I don’t know about you, but I like puzzles. No, I’m not talking about the jigsaw kind. Those things annoying me. They’re a lot of work. The kind of puzzles I like are puzzle games. I remember years ago getting my Sunday paper, opening up to the magazine, and doing the Jumble every single week. A Jumble is basically a bunch of letters that were randomized, and you had to figure out what the word was based on a clue provided. I loved those. As a matter of fact, doing those for years has made me a pretty good player on Wheel of Fortune (when I watch it).
Connect The Dots
Today, I want to talk about a different kind of puzzle – connecting the dots. What I am talking about is the marketing puzzle. Your marketing should connect the dots to your sales. When we think about connecting the dots, think of a child’s picture. Inside of that, there’s a bunch of numbered dots and you have to go in order, dot by dot by dot. Eventually, when you connect all the dots, it creates a very clear picture. But the dots themselves just sit out there on their own. If you don’t connect them in the right order, you don’t get the desired result.
It’s the same thing with marketing and sales. With marketing, it should be part of the sales process. Those dots should connect. But a lot of time with marketing, I find people who succumb to BSOS, or Bright Shiny Object Syndrome, and just start putting dots all over the place and hope that those dots will eventually start to create the picture.
The Connection Between Marketing & Sales
Recently, I talked with a client. They wanted to use more videos to market their business. They said they were doing videos of exercises already, but they wanted to turn it into a regular marketing feature. Then I ask the question about, how does doing video connect the dots between marketing and sales? There was dead silence. He said, “I don’t know.” That’s the question that we had to answer.
They were just rolling the dice and hoping their audience would connect the dots for them. That’s not the most efficient way to help your marketing lead to more sales. Just like the kid’s picture puzzle, every dot has a purpose, if you don’t do them in the right order, you don’t get the desired result. Every dot should be a measurable step.
Also, each one of those dots needs to be interconnected, meaning that every dot should lead to something that creates a real in-person conversation. That is ultimately what is going to drive sales. Finally, it has to create a measurable percentage of income. Somehow, someway, you have been able to connect the process to an outcome. Once you have all of those dots aligned and you connect them in the right order, it creates a very clear picture of how your marketing can help generate sales.
I want to break this down to three different processes, and each one of them has three steps.
Done In Order
The first process is it has to be done in order. Your marketing is there to create attention. Think about creating a graphic posted in social media. If people don’t stop as they’re scrolling, you basically have a wasted opportunity. You can’t get anybody to take action on something they don’t stop to interact with. That’s the second step. You want to grab their attention and get them to take some action. And then, from that action, you want to create some kind of outcome. The outcome generally is having a pre-sales conversation.
Steps In The Middle
The second piece of this puzzle is defining the steps in the middle. The first step is to engage the reader by catching their eye. Can you get them to move on to the next dot? That next dot is to take some sort of action. That action generally will be to read or engage with or comment on the piece. So, a like or a comment is always one of the key goals of each piece. It’s not going to do as much good if they just consume it. You want to make sure that people are engaging with what you’re doing.
Close The Loop
The third step in this marketing system is to create that outcome. In other words, can you get them united to your content in a way that you can get them on an email list, follow what you’re doing, or start a conversation to build on their know, like, and trust of you and your business? The part of this concept is to close the loop. What do I mean by closing the loop?
Well, your goal should be to create a fan. You want somebody to not only engage with your content but look forward to more. If you’re doing things in a sequence you want them to continue to follow along step-by-step. You want to get them to look forward to your next piece of content that builds on what you’ve just presented.
I see this all the time with my Quote of the Day on Facebook. People will start to expect them daily and keep on the lookout for the next one. The same thing happens on LinkedIn with my Baconisms, where I’ve created 30 plus different awareness graphics with quotes on them. People constantly look for and engage with them every single day.
The next step to get them to continue and increase their level of interaction: you want to get them to go from a like to a comment. As they start to comment more, they essentially are agreeing with what you’re saying. From there they may even take it to the next level, which is the best level, and that is to share your content. By getting them to share your content, you’ve now created a stark raving fan that will either take action on what you’ve posted. Even better yet, they are sharing it with their audience, creating a new connection and building your sphere of influence.
Marketing should lead to:
- Measurable Steps
- Creating Real In-Person Conversations
- Create A Measurable Percentage of Income Through Sales
Final Thoughts
Let’s revisit those three main parts:
Part one is it has to be done in order. If you don’t do it in the right order, you don’t get the desired results. You can’t skip one of those dots. Every single one of them has a purpose.
The second piece is you have to have definitive steps in the middle. Every dot leads to another dot, and that dot starts to make the picture clear until you get to the end, where you do have this complete finished thing that now you could recognize as a process, something that has a definitive end, and is very clear as to what the outcome is.
And the last piece of this is to close the loop. Make sure that you follow all those dots all the way through. As you do more of it, more people start to join in and engage with what it is that you’re doing in your marketing. As I said in the beginning, every marketing piece should lead to three things. Number one, measurable steps. Every single piece has to have some kind of measurement attached to it, whether it’s engagement, likes, or shares.
The last dot in the puzzle is creating a real, in-person conversation. The goal of all sales is to get to talk to somebody. They may not be ready to buy now, but by having a conversation, you can at least plant the seed (or help them connect the dots). Make sure you are connecting all of those dots in the right order. By doing just that, you will most likely create income in the form of sales.
I would love to hear your thoughts on this. Comment below and share your thoughts, ideas or questions about connecting the dots to get more sales. Have you had to overcome any of the presented concepts? What worked and what did not live up to your expectations? Do you have any ideas or advice you could share?
Read more: How Marketing Can Help Deal with the Mundane