Applying pipeline marketing to the lead generation is achieved by extending the user experience from one website to another.
Think of Google’s search box. You are reading an article and have a question. You type it into Google and click Go. When you land on Google it continues your interest by providing you further information in the form of search results. Like Google, pipeline marketing requires high levels of relevance to make it a seamless transition into lead generation, it has to be immediate and it continues things. Relevance, immediacy and continuity extend the user experience.
So how to start depends on the content where the user experience begins. Your lead generator must match that in some form to assist the user, particularly to answer a question the original content provokes. This generator can be normal advertising campaign or syndicated content. Syndicated content is better.
You also need to ensure you can deliver on the promise of an answer on your website. The customer is not looking for a purchase at this stage as it’s very early on in the buying process and you are simply trying to become a resource for them. If you answer the customers question they are likely to visit you more than once anyway. So get your website in order. That means your website, not a mini-site. You are delivering core services. If your promise is genuine it should exist on your website.
An example of this would be the Direct Broking stock quote tool used on a number of external websites like nzherald.co.nz, nzmoneytalk.co.nz and msn.co.nz/money. The quote tool serves to fit the user experience of the external website providing stickiness. It’s a resource these websites offer their users when it is relevant to their content.
This quote tool works on a promise of an immediate answer about a companies share price. It sits next to articles about companies, or share trading in general, and is relevant for those users who wish to know the impact the featured news has had on the companies share price.
Immediacy is the next rule. The user must get to this answer immediately upon landing on your website. You are looking to continue a user experience, not create one. You want them to stick immediately. The landing page has to deliver what was promised rather than requiring the customer to further interact with your website to get the answer. If you make them interact you will disappoint them. They will bounce and they will not come back. They will have negative feelings about your website.
So our quote tool lands on the quote page of the company selected. The Fundsource search box on nzherald.co.nz is another example of a good external pipeline. It lands right on the answer the user requires. Raboplus PIE Fund adverts do so with comparisons between banks. And Google search box shows search results.
Continuity is rule number three. The landing page has to offer the user a continued service to extend the user experience. This is another reason why you need to get your website in order.
We offer further quoting, charting and corporate news. We also offer an extra service with strings, being adding the stock to a watch list. The string being they can’t have the watch list until they join up to the service. The advantage of the watch list is continued email alerts about that particular stock to extend user experience over time and keep them interested.
If your customer sticks then you are now in phase two of moving them to the buying process.
