Hubspot Certification

Decision Stage Questions

What criteria do buyers use to evaluate the available offers? What do buyers like or dislike about your solution compared to alternatives? Who needs to be involved in the purchasing decision?

Example Buyer's Journey

- Awareness stage: Experiences constant back pain in the morning. Googles: Why does my back hurt in the morning? Learns their mattress may be the problem. - Consideration stage: Becomes aware their mattress is the problem and wants to find solution. Takes a quiz to assess the right type of bed products. Learns a foam mattress is recommended. - Decision stage: Enters stage to decide which provider to purchase from. Comes across several brands offering foam mattresses. Chooses company based on reviews

Buyer's journey stages

- Awareness stage: happens when a buyer experiences a problem and seeks to better understand it. - Consideration stage: a buyer identifies their problem and becomes committed to understanding the different solutions. - Decision stage: the buyer identifies the correct solution and decides on the best vendor to provide that solution.

Your topics should:

- Awareness stage:Speak to your buyer's symptoms and problems. Help your buyers understand their experiences. - Consideration stage: Inform buyers about possible solutions to their problem. Help your buyers evaluate the pros and cons of each solution. - Decision stage: Highlight the value of your solution. Convince prospects to choose you.

Things to consider while conducting the interview (buyer personas):

- Collect demographic information you can't find on Linkedin - Collect information on their role - Ask how they consume information - Find out their shopping preferences - Uncover their decision making process

CTA Tips for Interactive Content

- Consider inviting users to submit their emails as the CTA. - Gather valuable information to provide a personalized experience. - Use the results from your assessment or tool as the CTA.

Primary Content Creation Responsibilities

- Content strategy - Writing or producing - Editing - Designing - Distributing

How CTAs Help Marketers

- Convert a visitor into a new contact - Allow you to nurture those contacts through their buyer's journey - Measure the effectiveness of your content - Determine which content is driving the most customers and sales

Look for information that uncovers (buyer personas):

- Demographics - Reasons buyers decide to invest in a solution like yours - What success looks like to your buyers - What prevents buyers from considering your solution - What influencers are involved at each phase of the decision making process

CTA Tips for Visual Content

- Include a CTA to your website if the content is hosted on another platform. - Experiment with different types of CTAs. - Make your CTA stand out.

CTA Tips for Audio Content

- Make your CTA easy to achieve. - Shorten your URLs. - Include your link in the show notes.

Perrsonalization Strategy Example (Sock Club)

- Personalization and automation make certain strategies accessible, even if you don't have a large budget. It makes certain strategies accessible to you, even if you don't have a massive marketing team with a large budget. - Testing and tracking how your content performs can also be key to unlocking further insights about your audience. This helps you create the type of experience they want to engage with.

Buying Insights

- Priorities - What success looks like to them - What barriers they need to overcome - How they evaluate options - Attributes they pay attention to when making a decision.

The Benefits of Content Distribution Goals

- Set the tone of your distribution strategy - Help you choose the few most effective channels - Remind your team of what's important - Help you develop a focused strategy

Marketing: Delight Stage

- Social mentions - Reviews - Word-of-mouth marketing - Customer loyalty program - User-generated content

Blogging Strategy Example (M.M. LaFleur)

- Take time to understand the topics your audience really cares about. This helps you resonate with the people who matter most to your success — leads and customers. - Brainstorm ways you can incorporate thought leadership pieces into your content strategy. This can help your brand build credibility in your online space over time.

CTA Tips for Written Content

- Use actionable and specific language. - Design your CTA to stand out. - Keep Your CTAs to a minimum.

Marketing: Engage Stage

- Website and email personalization - Database segmentation - Marketing automation - Lead nurturing - Multichannel communication

Insights you're trying to uncover (buyer personas):

- What are the demographics of our buyers? - What are the reasons buyers decide to invest in a solution like ours? - What does success looks like to our buyers?- What prevents buyers from considering our solution? - What influencers are involved at each phase of the decision making process?

Buyer personas answers

- What is your ideal customers' background, goals, and challenges? - What are their interests and needs? - How old are they? - What incentives them? - From where do they get their information?

What do buying insights reveal?

- Which buyers are receptive, and which will ignore you - Which aspects of your solution are relevant - What attitudes prevent your buyers from considering your solutions - What resources your buyers trust as they evaluate their options - Which buyers are involved in the decision and how much influence they wield

What to tell your prospective interviewees (buyer personas):

- Why you're calling - This isn't a survey - How much time it will take - If you're offering incentives

Email Example (Jet Blue)

- You can tell how much attention they put into each of their emails. - Every element, from their headers to their actionable, contrasting CTAs work together to create a lovable email that is promotional without being pushy. - You want to use a voice and tone your audience will relate to and ensure it contains content that is relevant to them. - To do this at scale, you need to think beyond just demographic segmentation and take past customer behavior into account.

