A “3-minute” crash course in digital marketing. EP #212 - Den Lennie

G' day guys. Dan. Here, episode 212 of the how to Scale a Video Business Podcast. And today we're talking about prospect awareness. And what actually is that anyway?

It's something from the marketing world that is very, very, very important to understand in your video business. I'm going to explain why in this issue issue episode don't know where that came from. So what we're talking about here is something that was.

Created by someone called Eugene Schwartz way back many, many years ago. And it's called the five levels of customer awareness.

Now these are actually five scientifically identified states of awareness that your prospects or your customers have when they are considering engaging with your business. They are most aware, product aware, solution aware, problem aware and unaware. So let me now just explain what I mean by all of this.

I'll take you through them one by one. Okay, so you've got to understand that depending on where someone is on their buying journey, they're going to have a different level of focus and awareness on how important it is to solve that problem. So the five stages of awareness at each stage impacts differently how you present your offer and your sales message.

You know, one size doesn't fit all you've. I talk a lot about the importance of understanding a niche that you're working in or your specialism or what you're known for, because you just can't send the same message to everyone. You know, if you have a message for a manufacturing client and that manufacturing client is a 57 year old male who is an engineer, that is not going to be, you're not going to attract his attention in the same way you might attract the attention of a 26 year old marketing executive working for a vegan food company. So it's really important to understand not only who you're talking to, but how aware they are. So if someone in the let's call her Beth, 27 working for Vegan food brand, has worked in marketing for five years, she's going to have a different level of awareness when they come to create content on social than Bill, who might be 57 and running an engineering firm who's never hasn't even got Facebook on his phone. So one size doesn't fit all. So let me go through these and try and explain them to you as best I can for the example of here. So awareness level one is most aware. So if someone is at the most aware stage or your prospects at the most aware stage, then they're familiar with your products, they're familiar with you, and they know how to get a hold of you at this stage. If they need a project from you, they only need the bare minimum of information because there's trust. So if you're writing marketing for someone at this level, it's really the easiest person to write for. These are your best customers. They're your biggest fans. Prospects are the most aware, don't need to know the backstory of your company. They don't need social proof or very little of it. At best, they don't need to be educated on the benefits of the products. And, and the iPhone's a great example of this. Okay, so Apple doesn't use persuasive copy to explain why someone should buy an iPhone. Okay? People already know the new iPhone's coming out and they know they want it. So who are they? These are a really highly receptive audience that is already sold on your product or service. And the, you know, they literally look forward to you getting, getting it ready. Like they're your brand evangelists. These are people, customers who kind of know you on a personal level. And, you know, from an Apple perspective, these are the Apple fans with the Mac and the Apple sticker on, on everything they own. They're, you know, in the olden days a few years ago, they'd be camping out in the cold to wait for a new iPhone release, and they can't wait to hear from you. So, you know, when you, if you're, if you're an iPhone user and you're a Mac user, you know when new products are coming out and you can, everyone's just talking about it. So you know to do. These are the ones that are literally hanging out with you. They might even be clients who. You've got mobile numbers for this. They just send you a message saying, hey, I've got this project. Or they might be anticipating your next reach out to them.

So these are people who aren't afraid to spend serious time and invest with your products and services because they know and trust you. So, so how do you talk to them? Well, these are your followers and your fans, so don't be afraid to play the role of leader. You know, you can wow them with statistics and case studies and whatnot, but actually these people already know and trust you. So the fact is it's unlikely that you have tons of clients like this in your business, but you might have three or four. They have lots of desire. They just want to know, can you do it and give us a price?

And what Eugene Schwartz says about this level of awareness is like, be simple and Be direct, but above all, don't be fancy. So these are the clients that are ready to buy. These are the people that literally send you a message going, hey, I got a project. It's this much money. Can you do it?

These are the clients that you want to have. Okay, you want to get everybody up to this level. But awareness level two is product aware. Now, this is someone who is. Well, probably the easiest way to describe this is that people who know what it is you're selling, but perhaps they're on the fence. So they know that you're a video company, but they're not convinced that you're the video company they should hire. Maybe they've been burned in the past by a similar service, a bit skeptical towards new faces, and they just want to know if you can actually help them, if you. They need to know if you can empathize with their plight. You know, can you prove and provide the solute? Can you prove that you can do it? And can you provide the solution that they need? They know about your industry and they know about your products. They know you're a video company and they know you can make video.

So where are these people? Well, there's a good chance that they've maybe opted into your email list, if you've got one. Maybe they've made an inquiry on your website, maybe they've followed you on social media. They're interested.

