Conversational Marketing: What It Is and How to Create Your Strategy
If there is one thing humans love to do, it’s communicate.
To give you an idea, in Brazil alone, there are already 147 million active WhatsApp accounts (Statista 2022).
Moreover, we have also been conversing with robots: according to a study by Twilio, 90% of consumers prefer to resolve simple issues with companies via virtual assistance.
From letters to emails, from phones to WhatsApp, we see communication methods evolving.
The format changes, but the basic need and desire to open dialogues remain the same.
Today, consumers expect two-way communication: they want to be heard and expect fast responses.
This is where conversational marketing can be extremely transformative.
Want to learn more about this strategy and how it solves some of the main communication problems between brands and consumers?
Check out the article we’ve prepared!
What is Conversational Marketing?
Through a virtual assistant or chatbot, you bring your website visitor into an interactive conversation.
In this way, you capture contact details and better understand the lead’s profile by asking qualification questions: this is conversational marketing.
Conversational marketing is one of the most modern methodologies when it comes to lead generation.
Conversational marketing tools can offer personalized experiences through message boxes and interactive chats to generate engagement and conversion with visitors to websites, blogs, and landing pages.
Read also: 12 Digital Marketing Trends to Explore in 2023
Features of Conversational Marketing
So, does any tool used to initiate dialogue with a consumer in an interactive way fall under conversational marketing?
Actually, there are some features that define conversational marketing:
It’s Customizable
Tools like chatbots or virtual assistants are part of conversational marketing because they allow the personalization of interactions based on the user’s needs and responses.
This is one of the main characteristics of this type of marketing, which is consumer-centered.
Regardless of the type of technology, goal, or intelligence behind the tool’s development, it should be capable of delivering what the visitor wants in the simplest and quickest way possible.
It’s Scalable
The automation of processes and tools in conversational marketing allows the interaction to be scalable.
Conversational marketing simulates human interaction, closer to the service provided by a member of your team, but in a way that there is no limit to the number of interactions.
Chatbots and virtual assistants can respond to visitors’ inquiries 24/7, with quick responses provided either through predetermined rules or data learning over time.
It’s Analyzable
Since all the tools are digital and automated, the analysis of results is simplified and much more reliable, as data is recorded.
Many tools even provide access to dashboards with results, making the analysis process even easier.
How to Create a Conversational Marketing Strategy?
Before putting your conversational marketing strategy into practice, you need to understand that we are in the age of messaging apps.
SMS, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, virtual assistants, and chatbots are the foundation of this type of strategy.
Focusing on the latter two types of messaging tools, we will see that they have a high level of personalization, in addition to simulating a human and fluid interaction, getting even closer to the service done by people.
That said, to create your strategy, you should rely on one of these tools, moving to the following tactics:
- Attraction – Define how to attract the visitor into the conversation. Create well-designed paid media campaigns, and they will attract the right audience to your website and conversion pages.
- Qualification – Segment the information that qualifies the visitor as a potential customer. Use conversational marketing tools and focus your sales team’s efforts on opportunities that are more likely to become customers of your brand.
- Analysis – Understand and analyze the metrics that explain your results to know whether what you’re doing is working or not.
Read also: Marketing Strategy: How Combining Paid Media and Conversational Marketing Can Accelerate Your Results
7 Problems You Can Solve with Conversational Marketing
The rise in the use of conversational marketing tools is not without reason.
This strategy is the solution to some of the biggest headaches for managers and marketing departments.
We’ve highlighted the main ones in this article:
Low Conversion Rate on the Website
If your website has a low number of leads generated, this could be due to low traffic (meaning visitors aren’t even reaching your pages) or a low conversion rate (the site has visitors, but these visitors aren’t interested in leaving their contact details and thus becoming leads).
In the second case, conversational marketing tools improve conversion rates, as they are more attractive than static forms, making users more comfortable in providing contact details through personalized service and a smoother dialogue between the brand and the consumer.
Entry of Cold and Unqualified Leads
If the issue is the quality of the leads generated, conversational marketing can help attract and convert more relevant contacts.
Conversational marketing, in addition to generating leads, helps identify the most qualified ones through the questions asked during the interaction.
Rather than directing a large volume of unqualified leads to the sales team, which wastes time and harms results, a chatbot or virtual assistant can qualify all leads, delivering only the truly qualified ones to sales.
You might also be interested in: Is Your Marketing Funnel “Clogged”? Discover the Most Common Problems
Lack of Engagement and Few Lead Information
Another challenge companies face in lead generation strategies is the relevance of the information collected.
