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Half of Life Is Follow-Up: Networking and Reconnecting

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B2B marketing has changed quite a bit in the past four or five years; Artificial Intelligence has impacted so much—lead generation and scoring, targeting and segmenting leads, content creation and refining personalization are among the functions that AI-powered marketing tools have endowed with significantly more precision and power. It’s all good, but 21st century advancements cannot replace the effectiveness of a marketing tactic that is as old as the pyramids—networking. Life is about relationships and networking—meeting, greeting and connecting with people—has demonstrated that it is an effective way to build relationships that help you to do more business.

In a world increasingly dominated by technology, personal relationships stand out and become more important. While your prospective clients prefer a self-guided buyer’s journey and opt to keep you and your competitors at arm’s length until they are assembling the short list of candidates whose service or product will be chosen by the buyer search committee, those same prospects nevertheless want to work with people they trust, like, and feel connected to. For example, 73% of B2B marketing executives rank word-of-mouth and peer recommendations as the most influential factor in deciding which vendors to consider. Furthermore, findings come from Forrester’s 2024 Buyers’ Journey Survey indicate that 92% of B2B buyers start their journey with at least one vendor in mind, and 41% already have a preferred vendor selected before any formal evaluation.

In other words, if you’d like to get on the radar screen of B2B buyers, it makes a lot of sense to meet a few of them face2face. Getting to know people is how familiarity and trust can develop and trust increases the probability of getting on a buyer’s journey short list that is the pathway to a sale. An in-person introduction from contact that you meet in either a business or social setting can, one day, walk you past the gatekeepers and perhaps accelerate a (morbidly slow) sales cycle. Networking thrives on serendipity and many of the best business opportunities come from unexpected connections made in casual settings. Not only that, but relationship networks are also known to compound; a strong professional network grows and becomes more valuable over time as your contacts advance in their careers. One relationship leads to another; one introduction leads to years of opportunity; one influential connection can open doors to opportunities you never knew existed.

However, keep in mind that healthy and enjoyable relationships are a two-way street. That means, be sure to give your new contact before you ask for any favors—share useful content, make introductions for him/her, offer your expertise—before asking for a favor. Be specific about how you can help: Instead of saying, “Let’s stay in touch and let me know if I can ever help” is less effective than “I have a connection at [company] you should know — would you like an introduction?”

Nurture your relationships proactively by reaching out to contacts new and those with whom you’d like to reconnect before you need anything. Because you want to keep alive the magic of finding a new friend or seeing an old friend again, follow-up within 24 hours after meeting someone at an event. You might want to send a LinkedIn connection invite with a personalized note the next business day. Play a long game: relationships that result in business typically take 6-24 months to materialize.

4 phrases that make you likeable

Finally, let’s launch your networking strategy with four easy-to-remember phrases that will make you stand out as an appealing, smart, interesting (because you are interested in the person you’re talking with) and trustworthy person. Those qualities are the cornerstone of relationship-building. It is why networking is such a powerful marketing activity that should always be included in your business planning.

“I was just thinking about you!” This is a powerful phrase you can use absolutely anywhere. Everyone likes to be remembered. So telling someone, “I was just thinking of you!” immediately sparks connection. It’s a casual relationship-building follow-up phrase that immediately puts someone at ease by reminding them they are top of mind and makes them feel good. 

‘Tell me more!’ Asking people questions, especially follow-up questions, shows that you listen, you’re engaged and interested in the other person’s thoughts and feelings and that responsiveness makes you likable. That you remember what is or was important to that person shows that you value them.

‘You’re so…!’ What makes someone instantly likable? You might think it’s charm or cleverness. But often, it’s this: making others feel valued. In every conversation, people are quietly wondering, Am I being boring? Am I doing well? Do they like me? Your job is to answer those questions before they’re asked. Humans love to be validated for who they are, not just what they do. Frequently. Don’t assume you’ve said it before, or that someone knows how valued they are. We can almost never receive too much validation if it’s genuine. Doing so is simple. If you appreciate something about someone, tell them! Just say: “You’re so…” then you can highlight their humor, charisma, or whatever characteristic that is uniquely theirs. 

