The Content Manager: The Underrated Solution for Marketing Success [Endless Customers Podcast Ep. 50]

As a business owner or CEO, you've likely spent countless hours and dollars on marketing efforts that just don't seem to deliver the results you're hoping for. You've tried agencies, freelancers, and various experts, but something's still missing. What if there was one change you could make that would transform your marketing efforts and truly connect with your audience?

Enter the content manager - your problem-solver for marketing success.

At IMPACT, we've worked with hundreds of companies around the world, helping them revolutionize their marketing and sales strategies. And time and time again, we've seen the incredible impact that a dedicated content manager can have on a business. But we understand the hesitation. You might be thinking, "Do I really need another full-time employee? Can't I just keep outsourcing?"

Let's dive into why a content manager could be the game-changer your business needs.

The Content Manager: Jack-of-All-Trades, Master of Your Brand

So, what exactly does a content manager do? As John Becker, Coach and Director of Content here at IMPACT, explains:

"We use the term content manager. But this person might be called a content writer or a content director, a content marketing manager. And I think in some ways you can almost think of it as a communications director."

At its core, a content manager can be responsible for:

1. Content Creation: They produce educational content for your website, including blogs, articles, buyer's guides, and case studies.
2. Website Management: They ensure your messaging is on target across all pages.
3. Social Media Management: They handle social posts and maintain your online presence.
4. Video Scripts: They craft compelling scripts for your video content.
5. Newsletters: They create engaging email content to keep your audience informed.

In essence, anything written that represents your brand falls under the content manager's purview. It's a substantial responsibility, but one that can transform how you communicate with your audience.

In-House vs. Outsourcing: What’s Better For Your Business?

Many companies rely on outsourcing for their content needs. It seems cost-effective on the surface, but is it really? 

When you add up all the different marketing expenses - the SEO agency, the freelance writers, the social media manager - you might be surprised to find you're spending more than you would on a full-time content manager's salary.

But it's not just about the money. It's about the quality and consistency of your brand voice. An in-house content manager becomes immersed in your company culture, understands your products or services inside and out, and can react quickly to market changes or customer feedback.

As John explains, "If you have a content manager or a videographer on staff, you can suddenly get things turned around way more quickly. And as we always say to our clients, that means a lot more content gets produced. You're able to just tackle more topics, post on more sites, explore more platforms."

The Mindset Shift: Education is the Future of Marketing

At IMPACT, we believe that the way people buy has fundamentally changed. As John puts it:

"The future of marketing is education. People want information to make a decision, and if you are the one who offers that information, you build a relationship with a customer."

This is where a content manager becomes invaluable. They're not just churning out promotional material; they're creating educational content that builds trust with your audience. In a world where consumers are increasingly skeptical of traditional advertising, this approach sets you apart.

"There are plenty of marketing tips and techniques out there that are about gimmicks and hacks and, you know, kind of trickery," John notes. "And endless customers is the absolute other end of the spectrum. It's about sincerity. It's about honesty. It's about candor. It's about transparency."

Finding the Right Fit: What to Look for in a Content Manager

So, you're convinced. You're ready to bring a content manager on board. But what should you look for? John suggests:

1. Writing Experience: Look for journalism or English graduates who can produce content quickly.
2. Inquisitiveness: You want someone eager to learn about your industry and business.
3. Motivation: Self-starters who can take initiative are invaluable.
4. Coachability: The ability to learn and grow into the role is crucial.

Remember, the person you hire on day one will likely be quite different from who they become after a year in the role. They'll grow with your company, becoming an integral part of your brand voice.

The Power of Coaching: Optimizing Your Content Manager's Success

While hiring a content manager is a great start, pairing them with a coach can accelerate their growth and effectiveness. 

A coach provides accountability, shares best practices, and helps your content manager avoid common pitfalls. This outside perspective can help compress years of learning into months, getting you better results faster.

This coach can also refer to other current and previous clients, even in different industries, to let you know what has worked well for others. This can create much needed inspiration that your content manager wouldn’t have otherwise had.

The Reality: It's Easier Than You Think

If you're feeling overwhelmed at the prospect of hiring a content manager, take heart. It's likely easier than you think. John shares:

"A lot of CEOs come into hiring for this role and think, ‘I'm never going to find this person. This is going to take forever. This is going to take me weeks to even get a job posting out there. Then more weeks through interview onboarding. We're talking about someone who's not going to be up and running for months, right?’ And that couldn't be further from the truth."

