Adding intelligence to content-driven marketing

Content-Driven Marketing is a well-documented response to the changing nature of purchasing in the digital age. It is the most appropriate vendor response to an environment where increasingly savvy buyers undertake their own research in response to a perceived need, rather than being dependent on vendors for product information and advice.

The perceived need may still come from the vendor’s marketing activities - in fact it is likely this will be the case. But the vast amount of information available online to prospective purchasers means that prospects may progress from the ‘Aware’ stage of the AIDA model all the way to ‘Action’ without having any other explicit interaction with the vendor in between.

Knowing about every content interaction gives your sales team context and content for timely interventions

Content Driven Marketing enables the vendor to present themselves as the primary source of information on a product or service, giving prospects easy access to relevant information through the web, email campaigns, and social media. The aim is to be the prospect’s primary source of information for their buying decision and so maintain awareness, promote thought leadership and build a position as a trusted advisor.

The problem with Content-Driven Marketing is the loss of direct relationship with the prospect. Not so much for the lack of opportunity to sell, but more because of the lack of feedback that results.

Without direct feedback it is impossible to know how engaged the prospect is and where they might be at in the buying cycle. It is impossible to know when to intervene with a more direct sales approach. And in the real world, such interventions remain a key part of closing deals.

Intelligent Content-Driven Marketing takes the CDM principal one stage further by adding intelligent tracking to all of a company’s content-based interactions with prospects. By tracking every page view, download, video playback, event booking, and other interaction with a prospect, plus their searches, social shares, and email reads, ICDM enables companies to profile their prospect’s behaviour to better understand the right time to intervene, and the message and medium with which to do so.

This has advantages for both vendor and prospect. The vendor can use expensive human resource more efficiently, directly approaching only those prospects with the greatest propensity to convert, and doing so with a very personalised message, increasing the likelihood of success. The prospect doesn’t get hounded persistently, and when they do get contacted it will be at the right time with a relevant message.

CANDDi is the first intelligence platform for Content-Driven Marketing, ideally suited to the markets reliant on such an approach today - particularly high value, complex sales, such as technology, outsourcing and professional services.