“Last time we talked, you mentioned…”Do you want to persuade someone you’ve met before to reconnect? Try saying, “Last time we were talking, you mentioned…” followed by something that lit them up the last time you talked.  You could say, “Last time we spoke, you mentioned you were going to Portugal on vacation. How was that?” Or ask about the big project they mentioned, or a show you both love. 

Thanks for reading,

Kim

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Reputation Management Begins With Credibility

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Information moves faster and its reach is more widespread than at any time in history. Audiences—your clients, competitors, business colleagues and community in which you operate—participate in the 24/7 news cycle and expect transparency in real time. The lightning-fast movement will also include stories that involve your brand. Whether those stories posted by your organization and its supporters and are intended to build and celebrate your brand, or are negative and, for some unfortunate reason meant to undermine the perception and value of your brand, it is imperative that business owners and leaders take a proactive stance and manage information related to your entity as well as potential audience reactions to that information.

Staying out in front of the buzz about your business that’s pinging through the echoverse is essential, primarily because the potential for the appearance of unflattering information, that may or may not be true, is possible. The last thing you want is for a public relations crisis to land in your lap and create a five-alarm fire that forces you into a reactive rescue mission that can only leave you in a position of weakness, no matter how quickly and expertly you quash it. You will no doubt agree that having the luxury of shaping your brand stories and eliminating the need to control a crisis is the best defense? You may already have guessed that creating and presenting relevant and timely information is how the war can be won.

Online search and social listening

The potential for attacks on a business entity is worrisome and the aggression can be persistent. Arguably, the expansion of Artificial Intelligence powered automation has intensified the ability for bad actors to launch dirty tricks campaigns: some may originate from a particularly vicious competitor, or an unknown hacker may enjoy bringing trouble to the life of another human being. The first pillar of reputation management is maintaining consistent awareness. Business owners and leaders who fail to regularly monitor what is being said about their entity and note the prevailing tone of opinions expressed could be doing their brand reputation a disservice. Monitoring the prevailing sentiment is ideally an ongoing practice that informs you of what your customers and other stakeholders say about your brand. About every three months, it will be useful to search your name and the company name, plus your city, in engines such as Bing, Google and Yahoo and read what the AI summary or other search mechanisms reveal about you and your brand.

Quick response to customer complaints found on social media platforms must express empathy and offer a practical solution; apologize and offer your side of the story and make amends when possible. If a customer offers criticism (that might be constructive, BTW), address the matter. Disparaging rumors directed at your business must be met with a polite but firm, discreetly phrased but truthful, clarification. If you see that your business has been reviewed in an excessively negative and/or inaccurate way, contact the reviewing site and request that the offending post be removed.

Brands are also turning to social media user comments for market and consumer info when trends and other marketplace developments evolve too quickly for traditional research methods to keep up. Social listening tools like Talkwalker use AI to pull specific brand insights from the vast quantities of data available on social media platforms, in real time. Social listening, another manifestation of that practice, tracks online comments made about your brand, industry and competitors across social media platforms. From an analysis of those comments, a the big picture will emerge of the unfiltered perceptions that your customers, prospects and others have about your brand. Social listening can also capture developing trends that are bubbling up and indicate where opportunities (or risks) that impact your entity are hiding. In short, social listening data can assist all facets of your brand.

Informative and timely content

The second component of your reputation management strategy is investing in your strengths before an emergency develops. Build genuine, search-visible assets steadily, so that when a difficult moment arrives, your reputation has the depth to absorb it. A company that has consistently shown who it is can take a hit that would flatten a competitor with nothing in reserve. That reserve is built in the quiet quarters before a crisis, not during one.

By positioning yourself as a go-to source of useful insights and info, you’ll win audience trust—and that is vital. The quality and timeliness of the information you deliver, whether by text, video, or audio, will enhance your value. Distributing your thought leader content on social media platforms favored by your target audience maximize distribution and help you build a following. You’ll benefit from increased name recognition, eventually acquire trust and influence and, ultimately, you’ll create for yourself a solid brand reputation. Linking your blog and/or newsletter to one or more social media platforms when you publish is a great way to share your compelling content with a wide audience (readers will find my weekly blog at LinkedIn activity/posts.)

