How to Add Value & Market to Your Database

Would you market to your customers the same way you would to potential customers?

Probably not, here's another question ... would you market to your leads the same way you would to first time visitors?

That might be a little tricky. I hope all of you said no.

As a lead for a company, you want to feel as if they know everything about you and what you need. Almost like they have some super power helping them provide you with the content and information you need to help push you down the sales funnel.

Unfortunately, that's not always true. A lot of companies tend to engage and market to their middle of funnel leads the same way they would first time visitors.

Adding value to your marketing efforts can keep your leads from running in the other direction. The saying money can buy you happiness might not be true, but adding context to your marketing strategy will definitely make your current leads happy.

Before you know it, those MOFU leads might even be a customer.

4 Effective Ways to Market to Your Current Leads

Segmentation

Lets hope that you've heard this before ... no two leads are identical. This means each lead will have their own set of needs, wants and goals.

Therefore, one mass email or marketing strategy is not going to work. I mean it will if your objective is to get your contacts to unsubscribe.

You want to target your leads by sending them content that's relevant to their interests.

The days of sending multiple mass emails a week is over, it's now about segmenting your leads database to effectively reach those individuals.

If you don't already know this, your lead database can be sliced and diced a bunch of ways. Your list can be segmented by persona, industry, organization type, interest level, stage in sales cycle, form abandonment, page views, offers downloaded; I could go on forever.

Smart Content

Does your content change and adapt to the needs and interests of your contacts? If not, it probably should.

According to a 2013 study from Harris Interactive and Janrain, they found that nearly three-fourths (74%) of online consumers get frustrated with websites when content they see has nothing to do with their interests.

Showing your current and MOFU leads the same content as first time visitors isn't going to get them to reconvert. Using what you know about them is will.

Smart content is all about having the ability to meet customer expectations and creating a relevant experience. In today's age, consumers now expect companies to know and utilize what pages they've viewed, what offers they've downloaded, and other behaviors on their site to their advantage.

If a visitor is willing to give up their contact information, they are expecting you to use that information to target and engage with them. They don't want to receive the same email over and over.

So, what exactly is smart content? It's content that changes and adapts based on a leads activity and behavior. It takes into consideration the persons lifecycle stage. Smart content doesn't just apply to calls-to-action. The types of smart content you can generate include images, videos, text, etc.

If you're using HubSpot implementing smart content is easy. All you have to do is implement smart rules. A smart rule could be, "if the database says someone has already provided you with his or her company name, show them this XYZ."

Lead Nurturing

Now that you've started to segment your contacts and implemented smart content, this is a good time to start nurturing your leads.

You cannot just hand over your MOFU leads to your sales team. Typically, they aren't ready to talk to sales. You are just going to scare them away.

What would you do without lead nurturing? At this point, you should take what you know about your contacts to start developing that connection you have with them into meaningful relationships.

The goal of lead nurturing is to build up a relationship with a lead before pushing a sale onto them.  These leads are still looking into information and doing research. Encourage them to download an offer or read content related to their interests.

Lead nurturing is also a great opportunity to send emails to members of your database that aren't subscribed to your blog. Lets say someone on your marketing team just wrote this amazing article about how to move your HubSpot CMS to their new COS. You might want to consider sending the article to current leads that have HubSpot and those who are trying to move their site over.

It's all about being a resource for those individuals.

Social Nurturing

Lead nurturing doesn't just have to take place through email marketing and marketing automation. Social media plays a big part.

It's about having the ability to communicate and build a relationship with your leads. Think of your leads as your best friend.

A great tool for monitoring your social media profiles and building those types of relationships with your current leads is HubSpots Social Inbox. If you aren't using it you should.

Their color-coded sidebar and custom streams make it even easier to keep the conversation going.

• Green: Customer

• Orange: Lead / Contact

• Gray: Possible contact

• No color: Person is not yet a contact

Social Inbox makes it easy for marketers to follow crucial conversations initiated by prospects, leads, and customers.

This tool isn't just for social media managers. It's a great way for someone like me to send tweets to members of the sales or design teams. Nurturing and engaging with your leads isn't just about blasting your content out there. It's about providing them with content relevant to their needs.

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