Your 2023 Marketing Strategy, Step 3: Create Content

Folks. All right, so we've got the last webinar of the year.

If you've been in the last couple, we've gone through a step by step process, which step one I started with clarity, which is knowing who your ideal prospect is. Last webinar was focused on capture, which is capturing leads. You know, something we've talked about in the industry is we've all come from a model. If you've been in the industry for a little while, you've come from a model where you just go buy a list or build a big list, and it's filled with hundreds of prospects. You don't know who they are, and you just start sending them emails and calls. Right. Well, instead, what if we had a better way to capture those leads from people who are actually giving us permission to reach out to them? So that's something when it comes to your prospecting next year, I want you guys to consider, which is how do I create what we call lead generators, where people are signing up for things or giving me their emails where they are giving me permission to send them stuff.

Webinars, like I'm doing right now, is a great way for you to generate and capture good leads because these people are signing up on their own term, putting in an email to become part of it. Therefore, that is a way of saying, I am giving you permission to reach out to me.

So today we go, cool. Step one, I know who my ideal prospect is. Step two, I'm capturing qualified leads.

Now I have got a way to. I've got to have a way to harvest them. Okay, I put out a video last week or the week before talking about there's a big difference between planting crops and harvesting crops. And again, if you have been in the insurance industry, you have been taught how to harvest them. But the problem is we've all been taught how to harvest crops without planting them.

What I mean by that is I started in 2002 and what I was taught is how to just over and over reach out to prospects and ask for a meeting.

And I've done nothing to plant a crop with that, a relationship with that person. I just continuously reach out and say, will you please take a meeting with me? AKA harvesting a crop.

And so I, as time has gone on, guys, our buyers can we agree, our buyers have probably gotten a little smarter.

They've become a little more sophisticated in many ways, and they want more value from us before they're willing to take an appointment with us.

And so we have to have a better strategy to plant the crop. And that's where content comes in. That's what I'm going to talk about today is creating content to plan a crop of the prospect so that when they're ready to buy, you're the one they think of. When you're. When they're ready to. To harvest, you're there to harvest with them.

And right away, when people hear the word content, their head goes to like LinkedIn videos. But content comes in many different formats. And so what I'm going to talk about today is more conceptually two things. What kind of content should you think about going into next year? And then how and where should you put it out there?

Now what's interesting is I just got off a call this morning with one of our clients who is an advisor, and he's currently reading the book Fanatical Prospecting. Anybody ever read that book? Jeb Blount Sales Gravy.

There's a lot of good sales books out there, right, that we've all been recommended, that we've all read at some time. I've got Combo prospecting up there on my shelf. Here's the problem I have with those books today.

And I'm not saying they're bad books by any means, but here's where I do have a challenge to them.

Fanatical Prospecting, for example, was written in 2015.

What? What's happened since 2015?

What happened in 2020? Like a pandemic. The pandemic.

Covid and the Pandemic, right? I bet when Jeb Blunt wrote that book, when forget the author of Combo Prospecting wrote that book, they weren't anticipating, I'm going to write this knowing a pandemic's going to come five years from now.

And the question I asked this advisor as he's reading the book is I said, have they put an addendum in the book like a 2.0 to say, here's what this looks like post pandemic. Because a lot has changed, guys.

We took was it almost two years and transformed about a decade when it comes to technology and everything else, because we were forced to to work from home, we were forced to meet with each other virtually. We were forced to use technology.

Think how much better you are today at Zoom than you were three years ago. You had to be.

And so when it comes to prospecting, we have to adapt with that.

And what has become a challenge, but is also a massive opportunity is prior to the Pandemic, when you wanted to develop a relationship with a prospect, right? You probably had a mix of calls and emails. But then maybe you tried to take them out to lunch, maybe you took them to a football baseball game, out for a round of golf, you invited them to one of your events and that was the way you built relationships over time, right? Well, again, post pandemic, a lot of that has changed. Good news is we're coming back, we're doing the live stuff again. But I would argue we're not doing as much of that live relationship building as we used to.

Therefore, we have to have a better way to build a relationship with a prospect before we ever meet them. And that's where content comes in.

Now, today I'm not going to share a ton of slides. I am going to share examples, mainly on LinkedIn of how you can use content, showing you some of our clients that are doing it. Because guys, content is going to be your secret weapon. And here's the challenge I give everybody as we wrap up the year. Are you willing.

To put the time in to create it and to get better at it over time?

Before I tell you what content where you should put it, you got to ask yourself that question.

Because what I see too many advisors doing today because I talk to them every week is they don't have, they don't have a game plan.

Whether it's content or prospecting in general. And so what they end up doing every week is they do what comes easiest though I hate doing it. You know what's easy? Just picking this thing up, calling 25 times a day.

