A potential client or customer has decided they require a particular service that you offer but hasn’t decided which company to do business with. When considering how best to promote yourself in opportunities like this, the “Buyer’s Journey” is a helpful resource to keep in mind.
The Buyer’s Journey and Why it Matters
This is a conceptualization of the typical person’s movement from “problem-haver” to “customer”. It is often used by businesses to outline marketing campaigns. When promoting your business to a potential client or customer, it is important to understand the situation from their perspective.

What are the Stages of the Buyer’s Journey?
Buyers will often move through 5 different phases as they come to their decision:
- The Awareness Stage
- The Interest Stage
- The Decision Stage
- The Action Stage
- The Advocacy Stage

As your customer or client moves through their journey, your business’s relationship with them will change. In most cases, they’ll start as strangers. It will be your job to ensure that you can draw in Marketing Qualified Leads (MQLs). These potential customers have expressed interest in your work and have the potential to continue with the buyer’s journey to the end. To do this, you’ll need to build awareness for your business.
Tools for Building Brand Awareness
The most surefire way to be top of mind in a client’s eye is to have a sense of positive awareness. Does this customer recognize your name, logo, or other defining factors? Have they heard positive things from friends or on social media? If not, it’s time to get to work.
- Content Marketing
A strong way to build up your awareness is by producing content. More specifically, producing the content that your desired clients want. Build up your website with blog posts, FAQs, how-to guides, and other forms of information that pertain to your business and keep people engaged.
Content that Buyers Want to See:
- Blog posts
Blogs are an excellent way to kill two birds with one stone. Not only are you giving your customer an easy-to-access, organized collection of information, but you can also use keywords and links throughout your posts to generate traffic. These posts also create a new page with every addition and allow search engines to see that your site is constantly updating with new info rather than remaining stagnant.
- “How to” guides
These posts are often step-by-step instructions on how to accomplish a task associated with your business. This is an excellent way to establish expertise in your field and build trust with your clientele.
According to a survey published by HubSpot, “more people are actually driven to read blogs that teach them how to do something new.” Giving a customer a new skill, or an easier way to perform a task they’re used to is a priceless form of marketing for your business. It creates a positive relationship and can increase retention as they return to see what other information you have available for them.
2. Social Media
These days, social media is an irreplicable resource when it comes to marketing. When used correctly, it gives you the ability to market your business to numerous leads as well as supply you with data on said leads. Be sure to have a solid understanding of the social media platforms you plan to use when marketing as they are not “one size fits all.”
3. Paid Advertisements
Organic marketing can be coupled with paid ads to dramatically increase leads. Use paid advertisements that will help you reach your KPIs or share some of your best organic posts with new viewers by paying to promote them.
4. SEO & SEM
Search Engine Optimization and Search Engine Marketing need to be incorporated into your strategy as they can promote your businesses to potential clients who are purposefully searching for businesses like yours. Research keywords and incorporate them into the content you post on your site. This will promote SEO and allow you to appear higher in search results for people looking for your content.
5. Public Relations
It’s important to maintain a positive relationship with the community you serve, even with that outside of your target audience. Public relations are important in maintaining a professional image.
Measuring Results
You’ve now created a blog, filled it with a few posts, and you’ve added how-to guides to your website. How are you going to measure your results and ensure your posts are successful? It is important to outline your goals and compare the outcomes regularly.
What to look for in your goals
- Site traffic
While your goal is to increase revenue, one of the best ways to receive insight into the success of your posts is to look for an increase in site traffic (how many people are viewing your site). This can also provide information on what pages of your site are the most successful. Your site traffic is also set to grow over time with more posts so don’t be disheartened if your first post doesn’t go viral. Instead, monitor how well they perform over time.
- Clicks received
Viewing your site is one thing but interaction with your site is another. You want to ensure the customers stay invested in your content and, by extension, your business.
Next Steps
Your blogs and how-to guides were successful, and you’ve effectively used all the marketing tools available for this process! You now have the attention of your customer but that doesn’t guarantee you have their business. View the next post in our blog series covering “The Buyer’s Journey” or contact us for any of your marketing needs!