Because you cannot manage what you are not watching, those who pay attention to narratives that appear in the digital space or print, whether friendly or unfriendly, are getting reputation management right. A concern caught early on is a conversation; that same concern, if ignored and allowed to fester, is a headline. An effective business leader’s goal is not to respond well to incidents, but to anticipate that, unfortunately, occasional headwinds are inevitable. Building up credibility, which could be expressed as thought leader expertise, client, nurturing colleague or peer relationships and being responsive to any concerns, or participation in community organizations and/or events are the invisible yet powerful and sustainable pillars of reputation management

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: Vlada Karpovich

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Bring Visibility to the Value You Deliver

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Is the value of your B2B products and/or services fully recognized and acknowledged by your customers and prospects? You may assume that if sales get within striking distance of your annual revenue target, the answer is yes—yes, prospects trust that your solutions will resolve their pain point or achieve an important goal. It’s great when customers understand their need for what you sell and they’re willing to pay to use it. However, there may be a hidden negative action that has the potential to undermine your sales. Yes, you have a roster of paying customers, but some may have a casual attitude toward your offering. These customers fail to fully appreciate the significance of the outcomes derived from using your service or product. The failure to grasp the good stuff your service or product brings to the table is called a value gap; although customers improve the position of their company in one way or another when they use your offering, they don’t exactly count their blessings for being able to do so. Those customers do not objectively measure, document, or communicate to their company leaders and stakeholders the user case that explains why doing business with you is good business.

You might suspect a value gap if it appears the enthusiasm customers once expressed for the results produced when using your service or product diminish and leave your solution to fade like a wallflower, instead of sparkling like the belle of the ball. Maybe social media engagement is drifting downward and few customers are singing your praises and making referrals?

The existence of a value gap typically weakens future sales (including repeat business), shrinks the number of customer Word-of-Mouth referrals you receive and some customers may even find it acceptable to bargain down the selling price for your solution. Meaning, a value gap kills growth opportunities and you’ve got to reverse it. Doug May, founder and managing partner of Value Sherpas, a go-to-market advisory firm, and Wendy Wise, founder and CEO of Profitwise, which provides pricing and go-to-market services, are co-authors of Bridging the Value Gap (2015) and they can show you how to climb out of the quicksand.

Based on their experience, May and Wise recommend that companies make demonstrating customer value foundational in all relevant customer touchpoints across the organization to successfully when looking to overturn the value gap. Business owners and leaders should research, evaluate, confirm and integrate value that matters into customer-facing business operations to receive the greatest reward from interactions that are visible, and therefore memorable, to customers. In this way, the business owner will have the best opportunities to create competitive advantages that are unique to your organization. 

Your job is to discover what motivates prospects and customers to seek out products or services in your category, and then determine what customers and prospects value most highly about the solution they intend to purchase. Finally, you must decide how your company can consistently deliver highly impactful value and simultaneously enable customers and prospects to see and appreciate that value. The authors define the process as a sequence—research and understand, verify, operationalize and scale.

May and Wise point out that addressing the value gap is most efficiently managed when you align the benefits and outcomes associated with your solutions with quickly recognizable, easy to explain and highly valued business outcomes such as increased annual revenue, cost reduction and risk management. You do this by clearly identifying how customers capture value when they implement your solutions.

In your marketing messages and sales pitch, articulate and reinforce those defining, problem-solving, goal achieving outcomes to ensure that recognition of the value you bring to customers is the foundation of the sales journey. In all aspects of your sales and marketing functions, emphasize and explain the value that a customer will receive when s/he buys from your company, from implementation, to outcomes, to pricing and after-sale customer service. Organizations that make customer value not only visible, but also measurable, will make the value memorable and therefore better positioned to sustain growth and strengthen the competitive advantage.

Research, verify and understand

You can begin building a customer-value focus almost anywhere in the organization. Be advised, however, that this work cannot be done with surveys, or casual conversations that focus on “What do you value about doing business with us?” To understand the wins, losses, pain points and the use case, it will be necessary to identify a subset of customers who represent these varied contexts—and conduct deep, one-on-one conversations to understand how your solution affects their costs, revenues and risks and how it aligns with their strategic priorities. Document the most common benefits and begin to build a model to enable sales.