In fact, with the right approach, you could have quality candidates within days, and a content manager hired and producing content within weeks, not months. And remember, the best way to learn is by doing. Get your new hire creating content right away, and they'll quickly find their groove.

The Bottom Line: Invest in Your Brand's Voice

Your content is often the first interaction a potential customer has with your brand. It's how you build trust, demonstrate expertise, and set yourself apart from the competition. A dedicated content manager allows you to take control of this crucial aspect of your marketing.

As John puts it: "A content manager allows you to personalize and control that brand better than if you work with an agency. I think in the age of AI- and AI is really important to a content manager. It's absolutely a supercharger. They should be using it in various ways. But ultimately a content manager is a personalizer of your brand."

So, if you're tired of pouring money into marketing efforts that don't seem to move the needle, it might be time to consider bringing a content manager on board. It's an investment in your brand's voice, in building genuine connections with your audience, and in setting your business up for long-term success.

Ready to take the next step? Reach out to us at IMPACT. We're here to help you navigate this transition and unlock the full potential of your marketing efforts. Let's create endless customers together.

Connect with John

John Becker is a coach, trainer, marketer, speaker, and writer. A New Haven-area native, John studied at UPenn, Middlebury, and UMass, and has previously worked in both corporate and nonprofit settings.

• Connect with John on LinkedIn

Keep Learning

• Watch: 'The Big 5': Best Business Blog Topics to Drive Traffic and Sales (+ examples)

• Read: How to Fire Your Marketing Agency (And Not Skip a Beat)

• Free Assessment: How Does Your Sales and Marketing Measure Up?

Author: awinter@impactbnd.com (Alex Winter)

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Publicis Groupe Acquires Influencer-Marketing Giant Influential

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How To Improve Your Website’s Reputation With Google [Infographic]

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Reddit Cuts off Search Engine Scrapers, Including Bing

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Reddit Launches Lead Generation Ads

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How to Fire Your Marketing Agency (And Not Skip a Beat)

When businesses hire a marketing agency, it can be an exciting time.

The honeymoon phase is glorious, with ideas flowing and motivation high. But then sometimes months pass and the results aren't as you’d hoped.

Maybe traffic is low, leads are poor, and you're just not closing the deals you were looking for. You might be faced with the difficult decision of breaking ties with your agency, but you don't want to burn bridges or leave your business in an even worse place as you transition. 

Breaking up with your agency doesn't have to be messy. 

There are key steps you need to take to end the relationship on good terms and set your business up for continued success.

In this article, we’ll cover:

• How to know if it truly is time to fire your marketing agency.
• Steps to take when offboarding your agency and ending the relationship.
• How to proceed after the service end date.
• What to consider before jumping into hiring another marketing agency.

With this information, not only will you learn how to approach this difficult situation in the appropriate way, but you will also learn how to ensure you’re covered after parting ways.

Signs you need to fire your marketing agency

When businesses hire a marketing agency but don’t see the growth they’d hoped for, it can be difficult to know when the time is right to fire that agency. 

You might be thinking about how much time and effort it’s taken to find the agency, and maybe there are things you can do to help make it work, but trust us when we say that waiting too long can be costly. 

Now, we're not telling you to jump ship. But you should be on the lookout for a few signs.

Here are the red flags to be aware of when deciding whether or not to let your marketing agency go:

• You haven't seen an uptick in sales opportunities after six months: Marketing strategies can take a while to plan and implement, but they shouldn’t take too long. Although your business should expect a planning period and time to get things rolling, you should ideally be seeing significant results by the six-month mark. Even if other numbers are climbing, if they aren't resulting in sales, something is not working. 
• The content they produce doesn’t sound like your brand: One of the biggest setbacks we see businesses struggle with is that the agency-produced content doesn’t sound like them. Now, in modern marketing, "content" can mean anything from blog articles to website copy to conversion paths, to social media posts. In order for you marketing to be successful, you need consistency in your content across platforms.  
  It’s very difficult to get an agency or even a freelancer to capture who you are if they don’t focus solely on you — and with other clients to juggle, they will never be able to.
• Your agency team has high turnover: A high turnover rate at your agency is never a good sign. When you work with an agency, you're building a relationship and trusting your image with them. You don't want the talent on your project to be constantly changing. If your account is regularly changing hands it's likely that instability is a perpetual problem at your agency. 

