Relevance goes a step beyond the basics, and involves qualifying prospects based on a different set of criteria. For example, if someone on your list just purchased exactly what you’re selling, that decision-maker is simply not a prospect, no matter how well he or she fits your profile.
Look at it in basic marketing terms. You have a product or service. You identify a target audience based on: market or industry sector, size, location, title of contact, perceived or historical need for your offering, and so on. Bingo. You have your list. However, the list of names you have gathered is NOT a prospect list. It only represents a series of prospective prospects, or SUSPECTS, as many call them, because the relevance of your product to that decision maker has yet to be qualified.
Let’s take a close-to-home example.
There’s a sales representative I hear from regularly. Let’s call him Ralph. Ralph systematically calls me every 60 days about his staffing services. And every time he calls to “check in,” I politely tell him, “No, Ralph. I’m afraid we have no staffing needs at this time.” Even if I did, I would never place an order with Ralph. For a simple reason: Ralph is fishing. He believes that if he keeps casting his line in the same pool of water, over time, he will eventually land a fish. It’s just not going to happen because Ralph is ignoring the rule of relevance. Not only does he have no idea IF I have staffing needs, he also has no idea WHAT my staffing needs might be, or WHEN I may have potential staffing needs in the future. Ralph is basically being a lazy salesperson.
But determining the RIGHT TIME to position your brand as the right choice for your suspect is hard work you might say. I don’t have time to validate relevance you might add. Let me clarify. You don’t need to do a complete relevance evaluation for ALL your prospects. You should do it for your top 20, your ideal list. You should do it for the ones, that if you landed just one, it wouldn’t make your day, it would make your year.
How to determine relevance?
Relevance begins with putting aside your personal or corporate agenda and adopting your prospect’s agenda. It means keeping an ear to the ground, looking at what will influence a buying decision. It takes asking questions, a process made infinitely easier with new online surveys.
Relevance can also be determined by watching for change. A merger or an acquisition. A new CEO at the helm. New government regulations or new corporate policies. Consumer trends. All these issues create their own kind of relevance for your goods and services.
Then there’s seasonality. That time of year is coming. You probably don’t want to try to sell much of anything to a retailer between October 31 and December 31 (except maybe more part-time help).
And relevance doesn’t only apply to timing. It also applies to methods of your brand message delivery.
Take web segmentation We have a client that has about four different product lines. Instead of making one corporate website, we’ve developed four individual sites that all link back to one another. It has enabled a far deeper “conversation” in terms of content, and each Web site makes one product category relevant to one group of suspects. The result: our client is landing new business opportunities from all over the world, and attributes this to the segmented online approach.
Take customized direct marketing We have a client that is targeting two important market sectors. One aspect of the brand awareness program we have developed for them is a regularly published newsletter. However, instead of creating one edition, and sending it out to their entire target list, we constructed one newsletter template. We then produce two editions, one relevant to each market segment.
Take online PR First make a profile of the visitors – both editors and readers – to each news portal that attracts readers likely to be interested in what you sell and what you have to say about it. Then make each news story you generate relevant to that visitor profile. Those searching for what you have to offer will find your news.
Lest we forget What else does relevance do besides deliver the right message to the right people? It tells them that you care. The biggest mistake that B2B marketers make is continually delivering self-absorbed messages. When you deliver a brand message with relevant content, a message that speaks directly to your target, you take your communications to a whole new level. Lest we forget that prospects don’t wake up in the morning caring about your product. They want you to wake up in the morning caring about them.
To learn more about this author, visit Ed Delia's Website.
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