Operationalize it—starting with sales

 According to the authors, sales is the place to begin, because the impact is fastest and most visible (pricing is a close second). Apply the customer-value approach directly to live, in-progress sales opportunities. Embed value that is recognizable, measurable and coveted by the prospect into the sales process itself. Value messages must be woven into sales presentations and sales content. Develop business-case models—a good case study could work—that will allow the sales team or specialist to measure the customer’s current challenge or pain point and project the future value your solution can deliver—grounded in real customer data and benchmarks. One step is essential: the customer champion must be involved in building the business case that will ultimately land with senior leadership. Without that co-creation, the case will lack the internal credibility it needs.

Cascade the perception of value throughout the organization

Once the foundational models are in place, extend the customer-value mindset beyond sales to achieve a holistic approach—embedded across customer success, product, pricing and the C-suite—needed to drive higher margins and a sustainable competitive advantage.

  • Marketing: Ensure that messaging conveys customer impact for primary use cases and that demand generation focuses on outcomes, not just product capabilities.
  • Post-sale: Guide a meaningful portion of your customers to deepen their use of the capabilities and products you offer that are most differentiated—and that they are aware and can articulate the business value they are capturing.
  • Service/Product: Eventually embed customer business value thinking into product planning, using it to drive innovation priorities and feature sequencing.
  • Pricing: Evaluate your pricing against your use cases and the business value they deliver. Ensure that you are incentivizing the right customer behaviors such as adoption and retention of adjacent products while capturing appropriate revenue.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

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How To Encourage B2B Referrals

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When it comes to influencing B2B buying decisions, few marketing resources are as powerful as a referral made by a customer who had a good experience working with your organization and is happy to recommend those in his/her business network to investigate your brand if there is need of a service or product that matches yours. Customer endorsements, also known as Word-of-Mouth referrals, are a crucial ingredient of an effective customer acquisition strategy. It’s been documented that Word-of-Mouth referrals positively affect 20% to 50% of purchasing decisions and 84% of B2B buying decision-makers report that their buyer’s journey typically begins with a referral. Foundational to Word-of-Mouth referrals are good customer experiences and good relationships.

The term Word-of-Mouth marketing refers to an informal sharing of opinions, experiences and recommendations about a brand, product, or service between colleagues and friends. Whenever people speak about a business, they are participating in Word-of-Mouth marketing. Long before social media marketing existed, business owners and sales professionals relied on the trusted opinions of business colleagues and other reliable sources to guide their purchasing decisions. Word-of-Mouth endorsements continue to be sought after and trusted, even as business (and personal) communication has gone beyond telephone or face2face conversations to encompass digital formats, including social media, online review sites, webinars and podcasts and/or online professional communities.

There are few marketing strategies that are as potent or as cost-effective as endorsements made by satisfied customers and the power of Word-of-Mouth referrals is supported by metrics. According to data published by ThinkImpact, a platform that provides business and career related information, 78% of B2B referrals create viable customer leads for the business and 63% of B2B revenue comes from existing clients and referrals combined.

Credible, verifiable and sharable

In the increasingly complex B2B marketing landscape, Word-of-Mouth referrals are considered credible and verifiable business intelligence. In spite of, or maybe even because of, the dominance of professionally produced marketing materials and campaigns, prospective buyers are acquiring a growing respect for boots-on-the-ground, real world user experiences—and that evolving perspective has caused some to look skeptically at corporate-concocted marketing messages.

In stark contrast, Word-of-Mouth referrals are seen as unquestionably real and born of bona fide knowledge and/or experience and they have the power to significantly amplify your brand reputation and annual revenue. The problem is they are an unpredictable gift. Waiting for personal endorsements made by satisfied customers to materialize leaves too much to chance in a hyper-competitive marketplace. It should come as no surprise that a Freelancer must take charge and devise a strategy that will keep positive Word-of-Mouth opinions circulating through your networks.

The key driver of B2B Word-of-Mouth customer referrals is trust that is the outcome of consistently providing an excellent customer experience, encouraging customer engagement and inspiring brand loyalty that advances into advocacy and culminates in Word-of-Mouth referrals. Encouraging customer feedback through various channels and touchpoints, such as surveys, polls and calls-to-action that invite customers to produce a testimonial that describes an example of customer service or customer experience that they found especially meaningful—can put your customers on the pathway to making Word-of-Mouth referrals on your behalf.