Who to interview (buyer personas):

- Your customers - People who considered your solution but chose a competitor - People who considered you but didn't go with any new solution - People who never considered you and chose a competitor

Types of formats

- written content - visual content - audio content - interactive content

Content Distribution Options

-Owned Channels: Platforms your company owns. Includes your website, email, and social media accounts -Earned Channels: Third party platforms that share your content. Includes guest posts, online forums or communities, and brand mentions. -Paid Channels: Platforms you pay to distribute your content. Includes Google ads, sponsored social media ads, or paidinfluencer ads

The Buyer's Journey

1. Awareness stage 2. Consideration Stage 3. Decision Stage *You'll need to understand what they're thinking and feeling, as they progress toward making a purchase.

Steps for Creating a Blog

1. First draft complete 2. Blog edited 3. Design applied 4. Final draft complete 5. Post published

How To Brainstorm Content

1. Identify the topic. 2. Identify the format.

How to Develop a Content Creation Framework

1. Identify your workflow. 2. Determine who is responsible. 3. Gather your content creation tools.

Steps for Creating a Video

1. Script submitted 2. Script editing complete 3. Video filmed 4. Video edits complete 5. Final video approved 6. Video published

Automation Tool Recommendation

HubSpot has a powerful automation tool included in its paid tiers. It doesn't just send drip sequences.

Of those people, ___% of consumers check their email first thing in the morning.

58%

___________ blog posts are published every day.

7.5 million

____% of email users check their inbox every day, with some checking 20 times a day.

99%

CMS

A CMS, or content management system, is a tool for creating, storing, and publishing content online.

When should you focus on the engage stage?

If you're looking to convert more leads and prospects, or trying to lower the cost to acquire new customers

Content Planning Tool

A content planning tool will help you evaluate your content production schedule, manage multiple content projects, and align with all important creators and stakeholders.

What is a martech stack?

A marketing technology, or martech, stack is the list of tools that marketers use to execute elements of their marketing campaigns, from lead generation to email marketing, and from social media management to search engine optimization.

Buyer persona

A semi-fictional representation of your ideal customer based on real data and market reserch

Inbound Marketing

A strategy that attracts and retains customers by creating valuable content and tailored experiences

Content Creation Framework

A structure of processes for publishing content

Advertising software

AdRoll, Rollworks, 6Sense, and Adstream.

When should you focus on the delight stage?

If you're looking to improve your customer retention, customer lifetime value, and referrals

Demographic Insights

Age, Gender, expression, Income, Family life, Hobbies

Call-to-action (CTA)

An element in your content that prompts visitors to do something

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

As its name suggests, CRM software is a system for managing relationships with your customers. A CRM provides one central place to organize all the details of your leads and customers. It makes it easy for everyone on your team to gain insight into the state of your business and the status of every customer relationship.

When should you focus on the attract stage?

If your goal is to generate more traffic and leads

Content Formats That Perform Well

Awareness stage: blog posts, infographics, how-to videos Consideration stage: Comparison guides, live webinars, assessments Decision stage: free trial, demo, consultation

written content

Blog posts Guides E-Books Pillar pages Case studies Newsletters

Marketing Attract Stage

Blogging, SEO, Social publishing, paid search ads, display advertising

Content distribution

Content distribution The process of sharing, publishing, and promoting your content

______________ ____________ is a term Mark Schaefer created to explain the massive influx of content being published online.

Content shock

Segmentation

Customers expect unique experiences. This includes tailored recommendations, dynamic content, and exclusive offers.

Designing

Designing involves packaging the content in a visually compelling way.

Automation

Effective marketing automation considers the evolving needs of your leads, and the behaviors and interactions they have with you across all your marketing channels (not just email).

True or False: Create as many buyer personas as possible.

False Create as FEW buyer personas as possible.

True or False: Make sure that the person conducting these talks is anyone involved in the sales process

False Make sure that the person conducting these talks is NOT anyone involved in the sales process

Buyer Persona

Fictional, generalized representation of your ideal customer

Reporting Tool Recommendations

Google Analytics, or GA, is an analytics tool that gives you an extremely in-depth look at your website and/or app performance. HubSpot makes it easy to create custom reports to answer even your most complex questions. Databox allows you to view analytics data on your mobile, desktop, and TV from a variety of data sources — in just a few clicks.

_______________ ________ and social media ads allow you to control your target audience and require you to pay per impression or ad click.

Google ads and social media ads allow you to control your target audience and require you to pay per impression or ad click.

