Many clients come to us with the goal of getting new leads. Don’t get me wrong, this is an important goal. However, this can be shortsighted to the bigger picture of actually growing your business and creating lifelong customers.
Marketing, in its holistic sense, is more than just acquiring new customers.
There are actually 3 big goals of marketing which include:
Acquiring customers
Retaining customers
Turning customers into brand ambassadors
Let’s take a look at each of these.
1. Acquiring customers
Top of mind for most businesses, acquiring new customers means new revenue for growth. This goal is the most complex out of the three goals because you have to get new customers all the way through your sales funnel.
First, customers need to become aware of you through ads, colleagues, social media or other means. Then they have to be interested enough in either your brand, your quality content, or your services to consider your services through engagement. This engagement can be done through things like signing up for your newsletter, following you on social media, or reading a blog. Lastly, the engagement has to be valuable enough for them to want to learn more about your product or service and eventually buy it.
Phew! That’s a lot! You can see how someone who has already heard of your brand may be a much easier sell for your services (warm lead) than someone who is not yet aware of you (cold lead). However, don’t fear! Acquiring new customers is fun, exciting and rewarding.
When your marketing efforts are engaging enough to bring a customer through the sales funnel, it means you are doing something right. It means you have marketing strategies and activities focused on each part of the sales funnel: awareness, consideration, and purchase. It also means you’ve taken the time to understand your customer and are patient enough to see them come through each part of the sales funnel.
Consistency is key!
2. Retaining customers
Somehow people forget about this goal! And what an amazing goal it is. Retaining customers is a lot more cost-effective than acquiring new ones since they already know you and have used your services.
Marketing strategies that don’t focus on retaining customers are missing out! Strategies can include things like rewards programs, discounts for repeat customers, and last but not least providing a great service with amazing customer service.
Customers won’t come back if your service doesn’t meet their needs. That means you should be talking to your customers and learning how to improve your products and services continually. It means making your buying process easy and user-friendly. And it means you have great employees that give good customer service. Gathering this feedback is important and can be done in the form of surveys or customer interviews.
Since retaining customers is a main goal of marketing, your marketing team should be involved in the development and updates of your products and services as well as your buying process and customer service.
3. Turning customers into brand ambassadors
Customers fall in love with good brands -- with what they stand for and the story they tell. Having an emotive brand story is important in both acquiring customers and retaining customers. And when a good brand story can turn customers into brand ambassadors, you’ve hit a home run.
Brand ambassadors will go to bat for you, not just because of the service you provide, but because they are deeply connected with your brand’s higher purpose.
If we think about the sales funnel, people who hear about your company from brand ambassadors will automatically go into the consideration part of the sales funnel. This means you don’t have to spend as much time or money in marketing activities focused on awareness. These people also are more likely to consider a purchase because of the increased trust from hearing about you from someone else.
Word of mouth, hands-down, has THE highest conversion rate of any type of marketing activity. Therefore, any way that you can increase the number of people committed to your brand, the more successful you will be.
Building brand ambassadors should be a key focus of any marketing team. This would include strategies like developing a compelling and emotive brand story that resonates with your audience. It also includes things like referral programs and creating free high-quality content that educates or entertains (with no sales ask).
Having brand ambassadors should be the ultimate outcome of any business!
Next time you’re meeting with your marketing team, ask them what strategies you are using to:
Acquire customers
Retain customers
And turn customers into brand ambassadors
By understanding these three goals, you can build a comprehensive strategic marketing plan and brand strategy to be successful.
Need help building a marketing plan which focuses on your customer? Contact us or schedule a discovery call now.
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