Customer Acquisition: Overcoming the number one internet marketing problem

This is a guest post by Lilach Bullock.

Internet marketing and internet marketers have many issues, but this is the most common one – cost of customer acquisition. In this post we are going to explore costs and how as an internet marketer you can use your list to give you better results including better customer retention.

We are going to start with a little  maths. $C is the cost of acquiring a customer and $R is the revenue generated from that customer.

In order to acquire a customer you have to spend money and/or time: advertising, blogging, social media, sales copy, affiliate commissions, customer support, and so on.

If $R is greater than $C then you have a successful online business. As part of this series I will be sharing with you multiple ways in which you can cheaply advertise your offer AND how you can capitalise on the traffic you do bring to your website.

You could jump in and start pumping prospective customers towards your website and offer, but what happens if that prospect checks out what you’re offering and decides to leave? You would have just spent hundreds (possibly more) of dollars getting that prospect to come and check out your offer only to have them leave — for good.

What if you were able to keep that prospect around for a while? What if you could make the most out of every single prospect that visits your website? What if you could increase the efficiency of your marketing? You can do just that!

Not every prospect that you bring to your website will buy from you today, but many that do not buy today will eventually buy from you one day in the near future. So, why not try and make the most out of the money you have already spent to get those prospects to your website…? Why not try and capture them as future (and highly targeted) leads?

This is where a “list” comes into the picture. In marketing, a list is a collection of prospect (or customer) names and contact information. The offline world has been utilizing the list for decades upon decades! And you can tap into the same power online…

When you have a list of prospective customers, then, you can solicit this targeted list of interested people anytime you have something new to offer. Does this mean you should contact them every single day? No. But, having a list of proven prospects is by far cheaper and more reliable than going out and finding new leads (and faster — just click a button).

All you would have to do is send one email out, and you would have the potential of hundreds or thousands of sales. But this is not possible IF you do not prepare yourself in the beginning.

What you need to do is create a sales funnel before you begin sending prospects to your website

“What’s a sales funnel?”, you ask. Well, look at it this way: A sales funnel is no different than an oil funnel. An oil funnel allows you to pour a large continuous stream of oil into a small area…

A sales funnel is no different!

A sales funnel is a marketing process in which you take a multitude of prospects from multiple sources and you funnel them into one small area — your offer.

Sales funnels can get complicated really fast, but the image to the above is a basic and simple sales funnel. In fact, I could talk all day about different sales funnel techniques, but I won’t do that today. Today I just want to introduce you to the concept, and get you rolling with just a basic sales funnel. This way you can prepare yourself and get ready to capture those leads which you will be generating from the techniques on this blog.

The squeeze page captures your prospects. This is where you promise to give the prospect something (usually for free) and in return the prospect gives you their name and contact information so you can send them their free gift.

It is comprised of a headline, sub-head, bullet points of benefits, and an email capture form. The headline gets the prospects attention and the bullets sell the benefits of this free giveaway. The email capture form collects the personal information for each prospect AND the free gift can only be received once the prospect enters that data and hits submit.

You can then redirect them to your sales letter, or you can choose to have them check out their free gift first. Either way, the next step to the funnel is the follow-up.

The follow-up is there for those that have signed up for your email list, but have yet to buy from the sales letter. Some people will have to visit the sales letter a couple of times before they buy from you.

The follow-up will continue the sales process of getting the prospect to visit the sales letter.

Once the prospect gets to the sales letter, then, it’s the sales letter’s job to convert them into a buyer. Once this happens and the sale is made the sales funnel has been completed.

Now that buyer will always be on your list, so, the next time you have a similar offer available you can just email your list again, and those that have bought from you in the past will buy from you again. Why is this? Because it’s a proven fact that it’s easier (and cheaper) to retain a paying customer than finding a new one. Customers always feel safer giving their money to people they have already done business with.

Over to you – do you know your cost of customer acquisition and how do you retain your customers? If you are an experienced internet marketer share some words of wisdom here.