I have my 25 boxes on my notes and I can check off the box. I made 25 calls. That's easy. I know it's not as effective as it used to be, but I can do that. I know how to do that. But if you have a plan and are willing to put the time in, guys, I'm telling you, you can change your prospecting forever next year. So with content, here's what you want to think about. The first question is what constitutes content.

The first mode you have got to consider is what medium do I want to use?

Video.

Written.

Or audio? We've got things like podcasts these days. Those are the three main video, written, audio.

Video is pretty self explanatory. Written can come in any form of articles.

Emails.

White paper.

Blogs, whatever you want to call them. And audio really is using a format like a podcast.

And so that's where you want to start. Now the home run strategy, guys, is you're leveraging all three. But you don't have to at the beginning if you're just starting out, you got to pick the one you're most comfortable with. Some people are great writers. They hate getting in front of a camera. Fine.

I personally believe camera or video is the best because it gives somebody a chance to see you, hear from you and get a feel for your personality all at the same time.

But it does not mean you have to do it. We have clients who are deathly afraid of doing a video. The second they hit record, they turn into a robot.

So what we do for them is say, listen, let's lean into the writing side of content and just go from there. And it's been effective.

But that's where you have to start. What medium do I want to want to use? The second question is, where am I going to share it?

And before I talk about this, the answer is, if you can do all of them, you're going to hit a home run. But again, if it's starting with one, it's a start. Where you want to be sharing this stuff today, number one, social media. And I'm going to ask somebody to give me an answer. Knowing everybody on this call sells to businesses, I believe. B2B. What is the one platform you need to be on? LinkedIn. LinkedIn. It is the one B2B platform that exists today. I see a lot of people transitioning to TikTok right now.

Because it's generating a lot of comments and likes and views. My problem with TikTok guys is I want to know how many of Those people on TikTok watching stuff are actually can actually buy from you.

It's great engagement, you can go viral without having any followers. But I really want to know how many those people who are commenting can actually buy from you.

I know a CEO is on LinkedIn. I know a CFO is on LinkedIn or an HR director.

So that's what you want to consider. What platform? Social media. At a minimum, LinkedIn.

I will say if anybody here uses ad money, puts ads out on social media, you could probably do it with Facebook because you can target your prospects on Facebook with ads, but at a minimum, LinkedIn. And if that's all you ever do with social media, you can still be very, very successful.

Platform number two. So social media is one platform, another platform you want to consider.

But what you want to master going into next year is not.

The art of the sales email, which is what all of us are used to writing, which is, hey, wanted to check in. Can I have a meeting with you? Hey, here's why we're awesome. Can I Have a meeting with you. What you want to master is what's known as the nurture email. Remember planting crops?

A nurture email is meant to inform.

And if you do it on a regular cadence.

You are going to stay top of mind with your prospect. So it could be. I personally don't believe once a month is enough.

I think twice a month is a great cadence. I. We share our inside pitch newsletter every week.

Pick a cadence, get consistent. But the nurture is as important as a sale. Nurture is. I'm just going to use this email to inform you on something you may not know that's going to be really helpful for you.

And then the third platform I would highly recommend you consider is your website.

Now, I know some of you may not have control over your website, so you could take this little piece with a grain of salt, but if you do have some control on the content going on the site, your website is an amazing place to provide nurture content.

Now, website will make the most sense if you're using video and articles, but it is another platform from which you can provide content to your prospects.

Now, there is a fourth channel I want to talk about that far too many of us in the industry don't leverage.

But it's an amazing platform. You could argue it is a form of social media.

Anybody know what that might be?

Public speaking. Good, good, good guess, Bob. No.

It'S. It's a platform on social media. Oh.

Or on the Internet, I should say. Maxwell, you just wrote it. YouTube. Guys, YouTube is a heavily underutilized channel.

If I were an agency today, I would make sure my agency has a channel.

If I were a producer and my agency gave me approval, I would have a channel. Here's why. It is the second largest search engine in the world.

Now, it is purely for video content.

But if you do video, I'm Starting to believe YouTube is almost a must.

And here's why this is all important, guys. If, if you are on LinkedIn, if you have good email nurture, if you have content on your website and content on your YouTube channel and they. And, and build out one at a time. If you're just starting, by the way.

You are now a very searchable company.

Or a very searchable producer. What do I mean by that? Well, if you're creating content for me, the prospect that I'm looking for, and I can find it on LinkedIn, I'm getting it from you in an email. I can find it on your website and I can find it on your YouTube channel. You're everywhere.

You're searchable to me.

And that's what we want to be going into next year. The biggest problem I see with our industry today, and I'm just going to say it is.

