitely be considered for the ongoing optimization process.

User Experience

When a platform like Google wants to make its users happy, it needs to factor in a whole lot of elements. The following deserve some further explanation:

Relevance

If a search result isn’t relevant for a user, they will hit their browser’s back button and click on another search engine result. Relevance can refer to design, layout, content structure, content length, and depth, etc., and should always be a top priority in every SEO campaign—stay relevant!

Search snippet

Users are only happy if they find their answers fast. The way search snippets are designed and the content they contain play an important role, which is why Google sometimes decides to overwrite a page’s title and so-called meta description in order to present a nicer result to search users.

Care about your search snippets as if they were your cat!

Mobile

Nobody likes to wait for a page to load, especially on their mobile phones. As a result, site speed and mobile performance, and usability are crucial elements for Google when determining the ranking a site deserves.

With users’ patience levels decreasing and attention spans shortening, there is a demand for increased loading speeds. Consequently, search engines will be forced to insist more on a site’s performance. This will especially be the case on the server-side, as 5G and similar technologies are very likely to reduce the effect of large images or videos that before might have been slowing down a page.

Link Building

Google’s success in providing high-quality search results is largely based on their algorithm and how it interprets links from one website to another one as a signal for authority.

With social media and other sources of data giving search engines more and more information, it is very likely that the effect link building can have on a site’s ranking might diminish over time. Until then, focus on actively pursuing links from other websites to your homepage and your pillar articles!

Personalization

One of the best ways to attract people’s attention in marketing is through personalized communication. Search engines are getting really good at personalizing search results, and with the growing number of data points of more and more people, it is to be expected that they will get even better at bringing us the right results at the right moment.

Already today, Google tries to come up with search results based on what they know about us, our calendar, and our movements between different places—even before we search for them. Ever gotten into your car and Google Maps told you how long it would take you to get home? This is Google’s personalization in action! For search results, personalization will probably, at least in part, mean very personal search preferences.

• Some users might prefer longer and more in-depth articles as search results when they are at home and shorter summaries when browsing through their phone.
• Others will only use their phones to check their email, but whenever they search for products, they will buy at Amazon, so Amazon might need to come up first for them on any of their transactional searches.

SEO is an important part of marketing, and personalization will definitely play a big role in marketing in the near future. Learn how to use market segmentation to better understand your business customer.

OK Google

How many voice assistants do you have available in your day to day? Most of us might be used to calling Siri or Alexa, Google Assistant or Cortana, to help us with daily tasks, reminders, or to do some quick research. The essential idea of a voice assistant is to get a question as an input and respond with an answer. This directly affects SEO because voice assistants will limit themselves to very few, if not only one possible answer.

The more we see personalized search results coming up, the higher the chances are that voice search relies on a search engines to make sure the first result contains the best possible answer. Integrating an AI voice generator could significantly improve communication by creating natural and engaging content directly from internal discussion.

While now we generally have ten search results on page one of Google, in the future, it might just really be the first or maybe the first few results that count. In any case, questions will (and have always been) play an essential part in search.

‍People have questions and want answers—fast. Back in 2010, I had my first client start answering two questions a month on his blog. He did this consistently (with our writers’ help) over many years, and still ranks with very simple answers to very simple questions, getting leads and sales still in 2020, leveraging answers written in 2011.

If you have the best answer to your target audience’s question, you are likely to do very well in SEO. Add consistency over time, and you’re up for a long-term winner!

Search Components

There is just one thing that Google likes more than making users happy to help them find the right website: make them happy finding the answer directly within Google.

More and more, we see search elements popping up in search, like “People also asked” sections, featured snippets, carousels, maps, local search results, and knowledge panels.

All these blocks extract information from websites to answer user queries directly on the search result page, resulting in approximately 50% of searches not leading to a click-through to a website. The search engine has (and provides) all the necessary information.

The trend towards more and more search components has been clear over the last years. And while it's a good SEO strategy for sites to sneak their way into the first page with some specially marked-up answer, site owners will have to accept that Google is actually becoming their website’s homepage, giving direct access to the different parts of information they consider relevant, and sometimes, providing the full answer directly within search results with no click going to the website itself.

Google has a problem.

Not all problems can be solved easily—not even by Google. While still trying to make their users happy, Google aims at finding a way to find out whether a site is trustworthy, has a certain authority in its niche, and whether the presented information comes from a source with expertise in their field. This is especially true when it comes to so-called YMYL sites (Your Money, Your Life).

YMYL refers to sites that directly impact on people’s lives (health) and finances, thus directly impacting happiness. There is just too much content being produced online to keep track, and it’s getting harder and harder to determine which content really should be consumed when seeking advice, and which content has been written by a non-expert on a budget in 15 minutes by rewriting whatever could be found on the subject.

And there’s more: with AI getting more and more ahead, in no time, there will be commercial writing programs available, creating original content automatically with AI engines, based on a few parameters like topic, length, level of expertise, etc.

Those engines will feed themselves with thousands of similar texts to extract common patterns and produce articles on their own, in less time than it takes a copywriter to open their favorite editing app.

‍E-A-T stands for Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness, and has become a very important term from 2018-2019 when Google added a section to their quality guidelines, asking quality raters at Google to check for relevant signals that might indicate whether the site and its author can be trusted.

‍Branding might just be one of the most important things you can do in order to make sure future algorithms can recognize the expertise you own in your field.

So do you need SEO?

The future of SEO is definitely going to be based on artificial intelligence, enabling search engines to improve user experience through extremely high levels of personalization.

The exponential growth of partly AI-created content will require extra levels of analysis in order to select not only the best, but also the most trustworthy response to a user’s search intent. Many business owners are being told you need SEO to get more leads.

So it's a tactic you implement. But what is your strategy? If you want to learn the difference between a strategy and a tactic, click the link.

A well-crafted email sequence is a vital part of your marketing arsenal. Master the art of writing a lead nurturing sequence, and you'll regularly convert leads to customers. Get it wrong, and you'll butcher your email list.

Luckily, there is a simple lead nurturing process that you can follow.

I'm going to show you how to write a lead nurturing email that:

• gets high open rates
• moves your prospects further along the buyer's journey
• results in sales

But first, I want to start with a little myth-busting. You don't need to be a copywriter or a bestselling author to write a lead-nurturing email. Anybody can do it. Just follow the process.

Get Our Proven Lead Nurture Sequence Template

Just tell us where to send it...

We respect your email inbox and will never spam.

‍

What is a Lead?

