I might be about to shatter an illusion for you.

When it comes to business to business marketing people rarely if EVER buy on the first contact. Though we might want them to, it simply  doesn’t happen that way.

 

Here is the reason why : The B….. …..

In truth, the fact that people don’t buy straight away is normal and is to be expected.

Think of your own buying behaviour when it comes to a significant purchase.

I doubt you walked into that car showroom and handed over a wad of cash immediately, did you?

Or saw a great website and contacted the company in question and said yes on the first call; am I correct?

 

 

This is because you went through something known as the buyer’s cycle. There are four main stages:

  • Awareness-we become aware of a product, service or supplier
  • Consideration-we then start to research and validate our options
  • Intent- we then look at what we get for our investment and compare and contract
  • Decision-reviewing every piece of data we have so far, we then decide to say YES!

 

Is this ringing any bells for you?

Let me share an example of a client that recently decided to work with the team at Centredexcellence.

He is a business owner based in the UK; for ease let’s call him Simon (not his real name).

Simon originally saw something I had posted on LinkedIn that was shared by a few other business owners. It related to a challenge he was having at the time. He then signed up for one of our reports and arrived on our email list.

 

 

He stayed there for about a year. Opening our emails, reading our blog posts and joining our webinars. During this time, he was evaluating what we could do for him.

Our credibility, knowledge and expertise had an impact. He then attends one of our one day events. We had a conversation, and now we are working with Simon and his organisation as he is one of our VIP client’s.

Think about it. No chasing down on our part, our automated marketing system has multiple touch points that moved along with him (the term is nurtured) as he went through his own buyer’s cycle.

You might have heard the term nurture or keep in touch marketing before. I have just given you a simple example of how it can work; remember it as it’s going to become increasingly important as your market your recruitment consultancy.

Aren’t people ever ready to buy straight away Nicky? Yes, they are, though not necessarily from you.

 

 

Chet Holmes, the well known marketing and sales expert, revealed that only 3% of potential clients are ready to buy now. Which in one way is positive, however, if they don’t know you or have only recently discovered your brand and recruitment service in the market, human nature will kick in, and it’s highly probable they will say no to you.

However, if they had been connected to you or on your email list for some time and had experienced the ‘nurture’ marketing process when they were ready, you would have been their first choice.

 

Important

Your potential new clients in today’s business economy want to know you first then get to like you. This then leads them to trust you and then to make the decision to work with you as their recruiting partner of choice.

The exciting news is that this nurturing process works incredibly well when it comes to marketing your recruitment organisation and scaling your growth.

Want to find out how to utilise strategies like this in your organisation? Then read what the day entails here.

 

High performing consultants are the lifeblood of any successful recruitment organisation. The challenge starts when your recruiters underperform. There is a solution and I cover it in-depth in my latest ebook; How to Convert Your under Performers to Consistent Billers in 14 Days or less. You can download it here.