Welcome to Part I of Edition No. 73 of my weekly newsletter, providing practical analysis in the world of digital content strategy.
Last week we looked at TOFU content. This week, we’re moving one step further down in the content marketing funnel.
MOFU: You Have My Attention
Now that potential customers/subscribers/users know who you are – because you armed them up with top-of-funnel content – it’s time to build trust and set yourself apart from competitors.
Contents
What is the Purpose of Middle-of-Funnel Content?
What Kinds of Content Can Be Used?
What is the Messaging Focus?
What are the Distribution Channels?
What are the KPIs?
What is the Purpose of Middle-of-Funnel Content?
You must have done something right to get to this stage. Someone either saw an article, a social media post, an ad or some other piece of content that made them aware you exist. That’s what TOFU content is for.
Now, we’re onto the consideration, or engagement stage. Prospects, or leads, still aren’t ready to pay for your content, service or physical product. They are, however, interested in learning more.
Consideration of Your Product/Service
Users are going to be evaluating you with this question in mind: “When I am ready to pay up, why should I choose you over one of your competitors?”
That’s a valid question, and this is your chance to answer it head on.
Here’s an example from mattress company Nectar. They don’t shy away from their competitors, even dedicating entire pages on their website to laying out the features.
While you certainly want to set yourself up as the better of the two options, this is a chance to use cold hard facts to your advantage while elevating your product above a competitor’s.
For a content website that offers paid subscriptions, you might tout your larger staff, more frequent publishing, lower price, in-person events or other features that make you seem like the better choice.
Whatever path you take, you want to make it as easy as possible for the prospect to choose you when the time is right.
(This same page could be considered bottom-of-funnel content as well.)
Build Trust
Do you know your reader’s concerns? Address them. Talk about your return or cancellation policy. Why there’s no risk in giving your product a try (because of your money-back guarantee).
Your content should make you seem like an open book. If someone feels like there’s a catch to your offerings but not a competitor’s similar offer, they’re unlikely to dig any deeper to see whether you’re telling the truth. They’ll just go with the safest option that still meets their needs.
Provide Value
This could be applied to TOFU content as well, but it’s particularly important here. It may seem counterintuitive, or even risky, to “give something away for free” with no guaranteed return. But pulling the curtain back just a bit may be the last push someone needs to hand over their credit card information.
This doesn’t mean directly promoting your product – it means providing information related to your product that the prospect will appreciate, even if they never buy from you.
A great example is the beginner’s guide to running on Adidas’ website. It talks about the benefits, how to get started, how to take care of yourself, and even provides a daily eight-week schedule. Mixed in with this valuable information is a reference to some of its shoes, which of course they want you to purchase.
After reading the guide, maybe you do buy Adidas shoes, and maybe you don’t. But you have come away with a much better idea how to get started with running, and you know just who to thank.
How could a news organization do something similar? Let’s say you have a paid politics newsletter. Why not create a current-year voters’ guide that tells citizens everything from how to register, to candidate profiles to polling places. It’s information they could find out on their own, but you bundled it all in one place, and now you’re more likely to be their go-to for the latest news stories as election day gets closer. Both that year and the ones to come.
What Kinds of Content Can Be Used?
As with TOFU content, you have a lot of options here: blog posts, eBooks, case studies, social media posts, testimonials/success stories, reviews, comparison guides (like Nectar’s), how-tos, product overviews, landing pages, webinars, courses, data studies, tutorials, emails, ads and more.
Let’s talk about some of the more common, and perhaps most effective ones.
Blog Posts
The Adidas running guide is a great example. As stated above, what you want to do here is provide value. This value, however, should be aligned with the funnel stage’s purpose.
What problem does the Adidas blog solve? I want to get into running and I don’t know where to start.
A plumbing company could write about the best way to retrieve a wedding ring that’s gone down a sink. I can think of two possible results of someone reading that blog post:
They retrieve the ring themselves and trust your brand for more complicated plumbing jobs in the future
They realize they’re not qualified to do it, and you’re on the short list of plumbers they’re willing to hire
When you provide sincere value without shoving your product/service down someone’s throat, good things will happen.
Case Studies
Speaking of solving problems, this is where you can get specific.
Here’s a B2B SaaS example:
Our customer was wasting thousands of dollars a month paying a design agency for their brand’s visual assets. Now, their entire team is paying just $50 a month to use our tool, which allows them to create a lot of their less complicated designs on their own. By using our self-serve tool, they’re saving thousands per month.
What about a travel agent?
My client had spent hours a day Googling activities for her family’s trip to Spain. In a one-hour phone call, I gauged their interests and hobbies and created a customized itinerary that saved them time and stress, and allows them to board their flight with confidence knowing they have two weeks of fun waiting for them on the other side of the Atlantic.
These are simplified versions, but the important thing is to establish a relatable problem, the pain points that come with it, them swoop in with a time- and money-saving solution.
Courses
While selling a paid course could be an end objective, at this MOFU stage, we’re talking about free courses. Something that equips the user with a little extra knowledge that would better enable them to use your product.
Going back to our design-software example, the company could provide free courses on principles of psychology and color use in business designs. A free version of your software could be required to go through exercises in the course, while a premium (read: paid) version could be necessary to complete some of the more advanced activities.
Even if they don’t pay for your software at that point, you have provided value, and hopefully convinced them that your tool is worth the money if/when they’re ready to make a purchase.
What is the Messaging Focus?
Highly Targeted
Remember: prospects have a problem, you have a solution. The more specifically you can demonstrate you not only understand their problem, but have the best solution, the better your chance they’ll move on to the bottom of the funnel.
Don’t just write blog posts for runners. Write for beginner runners.
Don’t just offer a design course for B2B companies. Offer one for early-stage e-commerce startups without a full-time designer.
Don’t just offer a politics newsletter. Offer a special weekly newsletter covering “this year’s mayor race.”
Add Value
I have already touched on adding value, so I won’t beat a don’t-worry-he’s-just-sleeping horse.
Another reminder on a key point, though: providing value does not mean “my product/service is great.”
It means, “here’s some really valuable information related to your problem” while subtly mentioning that you can provide the resources to solve that very problem if they’re in the market.
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