Most B2B entrepreneurs I talk to make the same mistake with their online sales strategy, regardless of their experience.
This mistake causes them to miss out on an awful lot of potential customers, and it also lowers the success of their website (and online ads).
The mistake is this:
The website strategy focuses only on the "big conversion" (quote, order, direct contact) rather than collecting e-mail addresses.
In short: They immediately expect the visitor to make the 'big' purchase on the website.
If this is your tactic, you are shooting yourself in the foot....every day.
Especially if your organization sells products where people need a longer decision process - for example, financial products, software products, coaching, or other high-end products.
In this case, your potential customers don't make the decision to purchase your product right away. At least not during their first website visit.
They need more time, and may go around competitors before making an informed decision.
So these potential customers will leave your website without buying anything (or making an appointment)....
Subsequently, chances are that the visitor will quickly forget about your brand and your product.
How unfortunate is it that you never see these people again, and they never hear from you again? After all, most of these visitors do have the need for your type of product or service (they visit your site for a reason).
Make sure you at least take the opportunity to guide these people through their buying journey.
Don't let them leave your website only to end up at the competitor's site....
The best way to engage interested visitors is to collect their e-mail addresses.
Once you have an email address, the real sales + marketing game begins. In fact, through email marketing, you can send these leads valuable content and get them "excited" about your product.
So you can basically build your entire sales pitch through email - through case studies, articles, etc.
In short: you bring them to your final product step by step with valuable content and your brand always remains "on top of mind.
Compare it to your first meeting with your future wife: do you ask her to marry you right away, or do you ask her on a date first? Of course you ask her on a date first, that makes sense.
But does that make sense on your current website to ask your visitors to "marry" your organization directly?
Isn't it better to give these visitors a chance to get to know your organization and your products better - before they want to proceed to purchase at all?
There is 1 way to execute this perfectly: through personalized (and automated) emails.
This way you guide the person step by step after the website visit to the final sale, without costing you extra time and effort.
That automatically brings us to the next question:
The best way to collect email addresses is with free "giveaways" (at Schurq we also call these mini-conversions).
This can be an e-book, white paper, checklist, course, presentation, etc.
Most importantly, this giveaway should be something of value to your potential customer.
Examples of giveaways for B2B organizations:
To get you further started, I will give you some more good examples of giveaways:
Seebeyondnumbers (blog for financial planners)
Seebeyondnumbers.com is a blog for Financial Planners. Writer Ronald Sier is offering a giveaway here, namely a free e-book "Why people don't buy financial planning - 9 mistakes you don't know you're making (and how to fix them).
It is the first thing you come across on his website.
How tempting is this for a financial planner? I think most financial planners are very eager to know what their pitfalls are and how to solve them.
In short: an excellent giveaway.
Aweber (email marketing software)
Aweber offers several giveaways on their website. These giveaways are aimed at helping entrepreneurs from different industries get started in the world of e-mail marketing.
In this way, they make their giveaways very specific, appealing to different audiences. Obviously, this will greatly increase the conversion rate per giveaway - choose and you will be chosen...
Social Media Examiner (social media consultancy)
Here they offer an "Industry Report" - a survey they have conducted themselves. This way you can very simply create an authority position for your organization.
Think how you can apply this to your industry -> incorporate a short survey of your current customers into a white paper.
schurq.
We offer several giveaways, including a free marketing automation handbook or an online advertising handbook. This is basically a free consultation.
In this way, we can immediately add value to the potential client, after which a follow-up order is more likely.
Is there also an opportunity for your organization to have a free consultation/check?
Thanks for reading. In the next blog, I will teach you how to reach as many potential customers as possible with your sales pitch.
