The first step of the buyer's journey is AWARENESS

The Buyer's Journey has three stages. In each step, we need to meet the consumer where they are and understand their frame of mind. You've seen this discussion in many different blogs if you've done any kind of marketing research. Here, I'll go over some of the places you should be and techniques you want to use in those places to meet your most desired customer. It's essential, as a marketing professional, to understand where your customer is at each stage of the buyer's journey, so you know what to say and how to catch their attention. 

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The first stage of the buyer's journey is Awareness. Your customer has just become aware of their condition but doesn't completely understand what the symptoms mean. You and I both do this, it's the foundation of how we go about our path to solve whatever issue might be in front of us. To catch the attention of your prospect in the Awareness stage, you'll want to consider several opportunities. During the awareness stage is the time to offer up lead magnet content:

• Whitepapers
• "How To" blogs
• Videos
• Industry Reports
• Annual trend reports​

Whitepapers
Want to share your knowledge through a case study? Whitepapers are a great way to disseminate technical information or information with a lot of data. These papers are excellent for showing off your research skills and your ability to take technical information and make it interesting for the reader. You find whitepapers in content that's mainly in a data-driven context. Generally, you won't see this much information on a blog. You can take this opportunity to really shine in the eyes of the customer with a great case study that speaks explicitly to their pain points. Look to sites like Industry Week for insight on great whitepapers.

How To Blogs
Blogs are a great way to get people interested in your content and offer guidance that elevates the conversation further. The downside to blogging is that it takes time to research all of the information, sort out what you need, write about it, and distribute the opportunity across networks. All of this is super time consuming, but there is an option, write small pieces as you research, this idea helps you to create more content as you're studying, then you can put it all together in one piece or use the smaller pieces in redistribution with other content. This is a great way to keep up on your content and mix things up a little too. Look to sites like HubSpot for great blog ideas, the tool you're looking for is "Blog Ideas Generator" where you just type in the subject you want to write about and they give you ideas of how to pull it all together.
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Videos
Videos are the trend for 2020 and beyond, however, make sure they offer information and entertainment. No one likes boring videos, so be sure to do your research when choosing this option. Make sure that your video provides your audience with the most information possible, clearly, and concise, with attractive visuals and moderate level language usage. You want to attract as many leads as possible, so an overview is best to begin with and then as your leads move into the consideration stage, you can pinpoint where they were in the Awareness stage and get deeper into subject matter at that time. Hubspot has some great ideas for creating and managing your videos through their Video Hosting and Management course.

Industry Reports
Your prospects want to know that you are an authority in their industry because having experience in a given industry saves time. Believe me, there are clients I've taken on that were in industries I didn't know very much about and these reports were very helpful. However, if you aren't experienced in an industry, do research before stepping foot into a position that requires this knowledge. Industry reports are vital to you and your audience. You might find a great place to start your industry report journey is at Market Search.  They offer guidance to many industries, from Marketing Newsletters to Roofing and everything in between. Be sure to check them out to see if they have a report you can use.

Annual Trending Reports
Another great lead generator is Annual Trending Reports. You know, like those "10 Trends for 2020" reports. They come in a variety of mediums and focus on a number of different industries. Trend reports can come from companies, like the Facebook Business trend report for 2020 -  The 2020 Topics and Trends Report From Facebook IQ, or you might look to other reports from industry segments like transportation, copywriting, or others. Here's a cool site called Trend Watching. They look at trends like "Civil Media - Why the future of social is Meaningful connections" and "Brand Avatars - Human brands take powerful new form". Each of these is pretty cool if you ask me. ​

So there you have it. You'll want to make these items available in return for a name and email address so you can build your list. Be sure to stop by again and find out how SharpSpring and Crabby CoWorker can help you build the landing pages to go along with these lead gen ideas. If you have ideas you want to share or insight we missed here, please feel free to reach out via email or our social channels. Thanks for reading and we look forward to connecting with you.

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