why understanding your audience is like making friends
TRANSCRIPT
Why understanding your audience is like making FRIENDS
How to attract, engage and grow a loyal audience
It’s the common downfall of so much B2B marketing: brands forget they’re speaking to real people. And regardless of our industry, company or job title, we value and respond to
the same things in a business context as we do at any other time.
As a business, this means that the better you understand your audience, the greater chance you have of speaking to them in a way that resonates with them and makes them
feel valued.
This in turn creates a greater brand experience, increased customer loyalty and –ultimately – more sales.
Your customers are people
Attracting an audience is like getting to know a new friend…
It takes time.You can’t force it.
Who are you talking to?
The first step for any business is to understand who they’re actually talking to, and one of the best ways to do this is through audience personas.
Creating personas is how a business defines the core identity (or identities) of their customers and involves much more than just outlining a demographic. A persona is an archetype
representing the goals, behaviours, skills, attitudes and environment of a real group of users. They are human – not market segments, job roles or statistical averages.
Audience personas will help you identify more closely with the day-to-day tasks, needs and challenges of the customers you’re targeting.
Personas help a business define how it talks to all of its different customers, whether they’re a Rachel or a Monica; a Joey or a Chandler.
They help a business figure out what to say, when to say it and how to say it.
Knowing what each persona needs you for will help create a brand voice and enable you to map out how and when you should engage.
Stop boring them
Once you’ve attracted your audience, you need tokeep them engaged beyond their first interaction withyour brand. But how?
Are you talking to them about things they actuallyneed to know, or just spamming them with messagesabout your products and services?
Are you giving them something they can’t findelsewhere, or producing the same ‘meh’ content as allof your competitors?
Find out what they need…
…And give it to them
Do they need to know more about updates to superannuation legislation? How to implement the latest track and trace technology for manufacturing?
Educate your prospects. Inform them instead of selling to them and they will reward you with their loyalty when they are ready to buy.
The best way to be useful to your audience is to help them solve a problem, even if the solution doesn’t involve your full product offering. What are the challenges they face in their role? And
how can you help them overcome it?
Find out how they spend…
…And map your buyer journey accordingly
If you don’t understand how they buy, you won’t know when you should sell to them, and when
you shouldn’t.
Give them something to do
In order to maintain engagement with your audience, you need to give themopportunities to interact with your brand:
• Ask them to follow you on social media
• Suggest they sign up for your monthly newsletter
• Recommend they download your latest eBook
• Encourage them to click through to the related white paper from the blog post they’rereading
Every contact you have with your audience should include a call to action, in order topush them further along the buyer journey.
Keep building your audience…
by creating brand advocates
Be a brand they’re proud to follow
While it may take time and effort to create brand advocates, it’s certainly not impossible.
A customer who feels proud to be a part of your business will happily share your messages.
But what makes a customer proud?
• A business that delivers on its promises;
• A business that is truly helpful;
• A business that communicates with them in a way that they engage with.
Make it easy for them to tell their friends about you
If you want your customers to talk about you, you need to make it easy for them!
• Check your social sharing buttons are visible and work correctly.
• Make sure they’re linking to the correct pages and correct hashtags.
• Make sure your emails are easy to forward and format correctly.
• Use headings that make sense when shared.
• When creating content, think about why a customer would want to share it. If you can’t think of a reason, you’re creating the wrong content.
How you doin’ with your content marketing? Need a hand?
Contact Cirrus Media
02 8484 0950