Bottom line, if no one at your business is excited about the agency’s work, this is a major indication the marketing strategy is falling flat and doesn’t have the command it needs to create real change.

An effective marketing agency should be generating results that are motivating for your team.

If your agency is missing the mark, you're not alone. In fact, about 40% of brands plan on ditching their agency in the next six months.

The reasons are many, but they come down to the same core issue: There's more noise than ever before. In the age of AI, content is easier to create than ever before, and marketing plans are a dime a dozen. A sub-par marketing strategy won't help you stand out from the crowd. 

So, don't wait. Be honest with yourself about how your agency is performing and make the best decision for its long-term performance.

How to fire your agency (and not skip a beat)

So you’ve made the decision to fire your marketing agency. Here’s what your offboarding process should look like:

1. Review your current contract and follow its conditions

The first step to firing your marketing agency is knowing your contract. It’s important to know the terms of your separation, how much notice you need to provide, and the rest of the conditions you’ve agreed to so you can keep them.

Most agreements require 30 days of notice, but if there is no time frame specified, set one. Whatever you choose, just be sure to give your business enough time to wrap up loose ends and not blindside your team or the agency.

2. Have your decision-makers make the announcement  

To avoid confusion and enforce formality, make sure to have your decision-makers communicate your decision to end the partnership. 

This shows alignment and avoids the agency asking to speak to leadership for further details. 

Be sure that leadership is direct and concise with the decision. But they should also provides feedback, if possible, as to why. This professional courtesy is appreciated, especially if you've developed a friendly relationship with your contact.

3. Plan when and how to end current projects

If you're in the middle of a project with your agency, ask it to provide you with a timeline detailing how they will complete it before the service end date or come to an agreement otherwise.

This is critical to making sure you're not left with unfinished work you're unable to complete on your own.

4. Get all files and processes

Get your agency to gather and send you any files and processes used during your time together.

If you’ve used a project management tool, such as Basecamp, ask how long you will have access to it so you can take all the necessary files with you before ending any projects.

5. Get admin access to all company accounts

Make sure your agency grants you access and ownership of all the relevant accounts so that you can maintain them after the partnership ends.

(Believe it or not, some businesses miss this step and let agencies keep access to their private business accounts.)

These accounts typically include: 

• Google suite tools, such as Google Analytics, Google Search Console, Google Business Profile, and Google Adwords.
• Social media pages and accounts.
• Third-party accounts, such as HubSpot, Semrush, Hotjar, and Lucky Orange.
• Back-end access to your website.

6. Remove agency from all accounts

Once your service end date is over, be sure to remove agency users from all company accounts and change your passwords. This is so they can no longer access your company’s profiles, metrics, and private data. 

After the breakup...

Once these steps are complete, it’s time to set yourself up as soon as possible for your business’s next chapter. This may include asking yourself if you should work with another agency.

After all, will it really be that different?

Should you keep outsourcing your marketing?

Before hiring another marketing agency, think about what you need to accomplish. 

In general, we recommend that you keep the most important pieces of your marketing efforts in-house.

For example, if it’s important that your messaging resonates with your buyers better than anyone else in your industry, you can better accomplish this by bringing content creation in-house. 

While some outsourced writers are incredibly talented and may even have experience in your industry, they will never have deep understanding of your business. They’re simply not in it day-to-day.

The people who will resonate most with your prospects and most accurately address your products, processes, and culture are the people in it every day: your sales team, your engineering team, your customer support team, your executive team, and so on.

These SMEs (or subject matter experts) are the ultimate source of the most honest, helpful, and transparent content available, anywhere.

They will know more about your business than any outside marketing agency or freelance writer ever could. 

Overall, anything that is core to the way you operate your business and marketing on a day-to-day basis should be in-house.

Typically, we recommend the following:

In-house content management

You need a person on your team to obsess over your content day in and day out, making sure you’re publishing high-quality, educational content three times a week.

This includes blog articles, buyer's guides, email campaigns, and anything else that is helpful to your audience.

What you'll need to do:

When you bring content production in-house, you need to start by hiring someone to own it. Depending on their experience and specific responsibilities, this person may be called a content manager, content writer, or even content marketing director. 

