Engage Your eLearning Audience With Lead Nurturing Content
Lead nurturing is about relationship-building. Relationship-building is about human connection. What is one of the best ways to connect? Sharing your story [1]. The above is one of the best approaches you can follow when considering a lead nurturing campaign. Storytelling lets you meet your leads where they are and show them how you fit into their journey. Create and share lead nurturing content that shows who you are. But also focus on what you can do to help them.
Ultimately, sharing your eLearning brand’s story gives leads a peek into your company. Ideally, it will make it more clear why people work with — and love working with — you. That's exactly why it's one of the most powerful tools for building relationships. From there, you can start turning high-quality leads to high-quality customers.
Key Ingredients For Content Creation That Target eLearning Prospects
Knowing how important storytelling through content is, there are a few helpful practices for creating that content well. First, all of your content creation efforts should keep your audience top of mind. Think of what your leads might need from your content, what would be most relevant to them, and what would resonate best with their pain-points.
Don't make content that feels stuffy. If you appear human to your leads, they're more likely to feel a connection [2]. Make sure you tell stories about your real customers and don't be afraid to reference pop culture or current events. Be personal. Your team is full of experts in the eLearning niche. Take advantage of their expertise to create content that matters. Focusing on eLearning trends or on subjects that are of high value to the community is vital.
Share your stories in a way that provides value to your leads and respects their time. Be engaging, but get to the point you're making too. Immediately hook leads by showing them why what you're saying will be worth their time. To achieve this you have to know their concerns and share tips that can help their eLearning career. Or give insights on how they can use your eLearning product or service to meet their business needs.
Types Of Lead Nurturing Content That eLearning Marketers Can Use
There are a few kinds of content you can use for lead nurturing [2]. You can create original content, which is content you make yourself. Whether you write it in-house, have freelancers write it, or feature guest writers, you can share with your audience something that is uniquely your own. This could include eBooks, blogs, or guides that deal with the eLearning niche. You can use original content to engage your leads, sharing it with them at different points in their journey.
Curated content can also be a valuable nurture tool because it's timely and relevant. What curated content should you share? Articles, industry guides, and blog posts from outside sources can engage your leads. Such material can act as a strong complement to your own content creation efforts. Consider using this content in emails you send to leads to keep them engaged. Even when you don't have any proprietary content to share at that time.
And add occasional User-Generated Content to the mix. Having your leads or current customers help create content and build a community is another great way to build connections [3]. The above will also increase your chances of shareability. Plus, it could be fruitful in getting more backlinks for your site. For example, if you have eLearning influencers do guest-posting you can reach a new audience. These influencers would easily share a guest-post with their community and so forth. Thus, you end up increasing your brand awareness in addition to having good quality content on your website.
How eLearning Marketers Can Create The Perfect Lead Nurturing Email
Now that you've learned about the different types of lead nurturing content, it's time to learn more about how to share that content with your leads.
Email is one of the most powerful marketing tools out there. That holds true for lead nurturing too. It lets you communicate directly with leads in a personalized way while sharing your content and telling your stories. Crafting the perfect lead nurturing email means focusing on specific components. Here are 4 of the most important:
1. Subject Line
Email subject lines are crucial to the success of using email as a lead nurturing tool. It's the first thing recipients see in their inbox. If it doesn't grab their attention or pique their curiosity, your message will most likely go to the trash can or be left unread.
Make sure, then, that your subject lines are specific and unique and communicate urgency. You want readers to open it the minute they see it and find that doing so is worth it when they dive in.
2. Body Copy
Once leads have opened your email, you want them to find the content inside compelling and sharp. Somewhere in the body copy, include a Call-To-Action so they know what to do next with the information or content you've shared. A good test to see whether you're approaching this the right way is to do a test run. See whether you can read your email in 30 seconds and immediately identify its value. If not, you'll know that you have some changes to make.
Make sure you're thinking strategically about how you bring your copy together too. What part of the copy shows up "above the fold" when users open your message? Also, be sure to offer leads a plain-text version. Some people don't want to open an email in HTML form.
3. Calls-To-Action
Remember that mention of how important CTAs are? There's a right way to use them. Depending on your audience and what you have to offer, include one or two CTAs in your email. To find out whether one or two is more effective, do some testing and see what your leads respond to best.
CTAs might appear as buttons, images, or hyperlinks. Make them clear and bold because you want leads to be completely certain of the action they need to take. Do note, too, that not every single email needs a CTA. You want to nurture leads through educational, entertaining messages, and those won't always lead to a specific invitation to sign up or contact you.
Mobile Optimization
Finally, be absolutely sure that your lead nurturing emails—and all emails, for that matter—are optimized for mobile devices. In 2014, 41% of emails were opened in a mobile environment, according to a study from Campaign Monitor. Today, that number is up to 46% [4].
There are a few ways to go about ensuring your emails show up exactly as you want them to on mobile. If you're a beginner, you can use scalable design, which works on both desktop and mobile. The above approach doesn't require you to code in order to adjust image and text sizes. If you have some CSS knowledge and text-heavy layouts, you can implement fluid design. And with the right resources, you can implement responsive design, which lets you design for specific screen sizes along with everything the other two options offer.
Use nurturing content to capture your leads and engage with them throughout the funnel. Sharing that content in email is one of the best ways to connect. Also, don’t forget that segmentation and lead scoring is important for email marketing success. Be strategic and intentional with your email messages, and you'll find that storytelling can help you grow your eLearning business. The above steps will assist you in optimizing all your lead nurturing efforts for success.
For more information on acing your lead nurturing campaigns, simply download our Complete Lead Nurturing Guide for eLearning Companies.
References:
[1] How to Tell Your Brand’s Story
[2] The Definitive Guide to Lead Nurturing
[3] Online Community Management: Interview with Christopher Pappas