In many ways, a lead is a high-value future customer. This is a person or organization that will, in time, need your product or service. And you attract these high-value prospects with marketing.

Great content is vital for generating high-quality leads. I'm talking about writing blog posts, lead magnets, a landing page, social media, eBooks, etc. But you also want to capture their details—so their name, surname, phone number, and email address in your email list. And you can do this with an opt-in form.

Now the next step is to nurture these leads. But what is lead nurturing, and why is email marketing the perfect medium to use?

What is Lead Nurturing?

Lead nurturing is the process of building and maintaining relationships with a prospect at every stage of the buyer's journey. It engages potential customers in a series of conversations, with the end goal of converting them into buyers.

For them to convert, they need to be nurtured repeatedly in the sales funnel.

Thankfully, automated email sequences make the nurturing process possible.

Lead nurture is the basis of direct response marketing. To learn more, click here.

What is the Purpose of an Email Lead Nurturing Sequence?

Not all visitors to your site are ready to purchase immediately. In fact, only three percent of your target market is ready to buy at any given moment.

So what about the other 97 percent?

You could take a chance and hope they'll see your next marketing campaign and buy your product or service then, but humans are inherently suspicious. They've been burned many times before by brands who've overpromised and underdelivered.

To convince prospects to invest in your product or service, you need to build trust. You do this through education, entertainment, and by taking a personal interest in them.

This requires email marketing. It's a great way to build long-term, mutually beneficial relationships with minimal time, effort, and spend on your side.

5 Benefits Of A Lead Nurture Sequence

A lead nurturing sequence is an automated series of emails that a prospect receives after subscribing to your email list.

And the purpose of the lead nurturing process is to:

1. Stay top-of-mind for prospects who are interested in what you're selling but aren't quite ready to make a purchasing decision in that moment. We want to be on their mind when they're ready to buy.
2. Give your prospect a result in advance. It's compelling when a prospect takes your free advice, implements it, and gets a positive result. Imagine what a lead could get if they paid for the full service.
3. Inform and entertain. Think of your lead nurturing email sequence as infotainment. You want prospects to enjoy engaging with it. If you can educate in a fun and unique way, that's far more compelling than dry, boring content. Use it to send updates or share an important announcement. It is the best way to stay in touch with your customers.
4. Stimulate a conversation. Conversions come from conversations. By engaging with your prospect, you build a relationship that makes the decision to buy from you easier because you've earned their trust.
5. Move your prospect to action when they're ready. It could be a subtle call-to-action in your email signature. Or it could be a direct call-to-action in the body of your email—for example: “Get 25 percent off when you purchase my course today. Offer expires at midnight.”

Now that you know the benefits of a lead nurturing campaign, let's look at the types of email sequences you can send to your subscription list.

Do You Want to Grow Your Business Rapidly?

Then you need to market it. But not just any marketing will do. In my Lean Strategy Course, I show you the exact techniques I've used to start, grow, and exit several multi-million dollar businesses, so you can too.

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8 Types of Email Sequences in Marketing

When devising a lead nurturing campaign, you want to think about the type of nurturing sequence you wish to send your customers.

There are loads of automated email sequences you can use to nurture leads. Remember, the purpose of a lead nurturing email campaign is to build relationships with your prospects, move them closer to a sale, and become lifelong customers.

Not all of the email sequences listed below will be relevant to your business. For example, if you don't sell directly from your website, it's unlikely that you'll need a cart abandonment sequence.

Your goal should be to familiarize yourself and choose the best lead nurturing sequence to suit your needs. Here's our list of eight.

1. Welcome email sequence—helps you build trust and enables you to set the tone and mood for pushing the sale.

2. Confirmation email sequence—used to verify the identity of a subscriber.

3. Onboarding email sequence—provides information about the benefits of your offer, how to use it, and even testimonials from loyal customers.

4. Cart abandonment email sequence—a trigger-based sequence used to recover customers who have left a product on their shopping cart but never made the final stage of the sales funnel.

5. Repeat customer email sequence—used to upsell or offer similar recommendations that can best entice a customer to make another purchase. We break down how to upsell your products or services here.

6. Re-engagement or reactivation email sequence—used to win back prospects who have stopped interacting with you for a certain period for whatever reason.  

7. Event email sequence—used to notify users about an upcoming event to motivate them to purchase tickets or book a trip to a venue.

8.  Follow-up email sequence—used to remind subscribers to make a purchase, read a new blog post, complete a course program, or answer a survey, to name a few.

The beauty of a lead nurturing email is it's simple but effective. A nurture sequence is a compelling way to stay in touch with your customers on a personal level and entice them to buy a new product.

What to Do Before Writing a Lead Nurturing Email

Most of the work that goes into lead nurturing happens before you ever write a single word. It comes from researching and understanding who your audience is and what the different sub-segments are.

Before you write, you'll have answered in your head:

• What's keeping them up at night?
• What do they hope for?
• What are their pain points?
• How can your product or service improve their life?

Answering these questions ensures you know what type of content to include in your lead nurturing emails. Next, you need to organize your email database and CRM.

Not sure which CRM to use?

Personally, I'm a fan of Ontraport. Particularly if you've got a list that's more than 5,000 subscribers.

But if you're just starting I'd look at ActiveCampaign or ConvertKit. Both are great customer relationship management tools.

1. Identify what type of email sequence you need to create.

Generally, an email sequence can be categorized into a time-based or trigger-based sequence.

A time-based email sequence sends messages at predetermined time intervals through an email autoresponder. For example, once a prospect submits her email address to your CRM, a welcome email is forwarded. A series of lead nurturing emails will follow—sent on specific days—no matter if she responds to your welcome message or not.

On the other hand, a trigger-based email sequence, as the name suggests, is sent based on a recipient's actions. A series of lead-nurturing emails will only be delivered as long as the prospect responds, whether through clicking a button or checking out a link.

2. Organize your list of recipients.

Manually organizing your email list is a time-suck. A smart way to avoid this is to give your lead the option to self-select when signing up for your newsletter. This is particularly helpful to brands with multiple target audiences.

For example, an e-commerce platform selling various products will have some customers interested in kitchen equipment, others in the latest technology, and some in children's toys. Now a business owner without kids won't want to receive emails promoting Lego's new technic line. It's irrelevant to their needs, and they may unsubscribe.

So a lead nurturing campaign must be relevant to the customer receiving the email.

Also, don't buy email lists. You'll end up with a host of low-quality leads. Instead, develop a lead magnet such as a case study, eBook, worksheet, checklist, template, whatever. A lead magnet is an excellent marketing tactic and ideal for lead generation. (I've written about how you can create a lead magnet that converts in blog post.)

