The 3-Step Guide to Identifying and Tapping the Most Profitable Demand Channels

With so many demand generation channel options, making sure you choose the right ones for your brand can seem overwhelming. However, there are three basic steps to identify demand channels and effectively implement them for your target audience.

Profitable demand channels will vary depending on your niche and your audience’s stage in their customer journey. Learn how to generate the best leads and convert them into closed sales efficiently.

1. Understand Your Target Audience

Besides developing an ideal customer profile, you must also understand how your target audience makes buying decisions. Gathering the actionable data relevant to your audience is the first step to deciding what demand channels will be most profitable for your niche. Questions to consider include:

• What methods do they use for research?
• What information do they need for decision-making?
• How and where do they buy?
• Why do they choose to purchase from certain outlets?

Understanding your target audience’s wants can also help tailor your messages to accelerate them through the pipeline. It can motivate them to learn more about your products and services or convince them to purchase.

Obtaining first-person market research and persona development research services from companies such as Televerde can help you beat your competitors. You will know your target audience’s wants, when they want it, and where they want it. Televerde also accelerates sales enablement by providing real-time feedback on your customer’s needs throughout their journey.

2. Know the Best Demand Channels For Each Funnel Stage

A full-funnel marketing plan can optimize your customer lifecycle marketing strategy. Each stage of the funnel comes with different goals that determine the most compatible demand channel to implement. An omnichannel approach is best because most customers require multiple interactions with a brand or business from different channels before finalizing a purchase.

Awareness Stage

At the awareness stage, audiences are just discovering or familiarizing themselves with your brand. These people are unaware they need your products or services. To identify demand channels best for lead generation, consider outlets that allow you to educate on the problem you are solving. You want short, visually appealing, and convincing information to attract attention.

One of the best lead generation strategies is digital event marketing, such as presenting at user conferences, hosting networking events, or conducting webinars. You can partner with industry specialists who already have a following to attract audiences to your events.

Other ideas for lead generation at this stage include:

• Providing free resources such as blogs and infographics.
• Checklists.
• Creating SEO-driven content to improve search rankings.
• Guest posts on platforms your audiences frequent.

Consideration Stage

Now you want your audience to consider your brand over your competitors. This stage should be relationship-building and emphasize why your solution is the best fit for your audience’s needs. Some of the best demand channels for this stage include:

• Email campaigns.
• Social media exchanges.
• In-depth blog posts.
• eBooks.
• Guides for your products or services.

You can also utilize digital events with more in-depth content, including providing a Q&A platform since the audience will already know about your business.

Conversion Stage

To increase sales growth, you need to provide information that converts your audience into sales-qualified leads. You want to reinforce that your service or product is the best solution for your audience’s needs. Prospects will need a clear offer that details your value proposition, relevancy, and quality assurance. You can present this information in various forms, including:

• During webinars,
• Within emails,
• On a sales page, or
• Through a video.

It is also important to establish yourself as an authority that can help and has successfully helped others. Identify demand channels your prospects use to gather this information. Examples include:

• Sale sheets.
• Testimonials.
• Third-party reviews.
• FAQs page.
• Case studies.
• Demo offers.
• Referrals.

3. Leverage Technology and Human Resources

After you identify demand channels to implement, you will need additional strategies to profit from them. You must provide the right message, to the right contact, in the right channel, and with the right level of human engagement. By leveraging available cost-effective technologies with human engagement services, you can balance the right levels of interaction to win more business faster.

There are also multiple tools for measuring your effort’s effectiveness. Common ways you can measure a channel’s effectiveness is through:

• Lead generation: How many people are attracted and the quality of the lead.
• Pipeline acceleration: The rate people move through each funnel stage.

Using performance insight data, you can know what strategies are working, what is not, and adjust your plan accordingly. Competitor evaluation can also help you determine which channels to use. Whether it is how to outdo competitors in the same channel or try a different approach. You can also calculate the value of your leads to determine marketing return on investment (ROI). Additional tools to consider include:

• Business intelligence (BI) platform.
• Content management system (CMS).
• Customer relationship management (CRM) system.

Lastly, effective demand generation strategies require marketing and sales to collaborate seamlessly. When both teams have the same goals and share current data, they can make proactive decisions. For example, marketing teams can have accurate information on what leads the sales team wants and what information they need for the first appointment with a prospect.

Televerde offers marketing and sales services that cover the entire lifecycle of your customers, enabling effective communications required for success. Televerde also assists with the utilization of analytics and tools such as CRM systems.

Conclusion

Implementing a customer lifecycle marketing plan can be easier when you know your target audience and understand which channels are the best for each demand generation funnel stage.

Support from companies like Televerde can help you generate qualified leads, accelerate the pipeline, and increase conversion rates through a combination of technology and human response.