This person will be determine what content is needed, get it produced, and measure its performance afterwards.

🔎 Related: Content Manager Job Description Template

In-house video production

Video is no longer a nice-to-have. It's essential for building your brand and connecting with your audience.

Just think about all the questions your buyers are asking during the sales process. Imagine video content that answers every one. A videographer can help you make video a core pare of your marketing strategy — and you can do this cheaper and quicker than you think.

What you'll need to do: 

Similar to content management, when you bring video in-house you will need someone to own video production in your company. This includes determining what videos are needed and ensuring they're produced, but also actual filming, editing, and even script writing. 

🔎 Related: How To Hire an In-House Videographer: Selecting and Interviewing the Best Candidate

In-house CMS and CRM management

With so much to analyze and keep on top of, no marketing agency is going to manage your CRM like an in-house specialist will, whether you’re using HubSpot or another tool. You want to have constant access to analytics and reports from the marketing tools to see the most accurate and reliable data. 

What's more, you need to be able to make website updates in-house. This means understanding your CMS and developing the ability to make changes, build pages, move buttons, and run A/B tests.

We tell our clients that you should be able to handle 80% of your website management in-house. Knowing the basics will save you tons of money in the long run — and give you greater control in the day-to-day.

What you'll need to do:

Your CRM management may likely fall more into the hands of your sales team, as it houses all of your lead and prospect activity. Make sure they incorporate it into their sales process, but also make sure your marketing team is aware of how to use the CRM to personalize content, automate emails, and more.

In some cases, you may need a dedicated CRM admin person, but it depends on your size and unique needs.

Your CMS, on the other hand, will be the jurisdiction of your marketing team. 

🔎 Related: Need a HubSpot Admin? How to Find and Hire the Right Candidate

'What should I still outsource?'

When it comes to outsourcing, limit it to complicated projects that require a lot of technical skill but are on a part-time basis.

This may include but is not limited to: 

• Large technical or one-off projects, such as software integrations, brand development, website design, or app development.
• Paid advertising, such as on Google or social media. 

🔎 Related: We dive deeper into these areas in our article, "What Marketing Tasks Should I Still Outsource?" 

Take charge of your marketing success 

There are thousands of great marketing agencies out there, but sometimes success isn't about picking the right one. Instead, it's about knowing what you need and how to get it. 

For authentic content and effective marketing strategies, we've found that an in-house team works better. If you hand these off to a company that doesn't live and breathe what you do, you might end up with sub-par results. 

No one knows your business better than you do. No one knows your processes, culture, voice, and buyers better than you do. It's these details that you need to capture and share to build trust with a modern customer.  

Want to learn more about building trust and winning business in the age of AI? Subscribe to our "Endless Customers" podcast. We dive deep in marketing and sales success in every episode. 

Author: cdelaney@impactbnd.com (Connor DeLaney)

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How To Get Found in the Post-SEO Apocalypse [Endless Customers Podcast Ep. 47]

About This Episode

Can artificial intelligence technology like OpenAI’s ChatGPT replace traditional search engines like Google?

This is the question many business owners are asking today. Many of these same business owners have based their marketing strategy on being found through SEO and Google, therefore creating a lot of concern around the subject.

Marcus Sheridan has been at the forefront of marketing innovation, and has used search and Google to his advantage in creating an industry-dominating swimming pool company. Rather than being concerned solely about Google, Marcus highlights the necessity for businesses to adapt swiftly to the current changes. “You cannot have your house built upon Google. Otherwise, you could be in very big trouble,” he asserts, emphasizing the impermanence of traditional SEO strategies.

Hearing this from the mouth of Marcus Sheridan could sound strange, given the fact that he created the They Ask, You Answer methodology, which emphasizes the importance of written content for your business. However, Marcus shares that ‘blogging’ isn’t what his methodology is about.

"The thing that most people misunderstand about 'They Ask, You Answer'...is that they think it's a blogging strategy, which breaks my heart." He emphasizes, "What 'They Ask, You Answer' really is rooted in is how the buyer has changed, how they're behaving, and how do we meet them where they are."

Sheridan acknowledges the uncertainty but advises businesses to focus on immediate strategies to remain relevant. “We need to make sure we win the game of search when it comes to AI recommendations,” he explains. This involves creating high-quality content across various platforms, particularly YouTube and social media, to send strong signals to these platforms’ algorithms.