So to recap: allowing users to self-select on your opt-in form ensures you funnel the lead into the correct sequence.

3. Check your email sequence.

Whether you have one or multiple lead nurturing sequences before launching your email campaign, you’ll want to ask yourself:

• Does it follow a logical marketing automation workflow?
• Does it help achieve your objectives and goals?
• Does each step move the prospect through the buyer's journey?
• Will it result in more sales?

Much of this will boil down to your choice of a subject line, email content, and call-to-action. Let's look at the content you’ll need to include in your lead nurturing campaign to help you start.

But first, how do you generate content ideas? I'm going to share my best practices for developing content ideas. Follow these tips, and you'll boost your email open rate.

The Top Five Email Marketing Content Ideas

1. Write down frequently asked questions.

I generate a lot of my content ideas from frequently asked questions. Whether I'm on a podcast or presenting live, I encourage people to write to me. And they'll often ask questions. I like to note these down. So I'll use Apple Nights, but you can use something like Evernote. I can use these questions to generate content that my prospective customers are interested in.

2. Address the elephant in the room.

Next is objections. For example, why are your prospective customers saying no? Roadblocks could be that you're too expensive or they have a false impression of what your product does in relation to competitors’ products. Addressing these objections in your content is very powerful. By addressing the elephant in the room, you create trust.

3. Use stories and anecdotes.

Human beings are wired to listen to stories. Weaving stories into your lead-nurturing sequences is an excellent way to connect with your audience, grab their attention, maintain it, and lead them to a sale.

4. Show them case studies.

Now I've found this syndrome that many customers suffer from. Very often, prospects will be wondering if what you're selling will work for them.

So they'll say, "This works for B2B but not B2C,” or "This works for the tech industry but not the financial industry."

Case studies are a great way to bridge this gap. So showing people like them can get from point A to B, from a worse condition to a better state, can help the sale.

5. Tell them what's new in your field.

What's new in your prospects' life as it relates to your field, product, or service? There'll be innovations or things that come out very often, and people don't know because they're not in your industry. So being that source of news in your field is very powerful.

How to Write an Automated Email Sequence that Leads love

Now, it's time to get into email sequence writing. Follow these best practices to keep in touch with subscribers and turn them into repeat customers.

Write an awesome subject line.

The subject line is the first thing that your lead will read. It's been known to make or break email campaigns. It must be compelling or intriguing. Any time I come across a clever or quirky subject line, I like to note it down. Sometimes it sparks a new idea. But there's also nothing wrong with shamelessly stealing a powerful subject line now and then.

Ideally, your subject line should not be more than nine words. Anything more, and you could adversely affect your campaign’s open rate.

Introduce a pattern interrupt in your email.

I like to use a pattern interrupt in my email content. Whether it's an anecdote, a statement, or a question, this technique sucks people into the copy. It makes them read every sentence and paragraph because they're intrigued.

A short anecdote, a statement, a question, or something that makes a lead keep reading, is very powerful.

Share a knowledge bomb in your sequence.

I have this rule where my free emails should be more powerful and more valuable than other people's paid content. I don't want my emails to be just about selling or promoting a product or service.

So I make sure to include some kind of knowledge bomb that customers can walk away with. It's a nugget of information they can take and implement into their business and start seeing results.

Delve deeper into a topic.

I like to do this over multiple sequences.

I'll write a soap opera sequence where I'll open up a discussion on a topic and end the email on a cliffhanger. Like any well-written television series, you leave the reader wanting more. And then we move to the next one, and we go deeper.

So rather than just skimming over a topic in one email, I'll do this over multiple emails. It's a great sales tactic because I'm nurturing my prospect, building trust, and moving them along the sales funnel.

Add personalization to your message.

Customers or prospects want to feel like you're talking to them directly, so send a personal one-on-one email. People need to know they're not dealing with a robot. A.I. has its uses but not in email marketing.

Here's a tip: Address your lead using their first name. This creates personalization and encourages dialogue.

We cover how to personalize your marketing here.

Write according to your goal.

What is the purpose of your lead nurturing campaign?

Is your email sequence intended to reactivate a dormant customer, entertain, or make an offer?

Each type of email sequence requires a different approach, so it's vital to stick to your objective with every message you write. If your message deviates from your end goal, your sequence can end up being a total mess.

Address your leads' pain points.

Start with the pain. By recognizing what your leads are feeling and what keeps them up at night, you develop a sense of camaraderie.

Use their words in your marketing content—so your lead magnet, blog articles, or posts on social media. It's the best way to attract high-quality leads.

Deliver what you promised.

Did you promise a free case study or access to exclusive videos on the form your lead filled out? Did your lead magnet promise to show them how to build a lead-nurturing campaign?

The quickest way to lose a potential customer is to overpromise and underdeliver. Make sure your campaigns meet expectations.

Encourage leads to connect with you on social media.

Besides email communication, share links in your message where the reader can connect with you on social media, such as LinkedIn, Facebook, or Instagram. This is another way to stay in touch and share different content.

Make them entertaining.

I prefer writing my nurturing sequences with a sense of “infotainment.” I want them to be educational and entertaining at the same time. This ensures you solve their issues without boring your reader. Best of all, customers will look forward to hearing from you.

End your message with a call-to-action (CTA).

This is an essential component of your message. What would you like your reader to do next?

Should they click a link to your offer? Or claim their coupon from your website? A strong CTA should convince your prospect to act.

You need to create a sense of urgency or add an element of scarcity in your closing. This makes your sales engagement more powerful.

The Top 11 Tips for Writing a Lead Nurturing Engagement Email

Nurturing leads is all about establishing a relationship with your email subscribers. Your goal with each campaign is to move them further along the buyer's journey. Follow these 11 tips to write nurturing email sequences that convert.

1. Be conversational.

Make sure you use a conversational tone in all of your content. It helps to break down barriers. It makes it easier to read or consume. It's also easier to write. So write your lead nurturing engagement email much like you're speaking to a friend.

2. Keep your sentences short.

Cutting long sentences into readable bite-sized chunks is an art. If you want to create an impact with your words, a sentence should have eight to ten words max. So keep your paragraphs nice and short.

3. Check your spelling.

Sounds simple, and yet, I get countless emails with spelling mistakes. I've sent out a few myself.

The problem with spelling errors is it looks sloppy and it can draw attention away from your message. Basically, customers focus on the grammatical mistakes, and if it annoys them too much, they may unsubscribe. So put your emails through Grammarly. It can help you fix weird sentences and phrases.