But they just haven't taken the next step yet. So how do you talk to this level of customer to turn these people into ongoing clients and move them into most aware? Well, it's all about building trust. So at this stage, you want to be educating these opportunities to build more credibility. And this is where our social proof comes in. So think about testimonials from satisfied customers, people who can vouch for you, and consistency comes into play as well. So you want to be regularly sending information, I would say, via email to catch their attention. You know, if you're on my email list, you'll know that we send you an email every single week with this podcast because we want to make sure you don't miss it, because there might be something in that podcast which is super helpful for you. And you'll know if you get the podcast emails, you get proper copywritten shorts notes which break down what we're covering in the podcast. So we want to make that a kind of constant touch point so we can connect with you 50 times a year and say, hey, we've got this really cool thing. And then every now and again, we'll send a link to something we think is going to be really helpful for you. So just recently we sent something to help support our friend Ben Amos, who is giving away some free training. So we'll often use that opportunity to say, hey, there's something really cool over here we think you might find interesting.

Remember that nurturing leads is a marathon, not a sprint, so you want to keep going. So here's an example. So everybody knows American Express, okay? And they offer credit cards. But how do you know if an American Express card is right for you and your spending habits? How do you know if the American Express Platinum card is better than having a CitiBank Visa or MasterCard or an MBNA MasterCard? Now, American Express have led the way in differentiating itself by giving better points and better benefits. No fees in the first year, extra miles than other reward companies. Now other credit card companies are definitely catching up. But you know, when you see credit card adverts now, it's all about how many points are they giving you based on signing up. So the welcome offer is always really key. Now you may not be able to consider doing that for, for your business. It might not work. But what other methods can you present in front of a client or a prospect to have them say, hey, you know, these are the company we should, we should be hiring. And it could be as simple as having retargeting ads with customer case studies that automatically show when anyone has visited your website. So that's one way to raise awareness levels. Now awareness level three is solution awareness. Now here your prospect knows what they want to achieve and they know that solutions exist, but they're not necessarily aware that your specific solution exists. This would be very common in video. A solution aware market is a warm prospect, but they're hungry for answers. They have a problem. They know they need to shoot some kind of video and they're actively searching for providers. So think of them as investigators and doing detective work. They want answers, they're actively searching for them, but they haven't quite put in this under their, you know, your offer hasn't shown up and they haven't looked at it under the microscope. Chances are they've seen other production companies, other providers, maybe they've seen ads on Facebook, maybe they've googled, but they don't really understand what separates you from another company. So here's a pro tip, right? Go and do a quick Google search after this podcast and just search video production in your area. Okay, so video production services your town and observe how every single site Looks the same. Now, many have an offer for a lead magnet.

Probably not many, I reckon, probably none. So it's wide open for you to grab this. You know, if you're offering something like six things you should know before hiring a video production company, then that's going to stand out. If you, if you were offering that under the search phrase, you know, video production Sydney and, and the advert came up with video production Sydney, six things to ask a video production company before you hire them. That's more likely to grab attention than just like, hey, you know, ABC productions.

So maybe they're looking at some videos on YouTube, maybe they're thinking about doing it, Googling, finding out as much as they can, bouncing around, you know, Facebook, asking people and they're looking to become informed. Now these are great prospects because they're already sold on the idea video. They just need to narrow down their search. So this is who you want to be targeting as, as the kind of the coldest traffic. So the more information you can put out on LinkedIn, the more people you can connect with, the more you can have that conversation. Starting more you will build up your front end funnel and have a steady stream of proper opportunities coming through.

And these are the kind of people that you might find through targeted ads as well. So think of the language you would use on an ad for someone who's already searching. You might use copy like are you searching for a way to create great video? Check out our five step guide to making videos quickly download instantly. I mean obviously you'd have a better. But it copied that. But I'm not a copywriter, you know, this talks directly to those prospects who are actively looking and gives them a definitive solution straight away.

Now those kind of prospects in the search phase are more likely to click on your ebook, which is why it's so important to have some kind of lead generation tool or mechanism on your website. And a lot of people come up against resistance with this but, but it works extremely well. I just had a new client join me a couple of weeks ago into our foundation program who had, had been aware of me for years but recently downloaded the ebook. So the ebook was the restarting of that relationship. So you want to be playing the role of teacher here. These people are looking for advice and so they want to understand your product or service offering and the value before they pull the trigger. So these people are primed for free offers lead magnets, ebooks, action guides, you know, checklists and an autoresponder series or a video series that helps them Understand how the process works. Now.

These prospects need to be nurtured and not strong armed. So by giving them some necessary attention and help them understand the information they're looking for, you're going to build value and allow them to connect the dots and understand if they're getting this much value for free, then perhaps you're going to be a great choice to work with. And then, you know, it's all about offering value so that people can make an informed decision. The mere exposure effect says that it takes 15 to 18 points of contact with someone, a brand, product or service, before you feel comfortable reaching out to have a conversation that is even close to sales. So anything you can do to accelerate that process will super, really, really help you. People will generally go back to the first person who offered them value. So these are really good prospects in the video space. I'd say that the chances are most people are in the solution aware camp. Okay. And they're a great opportunity to nurture with value. So we go value at the solution Aware, evidence and proof at the product Aware. And then the most aware, it's just like, you know, being available.