Sheridan emphasizes the importance of YouTube Shorts, describing it as a golden opportunity for businesses to gain visibility. “YouTube Shorts is wide open for the taking in many industries. You could rank number one in YouTube results tomorrow,” he claims. He advocates for a strategic approach to content creation, blending viral potential with search optimization.

Despite the technological upheavals, Sheridan remains optimistic, urging businesses to embrace change with enthusiasm and curiosity. He concludes with a rallying call for adaptation and innovation: “We have to look ahead with hope. We have to look ahead with curiosity. We should look ahead with enthusiasm.”

Connect with Marcus

Marcus Sheridan is a writer, speaker, and business expert who’s worked with companies all over the world. Marcus is the author of They Ask, You Answer and co-author of The Visual Sale.

Connect with Marcus on LinkedIn

Learn more about They Ask, You Answer

See how companies have used They Ask, You Answer to fuel their success

Keep Learning

• Read: Why Trust is the True Currency for All Businesses

• Watch: Winning with YouTube Shorts: Mastering the Algorithm on the Front Lines

• Learn: What is a ‘Learning Center’ and Why Does My Business Need One?

Author: awinter@impactbnd.com (Alex Winter)

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TikTok Partners with DistroKid to Help Emerging Musicians

A new way for TikTok to guide emerging artists into the app.

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Meta Suspends AI Development in EU and Brazil Over Data Usage Concerns

Meta's latest policy changes relating to AI have raised questions in some regions.

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X Will Allow Users To Request a Community Note on Posts

Another way to help dispel misinformation and false reports in the app.

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X Tests Auto Advance Mode for Video Viewing

Auto advance would enable you to watch X videos in a more leaned-back manner.

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Meta’s Testing AI Comment Summaries on Facebook

Meta's got another way to get you using its AI features, whether you like them or not.

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An Overview of the Modern TV Viewing Landscape [Infographic]

The modern media consumption landscape is changing.

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TikTok Provides an Update on Its Data Safety Measures in Europe

TikTok says that much of its "Project Clover" initiative is now in effect.

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Meta Lifts All Restrictions on Trump’s Accounts Ahead of US Election

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X Moves to the Next Stage of Testing for Comment Downvotes

X's dislike button for replies is set to be a broken heart icon in-stream. 

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Instagram’s Looking to Enable Retrospective Tags for Collaborative Posts

Soon, you'll be able to tag collaborators after publishing an IG post. 

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Meta Lowers Age Limits for VR Social Experiences

But should preteens be allowed to chat in VR spaces?

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6 Common Website Lead Generation Problems (and How to Fix Them)

When everything is working “right” in digital marketing, traffic is up, conversions are high, and lead generation is operating at peak performance.

But what happens when the leads dry up? How do you fix lead generation problems? 

Unfortunately, there’s no button on any given website that you can hit to turn on the leads. (If only it were that easy.) However, there are multiple solutions any digital marketer can implement to fix the most common lead generation website problems. 

Lead generation problem #1: Low traffic

When it’s time to research why the leads aren’t flowing anymore, the first inclination is to turn to traffic numbers. If this is you, rest assured, you’re not alone. In fact, 61% of marketers say generating traffic and leads is their top challenge. But in the age of AI, where the very bedrock under traditional SEO is giving way, tactics that worked a few years ago may no longer apply. 

Still, it's important to master the basics. 

Solution: Master the technical SEO basics

Start at the very beginning and make sure that your website is technically working the way it’s supposed to. While technical SEO isn’t something you can master overnight, there are some SEO basics you should be monitoring consistently. 

Security 

If your site isn’t secure with an SSL certificate, Google will mark your site as “unsecured.” Not only does this mean you’ll be dinged with a lower search ranking, but it breaks your prospects’ trust in you if they don’t feel safe conducting business on your site.

Site speed

For every second of additional load time, a site loses 7% of its conversions. If you’re annoyed at how slow your site is, then your prospects are too. Don’t let them down by forcing them to wait for what you have to offer.

At this point, those prospects may not even make it to your page at all. 

Google has been rewarding faster sites in its rankings ever since its speed update 2018. 

Crawlability

If you want Google to crawl the content on your site, you need to tell it where to go. The Google spider naturally follows the links on each page, but you can direct it to where you want it to go by submitting a sitemap. This gives you the power to highlight pages you want indexed or exclude others you don’t.