We like to use the word status quo to win business. Anybody find themselves using that phrase with prospects yet? It's the one phrase that really describes how our industry still does business today.

Because a lot of people prospect as if social media does not exist. Guys, I hate to tell you, it's here, it's not going away.

And we still rely on the prospecting strategies we used in 1997.

When everything has changed so much.

So if you can just leverage. Think about every, every platform I just shared with you. LinkedIn, email, website, YouTube, what do they all have in common? Their electronic, their technology.

If you can leverage those four or a combination of those four guys, you are going to do extremely well in planting crops next year. You still have to pick up the phone, you still have to send direct emails and messages, you still have to do the direct marketing side. But if you back it up with this stuff, you're going to be very recognizable, very searchable. So that when you do reach out to people, they're going to be like, yeah, I know who you are, I know who your agency is.

Which leads to the last part.

Awesome. Andy, what content should I actually create?

And this is the game changer, guys.

Never forget this phrase. Anybody get my daily text? Anybody on my daily text channel? I think I sent this out on Tuesday or yesterday. Clear is better than clever.

Guys. Just be clear with your content. Somebody give me an example. Let's say you are on this call and you sell self funding. That's one of your things. What's a question a prospect might have about it?

Somebody give me something. How risky is it?

What is it? Why not create a piece of content that says how risky is self funding? Why not create a piece of content that says what is self funded health insurance? The reason we don't like creating that content is because that's common sense in your world. That's boring actually, right? Why would I create that? I know that. Why would I create that? My peers will think I'm stupid. Because that's common sense.

Is it common sense to your prospect though?

And that's all that matters. You want to become a searchable person, a searchable agency next year. Create the stuff they're actually looking for. What I would challenge everybody to do over the holidays is literally make a list. Think about what my niche is. Bob, you've got you're working on that level of funded program, right? Like what's my unique gift, what's the thing I focus on? And what are all the questions, objections, hesitations my prospects might have around it? And that should drive your content strategy next year.

Because here's the best part, gang.

That topic of what is self funding?

Let's imagine I just created a video for that two minute video. I explain what self funding is. I could take that video.

And I could put it out on LinkedIn. I could take that same video and I could put it in an email. I could take the same video, put it on my website. I take the same video and upload it to my YouTube channel. One piece of content, guys, on all four platforms now.

And it's searchable content.

The best way to come up with your content when you do this exercise is imagine a prospect is going to the Google search feature and typing a question, a phrase, something in that box to hit search. What would they be looking for based on what it is you sell and create that content?

How many people, with a show of hands, I always do this and I can never see anybody. Have you ever, do you ever, do you ever feel like you run into very common objections over and over and over again from prospects?

That's the stuff you should be answering because here's the other part of planting crops, guys, that changes everything.

When you meet with a prospect for the first time.

And you they are starting at ground zero and the process of shifting their mindset has just begun. It's gonna take a while to win that client's business. That prospect's business might take a couple years because they're still like in a place they don't understand, like why isn't fully insured a good deal. What you know, there's. You haven't shifted their mindset at all. If you haven't shifted their mindset at all, the sales cycle elongates. However, if you use your content as you're planting to shift their mindset, by the time they meet with you, they're already shifted. Selling them becomes so much easier.

That's why content works. It keeps you top of mind. It makes your name recognizable, your agency recognizable, and it allows you to build a relationship and shift the prospect's mindset before they've ever met you.

So that when they enter your pipeline.

Now, it's going to go faster, it's a more qualified prospect and the odds of you making that a client are exponentially higher.

And one last comment on this, because this is a big one when we create content, whether it is for social media or emails or YouTube, we get sucked into the wanting to focus on the metrics, the comments, the likes, the open rates, the click rates. Guys, the importance of creating this content is to stay top of mind.

I promise you that if you ever win a piece of business from LinkedIn because a prospect saw something, it'll be a prospect who has never liked or commented on your stuff before, ever. But they're watching.

If you ever get some traction from an email that leads to meetings, it might not come from somebody who opened or clicked on something, but you know what, your name has appeared in their inbox every week for six months. They know who you are now.

So you don't want to get caught up in the metrics, but it's about creating that top of mind awareness with your content. That is what is important. We are in a very noisy industry. There's more advisors than ever before. When you stay top of mind, you stand out. And that is the whole key to winning today.

Because when you do reach out with direct marketing and outreach guys, they're going to know who you are, they're going to recognize who you are and it's going to make it a lot easier for them to say yes.

Well, we wrap up and I offer, I ask a couple questions. I want to show you guys a couple. I did not get their permission, but I think they would be okay with me sharing this.

