Inbound marketing is a business methodology that attracts customers by creating valuable content and experiences tailored to them. The content should align with the needs of your target audience at all points of their customer journey.
The Inbound methodology is in a way a full digital marketing strategy focused on providing the most helpful content to each of your different audience groups at exactly the right time they need it. Planning and creating the content that is most helpful for your audience at each stage of their journey is at the core of Inbound.
To plan content, we can generally view our customer’s journey in three major stages: the awareness stage, the consideration stage, and the decision stage. We map out the questions and issues a future customer might have in each stage and think about how best to shine some light onto their issues as below:
Stages of the Customer Journey
- Awareness stage: when someone in your target audience starts to become aware they have a pain or problem that needs to be addressed or a need they have to satisfy, they will start researching their problem online. Usually, a future customer might have a problem but be “unaware” of it. Unless the issue becomes a more significant problem they will just pass by it. But once the pain increases, they will start to articulate the problem and maybe even give it a name. That is when they have entered the awareness stage.
- Consideration stage: The prospect has now understood their problem or need, has researched it to some extent, and is now searching for and considering the different options he/she may have to solve it.
- Decision stage: Once the buyer has first become aware of their problem, then considered and maybe decided on the paths, tools, or methods of solving their problem and addressing their need, they will now start actively looking and choosing between providers for the specific solution. At the end of this stage, they will either become a new client or customer for your business or choose a different provider and sign with them.
In regards to the stages of the customer journey above, an Inbound marketing agency’s most important responsibility is to research, plan, and provide the help a prospect needs at each of the three stages above through different pieces of sharable content. The type of content that usually works best in each stage differs although you should not limit yourself to anything and can let your creativity and experience guide your way. After all, you know your customers best!
What we want to do is to constantly help them move forward through the customer journey empowered with the right tools and knowledge to help make the best decisions, and ideally sign a contract with us if we are both a good fit for each other. This can all happen by providing the right content on the right medium at the right stage.
Inbound Content Ideas for the Awareness stage
When planning awareness stage content, you have to research your target audience and define your personas. A persona is a fictional, generalized character that can show is the various needs, goals, and behavior patterns of a certain group of our customers. Once we get a hold of our customers’ behaviors and goals, we will better know where and how to find them, address them, and talk to them on their own ground.
A potential buyer will have many questions at the very beginning (awareness stage) that each pose an opportunity for you to connect with them. You have to have the right answers to their questions and present the content you have on the locations they will be looking for this help.
Whatever the content’s subject and core idea is, it might be helpful to look into the below formats to deliver it:
- Blog posts
- Social Media posts
- Whitepapers and Ebooks
- Tools and kits
- Videos and webinars
Inbound Content Ideas for the Consideration stage
In this stage of the journey, your prospect is considering different solutions and ideas to resolve their problem. Product comparisons and guides can help them to a great extent in understanding the best choice they can make. Any case studies of previous clients that have made progress with a certain solution can also help your prospect reach a more informed decision. And to make it easier to choose to buy, it’s always good to give out a free sample of your product or service.
Inbound Content Ideas for the Decision stage
When the lead has turned into a serious opportunity by engaging with you in considering the right solutions, they will be as ready as possible to make a decision. You’ll need to guide their decision making and help them get the feel for and understand how your product stands out now. Maybe the best time to really showcase yourself and your product is this decision stage. Before this stage we were all in about the problem and the different solution. But you can now go ahead and take center stage.
Your future customer needs to understand why you stand out and how your product is different. So feel free to use free trials and live guided demos to make this work for them. If they’re still on the line, a consultation offer usually works well, and once close to making a decision, you can help push them with a final discount or coupon offer.
We are with you all the way and would be delighted to answer any questions you may have about Inbound Marketing and Sales. Just drop us a line and we can set up a quick call to discuss.
