Episode #015: Developing Your Customer Journey
Developing Your Customer Journey
How do you go from Social Media Posts to paying customers? That's the key question - and today on the podcast we're talking all about the customer journey from first touch to paying customer.
Tune in to learn how to turn eyeballs into customers!
Links Mentioned on the Show From Zach:
Full Transcript:
This is Not Your Average Online Marketing Podcast, episode number 15. And in this episode, we're talking about creating an epic customer journey. What is a customer journey? Well, we're going to talk about that today, so stay tuned.
Hey, hey, hey, not so average marketer. Welcome to another episode of the Not Your Average Online Marketing Podcast, a podcast where we give you insights, tips, training, and how-tos to grow your online business. Now, I'm really excited for today's episode, though I know I say that every week, because we're going to talk about developing a customer journey. We should start by explaining what exactly is a customer journey. Really for me, a customer journey is quite simply how does someone go from finding out about you to becoming a customer. What's the process that they need to go through from first awareness to paying customer.
And so what I want to talk to you about today is understanding how we actually develop that and move people through the process, because a lot of times we do what we're supposed to do in online business. We post on Instagram, we post on Facebook, maybe we do a TikTok, but do we really have a clear goal on how those content pieces that we're putting out into the world are actually turning people into customers? And when I talk to potential members and clients, a lot of times what they're saying is, "Well, I'm trying to grow my following, or I'm trying to grow my email list." And while those things are super important, if there's not a backend, if there's not a process that you're tapping into, then you're not going to really convert people into your ecosystem, into your business, into customers. And so what I want you to understand is that first things first, for me, a customer journey is quite simply the mental or physical visualization of the process from first touch to first payment.
So let's talk about how this actually works. I'm going to run through it at a very high level and then we're going to break down each of the steps. For me, it really is first touch. First touch is about social media, advertising, traffic. And once somebody has come through first touch, the next step is that they become a lead. They're a little bit warmer, they're on your email list. The next step of the customer journey is warming up your new leads. This is where you nurture, make offers, present your authority, potentially sell something. And then we move into regular nurturing. Regular nurturing is about releasing your content on a regular basis that moves people further into your ecosystem. Now, at this point, you may have generated a customer and that's great, but there's going to be a large majority of people on your list that don't buy something instantly.
And that's when the next step in a customer journey is what I call the condensed focus. This can also be referred to as a launch, but it's basically where you're doing a challenge, a webinar, a video series to turn those new leads into customers in a short period of time. Once you've done that, you now have new customers and that's where the customer journey doesn't end but really solidifies itself and you have that new customer sitting in your business. And finally, the next step in the customer journey is, what happens after somebody becomes a customer? It's really easy for us to consider what happens when somebody's becoming a customer, but what happens afterwards? Do you have an onboarding sequence? Do you have next steps for people to take? Do you have additional offers that you can present to them, or do you simply repeat the process and go back to the first touch of awareness on social media?
So that's a really high level of a general customer journey. Now, in your business, it may be more specific, it may be less specific and that's okay. But what I want you to understand is that it's really about moving people from discovering you to working with you, to the next steps after they're doing that. So let's break each of these down. What is exactly the first touch? First touch really is content. This can be content on your blog, content on your podcast. This could be social media content, this could be advertising, but really what I'm saying is, how are you getting your content out there to new people? I don't claim to be an Instagram expert, I don't claim to be a TikTok expert, but there's plenty of training out there about how to grow those platforms and reach new people.
So in the initial first touch phase, you may very well be growing your social platforms because you're trying to reach new people. What I want you to think about is, how do I get my message out there? For me, the best thing that I do is advertising. Now, I will claim my expertise as an advertiser. We've been advertising for years, almost seven years now since we started this business, and we just get really great results. I think that the reason that is is because we can be running ads all the time. Now, I've got various podcasts, you can check them out on advertising, but what's more important than learning the exact specifics of how to advertise is really understanding the benefit of advertising as a whole.