Anybody ever? Anybody know who this is? Yep, sure do. So Chris is a client. Chris was a client. I did a workshop with Chris. He built this whole brand around Benefits Insider. But the point I wanted to share is Chris is out every. I think he's daily now. I mean he is putting out content every day on LinkedIn.

And it's video based.

I'm not saying you have to be this active, but here's what I am going to say. I got a text from Chris late October and it said, dude, the haters are out. And I said, what do you mean? He said, I've got peers reaching out saying, what are you trying to become famous on LinkedIn? And shortly after that, he got a direct message from a prospect on LinkedIn that said, hey, I've been watching your stuff. Really good stuff.

I've been having issues with my broker right now and I like what you're saying in your videos. Can we meet? And that led to a discussion which led to about a 70. What was it? 70. $75,000 AOR.

Here's another one. This is my favorite. Anybody know who Pam Files is.

She'S got a nice boutique consulting firm down in Southern Mississippi and she's in our women's community trying to get, trying to get Pam to do a LinkedIn post was like pulling teeth. She is 61 years old, never done really social media and she's like, oh heck no. I said, come on Pam, come on Pam. Well, she started to very hesitantly, begrudgingly. She makes about four or five posts. She gets a call from a former contact at a former client.

Says, hey Pam.

Reaching out because I'm now at this company and we were just having a discussion that we feel it's time to go find another broker. And I've been seeing your content show up on LinkedIn, which made me think of you.

Would you be willing to take our account over now, guys, I get this is not everyday results. She goes, okay, she goes, but before we do that, tell me a little bit about your company. Oh, we have 1200 employees.

My point in sharing this, guys, is Chris. His content isn't like off the charts great. Pam's she's just getting started. But the only reason those two wins occurred were because they're out there.

Somebody, a prospect on a specific day said, I'm not happy with my broker.

But because I've seen Chris's name a lot, I've been seeing this Pam Files name.

I'm going to reach out to him.

And that's what happens guys, with content, whether it's social media, email, website content, if you can just create content that your prospects are looking for, it is going to lead to results. You're going to fill your pipeline with more qualified prospects. They're already going to be bought into what you're doing, which makes your whole sales process more effective.

So with that being said, we got a couple minutes for questions.

Fire away. So can you please remind me what software or what program you use to transcribe the audio on LinkedIn? Yes. Good news is, good news is LinkedIn now has a feature. Okay, they do that. So when you post video, LinkedIn has a feature now you it'll say do you want captions? And they'll add captions for you. Well, that's easy enough. Yes, thank you. Chad, you asked what video editing program is easy to use and ideal we still use for some of ours, Adobe Premiere Pro. It's one of the best out there. It's 21amonth. There's a learning curve to editing, but if you are going to edit your own for now, Adobe Premiere Pro is an awesome ineffective and there's plenty out there, guys. There's apps you can use to edit your videos and stuff like that. But wait to. We go. We used. We've been using Premiere Pro for a couple of years. We have people who do some of our editing now. They use Adobe and other tools like that. But that's the editing part, guys. Here's the. Here's the best part about this. If you want to use video, people don't want the fancy stuff right now. They want you to go like this and hit record.

By the way, I used to promote do these kind of videos. The. The landscape. These are doing very well right now. The vertical.

Any other questions? YouTube cost, John, you can have a YouTube channel for the very low investment of free.

Doesn't cost anything.

All you need is a Gmail because it's. It's owned by Google. So you have to have a Gmail or some Google email to set it up. You can. You can create one so you can set it up. But yeah, it's a free platform. Very easy to set up. Thank you. Just think of it, guys, as a library of your video content. That's really what you want it to be.

So, John, I know you guys do videos at Roastery. Yes, we've been doing many. You should have K Zoom. K Zoom set up a YouTube and upload them all for you there. Yeah, we will. We will definitely look into that. Thanks, Andy. I think that's a great idea. We're gonna be talking about that in January. Awesome. I'm looking forward to it, my friend. Any other questions, guys? Maxwell, you have YouTube with a question mark.

Free LinkedIn versus upgrading. Either or. The reason I would have free is because, excuse me, Premium or navigator is they give you an unlimited list of people who are looking at your profile. And I think that's a very underappreciated metric because if you're creating content consistently right, a lot of people are going to come check out your profile because they're gonna be like, who the heck is this person? And so if I go in and I see a list of who's checking me out and these people could be prospects, I'm gonna want to engage with them some way.

So.

Well, that's it, gang. So my challenge I want to leave you guys with is how bad do you want it next year? Are you willing to put the time to get better at this? Because I promise, guys, the piece most advisors are missing right now is that planting the crop and content is the best way to do it.

You don't have to overthink it. It's what are my prospects looking for? And I am going to.