Transcription
All right. You have made it to the end. Yes. Yes. But you’re hanging in there. Hey, we started at 9:00. We let you sleep in, people. You know what I’m saying? And we’re finishing up at 3:00 tomorrow. We are going strong today. For those that are persevering, we give you props. Make sure you give yourselves right now a big round of applause. Yes. Yes, yes, yes.
All right. We’re going to close out talking about obviously a subject that I love, which is good content. Hopefully everybody here has got a great content. This number is a number that we talked about again and again and again. A few people in the halls said, “What’s the big deal with the big five? What’s the deal?” That’s because I know there’s a set of you that are familiar with the whole they ask you answer story. There’s another set that is not. We’re going to quickly cover it. Then we’re going to talk about some things that I’m seeing that we must pay attention to, fun stuff but cool stuff that’s going to matter to all of us.
Okay. The question about the 70% is, when you talk most sales teams right now and most leadership teams and you ask them, “What percentage of the sale is made before someone actually talks to a salesperson?” More often than not, they have no idea of this 70% number. As great marketers, as great communicators, we’ve got to make sure always that our team understands this movement, this trend, and this number because if they understand that, they say things like, “Well, I guess we better have a great website.” I have to accept that reality. But what is a great website in 2018 and beyond?
Similar to what we’ve talked about today, a great website is simply, can I find it and can I find it fast? Now, that is what defines a great search or a great buying experience in 2018. Can I find it and can I find it quickly? That is the essence of this thing, this it is content marketing. But the problem is, once again, most folks if you talk to them don’t really understand what it is. That’s why we embrace this philosophy of they ask, you answer with our clients at Impact and we are trying to bring it to the world because it’s utterly simple.
Now, here’s what’s fascinating. We’ve seen this over and over again. Now here’s the part of the big five for those that didn’t get it. This is the part that really matters. When somebody is making a buying decision, you, me, we, we want to feel like we understand these five things before we engage the company. If we can’t get these five things, generally we don’t feel comfortable about it.
Here they are. As buyers, we’re obsessed with knowing how much is it? We’re obsessed with knowing what are the negatives or the issues with it? We’re obsessed with knowing how does it compare to all that other stuff that we’re looking at? How does everybody feel about? And what is the best it? That my friends, is the economy. What’s crazy is most businesses don’t like to talk about these five things.
If we looked at this in terms of the traditional funnel, so many companies have come to me in the last seven years since I’ve been talking about this and saying, “Marcus, we’re not getting results with our content.” There’s a simple reason. You see it over and over again. There’s a pattern. Number one, they’re not thinking like the buyer. But number two, this is how they roll. If you aligned your content in terms of where does the content fit in terms of the buying cycle, most of the content that most companies are producing is and what we call the land of fluff. In other words, it doesn’t really have value. Whereas the smartest companies know you don’t start at the top or outside of that funnel, you start with the questions that your actual buyers are asking. That is the core. This is the litmus test of great content. I’m really serious about this.
Everything that you saw with, say River Pools, or some of these other companies that we talked about or highlighted today. Here is the litmus test. The test is this. Could your sales team use that video or use that article or whatever that thing is right now? In other words, would they say, “My goodness that’s another tool in my tool box.”? Or would they say, “I don’t know why we’re addressing that thing because I don’t ever deal with that issue.”? This is fundamental. This is not slowed down over the course of the last seven years. In fact, searches for reviews have only increased in the last two years. If you’re not focusing on the Big Five, and that’s what Steve did at Yale and so many others have done in this room, this is what matters.
Now, there’s some other trends that are really fascinating. I’m calling this the “Me” Revolution. We’re all becoming obsessed with searching specifically to us. This is how we’re now approaching our voice activated devices, almost like personal assistants. What I mean by this. This is fascinating. Pay attention because it’s going to affect all of our businesses as we go forward and you want to be first when it comes to this. Searches with the two words added, “For me” have increased by 130% over the last two years, “For me”. Can you think of a search that you may have done with, “For me”?