That benefit is that I don't have to be constantly on social media to be growing my following. For some scenarios, the advertising may be your form of content, the way that you're pushing new people into your ecosystem. Once you've done that, once you have people that are actually connecting with you, the second piece of the customer journey is converting them to a lead, getting them on your list. What I want you to understand about this step is that it's about getting people warmer. So someone who sees your content on social media may or may not be your ideal customer. Someone who gets delivered your ad may or may not be your ideal customer.
But the next step is to promote content that moves people to your email list. With social media, that could be organic posts, that could be reels, that could be TikToks that talk specifically about how to get on your email list. So that first touch is like how do we grow these platforms, that second touch is how do we convert those platforms over to our email list.
And so once we do that, a couple things. One, you need to have a really great freebie offer. A lot of times we think, oh, people are going to want to hear from me, so I'll do a free newsletter or a free podcast every week. That's great and you want to do that stuff, but that's not enough of a draw to get people onto your list. So we're always in our business thinking, what can we promote that people will exchange their name and email for? In December of 2021, we actually did a 2022 planner and we had over 3,000 downloads in just about 30 days. It was absolutely nuts and we grew our email list really rapidly because of that. We actually had over 3,800 downloads, but about 3,200 of those were brand new leads.
Now, once people are on your email list, this is where I see a big misstep in the online marketing space, and that is that the next touch point shouldn't be an offer or it shouldn't be a regular email, it should be a warm up or welcome sequence. When people first get on your email list, what I see a lot of people do is they say, "Oh, I've got the lead, now I'm going to send them my regular newsletter or I'm going to invite them to my free training that I have coming up in two months." That's not a bad strategy and it will work, but you can improve that strategy by putting a welcome or warmup sequence in place.
Now, this in our business tends to be four to six emails that we send to brand new subscribers. The first email is all about driving people to follow us on social media, giving them their freebie, just kind of getting them to know us a little bit better. After that, we may position some offers. We may have a low ticket offer, we may have an automated webinar, we may have a video series, but we're going to drive people to take the next action that we want them to take.
We're also going to establish our authority in this welcome sequence. So we're not just going to send content that's like, "Oh my gosh, come follow me, come buy stuff for me." We're also going to send them free content that establishes our authority. And what it does is it actually shows your potential buyers that you know what you're talking about. You don't want to just like throw random content out there, you want to throw some of your best content out there.
Now, for reference, if you want to learn more about writing an email sequence, you can check out episode number 12 of the podcast where we actually walk you through writing an email sequence for new leads. This is the exact flow that I used to move people into My Corner of the Internet, how to write emails that really engage people, and a simple strategy that grows your social media while you're growing your email list. So I won't spend too much time on the intricacies of that warmup sequence because I've got that whole episode on it, but I just want you to understand that it's really important that new leads don't just automatically drop into a regular sequence, they move into that sequence through an intentional flow that you've put in place.
Once people have gone through that welcome or warmup sequence, some of them are going to buy from you, some of them may register for your evergreen trainings, webinars, video series, and that's great, but there's going to be a segment of that audience that doesn't. There's going to be a segment of the audience that doesn't immediately trust you or want to take you up on high ticket offers and that's okay. What we want to do is we want to move people into a regular content-based nurture newsletter. Now, for us, that's relatively simple because we release a podcast every week. So every week we have a content piece that we can email to our audience. We have a specific way that we connect with our audience. And so all we have to do is send out an email, at least once a week, that promotes our podcast. It's really that simple.
You may do blogs, you may do YouTube videos, you may do a podcast. It doesn't matter. What is important is that you're sending out regular new content to your audience because it's going to continue to do those things that the warmup sequence did but at a deeper level. It's going to continue to nurture them. It's going to continue to establish your authority. And you never know when someone's going to hear a podcast, a video or a blog post that ultimately makes them go, "Oh my gosh, I need to work with this guy or this gal. I need to work with this person." What can you put out there that continues to establish your authority?
