📕 Marketing to two personas; How to invest in your team; Stealing like an artist...
A recent McKinsey report highlighted how drastically COVID and our increasing shift towards digitization have changed the way we buy and sell products. Some key findings included:
More than ¾ of customers now prefer using a self-service sales model
70% of B2B decision-makers are comfortable making purchases over $50,000 using self-service
This bodes well for enterprise software companies who should hypothetically be able to close larger deals faster as a result. Another benefit – they can reallocate funds traditionally used for longer sales cycle activities (like in-person meetings) into acquisition channels to add customers more quickly.
🚪Understanding how different personas interact with your content is the name of the game when it comes to converting leads to actual customers. We like to think of website traffic in two different silos: front door and side door. Front door traffic is obvious – it consists of customers who come directly to your website, who are generally aware of your brand and need very little nurturing. On the other hand, side door traffic is more of deeper links like documentation, blogs, and forums. This pulls in a more tech-savvy persona who is looking for specific details on your product. The best technical marketers focus on making these less popular sections of the site as attractive as possible, because for side door traffic, that may be the only interaction they have with your brand.
📝 No one ever gets excited when they hear the word audit. That’s because financial audits are long, expensive, and anxiety-inducing but one type of audit shouldn’t give you chills - the marketing audit. This is different from your regular marketing reports because it takes a comprehensive view of all your activities and compiles them into an actionable resource. You’re able to identify areas to become more efficient and cost-effective and hopefully discover new areas for growth. Remember to keep them honest and unbiased, consistent, and actionable to gain the most value from your marketing audits.
🗣 It’s easy to default to social or earned media as your primary acquisition channels, but we don’t have to tell you how costly that can get. We continue to believe it's essential to balance those expensive channels with more creative lower-cost avenues, like original media such as podcasts, newsletters, books/ebooks. Doing this enables you to control the conversation around your company while highlighting the value you provide.
💬 When we think of the most successful teams in history, all of them have a common thread: they made significant investments in their team members and key players. All companies start with the brainchild (and dream) of a core founding team, but as they grow, the founder’s dream needs to become the entire team's shared vision. This is one of the many reasons why founders should place a high emphasis on investing in the development of early employees – invest in them and they will invest in you. A great quote on the topic we’ll leave you with: “Train people well enough so they can leave, treat them well enough, so they don’t want to.”
🎨 In Steal Like an Artist, Austin Kleon drives home the idea that greatness isn’t defined by originality. What makes art great, and appealing is that artists are constantly coming up with new ways to interpret basic ideas. This is no different in the SaaS world. Much in the same way that art is the product of the artist’s influences, new companies and products are the results of a founder rebuilding how to solve a persistent problem. Verticals expand because while there are some legacy players most of the old solutions have flaws or don’t fit universal audiences. How companies succeed is defined by how well they rebuild solutions to fit a new sect in the market.