The purpose of interactive marketing is to stimulate interactions and engagement with prospects and customers that builds or extends an active relationship. But many marketing campaigns employ one-way destinations. For example: A link from an email to an article that leaves the prospect with no where else to go to learn more. This seems counter-intuitive to me given the interactive nature of today's digital environment - not to mention the goal.Content strategy is a necessary element for nurturing campaigns.
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Most marketer's plan for the email message and the content offer, design a landing page and ship out the communication. But, what happens if [gasp] a recipient of that communication takes action? What happens if your content gets spread around online?Are you ready?The above list is representational of some of the activities marketing communications can should motivate.
The shortfall I see is that many communications only focus on getting the click through. Like that's the whole enchilada.But, consider that I have clients who actually get replies to their marketing emails. Often it's a thank you for a great article, but sometimes their replies request further information that generates new content development to fill gaps or even inquiries about a demo. Some responses indicate they're forwarding the email to the person who really needs to see it. All of these activities feed into generating Industrial Strength Intelligence.
If you're using an email address to send out communications that you don't monitor other than to clean up bounces, do you know how many interaction opportunities you could be missing? Go take a look at your landing page. In what ways are you motivating your prospects to extend their engagement with you?
Can they opt in for a content series on a related topic indicating a higher level of interest in solving a particular problem? Even if they're already on your house list, consider the options you can provide that help you tune your segmentation to achieve higher levels of relevance.Do you enable them to Forward the article to a colleague? This could be an influencer involved with the buying committee, or even a peer they know could benefit from your information.Are there other options to invite prospects to follow your storyline? Or is your content a one-off offer that doesn't relate to anything else?
And I'm not talking about a product page.Can they leave a comment about your article or provide some kind of feedback? If they could, what will you do in response?Based on what actions they take, do you have a plan to stimulate further interactions specific to what they've done? Or do you just let them sit on your house list until the next scheduled send?What will you do if someone Tweets a link to your article or white paper? Will you even know? How will you respond? Do you have something of value to say beyond "Thanks!" ?What about if someone writes a blog post about it? What kind of comment will you post? How will you invite that blog's readers to engage with more valuable information? Do you have any? Over 1 in 5 people posts content online these days. You know that, right?Think about how you can plan to be more responsive to what people choose to do with your content. When you're thinking about it, make sure you design your content with participation in mind. Think about what types of conversations your content can initiate and forward.Think about flow.Of course, it goes without saying, [or maybe it needs to be said yet again] the degree to which your content will stimulate interactions is directly dependent upon how well you know your customers and prospects-And, how well you can translate that knowledge into engaging content your audience wants to interact with.
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