__________ ___________ and _________ ____________ are most effective if the third-party has a similar audience.

Guest posts and brand mentions are most effective if the third-party has a similar audience.

Awareness Stage Questions

How do buyers describe their challenges or goals? What symptoms are your buyers experiencing? How do buyers consume content or conduct research?

How to Gather Accurate Information

Interview customers. Interview industry experts. Conduct keyword research.

Who to interview (buyer personas)

Interview folks who were most active in the decision- making process, and who made the decision within the last 3-6 months.

Marketing Attribution Reports

Marketing attribution reports pull together all the relevant interactions from your buyers' journey using pre-built models that can definitively answer which channels and content are helping you meet your marketing goals.

Automation Strategy Example (Sock Club)

Now, they automate outreach regarding upcoming sales, incentives, and promotions without all the bells and whistles of a traditional marketing email — because that's the experience their customers want.

Audio content

Podcasts Audiobooks Audio advertisements

Interactive Content

Quizzes Assessments Free tools

Search engine optimization (SEO) software

SEMrush, Moz, Ahrefs, and Google Search Console.

Collaboration Tool Recommendation

Slack has powerful features and integrations that make it possible for you to integrate all your other daily tools.

Social media marketing software

Social media marketing: Hootsuite, Buffer, and Sprout Social.

Ways to get stories from customers:

Surveys, Forms, Your sales team, Social media, Interviews

Buyer's journey

The active research process someone goes through leading up to a purchase

Content Strategy

The content strategy role is responsible for creating a content plan, mapping it to the business needs, and ensuring the responsibilities are met.

Distributing

The distributing role involves publishing or promoting your content, so it reaches your target audience.

Editing

The editing responsibility involves reviewing and providing feedback for the content.

Negative Personas

The people that aren't a great fit for your business

Topic vs. Format

The topic or idea is the information, education, or value your content provides. The format is how you decide to arrange or present your topic.

Social Media Example (ASOS)

TikTok: - A mix of styling tips, behind-the-scenes content, collaborations with influencers - Short, funny commentary on the world of fashion and celebrities Twitter: - Creates quippy and engaging content - The only link in their description directs to their customer care page

Project Management Tool Recommendation

Trello is a great project management tool for small teams and individuals. With its fun user interface, Trello lets you set up to-do lists and tag individual cards with due dates, members, labels, and more.

True or False: 42% of consumers will "get annoyed" if brands don't adjust their content to their needs.

True

True or False: 67% of consumers think it's important for brands to automatically adjust content based on current context.

True

True or False: 80% of consumers are more likely to make a purchase when brands offer personalized experiences.

True

What happens when you use behavioral inputs?

Using behavioral inputs from multiple channels, such as likes on your social media posts, views to your pricing page, or engagements with particular pieces of content gives you the context you need to fully understand a lead's challenges.

Visual content

Videos Infographics Images Webinar

Consideration Stage Questions

What are possible solutions to address their challenge or goal? How do buyers perceive the pros and cons of each solution? How do buyers decide on the right solution?

What can you show with attribution reports?

With attribution reports, you can show just how much influence your content had, which can help you advocate for more headcount and budget.

Content marketing Software

Wordpress, Buzzsomo, HotJar, and Canva.

Writing or Producing

Writing or Producing The person writing or producing is responsible for composing the content, whether that's writing a blog, filming a video, or recording a podcast.

Inbound Flywheel Attract Stage

You attract visitors with useful content and eliminate barriers as they learn about your company. The key is to earn people's attention, not force it.

HubSpot's Blog Ideas Generator

You can enter up to five nouns in the search field and be provided with several blog titles and content ideas in return.

Why are buyer personas important?

You don't want just any traffic to your site. You want the right traffic. The right traffic is the visitors who are most likely to become leads, and, ultimately, happy customers. Buyer personas are created through research and analysis of who's already buying from you. They can help you get into the mindset of your potential buyers and create the right content.

Inbound Flywheel: Delight Stage

You help, support, and empower customers to reach their goals. *Focus on creating buzz around your brand.

Inbound Flywheel: Engage Stage

You make it easy to shop and buy from you by enabling buyers to interact with you on their preferred timeline and channels. *Focus on opening relationships, not just closing deals.

Analytics Tools

Your analytics tool should allow you to pull relevant metrics and measure the ROI of your content.

Each channel has its pros and cons, but it's important to understand that some ______________ overlap.

channels

Have your _________ ______ _______________ initiate a request to get this information

head of marketing

inbound methodology

is a method for growing an organization by building lasting relationships with people and helping them reach their goals.

A deep understanding of your various buyer personas will allow you to ______________ your marketing for different segments of your audience.

personalize