Do you have high hopes for your marketing campaign? Of course you do, why would you put time, money and loads of effort into a plan that you expected to fail? With great idealism you look forward to the moment when the leads start rushing in. The problem is, they don’t. So what went wrong?
Most marketing pieces make one classic mistake – they don’t address the consumer’s problems. If you don’t present them with their problem, do prospective clients have an incentive to respond? Before you plan your next email campaign, direct mail piece or online campaign, consider the following…
Four things you need to know about your prospects:
- They are skeptical. Chances are they’ve had bad experiences and been burned by others making promises in the past. You have to earn their trust.
- They want professional guidance. If they knew how to do it they wouldn’t be searching for answers in the first place, d’uhh! Offer a little bit of knowledge and detailed instructions on how to take the next steps.
- They’re bombarded with marketing messages. You aren’t the only one whispering (of shouting) in their ear. Yours isn’t the first or the last message they’re gonna hear, so say something they aren’t expecting and haven’t already heard a hundred times.
- They will make buying decisions when they’re ready. Sure, you can try to plan for how long it will take people to gather information, analyze their options and pull out their credit card, but ultimately that comes down to personal comfort.
Of course clients’ desires and experiences related to your industry are going to differ. But no matter your industry, product or service, there’s one thing your prospects want to know about you: they can trust you to fix their problem in a way no one else can.
