Skipping steps is rarely a good thing in any relationship. That includes the one you have with your audience. That’s why it’s so important to establish a Buyer’s Journey – and to stick to it – in any marketing campaign. Even something as basic as a web page proves there’s really no getting around the process. If you’re not convinced, try putting a “Click here to buy” button in the marquee banner of your landing page and see what it gets you. (Spoiler alert: It won’t be clicks.)
A Buyer’s Journey is a nurturing path, gently guiding customers and prospects to the place you want them to go. Along the way, you feed them morsels to keep them from getting bored or disinterested – an appetizing white paper, a side of informative emails, a palate-cleansing video, an interactive PDF with some meat on its bones. And for dessert, a sweet loyalty program they can’t resist. But serve them that loyalty program as soon as they sit down at the table and they’re likely to crinkle their nose and say, “Not right now, thanks.”
Mahalo has developed a template for what a Buyer’s Journey should look like: its phases and their goals, useful assets to track to those goals, and how it all works together. Download it here and take a look. It’s possible you’ve been trying to put a hotel on Boardwalk without buying four houses first. And everyone knows you can’t do that.
