Most of us spend a great deal of time trying to be preferred and make the cut–to win the scholarship, make the team, get the job, or be promoted. What’s more, we expend a lot of effort to move forward: study hard for high grades, practice to excel in sports, take on tough assignments to shine at work, and build our résumés and on-line profiles to advance our professional reputations. Indeed, much of what we do as we progress in our careers is designed to highlight our accomplishments and abilities and to differentiate ourselves from others.
A B2B offering’s journey down the stages of the Sales and Marketing Funnel is no different. In my last few posts, I discussed the types and characteristics of marketing content geared to moving products and services through the funnel’s first two stages–Awareness and Consideration. In this post, I’ll cover the same aspects of Preference–the crucial third stage through which a company’s offerings must pass before attaining the funnel’s fourth stage, Purchase.
As implied by its name, Preference is the stage of the Sales and Marketing Funnel at which a company’s offering should become the solution of choice for the customer. If the customer is new and adoption of the solution will entail significant expenditure, such as a bulk or capital-equipment purchase or a long-duration service or support contract, the marketing content deployed during the funnel’s Awareness and Consideration stages has likely been varied, ranging from broad-ranging digital or traditional advertising designed to make the customer cognizant of the solution all the way through public-relations articles and social media postings intended to build its credibility.
Though such Awareness-and Consideration-stage content is critically important, its primary purpose is to get the company’s offering perceived as a potential solution to the customer’s problem. In contrast, the goal of Preference-stage content is to get the customer to view the company’s offering as the best solution to his or her problem. Consequently, Preference-stage content must 1) provide a “deep dive” into a solution’s features and benefits and 2) present convincing proof cases. The first objective is frequently addressed through product-specific web pages and salesforce “leave-behinds,” such as product-line brochures and selector guides, whereas as the second is often served via compelling case histories, how-to videos, and competitive comparisons. Ultimately, Preference-stage content must effectively communicate an offering’s unique selling proposition, differentiate it from competitor offerings, and persuade the customer to prefer it over all other potential solutions to his or her problem. Though a tall order, this is not beyond the realm of the possible–at least, not when Preference-stage content has been carefully designed and developed to meet this crucial objective.
In my next post, I will discuss content optimized for the fourth and final phase of the Marketing and Sales Funnel, the Purchase stage.
Please see parts 1, 2, 3, and 4 of this article series on content marketing at GF&Z’s blog “Perspectives in Global B2B Marketing,” on www.globalmarcomm.com.
Ronald-Stéphane Gilbért, Global and Content Marketing Practice Director— Gilbért, Flossmann & Zhang Worldwide, Cleveland
Contact GF&Z at solutions@globalmarcomm.com