Content Marketing Plan
Content marketing plan sheds light on several ways in which it may be a successful element of your lead generation for your company. In today’s episode, we’ll discuss content marketing as a means of generating leads for your business.
Quote:
“Create content that your client would want that is within your bandwidth to create, and content marketing generates leads for business.”
Topics and Timestamps:
- Previous episode topics (00:42- 02:00)
- Content based on bandwidth (2:01- 2:59)
- Sources of Leads (3:00- 3:45)
- Making connections (3:46- 4:02)
- E-mail as high-ranking method (4:03- 4:42)
- Appetizing content (4:43- 5:07)
- Analogy of grit tots appetizer to content (5:10- 6:18)
- Signature offer that works (7:13- 8:23)
- Client transformation challenge (8:42- 9:24)
- Content marketing for lead generation recap (9:25- 10:54)
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Transcription
007 | Content Marketing Plan: Lead Generation For Your Business
Are you ready to take your digital marketing to the next level, using tried and true methods and emerging trends? It’s Ashleigh and you’re listening to the Digitally Grounded podcast. We’ll talk about all things digital marketing from sales funnels and flywheels, social media, email marketing, and more. So if you’re ready to take your marketing to the next level, keep listening.
Hey, it’s Ashleigh and in today’s episode, we’re talking about content marketing: lead generation for your business. So in this episode, we’re going to discuss creating content that your client would want that is within your bandwidth to create and relates to your offer.
Now, this is a continuation of prior episodes. So initially, we were talking back in episode one about why you should own the land versus earned media or owned, earned, and paid media. We talked about owning the land, and owning the land, in my mind, is owning your content. Owning where your content is hosted, owning your space on the internet, not renting it from social media, and then having the Metaverse delete all your content because they feel like it, right?
Then we talked about holistic digital marketing and what that actually means because you want to have a well-rounded approach to your marketing so that you can make the biggest impact organically. I am all about organic reach first and building that audience and perfecting who you’re trying to attract before you throw any money on it because that way, your dollars will go farther, ’cause you’ll know who you’re targeting. You’re not making so many guesses.
And then in the previous episodes, episodes five and six, we talked about being an authority: using your thought leadership to build your business, and then episode six, funnel building talking about sales and lead funnels. And so here we are in episode seven, with content marketing.
When you’re selling your thinking, and you’ve discovered what you really like talking about and how you really like to deliver that content, you want to also consider, as mentioned, those three stages of buyers. Make sure that you’re creating content that is within your bandwidth to create meaning, you’re not going to get burned out and you’ll be able to be consistent, give it, you know, three months minimum, and really be able to say I’m going to go at this for three months, even if I don’t see results. I’m gonna get going with that because, with organic reach, it does take longer. Now, some people might say okay, well, we’ll do the organic reach and we’ll throw a little pay in the beginning just to bump things up and get some ROI quickly. But you know, it really depends on the business and how long they’ve been in business and who you’re targeting. I think it’s always good to be able to commit to something that you love. And the method in which you’re creating the content has to be something that is going to come easy for you so that you can stick with it, right?
So lead generation, when somebody is discovering you for your business. They sometimes want to know that they have a problem that needs solving. It may just stumble upon you and say oh, let me read this thing or let me watch this video, or let me just listen to this podcast and see what this person is talking about. Maybe you came as a referral. Somebody else shared a piece of your content and they don’t know they have a problem.
There are also people who know they have a problem, but they’re not really sure what to do with that information just yet. With lead generation, that’s your first touchpoint or your first barrier entry outside of just discovering you. You know, maybe they saw blog posts or podcasts or YouTube videos. They saw a post on social media.
The next step in that process is to make that connection with them and give them something that will be a little more than the basic thing that you put out on social media because what you want to get from them is their email address.
Email is still a high-ranking method for connecting with customers, nurturing that customer relationship, and also depending on the types of products or services that you offer. You can also do some great retargeting by, you know, emailing people when they’ve left things in their cart, and things like that. And you know, when Facebook goes down or when Meta goes down again because it’s inevitable and it will happen again, you can just email your folks and say okay, you know, the Facebook page’s down, but we can still connect with you on email, and here are the links that you need. And you can still run your business outside of those channels.
So when you’re creating this piece of content, you want it to be kind of juicy, right? You want it to be something that is appetizing. You want them to have a little taste of something that is just so delicious, and they just want more. And I’m going to tell you a story because I love food. And I have to connect it to food because I use the word appetizer, and now I could probably use one.