You will find it useful to expand your Word-of-Mouth referral network to include professional colleagues. Cultivating a reputation as a thought leader by developing relevant educational marketing content, combined with taking an active role in local business associations, can become a launching pad for establishing thought leader credibility. Devise a strategy that thoughtfully showcases your subject expertise and capabilities as it subtly promotes your unique value effectively and generates a positive buzz that results in Word-of-Mouth referrals. See below to find possibilities to expand your visibility to customers and colleagues who can become your brand cheerleaders and reward you with Word-of-Mouth referrals.

  • Social media and online review sites and communities.  Social networks are ubiquitous and enable participants to make many business and social connections. Invite your happy customers to share their enthusiasm for your product or service by posting user generated content that explains how your product or service made their life easier, enabled the company to achieve an important goal and what factors motivated them to choose your company instead of a competitor.
  • Case studies. Particularly if your service or product resolved a particularly vexing pain point for a customer, invite him/her to tell the story in a written or video format case study. A good case study allows prospects who are making final selections to envision the problem-solving capacity of your product or service and demonstrate thought leadership.
  • Webinars and podcasts. Laying the Groundwork for Word-of-Mouth Success for your webinar or podcast appearance by developing content that listeners will consider to be valuable. Address and offer effective solutions to problems that your listeners are likely to encounter—identify themes that your audience already has problems with and is searching for better ways to solve them. If you are the program host, your speakers should be someone who has proven credentials in developing valuable content. Finally, like an email subject line, create a catchy title for your webinar or podcast, it’s important to both communicate the benefit while creating curiosity.
  • Speaking engagements. Getting involved with local business associations such as the chamber of commerce, is a great resource to help you build your way to thought leader status and receiving Word-of-Mouth endorsements. If you haven’t done so already, get to know the leadership and membership by volunteering to manage programs. Volunteering to introduce a featured speaker or moderating a panel are pathways to an invitation to present a workshop that you’ve developed. An incubator for testing the reaction to a topic you’ve developed, or to polish your public speaking ability, is to explore speaking opportunities at your local library (where you may find a less demanding audience).

Thanks for reading,

Kim

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Spice It Up In September and Beyond

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Happy August! I hope you are enjoying summer, whether the season is a busy or slow one for your business entity. If taking a vacation is on your wish list, I hope that it has, or will, achieve its purpose, and allow you to see new sights or return to familiar places, have fun, recharge your energy, and lower your stress level. I also hope that you’re finding time to read at least one business book that’s helping you to sharpen your business acumen.

September and the fourth quarter will soon arrive and now is the time to consider how you can successfully position your organization to achieve a strong year-end finish. Selling a product or service is usually a challenge, especially for Freelance professionals and small business owners. B2B marketplaces are nearly always crowded, typically consisting of a handful of market leaders that are trailed by a passel of “me, too” offerings. Unless your company has a sizeable marketing budget, it can be a struggle to build and sustain marketing or branding campaigns that will heighten the perception of your value and make your product or service appear more appealing to prospects. In short, today you can begin thinking about how to identify for your business a new competitive advantage.

The time is now to assess potential strategies that can position your entity to generate higher sales revenue in the coming months and it’s entirely possible that your preferred strategy can be carried out at a comparatively modest expense. Listed below are strategy possibilities that are accessible to Freelancers and SMB owners. Keep in mind that your promotional messaging must address urgent buyer pain points. You must do more than merely being clever as a way to get attention. The purpose of whatever new strategy you implement now is to leverage the competitive advantages you plan to highlight will result in customer roster that has a higher value, increased sales revenue and an enhanced customer lifetime value.

Read on and consider what you might have the means to do to fulfill the important goal of optimizing your brand visibility and image and maximizing sales revenue and profit as we look forward to the waning days of 2026.

I. Dare to be different

How can you clearly communicate to current and potential customers that your product or service will effectively address worrisome pain points and solve problems, enable them to achieve mission-critical goals without expressing those very important strengths in boring and predictable text? Useful information should not be ignored but…brands that are competing for the same target customer group can all sound alike. Target eyeballs cannot help but glaze over. The curse of commodification can creep in as prospects wade through sound-alike sales funnels that echo chamber repeat the same sales pitch. Isn’t it time for you to dare to be different and take a brave step forward?

