There is a marketing revolution going on.
Sales starts... AND TAKES PLACE with leads online.
Why?
It is harder than ever to be cost effective with advertising. And trade shows are extremely expensive as brand and lead generating techniques.
But everyone, EVERYONE... visits and considers you digitally. In 2010 studies showed that more than a third of US consumers spent over 3.5 hours on-line every day. That's old news.
Today everyone expects you to be like Amazon.com or the iTunes store: Deliver high quality content, specifically relevant to "me". Recognize me. Help me. That's where the bar is set today for generating online leads. I require a useful and informative "relationship" before I talk to a sales person. (For instance, we have been building our car online at automotive sites for a long time.)
If visitors go to your website and get "only" a nice "brochure" then you are probably bleeding sales dollars. And if they do contact you, do you know what, on your website, they've been interested in?
Good news: Great is affordable.
You need to invest in great digital tools. And people. The good news is, these tools and people are available and cost effective, especially compared to old school techniques. Go for "great." It will be well worth it.Here’s what a great website should do for you:
- Sell like crazy. Measured by attributed bottom-line revenue. Your website should "work" profitably.
- Great websites are active. They generate leads by engaging the customer to do something, get something, and come back for more.
- Great websites are visible in all the right places. (search engine results pages, social media, SEO-SEM)
- Great web sites strategically move customers from strangers, to prospects, to customers to evangelists.
- Great websites engage and entice the viewer to identify themself and then automatically offer the right information and utility to the right prospects. (Dynamic and "SMART content")
- Great websites record every interaction with every visitor and make that information easily available to sales. (Marketing automation)
- Great websites automatically tell the sales guys when great prospects or competition is visiting.
- Great websites seamlessly integrate measurement with your email campaigns. They record opens, clicks and visits. And they automatically follow up. (Automatic email and lead nurture)
- Great websites "remember" and change automatically depending on who, or when prospects visit.
- Design matters but "pretty" is not the issue. Engaging utility IS the issue. Great websites are useful for the visitor.
Bottom Line: Great websites sell! They are lead generation machines.
Everyone will have a great website eventually. Why wait? There are sales to be made now and you will be judged by your website and digital tools. Your website is your most important marketing and sales channel. It is the "face" of sales, email, social, your brand and your company. Is it alive? Does it help you capture visitors and convert them to leads?
How do I get a great website?
You need all the “traditional web disciplines” like web development and design and SEO/SEM, and the discipline of inbound marketing that combines and integrates marketing automation software, with proven inbound methodology and best practices. Inbound also strategically integrates and measures the email, blogging, and social media activity of specific leads. And you need people. You need people who are expert at marketing, internet marketing, inbound marketing, digital marketing, and sales. And who truly understand your business model.
You need a MODERN marketing strategy focused on measurement and ROI.
Your website is the storefront on a busy street that everyone sees. Thats not good enough. You need more than a nice paint job. You need more than a good brochure. Your website must get them in the door and authentically ask “can I help you?”. And deliver that help. Don’t let revenue walk down the street to your competition.
P.S. Your digital storefront is open for business, year round, 24/7.
Download our free Lead Gen Tip, Tricks & Ideas and capture those leads.
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