So there’s a restaurant here near me called The Nest and they have these grit tots. Now not everyone likes grits, but I love grits and they form them into these little things almost like a tater tot and they are delicious. They are absolutely delicious. When I order those things and they come out on a little plate, I’m so excited and I’m eating my grit tots and once I start eating those things, not only could I probably eat like three orders of them as an appetizer, (don’t judge, but I could). I’m ready for the next thing, right? I’m ready to have my appetizer.
I’m starting to get ignited with that appetite and I’m ready, I’m like yes, I’m ready to get my lunch, or I’m ready to get my brunch or dinner or whatever it is like I’m ready for the next thing, ready for another sip of my drink of choice. And that’s what we want them to feel when we’re creating content for potential customers. We want them to have a little taste of something and be surprised, right? They’re going to take that first bite, and they’re going to think, oh yeah, this is really good. I want another bite of this. And before you know it, all the grid tots are gone. And they’re ready to order something else from your menu.
So think of it that way. Make it fun, make it interesting. And if you’re really stuck on what you should create as a lead generation tool or lead generation offer, you could think back to frequently asked questions, things that you’ve emailed your clients over and over again. Go back to some of the things that are within your process. Maybe there’s something within your sales process internally that you can condense and give in a freebie or well a freebie or lead generation tool, not all lead generation offers need to be free. I like to offer them for free unless it’s something like “next level”. But if they aren’t for free, then they need to be a lower cost barrier to entry. So keep it as a lower percentage of the overall signature offer that you have.
So let’s say your signature offer is I don’t know, $5,000 for the whole thing that you offer the whole service. You don’t want to have a lead generation tool that you know something that’s like $1,000. You want to have a lower percentage. So, in my mind what would I advise to a client who had a signature $5,000 offer? I would say, you know if you want to do free lead gen, do a free one. But if you want to have something that’s paid, put it at like that $100 range, right? Because somebody who has the bandwidth to spend $5,000 can certainly spend $100 on something that’s going to give them high value and give them a quick win. That leads me to my next point with lead generation tools and opt-in offers is trying to give them a quick win. If there’s something within your systems, something that you do as a special trick to help you know, get a fast result for someone, give that to them in the form of a lead generator. And that way, not only are you proving a part of your system that is successful, that gets results that work. You’re also building that trust, you’re getting information from this person and then you can follow up with them however you see fit. So like I said go back to your tools, go back through your systems and channels and see you know, what are these common threads that come up and can be adapted into a lead generation offer?
I have a client that did a transformation challenge. She’s a behavior modification specialist. And she had this challenge where it was, I think six or eight weeks, and she did it live. And we talked about it and I said well, adapt that into a lead generation tool. Let’s automate that because that’s what your customers really love. And it was a high converting challenge that you did. You know, let’s put it on automation and give it as a lead generation tool. Maybe it’s not as you know, involved as the in-person, full 100% thing, but we give a kind of a basic tier of that offer as a lead generator.
So I hope that I’ve given you a lot of things to think about and I hope that you grab a pen and paper and take some action. So I’m just going to recap, content marketing for lead generation: create content that your client would want that is within your bandwidth to create, and relates to your offer.
So think back, look back to your processes, and find those common threads, those common questions that come up, those things that performed well within your business, and see what you can adapt to create a basic barrier to entry tier that you can offer in exchange for contact information. And when creating this thing, think about whether or not you’re going to have a paid offer or a free offer. You may decide once you do, maybe a free offer. You want to have a level two that’s paid and it’s a little more involved. And then finally they get to level three and they’re working with you. You may not want to do it that way. But there are so many different options and every business is unique. So what I like to do is when I work with people one on one, I sit down with them and really figure out what’s gonna work best for them. Not only for them as a business but for them as a person, what is it that they’re going to be excited about that they’re going to be consistent with doing, what is within their bandwidth to do for a consistent amount of time, right? Think about all these things while you take action.
In the next episode, we’re going to talk about the email sequence strategy because now that we’ve got this lead generation tool, we’re going to move into how to nurture this connection that we just made via email. So I’ll see you at the next one. Bye!
The Digitally Grounded podcast is written and produced by me, Ashleigh Lindsay, our editor is Jessica Marshall, and our music is ‘Summer Hip Hop Upbeat’ by Lightbeats. Thanks for listening!
