Growing Your Business: How Marketing and PR Drive Sales

Growing Your Business: How Marketing and PR Drive Sales

Terynn Willis

PR Writing II

Spring 2025

Buyers Are Now in Charge

- Buyers now more likely to seek out information themselves about organizations. - Buyers now use social media as a tool to analyze who to do business with. - Employees use social media to share their job experiences.

Buyers actively go around salespeople, gathering information themselves and engaging a company representative only at the last possible moment.

- David Meerman Scott

Marketing

Main purpose is to reach many people, and understand buyer personas to communicate in a "one-to-many approach."

• Guides their target audiences into, and through the sales process.
• Web content is used as a marketing tool to capture audiences.
• Content marketers communicate with blogs, videos, infographics, virtual and in-person events to influence target audiences.

Sales

Main purpose is to reach one buyer at a time, and persuade them into finalizing the sales process.

• Typically happens when buyer is already close to making a purchase.
• Provides info about company's products and services.
• Marketers excel in persuading an audience, salespeople excel in persuading a single buyer.

Internet is almost always the first stop buyers make when interested in a product/service. Use this to your advantage!

Need to understand how to best leverage the power of web content.

• Help site visitors easily find what they need.

• Learn about the buyers' process. (how they found your site, how long they consider a purchase, etc.)
• Consider offline and online interactions (ex. QR codes on flyers)
• Important: visitors receive messages about your company from viewing the website.

How Web Content Influences the Buying Process

Tips for Creating a Buyer Centric Website

1. Develop Site Personality

• Buyers need to find self-reflection. You must organize your site to attract each buyer persona.
• Create a distinct, consistent, and memorable site.
• Fun and playful? Clean and Simple?

2. Use Photos and Images to Tell a Story

• Photos, videos, charts, graphs, infographics used to inform site visitors.
• Tip: Generic stock photos can have a negative impact.
• Tip: Don't make graphics too large, and use moving graphics sparingly.

"Created With Kindness: Clean, Cruelty Free, Vegan"

3. Use Interactive Content Tools

• Get people involved with web content, build interest, and move through sales cycle.
• Good way to engage with visitors
• ex. contact us links, comment sections

4. Provide Ways for Customers to Interact

• Show potential customers a vibrant community.

5. Make Feedback Loops Available

• Provide ways for buyers to interact with your company.
• ex. rate and review sections

6. Social Media Share Buttons

• Great way to extend reach to potential buyers.
• ex. Facebook like buttons, Twitter shares

• Some buyers prefer reading to research products/services, others prefer video and audio.
• Use suitable content.

7. Understand buyer's preffered media + learning styles.

8. Create content with "pass along value."

• Useful and interesting web content more likely to be passed on from buyers to their family, friends, and peers.

9. Keep the site current.

• Update site regularly in case of product changes, staff turnover, etc.

What Moves a Potential Buyer from Looking to Buying?

Step 1 : Sales Begin With Informational Content Successful site attracts buyers directly to the sales process.

• Effective web marketers consider site visitors' buying process when creating content.
• Early stages of buying process:
• Gathering information about their problems, and learning how your company can solve them.
• Learning about the benefits of your company compared to its competitors.

Successfully influencing a buyer to make a purchase.

Step 2 : A Friendly Nudge

Introduce product/service, and focus on the buyer and their problems.

• Provide helpful tools to help a buyer's decision.
• Offer easily accessible ways to communicate with company.
• Appropriate time to suggest subscriptions related to content (newsletter, blog, etc).

Step 3 : Closing the Deal

• If online, need to make it easy for buyers to make a purchase.
• For sales that require a salesperson, make it easy for buyers to express interest (ex. contact links, "have a salesperson call me" links).

Continue the Conversation

• After the sale is made, you must continue dialogue with new customer.
• Add to a newsletter, follow up on their purchase, provide opportunity for feedback, etc.
• Focusing too much on the sale, and not on the entire buying experience (which includes postsale) can decrease a buyer's likelihood to repurchase.

Salespeople as Content Curators

• When salesperson has potential customer engaged, there's an opportunity to follow up with something helpful.
• Youtube video, blog post, helpful guide. etc
• CEO should be your best salesperson.
• By using social media, CEO is able to drive sales.
• The best CEOs engage directly with customers whenever they can.
• Include a bio page for CEO -- potential buyers evaluate a company's executive team.

"When sales and marketing work together, business grows more quickly!"

- David Meeman Scott

Thank you!