This is a guest post by Jennifer Ramsey, a repost from savvysme.com.au

One of the most vital factors for a freelance business is having a compelling marketing offer and call to action for your customers.

Does your marketing pass the 3-second test? In other words, would your audience know exactly how you can help them with their specific problem in 3 seconds or less?

Because that’s all you’ve got: 3 seconds before they move on.

This is vital in professional services where you must stand out among the literal sea of other service providers. Money won’t come in unless your audience knows what you have to sell and trusts you enough to buy it.

I’ve seen too many start-ups spend more time on logos and physical branding at the expense of what’s most vital for business growth—your marketing offer and call to action.

Taking just two days out of your first 100 to focus on this will save you thousands of dollars and hours in marketing activity and frustration.

As a startup, you’ve got limited time and resources—so focus on creating an authentic, aligned offer that will deliver results to a specific audience. In turn, you’ll make sales and become known as an expert in your field.

After two years of start-up struggles, one of my clients made $15,000 at his first 3-hour workshop by creating a targeted marketing offer. Fourteen months later, he has hit his revenue and lifestyle targets and is taking his offering nationally.

The power of this approach is its targeted, strategic focus—you save yourself time and money and reap the rewards sooner. This is very different to old-style branding programs that emphasise building a brand and making an offer to a wide range of audiences in the hope that someone might buy.

So create some time in your schedule and work with your team to create a targeted marketing offer and call to action.

Six steps to creating a successful marketing offer

Here are six steps to help you create a focused marketing offer that will help you make sales:

1. Get to know your audience

To make the right offer to your audience, you need to know them as well as you know your best friend. You need to understand what bothers them most; what problems you can solve for them; how they live and who influences them.

To answer these questions you’re best to do a simple audience survey to find out as much about your audience as you can. Once you have done this, compile your information and create an “audience avatar”.

What is an “audience avatar”? An audience avatar is a summary of your ideal client. Done properly it will become your one stop shop source of information about your audience—you’ll always know what to say and how to communicate with your audience. You’ll be clear on their core issues and how you can solve them.

Creating an audience avatar will save your hours of time and marketing effort. To find out how to create an avatar check out my blog article here.

2. Clarify your marketing offer

Your offer needs to be clear to your audience. What do you want them to buy from you? What is the offer you are giving your audience? How will your offer make a difference in their lives? Is it explained in terms they would understand? Is it clearly stated in all of your marketing material?

An example of a great offer is the one offered by Freshbooks – a small business accounting software out of the US. Their offer is:

“Small business accounting software that makes billing painless.”

What do most of us in small businesses have issues with? Billing. It can be very painful, and if not done properly it can be devastating to cash flow and long-term business success.

Aside from hitting directly on their audience’s pain points, the other benefits of this offer are that it’s simple, memorable, and written in language that their audience will relate to.

3. Make your offer easily understandable and accessible to your audience

As a start-up, it’s likely you’ve been living and breathing your business for months or even years. You know it inside out, but can you explain your business and your offer in a way that makes sense to your audience?

There’s a phenomenon called the “curse of knowledge”—this happens when we know so much about our particular business or industry that we can forget what our audience needs to know to get started with us. This is something my clients struggle with—so we often go back to the beginning of their customer’s journey to focus on what they need and want to hear.

4. Have a compelling call to action

With the proliferation of social media and video, the marketplace is becoming increasingly saturated and noisy for everyone. You need to make sure you and your business can be heard and seen amid the noise with a very clear call to action. Does your call to action make sense? Is it clear and does it address your audience’s pain points?

Again if we look at the Freshbooks example above this is a great example of a simple, clear call to action in a prominent position on their website.

5. Create a sales funnel that is congruent for you and your audience

Does your sales funnel make sense to your audience? Is every step of the process appropriate and relatable to your audience? Would your audience feel comfortable with your selling practices?

Put yourself in your audience’s shoes and step through each step of your sales funnel. Are the emails or other marketing material written in appealing language? Does it feel comfortable to you? Would you want to buy from you? If so, then your funnel will be congruent and comfortable for your customers.

6. What is your plan to build your know, like, and trust factor?

People buy from people they know, like, and trust, so what is your plan to build your credibility with your audience? You need to have a plan in place to market your offer and for people to get to know you.

This plan needs to cover two things—how you put your offer out there (what platforms you’ll use) and how your audience will get to know you (what will you do to become real and relatable to your audience).

Building your know, like, and trust credentials take time. So allow yourself time in the market for people to get to know you.

To learn more about how to do this visit this blog article here.

Investing the time now will pay dividends later

Investing time in properly researching your audience and creating a targeted marketing offer will pay off. It will save you thousands and ensure you’re growing a viable business that will achieve your goals and make the difference you want to make in the world.

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Jennifer Ramsey
Director at jenramsey.com
I come from a background in corporate marketing, brand positioning and PR to help businesses craft and communicate their message and build their visibility with their audience. This post was written for savvysme.com.au.

 

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