This problem is most common among companies using static forms on their website and landing pages.
After all, the form must either ask for too little information, which could scare off the visitor from converting, or ask for too much information, which results in a lower effectiveness rate.
In the first case, leads are generated, but without the necessary information to proceed with marketing strategies that will actually impact them.
It may even be that the volume of leads generated is significant, but there is insufficient data to identify the profile of the contact, what they are looking for as a solution, and if they are fit to move forward in the buying journey your brand has mapped out.
Slow Response Time, Impatient Users
When a user contacts a company, they expect an immediate response, and often, this is only possible through automated tools.
The support team can become overwhelmed and unable to provide a timely response.
Another important factor to consider is that users don’t always message or access the website during business hours.
Leaving a potential customer waiting for a response is not a good choice, especially in today’s fast-paced, connected world.
While you are not providing immediate feedback to the visitor, your competitor may have already converted them into a lead, meaning you are missing out on business opportunities.
Dive deeper: How to Reduce Response Time to Leads to Increase Sales and Customer Satisfaction
Poor Contact Experience for the User
On the other hand, your team may manage to respond in the time desired by the visitor.
But even with a well-trained team, ensuring consistent top-tier service is a challenge.
With tools like virtual assistants and chatbots, the service is always standardized, and quality control is firmer.
This prevents the user from having a bad experience, which often causes them to abandon the interaction or not make a purchase with the brand.
Low Productivity in the Sales Team
A sales team that struggles to close new clients may be facing various challenges.
However, once the conversational marketing method generates and identifies qualified leads, the sales team can focus its efforts on the warmer contacts to finalize a sale or hire.
Additionally, with important data in hand, the sales team will know exactly what the consumer is looking for, at the right time.
Long Sales Cycle
Another challenge worth mentioning, which can be minimized with the use of conversational marketing tools, is a long sales cycle.
In such a cycle, the consumer may not be stimulated through the sales funnel, and interest in your solution might not be sparked.
With the use of the solutions mentioned here, this problem can also be alleviated, as, with the right information about your audience, you’ll know how to build the strategy to maintain contact and qualification until the purchase.
Moreover, with these tools, it’s easier to identify where the leads are in their journey: if they are ready to buy, there’s no need to guide them into a nurturing flow, for example.
Examples of How to Do Conversational Marketing
Chatbot
The chatbot or virtual assistant can be used as customer support, answering questions and sparking interest in visitors.
As mentioned throughout this article, it can be used to standardize messages, offer personalized service, and operate 24/7.
If you want to know how to have a chatbot on your website right now, check out this article: How to Create a Free Chatbot with Leadster?
In less than 10 minutes, you can start using the tool and analyze your results!
Email Marketing
Although email marketing isn’t the most obvious example of a conversational marketing tool, it shouldn’t be overlooked, as it can indeed be explored this way.
To do conversational marketing with email marketing, you can leverage segmentation and analyze habits and interest data from the emails sent to complement your strategy.
Customer Success
Customer Success programs can also be part of the conversational marketing strategy.
With this type of strategy, you maintain contact with the customer after the purchase or contract, ensuring customer satisfaction and increasing the chances of a new purchase or referral.
Social Media
There are specialized chatbots for social media, and you can also use them in your conversational marketing strategy.
It’s important to ensure that these communication channels are covered, as many users today search for brands and solutions there.
In addition to communication via inbox, comments, tags, mentions, and other interactions should also be monitored.
Read also: Social Ads: How to Use Social Media to Generate More Leads
Phone and SMS
More traditional, channels like phone and SMS are also tools that can be explored for conversational marketing.
However, it’s worth evaluating if they are the best option for your business, as they have certain personalization limitations and are less accepted by some consumer profiles today.
WhatsApp has become a strong ally of conversational marketing strategies, as it boasts a large number of users who are familiar with the app and feel comfortable starting a dialogue with a brand through it.
Read also: Message for Customers: Ready-to-Use Texts for Sales on WhatsApp – and More!
I’m sure conversational marketing can be the solution you were looking for to boost your brand!
If you want to learn more about this type of strategy, check out our complete Conversational Marketing guide!
Now, if you want to go beyond the content and put this strategy into practice, know that Leadster can help!
You can try our Conversational Marketing platform, which offers a marketing and sales chatbot, for 14 days free!
Take the opportunity to capture 3 times more leads, qualify them, and distribute them intelligently.
Start your free demo right now! 🚀
