To Give is Golden ” To Receive Divine! How To Receive Great Leads NOW!8
If youve been selling for as long as I have, you may find, like I have, that not selling is one of the most difficult lessons you will need to learn about social media marketing. Sometimes, Im not even aware that Ive done it ” pitched the reader, that is! The key to success in using social media is to use pull marketing by providing your ideal prospect with great information that they can use now.
So how do you do that? First Step: Determine who your ideal prospect IS. A helpful exercise is to sit down and write a paragraph or two as if THEY were writing it about what they want, what their concerns are, what information they need to make a decision. Writing as if you are your prospect talking to you about their needs will give you amazing insights.
So now you have determined the needs and wants of your ideal prospect, the next step is to figure out what to say to them. You can do that by going to http://www.google.com/trends. Check out what are the most popular topics and choose one to write about or comment on.
One of our coaching club members used exactly this strategy to make a brief post on her Facebook home page about the first time homebuyer tax credit. Within minutes, she had 10 people contact her for more information. 3 of those people became buyer leads ” and one of them wasnt even anyone she knew!
Having your topic on hand, you can either write an article or blog post. Then create a post on twitter or Facebook that links back to your blog.
Here are a few pointers for crafting a well-written article:
The Headline
Your headline is the most important part of your article. If it isnt compelling, your article will not be read. Be sure to include your keyword so that the search engines find it. Start noticing headlines on newspapers and magazines. You may want to keep the best ones in a file to jog your thinking when you sit down to craft your own article. (Bonus Tip: The tabloids that you buy while waiting to check out at the supermarket are absolutely EXPERT at writing attention-getting headlines!)
The Body
The article body is the meat of your content. Be sure to sprinkle your keywords throughout the article so the search engines pick up your article. Pretend you are writing as if you are speaking to a friend. Keep the style conversational. Avoid technical language or a formal, stilted manner. The ideal length is about 400 words or so. Limit paragraphs to just a few sentences and be sure to use bullet point and subheadings. (Another Bonus Tip: You can outsource the transcription to www.elance.com.)
The Resource Box
To close your article, you will want to include a call to action. THIS is where you FINALLY are allowed to pitch your product. However, if you dont offer a compelling reason for them to contact you, they wont! Be sure youve included a link to your website so they are able to contact you and request additional information. Dont go through all the hard work of providing excellent information only to lose them because youve neglected to tell them how to contact you.