Broken links and 404s

Broken links obstruct the user experience on your site and, if not resolved, can prevent users from hitting your site at all. 

You guessed it — Google penalizes sites with too many 404 error pages. The easy solution to this is to fix those broken links. Google Search Console provides a list of broken links and errors you can resolve to keep your site clean and working properly.

Solution: Improve your content

While SEO basics are important, the biggest SEO hack of all time is also the hardest: Produce great content. If your content is valuable to your reader, it will perform better. Google has stated this as its mission for more than a decade. 

Now, with AI-generated answers and a bigger push toward location-specific search results, this holds more true than ever. 

So, even with your site is secure and speedy, you must optimize your content so it appears on the coveted search results page?

SEO’s importance, of course, extends far beyond the technical. Aside from getting your pages indexed and ranking higher in search, SEO:

1. Gets more traffic to your website 
2. Makes pages easier for readers to consume
3. Brings higher-quality traffic to your site
4. Pulls in more and better-qualified leads

Marketers who are new to SEO often believe that it’s driven by keywords alone, but everything on your site needs to work in tandem to get the SEO juice flowing, including:

• Title
• URL
• Meta description
• Headers
• Keywords
• Links
• Visuals 
• Actual content (we’ll get to that later)
• Word count

To drive organic traffic to your site, you’ll need to spend time perfecting each of these SEO elements.

🎓 For more information on optimizing for AI, check out: How to Build a Brand that AI Loves

Lead generation problem #2: Confusing UX

Imagine being dropped in a city you’ve never visited. Wandering into unknown territory can be either exciting or intimidating, depending on whether or not you know where to go. 

Don’t assume your website visitors are thrill-seekers — give them a map so they know how to get where they're going. Otherwise, they may enter the site, stumble around for a while, get frustrated, and leave.

Solution: Provide easy navigation

An easy to use website is the greatest marketing hack of all time. According to recent research, 37% of website users admitted that a poor experience with site navigation was enough to make them want to leave the site entirely.

There are several website navigation best practices to consider here, but the essence of easy site navigation should be centered around helping users know where they are, know how to return to where they were, or easily find where to go next.

This can be done with a few tactics:

• Providing a clear navigation bar at the top of the site that's helpful without being overwhelming.
• Having an efficient and pleasant search experience to reduce clicks.
• Presenting well-thought-out next steps on each page (relevant calls-to-action, or intelligently related articles/pages).
• Personalizing for a more curated, relevant overall site experience. This can be achieved with purely additive technology, like thoughtful pop-ups or dedicated sections.

Bonus Solution: Create a learning center

Providing a central place on your website where visitors can find all your best content is another powerful tactic to use so prospects don’t get lost.

Creating a learning center that is easily filtered and searchable lets visitors jump straight to whatever they are looking for. This not only helps newcomers to the website, but it acts as a crucial resource for your own employees. Your learning center will become a mainstay for your sales team to quickly access the content you create.

Learning Centers come in all forms, as these two IMPACT client sites show:

Berry Insurance's learning center is highly searchable and filterable. 

While River Pools’ learning center offers quizzes, calculators, and other resources to help potential customers. 

Lead generation problem #3: Disruptive conversion paths

Traffic may be up but leads are down — what’s a marketer to do?

If you find yourself in this scenario, you might have website conversion paths that are missing the mark in relation to where your prospects are on the buyer’s journey.

A sign of this might be having a very bottom of the funnel offer like “Request a Consultation,” “Contact Us,” or “Buy Now” as the call-to-action (CTA) after every blog post. 

Chances are, many of your readers simply aren’t ready to jump into a deeper conversation with you just yet. They’ll need more info from you before they give you their trust…and their business.

Solution: Mind the CTA

To make sure that your CTAs are attached to the right content pieces, run through the following exercise for each content item and offer.

1. Define your audience: Different offers (and the CTAs that go along with them) are most likely aimed at different audience segments. Make a list of all your content pieces and map which audience segment each piece is created for. Then, make a separate list doing the same for every offer you’ve created.
2. Define your buyer’s journey stage: Keep those lists handy and, in each of them, add another column to map the buyer’s journey stage. 

For each content piece and offer, determine if the reader is in the awareness stage (someone who is looking to define a problem), the consideration stage (someone who is looking at their options to solve the problem), or the decision stage (someone who knows how to solve their problem and is choosing who will help them).

