Content marketing is one of the most prolific buzzwords in the market today. In fact, around 90 percent of organizations are engaged in content marketing today and most of those are investing more in it every year. Consider these facts:
42% of B2B marketers report efficiency in content marketing – Content Marketing Institute
78% of CMOs believe the future of marketing is in custom content – Webdamsolutions.com
87% of buyers confirm that online content has an impact on vendor preference – B2B Marketing Insider
Most think of content in its written form: white papers, long-form articles, case studies, etc. Content is successfully delivered in other forms such as webcasts, video, and audio presentations. Quality content can give you the desired results, quality leads, brand awareness and direct sales leads; just some of the reasons why Content is King.
Success in content marketing is only possible when the content reaches the right audience at the right time. Quality content in the hands of qualified individuals generates a higher return on investment. A Search Engine Land post by Derek Edmond highlights the importance of quality content, keyword-focused writing, and audience-specific targeting to produce the desired results. Producing content is one thing – quality content focused on a specific audience and distributed through intentional channels produces the best results. This is a concept clearly promoted through the latest research from Advertising Age.
The majority of buyers are no longer getting sellers involved in the initial discovery steps. Using search tools, buyers are able to complete a great deal of research before deciding who to contact for more detailed information and quotes. This is the role telemarketing fills in placing quality content in the hands of qualified decision-makers in real-time. It is what makes telemarketing the Royal Chariot to support the kingdom where content rules.
In fact, telemarketing is the only proactive means of real-time communication marketers can use to place quality content in the hands of qualified decision makers at the “time it counts most,” the time these business professionals are searching for the type of business solutions a company offers to overcome their business challenges, to take their company to the next level of success.
Table of Contents
A Long History of Working Content
In some respects, content marketing is nothing new. E-books have been around as long as the Internet and whitepapers actually pre-date the Internet and have proven valuable in many business-to-business (B2B) content marketing strategies. However, the big difference in the way organizations use content marketing has been due to the massive popularity of social media and search engines over the last several years.
It wasn’t that long ago that B2B marketers would learn about your organization through ads, industrial directories or trade journals. They would reach out to you through snail mail or a phone call, thus beginning their buying cycle (the sales cycle). Thanks to technological advancements over the last decade or more, the methodology has changed and people are able to utilize content to better market their brand. By some accounts, content marketing has helped buyers complete around 60 percent of their buy cycle before ever making the first contact with your company.
Thanks to quality content, buyers are able to see the details of each stage of the buy cycle plainly written out before them. While this is true, nothing much has changed in regard to the importance of your unique selling proposition, it is now being delivered across multiple channels, one or more of which is sure to connect with your prospective client in the form they prefer. Simply put, this means they need less of your sales team interactions.
Producing quality content is no longer an option; it is a must, if you want to survive this new world of buyers. If your company does not produce quality content, you are not a relevant player in the market. Buyers may never discover your product and/or services and you may not be a part of their buying process. More and more buyers rely on digital information so what are you doing to make sure they “find you”.
The Important Focus Across Multiple Channels
Most marketing strategies today utilize several channels, including print advertising, e-mail, public relations, search engine marketing, television and radio to name a few. But content marketing is the most effective means of “pushing” a product or service. HiveFire surveyed around 400 marketing professionals in 2011 and found that marketers are taking a step back from traditional tactics and a leap forward to content marketing.
The survey says there are twice as many B2B marketers employing content marketing than print, television or radio advertising. Content marketing works because it’s supplying the public with original content that actually means something to them and results in better lead generation and enhanced brand visibility.
Reaching the Right Audience
It’s been established that content marketing is king, but are you sure you’re getting your content to the right person at the right time?
When delivering content using social media you need to employ the right strategies to ensure the content stands on its own. When you direct the right message
to the right social networking sites, the audience helps you drive your message across multiple digital channels.
Using multiple channels has its perks, but using traditional channels is still a viable option. Many companies are finding results with a direct mail model. The effort here is directed at an audience that perceives the digital space as too crowded and noisy and will respond favorably to traditional direct mail.
Along those same lines, telemarketing is also proving to maintain its valuable position in almost every marketing effort. Telemarketing does much more.
Telemarketing, being the only on-demand proactive marketing method available, can ensure that a marketer’s quality content is placed in the hands of qualified prospects. Professional telephone sales representatives (TSRs) are able to identify:
- Decision makers
- Decision-making processes
- Content delivery methods/preferences
- Buying intentions and buying time frame
- Budget availability
Armed with quality demographic information and behavioral flags, TSR’s will place your content, and create actionable quality leads worthy of your sales team’s time. They will successfully make content relevant in a very cost effective way producing a great return on investment.
Quality vs. Quantity
How focused are you on quantity vs. quality? Your organization is searching for a big number of high-quality leads that can provide you with consistent and profitable results. Some would argue that a marketing attempt that garners a high number of leads will also yield the worst quality, which can happen when your content is offered up for free and you consider everyone who consumes that content as a lead. On the other side of the debate, you’ve got the argument that marketing efforts that yield the highest quality of leads churn out the lowest volume.
Some companies have steered around this problem by requiring prospects to answer a number of qualifying questions before they are granted access to content, such as a white paper or webinar. The leads that follow through are certainly more qualified, even though they’ve gotten your content for free.
Why Telemarketing is Still an Important Strategy
In examining mediums whereby marketing efforts can be most effective, it’s important to discuss telemarketing in detail. Some of you will consider telemarketing an archaic medium that has no use in marketing today. However, holding on to this belief only means you are missing out on a valuable form of marketing that has one of the best returns on investment of all marketing strategies.
When carried out properly, a telemarketing campaign will deliver the right content to the right person with great consistency. While a growing number of adults prefer to communicate via electronic means, the best ways to qualify a lead and make a conversion an interpersonal communication experience is through telemarketing.
Telemarketing remains an effective tool that organizations use to create profitable environments. The successful use of telemarketing involves having a good knowledge of who your audience is, what they want and how they want it given to them. Professional telemarketers are experts at relaying their message in a polite and respectful manner and only to those who are interested in what you have to offer.
Business to business telemarketing, unlike consumer telemarketing of years past is less about making the sale and more about making sure the customer is well informed. If the telemarketing of yesterday was focused on a quick sale, the environment has certainly changed to one more focused on discovering opportunities, and developing and nurturing leads.
Telemarketing and Lead Development
The best telemarketing companies are offering lead development services that focus on new business development, quality control and assurance, event marketing, customer development, marketing research, lead enhancement and qualification. Telemarketing campaigns use quality calling guides, excellently trained agents and top-notch hardware and software. With the right information being delivered to the audience you want to reach, telemarketing campaigns can also extend the value of content to make sure you get qualified leads which result in increased sales.
One company that has consistently offered excellence in lead generation is Blue Valley Telemarketing. Blue Valley professionals will help you with your campaign design and integration. With years of experience, managing about 10,000,000 annual calls, Blue Valley will make sure your product is not only represented professionally and accurately, but will be perfectly placed with interested prospective clients.
The Importance of the Right Partner
Blue Valley Telemarketing is your new profit center. As a firm focused on delivering high quality services, Blue Valley has proven itself for over 20 years. In support of large and small companies alike, Blue Valley has demonstrated over and over that it knows how to identify and reach the right audience, and how to deliver content in a way that produces profitable results.
Content placement is first, following up to discover their level of interest and understanding where they are in the buying process is second. Telemarketing qualifies leads so sales reps can follow up on quality actionable leads only, producing better results every time.
Last Updated on November 20, 2023 by Ronen Ben-Dror