Why does your business exist? What greater purpose are you trying to achieve? What changes are you trying to affect in your customers or the community? What problems are you trying to help your customers solve and why are those problems important? What do you want to share specifically and why?
Which products are most profitable and generate the most referrals? Which services do you enjoy delivering the most? List your products and services in order of value in terms of helping you achieve your “why”.
To identify who your ideal client is ask yourself this question: who stands to benefit the most from your products and services? This “who” will be the most profitable and the best source of referrals for your business. Use John Jantsch’s formula to bring your “who to life”.
Identify 3 to 5 SMART goals that will help your business better deliver those products and services that are the most valuable to your “why”. A SMART goal is Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time Bound. For example, “increase our mailing list” is not a SMART goal. “Increase our mailing list by 500 subscribers who have expressed interest in product X by June 30” is a SMART goal.
You will more than likely have multiple tools that you can use to help your marketplace with different problems. List as many tools as you can. These tools will most likely be products and services you sell, or “segments” or “snippets” of those products and services. For example a business health check might include a worksheet that the small business owner can fill in. The worksheet on its own might be a tool you can offer your marketplace to help them.
Once prospects in your marketplace are visiting your website to consume the content that you have produced, you need to capture as many leads as you can. The best way to do this is to offer those visitors something for free in exchange for their email address. Brainstorm ideas for things you can give away that will add value to your marketplace and further position you as a trusted source of information. Worksheets, checklists, spreadsheet templates, blueprints, calculators, meal planners, budget planners and any other type of downloadable activity-based tool usually work the best.
Now that you have captured somebody’s details, it is time to nurture that relationship by offering more value and beginning a conversation with them. This is usually done through a series of follow-up emails that further assist your prospect. For example, a series of 3 to 5 emails teaching your prospect how to use the tool they just downloaded is a great place to start.
The reason most leads do not convert into customers is because they are not sure what to do next. Identify your on-boarding process and brainstorm how you can take this process online. For example, an accounting firm might offer a business health check session and place an application form on their website with a payment option for a new client to book this session. Part of your email nurture sequence should clearly state to your leads how they can engage your services or buy your products.
It is possible to measure almost everything our website visitors and email subscribers do through online metric software such as Google Analytics and email marketing software like Mailchimp. The problem is there is too much to measure and you can end up feeling overwhelmed by all the data. Each organization has one “magic metric” that, if improved in the next 90 days, will add the most value to the business. It could be visitors to the website, lead capture conversion rates, lead to client conversion rates, click through rates from your emails, or any number of other metrics. Identify your “magic metric” based on your goals and your current situation.
