Having heard every 'expert' under the sun harp on about how the buyer journey has changed etc., I still had never experienced my 'penny drops' moment where I really felt that change myself. However, this article struck a chord with me after a particularly enlightening phone conversation with a potential client a few days ago.
This person had submitted a request for some more information on our website and, as is standard, I gave them a call back to introduce myself and answer any questions she might have on Passle.
She didn't need me to explain a single thing about Passle... Not any feature, piece of functionality, integration, client examples etc. etc. - She knew and understood it all. The only clarification needed was around the pricing model for her business.
In the space of a few minutes sat at her desk and a chat with a colleague, this person had learnt almost everything she needed to know about us and our product without us ever knowing.
My guess is that this process is happening again as I write this post and probably happening to your business as well. Luckily for us, we addressed their concerns to such a degree that they felt compelled to reach out to us. For others this will not be the case.
If you and your business are not consistently demonstrating why you are the go-to expert, vendor, service provider etc. in an increasingly crowded marketplace to that invisible buyer, then you are missing out on revenue. Moreover, somebody else will be answering that question. Of that I am sure.
How to make sure you are putting your best foot forward?
- Optimise your site for SEO: (do all external/internal links work correctly? are there any out of date pages? Does it answer your clients' problems?)
- Provide useful content for the niches in which you work.
- Succintly explain what you do so as to entice the reader in
- Track all website traffic, understand where it comes from and how people interact with your site and respond accordingly.
- Ask your existing clients why they chose you in the first place. If there are patterns in their responses (you do 'this' really well), then make sure to pounce upon your USP!