Caution must be exercised and controversy is to be avoided for sure. You cannot afford to turn off the potential or current customers. But by choosing the right product attribute to showcase and then creating a cheeky tagline—or short video, or catchy image—that cleverly and succinctly describes your lead attribute, you can steal the thunder of competitors and propel your brand to the head of the class. If the Boston Red Sox can win 15 games in a row during July and escape an early death that had fans and sports announcers talking about “next year” sometime around Memorial Day, you can claim the spotlight for your brand and leap to the front of the pack. The suggestions below can stir up your creativity. Just do it.

  • Use humor to reframe the perception of your offering and your entity and escape the constraints of commodification
  • Align with a cause, such as climate change or animal rights (but avoid getting preach-y)  
  • Choose a unique visual branding style. Think 1950s retro, or find inspiration in the work of well-known artists such as Roy Lichtenstein, Peter Max, or Yayoi Kusama.

II. B2B influencer marketing

Another strategy that has the potential to help you separate your entity from the congested marketplace is to align with a B2B Influencer. While originally a strategy used by your B2C counterparts, competition for billable hours in the B2B sector has stimulated the acceptance of influencer marketing by those in the B2B sector, including Freelancers.

B2B influencer marketing is not a means to showcase your services or products—that’s a B2C strategy. Freelancers and SMB owners work with B2B influencer marketing specialists to increase the stature of their brand and use that professional capital to build credibility that facilitates trust and relationship-building with potential customers who, if all goes according to plan, will become paying customers. The goal of B2B influencer marketing strategies is to align your organization with recognized and respected industry thought leaders—the influencers— whose industry knowledge, reputation and loyal followers can be leveraged in your target market sectors.

The most effective B2B influencers are well-known and respected experts and regarded as thought leaders in their field. B2B influencers aren’t celebrities, but they are trusted members of influential online communities. They are also respected speakers who are regularly on podiums at industry conferences and other business events. The knowledge and experience they’ve acquired gives the influencers great authority and credibility that’s enabled them to build a sizeable, loyal and often activist following.

Based on that authority and credibility, the best B2B influencers are able to build trust and enthusiasm for brands within their community of followers. They are also known to make endorsements that can stimulate purchases made by decision-makers within the community. A brand endorsement can result in a significant number of positive reviews posted on social media platforms that are capable of creating a word-of-mouth campaign that can spread to the general public and stimulate still more purchases of your brand’s services or products.

The influencer phenomenon is a growing trend in B2B marketing. Apparently fueled by the entry of Millennial and Generation Z into stakeholder and decision-making positions, prospective buyers are increasingly more trusting of the recommendations of independent thought leaders, that is, influencers, than in the marketing content you provide. Millennials and Gen-Z are comfortable with influencers and that preference is starting to impact purchasing.

  • Increase brand awareness. By aligning with a B2B influencer with a large following in your target market, your brand will have access to a new audience of highly-engaged prospects.
  • Enhance credibility. B2B decision-makers increasingly trust industry thought leaders, sometimes more than marketing content. This trend is becoming more common as Millennial and Gen Z buyers move into stakeholder and decision-maker positions that impact purchases. Millennial and Gen-Z stakeholders and decision committee members are comfortable with influencers
  • Increase leadgen and sales. Selecting an influencer who is closely aligned with your brand values can help you reach specific groups of prospects who are highly likely to become your customers.

III. Get strategic about social media

You may not have the bandwidth to undertake a major overhaul of your presence on social media platforms, but if you take just three steps, your social media ROI will become more significant for your business.

  •  Define prospects: Successful B2B social media speaks to specific customer personae and post content that addresses their specific pain points and how your service or product will solve the problem or help achieve the goals. Enhance your leadgen and site engagement by posting content that helps decision-makers for your service or product. Make your marketing content speak to their pain points, goals
  • Meaningful messages: Create content that speaks to the value that prospective customers are looking for. Clarify your understanding of why prospects feel they need your product or service? How does your offering make their life easier?
  • .Create a content calendar. This will solve two problems for you: 1.) If there are specific times of the year that you want to post, you’ll remember to do so; and 2.) You will post consistently and give your audience fresh content that drives engagement.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: Stock AI image

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Why They Aren’t Your Customers

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A business owner is always on a mission to attract potential new customers, to introduce them to the company’s products and/or services and pique their interest by helping them to envision how using one (or more) of your offerings will make some aspect of their life or work better—-solve a problem, save time or money, achieve a goal, or enhance the company brand, for example.

