The Perfect Customer Lifecycle by Infusionsoft helps paint a picture of your overall marketing campaign. A well-developed lifecycle shows your communication touch points with a customer through seven key stages of interaction with your business:
Step 1: Attracting Traffic
Developing a robust online presence through your site is the crux of great content marketing! Feature fresh blog posts and white papers to make yours a trusted site for potential customers and search engines.
Still need more traffic? A great short- term strategy is PPC or pay-per-click in which small ads featured on search engines or websites line up your product with a surfer’s need or page content. Two great options are outlined below.
Google AdWords – Google is the simplest and most well-known platform for PPC advertising. Simply bid on keywords relevant to your business and pay only if someone clicks on your ad. The price you pay is based on search volume, competition and your quality score (which takes into consideration relevancy, click-through rates and site speed). Ads are served at the top or right hand side of search results.
Facebook Ads – Where Google targets ads based on search intent, Facebook allows you to hyper-target by demographic, location, interests, ZIP code and more. Sponsored Ads are displayed on the right.
Step 2: Capture Leads
If a customer buys on his very first trip to your site, great! Chances are if that was a majority of your traffic however, you wouldn’t be reading this blog, would you? What is happening to those that don’t purchase? Before they float away, get valuable information you can use to market to your prospectives by placing a form in front of your compelling content, like ebooks. Keep in mind the offer must have value, whether informational or monetary (ie: coupons) for a lead to part with his email. Also, forms should never be mind-numbingly long.
Step 3: Nurture Prospects
“Nurturing” prospects means keeping the lines of communication open, building a relationship until the prospect is ready to buy. After all, according to research by The Annuitas Group, nurtured leads make 47% larger purchases than non-nurtured leads. Keep in mind; appropriate timing and personalization keep the recipient from feeling spammed.
Step 4: Convert Sales
This is most vital part of the sales process- the moment money is exchanged. If online, this process takes place through an ecommerce platform. If you are still closing a majority of customers on the sales floor, remember it typically takes five or more sales calls to close a deal. As such, keep sales teams on track with a CRM or Customer Relationship Management tool in which they can measure progress. The data on what drives customers to conversions is invaluable!
Step 5: Deliver & Satisfy
You have assured your customer you are the best to do business with, now prove it. Be on time, meet deadlines, and offer discounts on future purchases. Fantastic service is your best marketing tools.
Step 6: Upsell Customers
According to Infusionsoft, 80% of your profits come from the top 20% of your customers. Not surprisingly, repeat customers reduce marketing costs and have the potential to be lifelong patrons. Do not neglect the relationship you took so long to build. Check in from time to time and offer new services or relevant specials via automated emails.
Step 7: Get Referrals
We are all more likely to do business with someone we are introduced to through a mutual acquaintance. This process can go viral with review sites like Yelp, Citysearch and Trip Advisor allowing reviewers to connect despite different social networks. Solicit reviews and referrals instead of waiting to get feedback. Always make the effort to thank referrals appropriately.
While the perfect customer lifecyle is ideal, it is attainable in stages. Automation can be a huge time saver in nurturing prospects and upselling current customers, yielding a measurable ROI. Want to reach your professional goals faster and leave more time for your personal life? Think about your current customer lifecycle. Does it fit into the above steps? Which are missing? If you are unsure, it’s time to speak with Marketing Samurai to develop a strategy that will bring you more traffic, garner more leads and create MORE repeat customers.”