4. Highlight important words or phrases.

You want specific phrases or offers to stick out in your text. Highlighting, bolding, or underlining helps to emphasize a call-to-action.

Sometimes it's called junking up or word art. Basically, this helps your customers focus on essential information. For example, it could be the link to a form or a new course you're selling.

5. Include facts, statistics, or quotes.

Use data in your lead nurturing. Here's why. Data is eye-catching. It reads as truth. So when writing your lead nurturing email campaign, consider using data to emphasize something you're saying.

6. Only use one CTA.

It's tempting to link to multiple offers or webpages in an email, but don't do it. You'll only create confusion. Instead, determine your email's purpose and link to one call-to-action. You can include a link multiple times.

For example, if you have a limited offer or something that's time-sensitive—like an opt-in for a webinar—you'll want to pepper the call-to-action throughout your email. See below:

7. Focus on one topic.

Again, like with the call-to-action, you don't want to create confusion, so focus on one topic per email.

8.  Link to podcast clips or pieces of content you've written.

People like to engage with your emails, so make them interactive. It's not just about sharing your thoughts; you want your customers to take action. Including links to podcast clips, blog articles, or contributor pieces is a great way to build trust, educate, and move your prospects from the bottom of the funnel to closing sales.

9. Write a super signature.

So a super signature is a soft sell. It appears after your name and can be included in sales emails and value-building emails. I like to have it as a P.S.

And what a super signature does is give your leads the option to purchase your product when they're ready. So whether you're creating an email marketing campaign or you're just sending helpful content, make sure you've included a super signature.

10. Get someone who's not in your field to read your email.

It's easy to assume that if you write with clarity customers will know what you're talking about. That's not always the case. So get someone who isn't in your industry to read your emails. If they don't understand what you're talking about, it's helpful to know before hitting send on your lead nurturing email.

11. Develop a copywriting style guide.

You might also want to consider putting together a copywriting style guide, especially if you're planning to hand content writing over to your team. Style guides make it easy for content writers to get the voice of your business.

If you don't use swear words or slang, that needs to be in your guide. If you prefer to write in the first person, note that down. Make it easy for a writer to get into your head and craft compelling lead nurturing emails.

Get Our Proven Lead Nurture Sequence Template

Just tell us where to send it...

We respect your email inbox and will never spam.

How Often Should You Send a Lead Nurturing Email?

Now, this is a question my clients ask regularly. You don't want to annoy your audience, so it's vital not to bombard them with emails. For example, I don't want to hear from my plumber three times a day.

Whereas my stockbroker, I want to hear from him regularly. I want to know what happened in the stock market that day. So the frequency depends on the industry.

Also, you don't want to wait too long between emails. The maximum time you should go between a prospect hearing from you is a month. If you're not connecting with your audience at least monthly, you run the risk of them forgetting who you are, and they could unsubscribe the next time you email.

Start Building Your Lead Nurturing Campaign

Now that you know what a lead nurturing campaign is and why it can help move your leads through the buyer's journey, it's time to craft your email sequence. Note down the process you need to follow:

Step 1: Build a lead magnet.

Step 2: Select your email sequence.

Step 3: Start writing each email in your lead nurturing campaign.

Step 4: Set up your CRM to funnel leads into the correct sequence.

Step 5: Hit the autopilot.

Don't be afraid of marketing automation. It will help to move leads through your sales funnel and closer to becoming a customer. As long as you've written conversational emails that entertain, inform, and nurture, your campaigns will result in sales.

Not sure what is a business process? Click the link to learn more about how to craft your processes.

Found this helpful? Check out our blog on the difference between lead generation and lead nurturing.

Marketing can be incredibly confusing. Most people don't really know what it is, they just know it can be the answer to their business prayers.

But simply implementing marketing into your business won't result in success. You need to first understand what marketing is, and then have a plan of action.

So let's start with what marketing is. And this is the simplest, most jargon-free, definition of marketing you’re ever likely to come across:

What Is Marketing?

If the circus is coming to town and you paint a sign saying ‘Circus Coming to the Showground Saturday’, that’s advertising.

If you put the sign on the back of an elephant and walk it into town, that’s promotion.

If the elephant walks through the mayor’s flower bed and the local newspaper writes a story about it, that’s publicity.

And if you get the mayor to laugh about it, that’s public relations.

If the town’s citizens go to the circus, you show them the many entertainment booths, explain how much fun they’ll have spending money at the booths, answer their questions and ultimately, they spend a lot at the circus, that’s sales.

And if you planned the whole thing, that’s marketing.

Learn How To Market Your Business Successfully

But not just any marketing will do. In my Lean Strategy Course, I show you the exact techniques I've used to start, grow, and exit several multi-million dollar businesses, so you can too.

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Other Marketing Definitions

Marketing is a series of activities and processes that a business or brand takes to promote their product or services to their ideal customer. These are the people most likely to buy what they're selling.

Marketing encompasses research, strategy, advertising, social media engagement, and selling.

The point is to educate, inform, and move a prospect closer to a sale.

Why Your Business Needs Marketing?

It's simple, really. If someone has never bought from you, how do they find out about your product or service?

Unless you've got a robust referral system in place, they're unlikely to have heard about your business.

And they're most likely not going to buy from you.

So, if you want people to take a closer look at your business, and spend their precious dollars, you need marketing.

It's what you do to attract your ideal customer.

Now you need a strategy to get them to like you and do business with you. We've got the perfect solution. You need direct response marketing. Click the link for more information.

If you enjoyed this article, you may also enjoy our article on How to Create a Lead Magnet that Converts in 6-Steps. As a small business owner, it’s the smarter way to attract high-quality leads and you can automate much of it.

Much of the time we spend here is devoted to discussing strategies for rapid business growth through marketing.

However, I’ve found it’s just as important to learn from mistakes as it is to follow good advice.

In this article, I’ll outline three of the most common marketing blunders made by small and medium-sized businesses.

These three “stupid” marketing strategies have killed many small businesses. Left unchecked, they could kill yours.

So here's what not to do.

Want to know what is the difference between marketing strategies and tactics? We've broken it down here so you can have all the facts before you invest time, money and resources into marketing your business.

Also, check out this blog to see the hot marketing trends for 2022.

Do You Want to Grow Your Business Rapidly?

Then you need to market it. But not just any marketing will do. In my Lean Strategy Course, I show you the exact techniques I've used to start, grow, and exit several multi-million dollar businesses, so you can too.