You are aware that the answer to most sales appeals is “no;” but have you ever unpacked the deal-breakers that cause prospects to turn you down? Respectfully, I suggest that you explore this uncomfortable question. What you learn may surprise you, but I’ll wager that it will not discourage you, even if you discover a lapse that you should have anticipated. Being all things to all potential buyers is not a goal for the vast majority of business entities. If you’ve made a couple of mistakes, you’ll have a chance to fix things. As for non-customers, they can be grouped into four categories that describe their relationship with your brand:

  • Prospects who are unaware of your company, service, or product and may also be unaware of your product or service category.
  • Prospects who are aware of your company and its offerings, but they are uncertain that your service or product is an effective solution for their needs.
  • Prospects who are aware of the category of services or products that you provide, but your company is unknown to them.
  • Prospects who are satisfied with the services or products provided by a competitor company and they are not motivated to change.

Every now and again, fortune will smile and a non-customer will decide to investigate your online marketing funnel and become an active prospect. This individual could enter into active engagement and request information that leads to a chat with you. As you answer questions and position your solution as a preferable alternative to what s/he uses now, you may spark a level of trust and confidence that convinces the prospect that there is something better—and that better mousetrap could be your product or service. Make the most of what could be a good opportunity and listen for cues that subtly reveal a prospect’s niggling dissatisfaction that, with skillful handling, could blow up to become the motivation to abandon ship and buy from you.

Engagement

The most immediate way to assess a prospect’s feelings is by noting the level of engagement s/he demonstrates. A serious prospect will actively participate in discussions with you, either directly in conversation or by way of interactions with your online sales funnel. S/he will make comments, ask questions and solicit recommendations for how to use the product or service in specific situations. Serious prospects want to understand how your product or service will perform; will the results and outcomes justify the purchase? Will your product or service address specific pain points, solve a formidable challenge, or help to achieve an important goal? These prospects will be engaged with you every step of the way. Their responsiveness is typically swift; they are happy to follow-up on emails or to take meetings.

By contrast, prospects who are merely browsing are not prepared to become a paying customer anytime soon. They may need to obtain the support of higher-ups in their organization; they might be waiting for budget confirmation and timing. Prospects who are just looking around are inclined to be casual about their communication with you or your team. They might be motivated by curiosity to comparison shop; or maybe there’s a missing element in what they’re using now, something that was not a deal-breaker when they bought from your competitor. So, your commitment phobic prospect will occasionally search for a product or service that could become a potential replacement and mentally entertain a comparison. But will the prospect change horses?

For this prospect, there is no rush; s/he might take days or weeks to respond to your follow-up attempt. Casual prospects may postpone meetings without requesting a reschedule date; the feedback they give is likely to be vague and noncommittal. If you’re chasing someone for a response, or repeatedly trying to reestablish contact, it’s almost certainly indication that s/he isn’t fully invested in the conversation—or, worse, they’re simply not that interested. Ask yourself: which prospects make an effort to stay engaged with you and which respond only when you reach out—if that? When it’s the latter, you may find that the prospect is even more unreliable than they let on.

Urgency

Prospects with an immediate need for your product or service are usually far more likely to convert. They’ll have a specific problem that requires timely attention and they’ll make that clear early on in your interactions. Whether they’re on a tight timeline or under pressure to resolve a pressing business issue, serious prospects will express a desire to move quickly. You might get questions such as, “How soon can we start?” or “We’d like to get a solution in place by X date.” These statements indicate that the prospect is motivated and ready to move forward and make a purchase.

By contrast, a prospect who is merely browsing will not exhibit urgency. S/he might express interest, but when it’s time to take the next step, there will be hesitation. Commitment phobic prospects push timelines into the future or claim that they need more time to think things over. The lack of urgency may signal that the prospect isn’t prioritizing the purchase or, worse, that there is no plan to move forward. As a rule, when prospects are serious, their enthusiastic and consistent engagement communicates that they are eager to do the deal. If you detect only lukewarm interest, expect that prospect to disappoint you.