Now, one thing that I want to note is that you can also align your content with things that you're regularly promoting or things that you want to promote for say a launch. For example, this podcast episode is all about establishing your customer journey. We have a free five day training coming up called Automate: Five Days to Grow your Email List and Conversions. If you want to check that out, you can go to heartsoulhustle.com/automate. Again, that's heartsoulhustle.com/automate. At that URL, you're going to be able to register for our free training. That free training is going to walk you through creating your own customer journey. We're going to help you establish what you should promote, how to promote them consistently with advertising, how to write your welcome sequence that converts new leads to potential buyers.
Now, I want to kind of be a little funny here. We actually just kind of inception what you can do with your content. So if you head to heartsoulhustle.com/automate and you actually sign up for that training, you're more likely to sign up because you listen to this podcast, because you're part of our regular content sequence. Now, we'll link all of the links that we're talking about in the show notes that you'll be able to find at heartsoulhustle.com/nyap015. Again, that's heartsoulhustle.com/nyap015 for Not Your Average Podcast, episode number 15.
Because we're doing that, because we are doing a five day challenge, that is what I would consider a really next important step because some people have gone through our automated sequence and bought products and some people have it. But now what we're going to do is we're going to take this list that we've been building, those 3,000 leads that we brought in in December, and we're going to hone it down to the people who are most interested in our content. That's going to be a condensed focus. It's going to be a launch. It's going to be a five day challenge. In this five day challenge, we'll provide massive value to our audience and then we'll make an offer at the end.
See, what works so great about this is that there's this segment of your audience that just needs to get to know you, just needs to connect with you, just needs to see your teaching style before they're ready to commit to something at a deeper level. What's great about a launch is that you've done all this pre-work. You've found people on social media. You've gotten that first touch. You've turned them into leads. You've put them through a warmup sequence. You've nurtured them over a period of time and now you're going to put them through a launch.
About a launch is that it's this focused effort of all these new leads. Now, you may also with your condensed focus, your launch, run ads specifically for the challenge to people who don't know you. What I love about this is that you've got this segment of your audience that's really warmed up that's likely to buy the offer at the end or convert to the offer at the end. And then you also have this segment of your audience that is brand new to you but because you're doing all this concerted focused effort, they're actually going to connect with you faster. And so you're going to convert lower on the cold people that you're bringing in and you're going to convert higher on the warm people that you've been nurturing, but ultimately you're moving more people into your paid opportunities.
Now, once that happens, once you do your launch, it doesn't end there when people buy. You need to be thinking about what is the experience after people pay me. Now, this is something that I see a lot of people skip over and frankly, I didn't do a great job of this the first several years in business. But now when we sell a training, a course, a membership, we set up intentional touch points for new customers that can connect with us inside the training. It's about connecting with me or my team, it's also about speaking to the desires that they had when they joined the offer. For example, we have our membership, Not Your Average Membership, which is a monthly training program that gives you a monthly action plan that you can use to grow more leads and sales in your business.
Now, we've got a good number of members in there. We're very happy with that program. But once people join, we send them a welcome email and then we also send them a weekly update of what's happening in the membership. So we don't just stop at, "Oh, you joined the membership, great, log into the portal." We send them a weekly update. We recap how people are doing in the membership. We talk about new content that's been released. We talk about how they can get the best experience in the membership. That works really well for us because it keeps people connected.
Whether you're doing a course or a membership or a live training, a bootcamp, a workshop, you want to stay connected with these people for a couple different reasons. One, because you don't want the experience to end once people pay you. You want to create a really valuable customer experience. But also these are your warmest customers, your warmest leads. These are people that are interested in working with you. They've already pulled out their credit card or their PayPal and said, "Yes, I'm willing to commit to you." But you don't want them to not get consistent support and connection, because for example, I have my membership that is $49 a month but I also have coaching programs. We may also be releasing some other content in the next few months. And if I want my warmest audience to be interested in those topics, then I need to make sure that I stay connected to them; because that brings us to the last step in the customer journey, which is next steps for your customers, potential upsells and repeating the process.
