Every manager knows that the end consumer is the most important factor in keeping a company active and profitable in the market. And when we talk about how to prospect customers online, we are faced with a new world of possibilities.
The Internet has completely changed the game when it comes to attracting customers. With the evolution of Digital Marketing and so many companies competing for attention, it is time to invest in modern tactics and tools that enhance your approaches.
Finding new customers and winning them over to close a deal should be at the top of the list of priorities, after all, these are the actions that will boost the company’s sales and profits.
To achieve this, the company needs to be proactive and implement strategies to attract and engage the ideal audience. The goal is to get them to buy and, who knows, become loyal consumers of the brand.
To help you identify your ideal customer profiles, better known as Ideal Customer Profile (ICP), we have created the Ideal Customer Profile Spreadsheet. Click on the banner below to check it out!
With the right tools, you can turn the internet into your greatest ally in the search for new customers. Let’s find out how to make this happen?
How to prospect clients online in 8 steps
There are some important techniques when it comes to prospecting clients and converting more sales using the internet. These are activities that I use on a daily basis and that can make a difference in your business.
With that in mind, I’ve prepared a practical guide with 8 simple and straightforward steps to help you start applying it right now. Ready to get started?
1. Know your audience
The first question to ask yourself is: who is your ideal client? This is the starting point for accurate prospecting on the internet. After all, how can you attract someone without knowing who you are looking for, right?
Defining your target audience and creating personas that describe them helps you know exactly where to focus your efforts and how to speak your potential customer’s language.
Think about your prospects’ pain points and needs. This information is gold when it comes to creating messages that truly connect.
To map this ideal profile, also known as ICP, I use tools like Google Analytics and CRM. They help me better understand who the people are who already interact with my brand.
However, it is important to make it clear that your ICP is not something fixed. A company is always moving and it ends up being the reflection of what it is seeking as an ideal.
So naturally the ICP will receive updates based on the company’s evolution within its own market.
But you also need to keep an eye on your sales performance and customer retention. If you notice that a specific segment is responding better to your offers or staying with you longer, it may be time to adjust your ICP.
So, be sure to check out the Ideal Customer Profile Spreadsheet! It will help you organize all this information and have a clear view of your business’ target audience.
With this knowledge in hand, you will be ready to take the next step in your online prospecting journey.
2. Study the market
Before diving headfirst into prospecting and sales growth strategies, it’s time to take a step back and look at the bigger picture to understand the terrain your company is treading on.
Therefore, it is essential to conduct market research. It will show you the way, revealing how your audience behaves and what they think about products or services like yours. In addition, you will find out who your competitors and potential business partners are.
This knowledge is the basis for creating customer acquisition strategies and also learning how to stand out from the competition.
So, before you start shooting in all directions trying to convert your audience, stop for a moment. Take some time to get to know your market. Believe me, this initial effort will make all the difference in the future!
3. Use market segmentation
Market segmentation is a strategic part of Digital Marketing. It helps us organize audiences and create targeted communication for those we want to attract and close deals with.
In other words, it divides your audience into smaller, more specific groups, and this way, you can prioritize who really matters, with more personalized communication.
There are several ways to do this division:
- Behavioral: based on people’s online actions;
- Geographic: according to location;
- Demographic: considering age, gender, income, etc.
To put this into practice, we have some really cool platforms, such as Facebook Ads, Google Ads and LinkedIn Ads.
But it doesn’t stop there. If you have an email list or use a CRM, you can go even deeper with personalization.
When you speak directly to the pain points of a specific audience, your campaigns tend to generate more conversions. This, in turn, generates results at a lower cost compared to generic campaigns where you speak in a broader and more abstract way.
Segmentation allows you to be relevant to whoever is listening to you, as if you were having a one-on-one conversation with each potential customer, even if you are talking to thousands of people at the same time.
4. Promote Inbound Marketing actions
When it comes to prospecting customers, Inbound Marketing and Content Marketing are strategies that bring impressive results.
In recent years, the way customers interact with businesses, research products, and seek information has changed dramatically. Today, the internet is the first place people look for answers to their questions and needs.
Therefore, if you want to attract and win new customers, you need to have a good digital positioning. This means being on social media, creating ways to attract the public’s attention and knowing how to relate to leads.
But how do you do this in practice? That’s where content comes in. Blogs, videos and infographics are like bait to attract leads. They are ways to generate interest and get people to come to you naturally.
To ensure that your content will be found, SEO techniques will be your best friends. They basically:
- Increase your visibility in search engines;
- Bring qualified leads directly to your website;
- They act as a customer magnet 24 hours a day.
Now, when these people arrive on your website, you need to be prepared to welcome them. To do this, rely on optimized landing pages and lead capture forms so that you can continue the conversation with them later.
5. Qualify your leads
Those who have already shown interest in your company deserve special attention. After all, these people are potential customers and need to be treated with care.