Tell Me More

#1 Stupid Marketing Strategy – Not Tracking Advertising Return On Investment (ROI)

John Wanamaker, one of the marketing greats, famously said:

Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.

While this was understandable a century ago, when it was first said, it should be a crime to say today. Yet the reality is that most small businesses do little if any tracking of advertising.

Not measuring where your leads and sales come from and not tracking ROI on ad spend is the mark of the amateur. We all have at our disposal the technology to quickly, easily and cheaply track advertising effectiveness.

Tools such as toll-free numbers, website analytics, and coupon codes make this trivial. Remember what gets measured, gets managed. Be ruthless with your ad spend by cutting the losers and riding the winners. Obviously, to know what’s losing and what’s winning, you need to be tracking and measuring.

#2 Stupid Marketing Strategy – Going Too Broad

Who is your target market? If you tell me “everyone,” then I know you haven’t properly thought this through.

Trying to target everyone, in reality, means you’re targeting no one. By going too broad you kill your “specialness” and become a commodity bought on price.

By narrowly defining a target market whom you can wow and deliver huge results for, you become a specialist. A specialist is someone sought out, respected, and most importantly trusted.

When you narrow down your target market, you naturally decide who you’re going to exclude. Don’t underestimate the importance of this.

Excluding potential customers scares many small business owners. They mistakenly believe that a wider net is more likely to capture more customers. This is a huge mistake.

Dominate a niche, then once you own it, do the same with another and then another. But never do so all at once. Doing so dilutes your message and your marketing power.

Read this article to Find Your Niche & Dominate It.

#3 Stupid Marketing Strategy – Wasting Money On “Branding” When You're A Small Business

So many small businesses waste huge sums of money on “branding.” They see their large competitors do so and think that this must be the path to success.

I explain in explicit detail here why this is crazy.

Here’s a short illustration. Think of yourself as a hunter and your marketing dollars as firepower. You need to use your limited firepower wisely so that you can successfully hunt, come home victorious, and feed your family.

If you start randomly firing in every direction, you’re going to startle and scare off your prey. You need to be targeted and clever if you wish to be victorious.

Of course, some people will argue with me and say that “getting your name out there” is the way to go.

Unless you’re a large business like Nike, Apple, Coca-Cola, or similar then it’s likely you can’t afford to burn tens of millions of dollars on fuzzy marketing like “branding” or “getting your name out there”.

Rather than “getting your name out there”, you’ll fare much better by concentrating on getting the name of your prospects in here.

Time To Craft Your Marketing Plan

As a small or medium-sized business, you need to get a fast return on your marketing spend.

Putting your comparatively tiny marketing budget into fuzzy marketing is like the proverbial drop in the ocean. You need a plan.

The game of mass marketing, branding, and “getting your name out there” type of marketing can only be won with atomic bomb scale firepower.

If you’re a small to medium business, that’s not a game you’re equipped to play.

If you’ve found yourself engaging in any of these stupid marketing strategies, now’s the time to stop, re-evaluate, and change course.

Whenever I speak to business owners, the topic of conversation invariably turns to marketing. When I ask how they market themselves, “word of mouth” almost always comes up as the primary or only form of marketing they rely on.

This used to shock me but now I’ve come to expect it.

Whilst word of mouth marketing is powerful, and an important part of your marketing plan it’s an extremely slow and unreliable way of building a business. Assuming you do everything right, it can take many years, even decades, to build a successful business on the back of word of mouth alone.

Word of mouth or referral marketing is the business equivalent of a free lunch. Sure it’s nice when it comes your way and you appreciate it, but do you really want to rely on it to feed your family?

By being solely reliant on word of mouth, you’re putting the fate of your business in the hands of others. Essentially, you're hoping they like you and remember you often enough to regularly send new business your way.

This is an extremely dangerous path to be on. Instead, now’s the time to start building a much more robust marketing system.

Do You Want to Grow Your Business Rapidly?

Then you need to market it. But not just any marketing will do. In my Lean Strategy Course, I show you the exact techniques I've used to start, grow, and exit several multi-million dollar businesses, so you can too.

Tell Me More

Building An Unbreakable Marketing System

Having only a single source of new business is extremely dangerous. Being unable to control that source makes it doubly so.

I advocate having at least five different sources of new leads and new customers. This is called lead generation. You can read about the benefits here.

Added to that, I recommend that most of these five sources be in paid media i.e. they cost you money to market yourself. The reason paid media is so important is twofold.

1. It's Extremely reliable.

If I pay a newspaper to run my emotional direct response ad, there’s a high probability the ad will actually be run. It’s much harder to get reliable and consistent lead flow from free marketing methods such as word of mouth.

2. Paid marketing Forces you To Focus on Return on Investment (ROI).

If a paid marketing method is not working, you cut it. You don’t waste further time or money on it. Whereas when the marketing method is free, such as with word of mouth, we tend to be less ruthless and often end up wasting huge amounts of time because we didn’t have to pay anything upfront. However, there’s an opportunity cost which, if careful analysis is done, often translates to a surprisingly large amount of real money.

The art and science of being able to consistently turn a dollar of paid advertising into a dollar or more in profits through direct response marketing will make your business resilient and can help you turn the tap on to rapid business growth.

Boosting the Reliability of Word-Of-Mouth Marketing

While we don’t want to be solely reliant on word of mouth, we do want to amplify it’s power and increase it’s reliability where possible.

One of the best ways I’ve seen this done is by straight out asking for referrals from customers for whom you’ve delivered a good result. It’s amazing how many business owners hope for referrals yet rarely ask for them. Something as simple as:

“Mr. Customer, it’s been such a pleasure working with you. If you know anyone who’s in a similar situation as yourself we’d love you to give them one of these gift cards which entitles them to $100 off their first consultation with us. One of the reasons we’re able to keep the cost of our service low is because we get a lot of our business through referrals from people like you.”

See what’s going on here:

• We’re acknowledging them and appealing to their ego.
• We’re not asking them for a favor but instead offering something valuable they can give to someone in their network.
• We’re giving them a reason why they should give us referrals – a reason that directly benefits them.

You could also look at affiliate marketing. This is another great way to generate referrals to your business.

Systemize Your Word Of Mouth Marketing Strategy

By putting a system around generating referrals, we’ve dramatically increased the reliability of word of mouth marketing. And while not everyone will give you referrals, many will and it sure beats just silently hoping.

Relying on the goodwill of others is not my idea of being an entrepreneur. By creating multiple sources of new leads and increasing the reliability of word of mouth marketing, you take back control of your lead flow and build a solid foundation for rapid business growth.

