Carpe Occasionem marketers! Seize the Opportunity. As a marketing exec I have been watching the adoption of anti-spam legislation and thinking that it may make life more difficult for marketers. However, I am now realizing that it may be more of an opportunity than a problem.
Even as we speak, there are groups around the globe discussing how to put a beat-down on the global Spam problem. I raise my clenched fists to the sky and proclaim, “I am not a spammer, just an honest marketer that has identified potential buyers through research and offered them unsolicited information which they might find useful.”
OK, so where is the opportunity in all of this?
The opportunity is for companies to step up their content-related processes. Rather than focusing on a shotgun approach of hitting as many leads as possible with less-than-optimal content, companies can use a rifle-shot approach that targets specific audiences with content that is so compelling that they will want more!
I know that 40-50% of opportunities are born from leads generated from marketing tactics, and the two best producing tactics are Events (content and branding) and Website (content and SEO). The remaining opportunities are cultivated by sales, but they still require marketing content to help them progress from “interested” to “buyer.”
Content is the fuel for the lead lifecycle. Without good content, companies would not be able to generate the leads they need, and sales would not be able to guide people from prospects to buyers. Content is king.
So where do you start?
- Get entire company bought in on defined segments for your target audiences (by geography, industry, job role, etc.
- Define the messaging for each segmented audience
- Create content for each of those segments
- Align marketing activities to those marketing segments
- Repeat
Most marketers would agree with this approach, but not all of them are following it. So, if you’re thinking that your company will be hobbled as anti-spam legislation spreads from country to country, take a step back, get a fresh look at it, and you will start to see the opportunity to make your marketing efforts more effective with inspiring content.