Therefore, your company needs to be ready to welcome these people with open arms. The goal is to involve them more and more with your business and make them want to purchase the products or services you offer.
With Digital Marketing strategies, you can transform these interested parties into leads. And with this data in hand, you will be able to send valuable content, qualifying them and encouraging them to close a deal with the company.
But it doesn’t stop there! Once you have those leads, it’s time to nurture them.
Think of it as if you were growing a vegetable garden. You need to water it (with information), fertilize it (with relevant content), and provide light (with interesting offers) so that it grows strong and healthy.
A great technique for this is lead scoring. It’s like giving your leads a score based on the actions they take. Did they click on an email? Points for them! Did they download an e-book? More points! This way, you know who is most likely to buy and can focus your efforts on them.
Other cool initiatives to warm up the relationship with your leads include exclusive webinars, personalized discounts and invitations to events, for example.
The key is to stay in touch without being annoying. Show that you care and that you have something valuable to offer. Over time, these leads will feel so connected to your brand that the decision to buy will come naturally.
6. Use Outbound Marketing for active prospecting
To begin with, it’s important to understand the difference between Inbound and Outbound Marketing. While the former attracts customers to you, the latter is when you go after them.
And no, we’re not talking about billboards or traditional marketing here.
Outbound Marketing is an active prospecting methodology in which the company defines one or more ICPs and, based on this, creates a list of contacts to begin approaching proactively.
This can be done in a number of ways, such as:
- Calls (cold call) ;
- Emails (cold mail) ;
- Messages on social networks ;
- Contacts via WhatsApp.
The term “cold” is used because you are making contact with someone who is not expecting it, does not know you and does not have a prior relationship with your company.
Now, if you’re wondering if this still works, the answer is yes! With the right techniques, Outbound Marketing can be a great strategy.
One of these techniques is Email Marketing with automation, which allows you to create sequences of personalized emails to be sent automatically to nurture and qualify your leads.
Another strategy is to use personalized cold calling or cold email campaigns. The key here is research: the more you know about your prospect, the more relevant your approach will be.
To do this, here’s what I recommend: before you make a call, take a look at the person’s LinkedIn, see what they’re working on and what their interests are. Use this information to create a real connection during the conversation.
Remember, the goal is not to be invasive, but to show how your product or service can solve a specific problem for your prospect.
7. Do Marketing Automation
There are some tools, such as HubSpot, Salesforce, that help you manage and track your leads in an organized way. They keep all the information in one place, always up to date and easy to access.
But the real magic happens when you combine CRM with marketing automation. With them, you can create personalized journeys for each lead.
For example, when someone downloads an eBook from your website, you can set up a sequence of emails that will be sent automatically:
- First thank you for the download;
- The second offering more related content;
- The third inviting to a webinar.
All this without you having to lift a finger!
Another cool thing about automation is lead scoring, as we saw before. You can assign points to different actions taken to organize the audience that is ready to be contacted by the sales team.
And it doesn’t stop there. With automation, you can create triggers for specific actions.
In practice, if a lead visits your pricing page three times in a week, why not send an email offering a free demo? Or if they abandon their shopping cart, why not send them a reminder with a discount code?
Ultimately, marketing automation allows you to create personalized experiences on a large scale and this will undoubtedly be very beneficial for your business.
8. Personalize your actions
Personalizing your marketing actions is the best way to effectively connect with your potential customers. To do this, it is important to know well who is interacting with your brand online.
Some very useful tools for this are Hotjar, Google Analytics and Heatmaps, which reveal how people navigate your website, which pages have the most visits and where clicks occur.
When we talk about personalization, we are dealing with two contexts: one based on automation and the other on person-to-person discourse.
In automation, you use market intelligence to understand the context of the company you want to prospect. The goal is to create useful messages that spark enough interest to start a conversation.
In a person-to-person context, personalization goes even further. For example, if you discovered that a company has 50 employees and operates in the technology sector, you could approach it like this:
“I saw that in the technology market, companies of your size usually face challenge X. We solved it for company Y, and the result was Z in so much time. Does that interest you?”
This behavior works for both automated campaigns and manual outreach. The key is to use the data available to create an authentic connection.
Close more deals with the help of Orgânica!
As we have seen, prospecting for customers in the digital environment combines strategies that, when well applied, bring impressive results for your business. By combining Inbound and Outbound Marketing techniques, for example, you create a complete process of attracting and converting leads.
Segmentation is also important as it allows you to target your efforts to the right audience, while personalization makes your message stand out and connect with potential customers.
To make the most of these strategies, invest in automation and data analysis tools! They will optimize your work and identify opportunities for improvement in your campaigns.
Want to know how your company can improve its online customer prospecting? Orgânica can help you! We are a Digital Marketing agency specialized in prospecting and acquiring customers for your business.
Get a free Digital Marketing Diagnosis with us! Through it, we can analyze your current strategies and propose personalized solutions to increase your conversions. Your company deserves this boost, will you join us?