If you enjoyed this article, you may also enjoy our article on How to Create a Lead Magnet that Converts in 6 Steps. As a small business owner, it’s the smarter way to acquire leads for your business and build your authority.

If you're new to marketing, you might be wondering why you don't want to position your business as a commodity?

Whether you’re selling freshly baked bread, accounting services or IT support, the way you market yourself will have a dramatic impact on the clients you attract and the amount that you can charge for your services.

Position your business as the best price or lowest offer, and you'll attract price hunters. Here's why that's a bad deal for your business.

Marketing Positioning - It's not about the product

A commonly held belief is that “it’s all about the product” i.e. if you have a better product or service people will automatically be more likely to buy from you and pay you more for it.

While this is true to some extent, the law of diminishing returns comes into play when your product or service reaches a “good enough” level. After all how much better can your IT support or accounting services or bread be than that of your competition?

Once you’ve reached a level of competence, the real profit comes from the way you market yourself.

How you position your business can determine the type of customer you attract, and whether they stay long-term or short-term.

How Much Money Does A Violinist Make?​

How much does a world-class violinist make? Well, that depends on how he markets himself.

Have you ever heard of Joshua Bell?

He’s one of the finest classical musicians in the world. He plays to packed audiences all around the world, making upwards of $1, 000 per minute.

The violin that he plays is a Stradivarius violin built in 1713, currently valued at $3.5 million. This particular Stradivarius violin, being close to 300 years old, is renowned to be the most beautiful sounding violin ever crafted.

So, here we have the finest violinist in the world playing the most beautiful violin ever. It’s safe to say that Bell, as an musician, is the best at what he does.

At the height of his career he was approached by the Washington Post to participate in a social experiment.

They wanted him to play at a local subway for an hour, during which thousands of people would walk by and hear him playing.

So on the morning of January 12, 2007, Bell played through a set list of classical masterpieces with his violin case open.

Can you a guess how much the finest violinist in the world, playing a beautiful $3. 5 million violin made in hour?

A grand total of $32. See for yourself:

The finest violinist, playing the most beautiful instrument made a meager $32 from his “customers.”

The same violinist played in a Boston concert hall a few nights earlier. It was a performance where audience members paid $100 or more per ticket. During that event, he earned over $60,000 per hour.

The same talented musician, playing the same music on the same violin, yet in one instance he earns $32 an hour and in another, he earns $60,000 per hour.

What made the dramatic difference? In a word – positioning.

Positioning For Profit

If you’re a professional musician and you position yourself as a subway busker, your “customers” will treat you as such and pay you accordingly.

Conversely, if you position yourself as a professional concert performer you attract a totally different customer and once again get paid accordingly.

In other words, people will generally take you at your own appraisal – unless proven otherwise. Of course, you can’t cheat by positioning yourself as a professional musician and then show up and be unable to perform at a high level. The same is true regardless of what business you’re in.

If you’ve got a quality product or service, what’s stopping you from positioning it at a much higher level – offering it a premium price and attracting a much higher quality of customer? Resolve to stop positioning yourself as a commodity and competing solely on price. The result to your bottom line will be phenomenal.

If you enjoyed this article, you may also enjoy our article on What is Direct Response Marketing? As a small business owner, it’s the smarter way to market your business.  

So many business owners just don't get marketing. They waste time and dollars on adverts that just aren't going to engage their target audience. If you want to catch their attention, and grow your database of leads then you need to hone in on their problems.

You want to target their pain. To do that, you need a plan. Let me break it down for you.

Become Your Prospects Pain Relief

You’ve got a splitting headache. You open your medicine cabinet and start rifling through your museum of half-used tablets, creams and vitamins only to realize you’re totally out of pain relief medication.

So you rush down to your local pharmacy in the hope of getting the tablet that’s going to give you the relief you so desperately need.

Do you worry about the price? Does it even enter your mind to shop around and see if you can buy the same product cheaper at another pharmacy? Unlikely.

You’re in pain and you need immediate relief. In fact, even if the tablets were priced at double or triple the normal price, you’d probably still buy.

The usual ways of shopping get thrown out the window when we’re in pain. The exact same is true for your customers and prospects.

The problem with Selling features & Benefits?

So many times businesses talk about “features and benefits” rather than speaking to the pain that the customer already has.

How much selling does a pharmacist need to do to sell pain relief medication to someone with a splitting headache? Very little I suspect.

The same is true whether you sell TV’s, cars or consulting. You have prospects and customers who are in pain. They want pain relief, not features and benefits.

If you’re selling me a TV, you could sell me features and benefits by telling me it’s got four HDMI ports and 1080p resolution. This will mean very little to most people.

However, imagine instead you target my pain point which is bringing it back home, unpacking it, and spending an infuriating number of hours trying to get it working properly with all my other devices.

Instead of price discounting and positioning yourself as a commodity, why not offer to deliver it to my house, mount it on the wall, ensure the picture quality is spectacular, and make sure that it works perfectly with all my other peripherals.

Now you’re giving me pain relief and price becomes less important than if you’re selling me a commodity with a list of features and benefits.

Comparing Apples with Oranges

In the above example, even though you might be selling the exact same TV as your competitor, if you package it up in a way that takes away my pain – then you’ve won my business.

It’s also much more likely I’ll become a raving fan and refer others to you because you weren’t just the vendor of a commodity. You were a problem solver.

Now it’s an apples to oranges comparison. How do you compare this to “it’s got four HDMI ports and 1080p resolution”?

Selling features and benefits is the best way to turn your prospects into price shoppers who view your product as a commodity bought solely on price.

Your goal is to be a problem solver, pain reliever, and turn any comparison with your competition into an apples-to-oranges comparison.

What's Your Cure?

Remember people are much more willing to pay for a cure than for prevention. Targeting existing pain rather than promising future pleasure will result in much higher conversion, much higher customer satisfaction and lower price resistance.

Look for pain points in your industry and become your target audience's source of relief.

If you enjoyed this article, you may also enjoy our article on What is Direct Response Marketing? As a small business owner, it’s the smarter way to market your business.

What is risk reversal and why should you consider implementing it into your business marketing?

It’s natural to always try and present your business in the most favorable light possible when marketing yourself.

However, this often leads to one of the most common marketing blunders – discussing only the positive aspects of doing business with you.

Avoiding the elephant in the room – the risks associated with buying from you, is a rookie mistake.

So part of your marketing plan needs to include how you'll reverse the risk of buying from your business.

Do You Want to Grow Your Business Rapidly?