Now level four is problem aware. Now at this level, prospects know they have a problem. They know that they should probably be doing video, but they don't know if they should do it themselves or get a company to hire to do that. They're not necessarily aware they can do that within their budget. I don't think I'd be wanting to target too many people in the problem aware category because they need a lot of education, a lot of convincing about the value of spending money on quality video. And one of the mistakes I see a lot of people making is they're trying to be evangelist for video. They're trying to convince someone they should do video. And that is, that is not the strongest position to be in because you'll put a lot of energy into trying to convince someone to do video, when in actual fact you'd be better off working with people that are, you know, more developed in terms of where they're at in their journey. Most people know you can shoot video on your iPhone and upload it to Facebook, Twitter, Facebook, whatever.

So, you know, these people have a problem, but they don't know what to do next. They're kind of flying blind and they don't know where to turn. So these are people who, you know, they want to make a video. Now for the right company, there could be a lot of opportunity here. As long as you recognize you're gonna have to do A lot of work and you'll have to be patient. So if you're someone who offers like free video training or a video service that trains people how to use their iPhone, it might be a great fit. Maybe they're googling how to make video, maybe they're clicking on YouTube saying, how do I shoot video myself? I mean, they might stumble across you through organic search, but they're mostly, they don't know what you're selling, nor do they know anything about the video industry. They have a problem and they know they have a problem. So once you've identified that problem.

They'Re going to assume that you know a thing or two about their solution. Your job is to introduce your solution and persuade them to dig a bit deeper and have a closer look at what you're doing. So what Eugene Schwartz says here is this is where you can make some big promises in your, in your rants to this level of awareness so you can be a little bit over the top. You could say things like, the one thing you should do with all your video is to guarantee audiences watch them. It can be a bit dramatic just to get attention, but, but there are things you can do so you could say, hey, here's, here's it. The advert could read how to guarantee your audience will watch your video. It's a big, bold statement, you know.

Now, final awareness level is unaware. And this is where someone is completely unaware they even have a problem. They don't know anything about your product or service. All they have is their own identity, their own beliefs and their own opinions. They don't know about your product and they don't even know that it isn't a possible solution. And they might not even know that they have a problem yet. They can be so unaware that these prospects are really not worth your time. They're completely clueless. They don't even know they've got a problem. So if someone was unaware, they'd be like, oh, I didn't notice I was sneezing, you know, the next level up of the stage problem, where would be, oh, why am I sneezing.

At, you know, the next level up? You'd be saying, well, what do I. What are the best treatments for the common cold?

The next level up would be product awares. I need Panadol right now.

And, or rather don't need Panadol or headaches or something else. Then the final level of awareness is I just need to go home and eat mum's chicken soup. You know, that's, that's how it would go in a kind of food analogy. So you don't really want to be getting close to completely unaware people because they're not even aware they have a problem.

You know, they don't necessarily have a lot of hope for improvement and so they're not really a good prospect. I wouldn't recommend going after unaware prospects. It's just too much hard work. So who should you target? Well, reflecting back, the people that I think you generally want to be targeting are product aware and solution aware. These are still two very distinct markets and you have to think about who it is you want to target because the language you use, the words you use, and how you communicate with them will have a huge impact whether or not they'll be responsive. So think about who you want to talk to, how you want to talk to them. And yeah, hopefully that's been helpful. Guys, it is quite technical. It is something that takes a few goes to get your head around, but it's a really important thing to understand. Ask yourself this has owning your own video business been everything you dreamed it would be when you first got started? It might be hard to admit, but think about whether you're genuinely achieving everything you set out to when you made that decision to grab the camera and go it alone. Are you really working less? Are you really earning more? And are you really in control? Chances are you're bloody good at what you do, but you're having to work like a dog, 70 plus hours a week, whether it's filming, editing, marketing, or any of the other jobs that come with being the big boss of your own video company. When you're managing projects, constantly searching out for new clients and worrying about cash flow, it's easy to lose sight of the bigger picture or make real progress. Let's face it, that stress is the last thing you need when you're trying to run a profitable company that supports you and the people you care about. Truth is, a business that provides financial, professional and personal freedom really is achievable. But maybe you've got that nagging feeling that you're overworked, lacking stability, and struggling to get to where you really want to be right now. It could be that you just don't know how to make a positive change on your own. So I created the Video Business Accelerator coaching programs to really supercharge your video business. With these unique coaching programs, you'll learn all the tools you need to get complete confidence in the success of your video business. You can take the first step on your journey to a successful business that doesn't control your life. Let me show you how. Head over to Denlany.com and click on accelerator.