Somebody has gone through all of these steps, become a customer, you're sending them regular content to keep them nurtured, warm, and connected, then you need to ask what happens next. For example, maybe this whole process for you is about selling a low ticket offer. It's about taking something that you sell for maybe 27, 37 bucks and getting initial customers. But maybe you have a $197, $297 course, and you want people to move from your low ticket offer to your course. Well, then it's really important that you make that offer. So what are the next steps that you want them to take? Can you set up an email sequence? Can you set up advertising? Can you put your content in front of these people so that they're actually seeing the potential of what they can do next?
See, a lot of times we think, how do I get that sale? How do I get that sale? How do I get that front end sale? And while that's not a bad thing, you do want to generate revenue in your business, that's what makes us a business, you want to make sure that you're not just relying on that first sale. I had a mentor of mine who used to say the businesses that will win are not the businesses who get the sale fast, they're the businesses that build the lifetime value of their customer.
What we mean by that is, it's repeat buyers. It's consistent membership retention that ultimately grows a business. It's not just, "Oh, I need money. I'm going to run ads. I'm going to make money. Then I'm going to move on." It's nurturing and fostering that connection and staying really present with buyers and potential buyers. You have to realize that the game is a long game, it's not a short game. And so this customer journey is just continually moving people through your ecosystem, through your content and promoting what you want them to do next.
So, with all of that being said, I want to recap the customer journey process that I shared today. First and foremost, we talked about what is that customer journey. It's that first touch to client, to follow up. The first touch is all about social media, ads, driving traffic, getting people connected with your free content. Then you turn people into a lead. You get them on your email list. They start to get a little bit warmer. Once they're on your email list, you don't just start blasting them with regular content. Instead, you put them through a warmup or nurture sequence that nurtures them, proves your authority, positions your offers and potentially gets you some front end sales.
After they go through that sequence, then you dump them into your regular newsletter sequence where they're going to get regular nurturing, whether that's podcast, YouTube videos, content. And then if you still haven't gotten that conversion that you're looking for, you put them through a condensed focus period which we also call a launch. Could be a challenge, a webinar, a video series. It doesn't matter. It's about turning new leads that haven't converted into new customers that love your content.
Now, once somebody becomes a new customer, you want to be thinking, how do I onboard and communicate with them? What do they need to experience in their first 10, 20, 30, 60 days inside my program to want to continue the process? Once you've done all of that, then you ask yourself, what are the next steps? What do I want people to do after they've gone through my sequences, after they've gone through a launch, after they've bought my product? Am I moving them into another product? Am I just continuing to foster connection? Am I upselling something? What is the process?
Now, again, we're going to link all of this up over at heartsoulhustle.com/nyap015. We'll have a copy of this show. We'll have some notes for you. We'll have a full transcript of the episode. If you want to read our episodes, you can absolutely go do that. Read through all the transcript and take your notes there as well so you don't have to listen over and over and over again to get all the juicy goodness that we put into these episodes. But I want to wrap by saying this. If you want to work together and create an epic customer journey, I want you to head over to heartsoulhustle.com/automate. That is where we're doing our five day challenge on automating your leads, sales, and conversion process so that you can get more leads, more customers, and more progress in your business.
We're going to be covering how to choose an offer to put in front of them, how to run basic Facebook ads, how to set up your nurture sequence. Really we want to help you so that you get more leads and sales into your business on a regular basis because those are the lifeblood of your business. So if you want to learn more, heartsoulhustle.com/automate, we'll have all the details for you there. And I will wrap up by saying this. Considering the customer journey is essential to your success. Don't just post content, don't just run ads, don't just send emails, always be asking, how does this tie in to the journey I want my customer to go on?
So, there you have it, how to develop your customer journey. I hope you got lots of value from this episode and until next time, stay not so average.