Then you need to market it. But not just any marketing will do. In my Lean Strategy Course, I show you the exact techniques I've used to start, grow, and exit several multi-million dollar businesses, so you can too.

Tell Me More

Risk Reversal Overcomes The Fearful Amygdala

The amygdala is the fear part of our brain. It governs our reactions to events that are important for our survival. And it stimulates fear to warn us of imminent danger.

If you’re being followed at night by a suspicious looking individual and your heart is pounding, that’s your amygdala doing its job. That’s good.

However, the amygdala in your prospect’s brain can also stop them from buying from you. That’s bad.

When a prospect considers buying from you, their amygdala is making a judgment call about the potential risks involved.

The risk being evaluated by the amygdala may be as trivial as a bad tasting latte. Or it could be as severe as an untimely death on an operating table.

Either way, the risk evaluation is always going on in the background. As a business owner and marketer you need to understand that.

If you skirt around this issue in your marketing, you allow the amygdala in your prospect’s brain to run wild and potentially kill the sale.

Given that this risk evaluation will happen whether you like it or not, why not participate in it.

Give yourself the best chance of addressing any potential deal breakers before they get a chance to damage your bottom line?

You Can Reverse Risk By Telling Them Who It's Not For

Traditional selling tells us to overcome objections. However, in reality, objections are rarely voiced.

Instead in polite society, we say nonsense things like, “let me think about it.” Our amygdala is actually screaming “let’s get out of here.”

Part of the job of good sales copy is to tell potential prospects who your product or service is NOT for.

There are three very good reasons you should do this.

1. It filters out people who aren’t part of your target market or those who wouldn’t be a good fit for what you have to offer. This ensures you don’t waste your time on low-quality or low-probability prospects. It also reduces refunds and complaints from customers who misunderstood what they bought.
2. It immediately makes it more credible when you tell them who this product is for. It feels much more even-handed when you cover both angles by telling them who it is for and who it isn’t for.
3. The prospects who it is for will feel the product or service is much more tailored to their needs. Versus if you had said your product is for anyone and everyone. It feels more targeted and exclusive.

How To Implement A Risk Reversal Strategy

You’ve set the scene by telling them who it’s not for. Now you need to address the risk element for the prospects who are a good fit.

The first time I saw tasting spoons at an ice creamery, I finally realized just how truly risk averse we all are.

Here potential ice cream buyers hold up a queue of people behind them while they taste test several flavors with tiny plastic spoons. All this is to ensure that the flavor of ice cream they commit to buying doesn’t disappoint.‍‍

This needs to be more powerful than  like “money back guarantee” or “satisfaction guaranteed” something ordinary and lame like “money back guarantee” or “satisfaction guaranteed.”

By having something to lose if it doesn’t work out, you have an easier path to the sale. You’ll much more easily avoid alarm bells set off by the amygdala in your prospect’s brain.

A practical example Of Reversing Risk

Sometimes the best way to understand risk reversal is to see it in action. So here goes. If I’m wanting to hire an IT company for my business, what sort of things might I fear?

• Are they going to send some junior technician who’ll fluff about for hours as he learns on the job while I get billed a premium hourly rate for the privilege?
• Are they going to be available when I urgently need support?
• Will the problems they fix continue to recur?
• Are they going to bamboozle me with geek speak when I request an explanation of work performed or needed?

A risk reversal guarantee for this type of business might look like:

“We guarantee that our certified and experienced IT consultants will fix your IT problems so they don’t recur. They’ll also return your calls within 15 minutes and will always speak to you in plain English. If we don’t live up to any of these promises, we insist that you tell us and we’ll credit back to your account double the billable amount of the consultation.”

Compare that to a weak and vague guarantee like, “satisfaction guaranteed.”

Is this kind of guarantee risky?

Only if you consistently do a crappy job. If you are committed to giving your customers excellent service and train your staff accordingly, then there is almost zero risk for you.

More importantly, there’s almost zero risk for your prospects. This will make closing sales much easier.

Indeed the law often requires that you provide warranties as to the quality of your products and services and make things right if they fall short.

So given this is likely already a legal requirement, why not up the ante and make it a feature you promote in your marketing?

In Closing

A smart entrepreneur will look at their business from the eyes of a fearful, skeptical prospect and reverse all the perceived risks so that the path to the sale is much smoother.

This will also result in customers who are much more sticky and who won’t fall for your competitors who by comparison seem much more risky to deal with.

How can you implement The Risk Reversal Strategy in your business today?

If you enjoyed this article, you may also enjoy our article on What is Direct Response Marketing? As a small business owner, it’s the smarter way to market your business.

In this article, I’m going to take you through three simple steps to implementing direct response marketing in your business using a strategy I call “The Visible Target Technique.”

I passed high school mathematics, not because I understood any of it, but because my uncle kindly tutored me long enough and often enough to help me pass the final exam.

Uncle Abe had a frequently used catch phrase to indicate there was a better way of doing something, “You’re not wrong but that doesn’t mean you’re right.”

That’s exactly the phrase I would use to describe what most small to medium businesses do with their marketing. But what do I mean by this?

Do You Want to Grow Your Business Rapidly?

Then you need to market it. But not just any marketing will do. In my Lean Strategy Course, I show you the exact techniques I've used to start, grow, and exit several multi-million dollar businesses, so you can too.

Tell Me More

Gain Leads By Treating Your Advertising Like An Investment

How you invest your money affects your financial success.

At this point you’d be justified in thinking, duh Sherlock, thanks for stating the bleeding obvious. However, few business owners truly understand the financial investment called advertising.

The theory behind branding is that you want to “get your name out there.” So, if you broadcast your message enough times, you’ll by chance get an audience with your prospects and some percentage of them will buy from you.

If that sounds a lot like our disoriented archer, flailing about in the fog, shooting his arrows in random directions and hoping for the best, then you’d be right. You might be thinking – if he just shoots enough arrows in all directions, surely he’s bound to hit his target. Right?

Maybe, but for small to medium-sized businesses at least, that’s the stupid way of marketing because they’ll never have enough arrows (i.e., money) to hit their target enough times to get a good return on their investment.

So to restate the obvious another way: how you invest your advertising dollars affects your profits and business success. If you’ve been trying to do branding with limited success, Uncle Abe would likely tell you your current marketing strategy is not necessarily wrong but that doesn’t mean that it’s right. Let’s take a look at a smarter way of doing it.

