Businesses exist to create customers.  But unfortunately, many business persons have the wrong notion that their business’s primary role is to create a profit! They never care to ask, how can there be a profit if there are no customers.

You see, that profit will only come when your customers are ready to exchange their money for your service or product.  So, your business, first and foremost, is to get the potential customer to agree that your product or service is really worth his money.

That is what customer acquisition is all about.

The question therefore is, how do you create the right customers for your online business?  

In this article I want to give you a simple but fail-proof formula that will help you both to effectively and efficiently acquire just the right customers to fulfill your business goals. It doesn’t matter what business you are in, implemented rightly, will work wonders.

And so without wasting your time here is the formula:

SM x SEO x CM = ECA

Where:

SM = Social Media

SEO = search engine optimization

CM = Content Marketing

and,

ECA = Effective Customer Acquisition

That’s to say,

Social Media + SEO x Content Marketing = Effective Customer Acquisition

So, how does this really work? Now, let’s briefly explain this formula.

1.    Social Media

Marketing research have continued to prove that getting involved in social media is a must for any business  who wants to engage today’s well educated customer. The recent growth of online social media is not just a phenomenon to be overlooked. It’s a clear indication of where the tide of marketing is flowing.

Reports have it that many people look to the social media sites for opinions of friends and acquaintances before making buying decisions. I’m sure you don’t want to ignore this.

So the first element on our equation is to get involved in social media.

If you are the type that still believes social media is for students and youngsters then it’s time to do a re-think.  Your potential customers are using the social media sites to get information before spending their money. Getting involved in social media is a sure way of ensuring that you are there when your potential customers goes looking for that information.

2.    Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Is search engine optimization dead?

This is one of the biggest questions many are asking in the wake of the recent Google Panda and Penguin updates. Especially important was the situation where Google came ‘slapping’ what it termed “over-optimized” sites with the Penguin update. Right now, even the most ardent SEOs now consider search engine optimization with caution.

This is understandable.  

However, what you mustn’t over look is the fact that the search engines remains the first place many people go to when they want any information about just anything today. While potential customers use the social media sites for opinion of peers, many more use the search engines to get more information about the products or services they want to acquire.

Now, the simple way you can position yourself to be found on the search engines is no other way but by investing in search engine optimization.  You must understand that the search engines have specific criteria of ranking the millions of web pages on the net. And search engine optimization (SEO) is all about ensuring that your content have these criteria in place so that they are ranked high on the SERPs.

Truth is, the recent Google Panda and Penguin updates have really made things easy for us when it comes to optimizing your pages. All Google is really asking of you is to put the right things in the right places. Once you do this, when your potential customer goes to the search engines looking to get information, you will be there waiting for him!

3.    Strategic Content Marketing

This is actually the cementing factor that holds it all together. As mentioned earlier, we will need to be on the social media sites to connect with those who desire the opinion of friends and acquaintances before making their buying decisions. The same goes that our web pages must be optimized to rank high on the search engines to get the attention of those using the search engines to look for information.

But simply having a mere present in social media is definitely not enough. Neither is it enough to simply optimize your webpages for the search engines.  Though these are important, you must go beyond them.

Your social media marketing strategy must be focused on creating marketing content that is customer-centric and your web content delivered to the search engines must be informative enough to engage and educate your potential customers so that no matter where they locate you, you will be an attractive suitor!

You have heard it many times but it is worth repeating that traditional interruption marketing is going into extinction. Today’s customers are more educated and prudent than ever.  To get their attention you definitely need to be innovative and strategic in your dealings.  They want enough information about your service or product before making their buying decisions.  When they go looking for information on the social media sites or the search engines they expect information that is right on the point.

The responsibility therefore falls on you to package the right content about your products/services and ensure that it is easily accessible on both the search engines and social media sites. This is what content marketing is all about – creating useful and quality information to build your profile as a trusted source of valuable content that people want, based on demand.

The essential thing about content marketing is to ensure that you have a regular flow of this high quality content on your website and your online social media profiles to keep the visitors and search engines coming back for more.

It must be understood that whether it’s on the social media sites or on the search engines, your point of contact with the potential customer is your content. And so getting your content marketing right is a sure way to get every other thing right.

Marketing Take Away

Customer acquisition today has gone a 360⁰ about turn! Instead of the traditional marketing ‘push’ approach, you should be using marketing ‘pull’ approach. This is what “inbound marketing” is all about. You need to position yourself as the go-to resource in your business so when your potential customer goes looking for solutions, whether on social media sites or search engines, you’ll be there for them!

This simple formula used any day will help you easily engage both current and potential customers and acquiring new customer will be a thing of ease.

Over to you: I’ll be glad to hear your opinion,  so share it with us in your comments below.