Let me show you some of the popular ones. It’s fascinating. What car is right for me? What is the best type of investment for me? What is the best diet for my dog? Specific individualized. We love dogs, right Bella? We love dogs. Then finally, which guitar is right for me? This is the type. This is the questions we’re asking. It’s becoming a for me society. This is us as buyers. How does this impact you? Well, we’re going to talk about it here in a second.
There’s another trend that’s really fascinating. That is the should I trend. Now this one is really evolved. This is the one that’s going to make you say, “Dang. We’re kind of screwed up as a human race.” Would you like to see the most searched should I phrases in the world right now? Would you like to see them? Say yes. Yes. Good. We’ll show them to you because you asked for it. Yes.
Number one, what should I order for lunch? Because clearly you don’t know. Number two, should I text him? Any of y’all got teenagers? Teenagers in the room? Teenagers? I want you to go home to that teenager, to that wonderful young lady, and I want you to tell that person if you have to ask a machine, the answer is no. Then finally, most disconcerting, what should I do with my life? They say I’m worried about AI taking over the world. No, no. It already has. So you might as well get on board everyone.
How does this affect you? Well, an example of what we’re doing at River Pools right now is we know that people are asking what is the best type of swimming pool for me? What is the best shape and size for my backyard? So we’re developing a series of really simple applications that go on the site where they can walk through this process of self selection or self configuration. This is what buyers want today. This is what you want. This is what I want. What could you create that would allow someone through a simple series of questions to achieve this?
Let me show you one other great example before I close out. This is my daughter Danielle. Some of you know the story of Danielle. She’s traveled with me all over the world. She’s amazing. She’s getting ready to go to college. She has been doing makeup in a variety of ways over the last three or four years. Got a little business in high school. It’s been successful. Now she wants to take that to college. She came to me and she said, “Dad. I need a website for my makeup business in college.” I said, “I agree.” Naturally, we went to an easy place to build a website, which is Wix.com. Anybody ever heard of Wix.com. Now, here’s what happens when you go to Wix.
Imagine this. She’s on the computer in front of me and I’m standing over her shoulder watching this happen. She goes there and quickly Wix asks her a very simple question. No confusion. Wix says to her, “We want your Wix experience to be perfect for your needs. Answer a few questions to help us get to know you better.” She’s like, “All right. I’m game. Let’s play.” She makes the click. Next thing the only thing she sees on the screen, nothing else, I want to create a website for, now she has a choice. myself or a client. As soon as she clicks myself, kind of smiling as she’s doing it. You could tell she’s enjoying the process, another sentence pops up and it starts to do this more and more and building upon itself each time she’s answering the question. It’s really fascinating to watch her face as she’s going through this.
Then it asks her, “Let Wix ADI create a website for you. Answer a few questions and get a website design for you in minutes with custom text and images.” She’s like, “This is sweet.” I’m like, “Yeah. I know. Let’s keep going.” She keeps going. Then it says, “What is the website for.” She says, “I’m going to be a makeup artist.” “Does your website need any of the following features?” She’s like, “Yeah. I need to take bookings.” Then it gets really interesting because it says, “What is the name of your business?” What does she not have yet? A name of her business. So she thinks of a name, she types it in, almost smiling again, looking at me like, “Wow, this is so cool, dad.” She goes through the process. It says, “Why don’t you pick a style that you love of your website?” So she picks a style. Totally investing emotionally the whole time.
Then finally it says, “Now I’m going to create your homepage.” It says, “Preparing.” She’s preparing. It shows each one of the steps, each one of the sections as it’s being built. She’s watching this realtime. The anticipation is building. Then finally, it pops out. Here it is. The first version of your website, natural beauty by Danielle. She looks at me and smiles. Of course, the next thing she does is? Yes. She asked me for my credit card. That’s what happens. That’s what they do. You have teenagers. That’s what they do.
Here’s the catch. In her mind, did she already own it? Yes or no? Yes. The question is, what can you and I do to create that type of experience of self selection, of self configuration? Here’s the thing. This is going to happen all the time. You want to be first in your space. Be the first mover and let everybody else freak out. When that happens, you’re going to see the leads are going to explode. It’s exciting times with content. All we’ve got to do is think like a buyer. Once again, thank you very much.