The Visible Target Technique Is a Painless Way To Attract High-Quality Prospects

Over the past few years, I’ve built multiple high growth businesses. I’ve also shared my strategies by speaking at conferences, writing in online and print publications and one-on-one with business owners and entrepreneurs.

That’s why you need the Visible Target Technique. It’s a simple but powerful marketing strategy. I’ve personally used it over the years to grow my businesses rapidly. This technique that ensures you’ll never have to waste huge sums of money on advertising without even being able to measure if it’s working or not.

You can kiss goodbye that hopeless old marketing adage: Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted: the trouble is I don't know which half. If you're wondering, “How do I use The Visible Target Technique?” Let me show you.

How to use the visible Target Technique To Get More Customers

Is your goal is to get more customers, more easily than you ever thought possible? Then you need to implement these three simple steps. Here's how the Visible Target Technique works.

• Step 1: Select a narrow target market
• Step 2: Create a lead generating ad
• Step 3: Follow up until they buy or die

Step 1: Select A Narrow Target Market

A 100-watt lightbulb, like the kind of lightbulb we normally have in our homes, lights up a room. By contrast, a 100-watt laser can cut through steel. Same energy, dramatically different result. The difference being how the energy is focused. The same is true of your marketing.

You have a limited amount of money. If you focus too broadly, your message will be too scattered to be relevant to anyone. The goal of your ad is for prospects to say, “Hey, that’s for me.” So you want to find a niche.

Take the example of a photographer. If you look at ads from most photographers you’ll often see a laundry list of services like:

• Portraits
• Weddings
• Family photography
• Commercial photography
• Fashion photography

The technical way photography is done may not change very much from situation to situation, but let me ask you a question. Do you think someone looking for wedding photography would respond to a different ad than someone who’s after commercial photography?

Do you think a bride-to-be looking for a photographer for her wedding might be looking for something radically different than a purchasing manager from a heavy machinery distributor looking to photograph a truck for a product brochure?

Of course! However, if the ad just rolls out a broad laundry list of services, then it’s not speaking to either prospect, therefore it’s not relevant, therefore it will likely be ignored by both market segments. That’s why you need to choose a narrow target market for your ad.

Being all things to all people will lead to marketing failure. This doesn’t mean you can’t offer a broad range of services, but understand that each category of service is a separate campaign. My advice is first dominate one target market, then move onto the next.

Step 2: Create A Lead Generating Ad

Even in a narrow target market, all prospects should not be treated equally. The more money you can spend marketing to high probability prospects, the better your chances are of converting them to a customer.

Just like our proverbial archer, who has a limited number of arrows, you have a limited supply of money for your marketing campaign, so it’s essential you invest it wisely.

‍For example, if you have $1,000 to spend on an ad campaign which reaches 1,000 people, you’re essentially spending $1 per prospect. Now assume that out of the 1,000 people the ad reaches, 100 are potential prospects for your product. By treating them equally, as you would have to do with mass marketing, you’re wasting $900 on uninterested and unmotivated prospects to reach the 100 who are interested.

‍What if instead of treating them all equally you could sift, sort and screen so that you were only dealing with high probability prospects and not wasting valuable time and marketing dollars on uninterested and unmotivated prospects? You could then spend the whole $1,000 on the 100 high probability prospects.

That would allow you to spend $10 on wooing each of them instead of the measly $1 per prospect you’d have if you treated them all equally. With ten times the firepower aimed at the right targets, do you think we’d have a better conversion rate?

Of course. But how do we separate the wheat from the chaff?

How do you get leads to opt-in?

The short answer is we bribe them into telling us!

Don’t worry there’s nothing underhanded here. We offer an “ethical bribe” to get them to identify themselves to us.

For example, our friend the photographer could offer a free DVD telling prospective brides exactly what they should look for in a wedding photographer and showcasing some of his work.

A very simple lead-generating ad could be headlined: “Free DVD Reveals The 7 Costly Mistakes To Avoid When Choosing A Photographer For Your Big Day.”

Anyone requesting this “ethical bribe” would be identifying themselves as a high probability prospect. You now have at least their name and address which would go onto your marketing database.

Remember the goal is simply to generate leads.

Avoid the temptation of trying to sell from your ad. At this early stage, you just want to sift out the uninterested and unmotivated so that you can build your database of high probability prospects.

Why You Want To Avoid Selling From Your Ad

• At any given time, about 3% of your target market is highly motivated and ready to buy immediately. These are the prospects most mass marketing hopes to convert.
• There’s a further 7% who are very open to buying.
• Another 30% who are interested but not right now.
• The next 30% are not interested.
• And finally, the last 30% wouldn’t even take your product if was free.

If you tried selling directly from your ad, you’d be targeting only the 3% who are ready to buy immediately and losing the other 97%.

By creating a lead generating ad, you increase your addressable market to 40%. You do this by capturing the 3% who are immediate buyers but also by capturing the 7% who are open to talking as well as the 30% who are interested but not right now.

By going from a 3% addressable market to 40%, you’re increasing the effectiveness of your advertising by 1,233%.

Step 3: Follow Up Until They Buy or Die

So now that you have your database of high probability prospects, what do you do next? Quite simply you market to them until they buy or die. It may seem like I’m advocating being obnoxious and pestering people to buy until they cave in. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Traditional selling is focused on pressure tactics like “always be closing” and other silly little close techniques which are based on pressure. It makes the seller a pest who the prospect wants to avoid.

Instead of being a pest, I advocate becoming a welcome guest. Send your high probability prospects a continuous stream of value until they’re ready to buy. This could be in the form of tutorials, articles, case studies or even something as simple as a monthly newsletter that’s related to their area of interest. This builds trust, goodwill and positions you as an expert and educator rather than just a salesperson going for the jugular.

Various technology tools make it easy to automate this continuous follow up mechanism, making this a cost-effective and scalable way of building up a huge pipeline of interested and motivated prospects. Some of these prospects will convert into customers immediately, while others will do so weeks, months or even years later.

The point is that by the time they’re ready to buy, you’ve already built a solid relationship with them based on value and trust. This makes you the logical choice when it comes time for them to make a buying decision.

Start Implementing This Technique Now

This is one of the most ethical and painless ways of selling because it’s based completely on trust and an exchange of value.

While your competitors are blindly shooting arrows every which way in the hope of hitting one of the 3% of immediate buyers, with “The Visible Target Technique” you’re focusing all of your firepower on a clear and visible target.

If you enjoyed this article, you may also enjoy our article on Marketing Plan 101: What is a Marketing Plan? + 5 Examples. As a small business owner, it’s the smarter way to acquire leads for your business and build your authority.