Be a matchmaker. Once you’ve determined the audience and buyer’s journey stage for each item, it’s time to match them up.

For example, if you have an article that is written for Buyer A in the awareness stage, then look to use a CTA that prompts the reader to an offer written for the same buyer in the same stage. 

Not only does this allow you to provide conversion paths that are appropriate to your readers — meeting them where they are — it also lets you to pinpoint content gaps in your editorial calendar.

Lead generation problem #4: Content doesn’t connect

Trying to be everything to everyone (when you don’t really want everyone) might pull in a large amount of traffic, but it won’t do much to create the quality leads you’re looking for.

To get over this hurdle, make sure your content is connecting with the people coming to your site.

Solution (part 1): Write what people want

Covering blog topics your audience actually wants you to write will attract the right people by answering their questions. Your prospects are conducting online research to solve a problem or make a decision. Wouldn’t you rather be the one to educate them and give them honest advice about the next steps they should take?

Content that connects to your audience will keep them on your site, establish trust, and convert them into customers.

Solution (part 2): Clarify your value proposition

Make it clear to the reader they’re in the right (or wrong) place by providing a clear value proposition on your home page.

Like anything in marketing, this is easier said than done. Crafting a value statement is a strategic exercise in combining who you serve, what you do, and how you’re different.

The work you put into this, however, will pay off in spades. A good value proposition can not only help guide your content strategy, but it will clearly indicate to site visitors the tone and overall direction of what they’ll get on subsequent pages.

Don’t be afraid to be exclusive. It’s okay to write a value proposition (and other website content) that excludes bad-fit prospects. Allowing people to opt out of what you’re offering will save you both valuable time and effort.

Lead generation problem #5: Lack of trust

Alternatively, people won’t do business with you if they feel you’re hiding something from them.

Prospects and visitors who come to a site only to find it doesn’t provide what it promised, is too good to be true, or is void of actual information will cause your website bounce rate to increase exponentially. 

Solution: Stay true to your meta descriptions

Title tags and meta descriptions are two factors that can drive SEO and are also the two elements that appear on the search page that give your visitors an indication of what they’ll get when they click into your site. 

If your titles and metas are misleading, however, your visitors won’t be visitors for long — they’ll leave as soon as they realize you’ve written the meta to get their attention, not to educate them.

Do what you say and say what you’ll do. 

All that said, Google can change your meta descriptions at will to better reflect your content or better suit search terms, so keep that in mind. 

Solution: Profile your advocates

No matter how honest you are with your content, you can take your authenticity to the next level by including testimonials from successful clients and happy customers on your site. Visitors are more at ease with what you have to say when they can see actual results from real-life clients.

Assess who would be ideal candidates for case studies and invest the time to conduct interviews with these customers. 

For some quicker wins, ask your salespeople and client-facing coworkers to pinpoint their happiest accounts and customers. From there, reach out to satisfied clients and ask them about their experience with you, the results they received, or why they stay with you.

With their permission, you can use their quotes as testimonials throughout your website.

Lead generation problem #6: Setting and forgetting

Getting every element of a website exactly right takes a massive amount of effort and strategic thinking. It’s a rewarding feeling to have it set, but the work on a website is never finished.

Those marketers who take the time to breathe a sigh of relief, leave their site alone, and move on to the next project run the risk of abandoning leads. The attention you spend on maintaining the health of your site extends to the health of your digital pipeline.

Solution: Measure and respond

Think of your website as a living being that needs to be fed and nurtured constantly. Many of the marketing KPIs you should be tracking — traffic-to-lead ratio, landing page conversions, organic traffic — are directly tied to website performance.

Measurement is important to monitor your site’s health, but it’s meaningless if you aren’t acting on what the information is telling you. 

Analyze your data on a monthly basis and budget for time to test and experiment. For example, if something's not performance the way you'd hoped, set up an A/B test to see how two options compare. 

Common problems with several solutions

Is there a single button to push to fix your lead gen problems? Nope — there are several.

The key is figuring out what type of problem you’re having and determining the right solution. Use your analytics to guide you to where you need to look and what you need to do to rewrite, redesign, or repair on your website. 

With some strategic improvements, your data and your leads will be headed in the right direction.

Author: jbecker@impactbnd.com (John Becker)

* This article was originally published here

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