Decision-maker

One of the most frustrating experiences in sales is trying to mid-wife a buyer’s journey with a prospect whom you discover doesn’t have the authority to make purchasing decisions. Serious prospects usually have the power to buy, or they’re closely connected to the one who does. If your prospect must refer decisions to higher-ups, or is unclear about who will make the final call, this could be a red flag.

Early in your conversations, smart Freelancers ask the prospect questions about their decision-making process, such as “Who else will be involved in the decision?” or “What steps do we need to go through for final approval?” It’s critical to know if the person with whom you’re communicating has sole authority to make the buy, or if s/he has one vote on a decision team of five people, for example. Or maybe your prospect is doing the legwork for the sale because the person(s) who can green light the sale don’t like getting directly involved in sales (it happens). Whatever the protocol the prospect’s company follows, if s/he is serious, that person will give you accurate info about the purchase approval process and will fill you in on the internal steps and timelines needed to make a decision.

Uncommitted prospects, on the other hand, tend to be ambiguous, if not evasive, about who holds the decision-making power. If the prospect repeatedly tells you s/he needs to consult someone else about the sale, but never seems to move the process forward, that individual is most likely wasting your time. Without clear authority or a transparent decision-making process, it will be difficult to determine when, or if, the sale will be approved.

Moving forward

A serious prospect will move through your sales funnel with consistency and purpose. S/he will ask questions, including those intended to obtain information on the service or product delivery and implementation timelines and pricing specifics. Even if discussions and negotiations take time, there will be clear forward momentum.

Commitment phobic prospects, as you might guess, tend to stall. It’s possible that what appears to be genuine interest is demonstrated early on as the prospect engages in preliminary discussions. But when it’s time to progress to more concrete steps—such as proposing a delivery and implementation timeline, or reviewing a proposal—you find that communication becomes opaque and slows down, it does not bode well for the possibility of consummating the sale. This stalling tactic is manipulative as it traps you in uncertainty and denies you from good faith business practice. Such prospects may be unable to guarantee an adequate budget, or they may be in serious negotiation with another vendor and merely using you as a bargaining chip or a Plan B option. You are advised to be circumspect.

It’s important to recognize the potential significance of persistent delays and face up to the possibility that the prospect may not be willing and able to make a decision. If the prospect habitually postpones meetings, this could surely indicate that this individual is unreliable, probably because the authority to make the purchase is not in hand. Do yourself a favor and monitor how quickly and smoothly prospects move from one step to the next in your sales funnel; any unusual delays are worth questioning.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: © MoustacheGirl for Getty Images

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7 AI Tools Take Your Freelance Entity To The Top

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If striking out on your own to launch a solo Freelance entity has progressed from interesting idea status to a Pinterest goal in development, you may be ready to explore a few specifics that will help you prepare to advance your plan from the Pinterest board to a functioning business entity. It is almost certain that you’ve considered how Artificial Intelligence-powered software and other digital tools can optimize your business operations. You’ll be happy to know that numerous AI-powered technological resources are readily available to help Freelance solopreneurs operate their one-person enterprise with an efficiency and impact that rivals larger organizations.

A 2026 report published by Upwork, the Freelance talent marketplace that serves both companies in search of knowledge economy workers and independent professionals whose business is to provide it and the digital communications provider Zoom, 91% of Freelance single owner business entities say that AI has reduced their routine administrative work and enabled 74% of respondents to scale without hiring full-time employees. In fact, many Freelance business owners view operating a single-person entity as an advantage that bakes in operational flexibility and strategic agility. When necessary, a Freelance solopreneur can turn to software-as-a-service AI agents and/or assistants, or hire a Freelance colleague whose expertise can be contracted on a per-project basis, to expertly manage whatever aspects of the project are outside of his/her wheelhouse. The Rise of the Solopreneur report, which surveyed nearly 3,000 respondents located in 48 states and participating in 12 industries, provides a window into how this entrepreneurial segment is building success and expanding its impact in the global labor force. For workers and companies alike, the rise of Freelance solopreneurs who strategically implement AI-powered tech resources demonstrates that the future of work may no longer be defined by the number of workers a company employs, but rather by the founder’s expertise.

The challenges once inherent in operating a business alone have steadily declined since the advent of tech advances that have become commonplace—cloud computing, e-commerce infrastructure, including secure online payment options, social media platforms and other marketing activities that promote the company and build the brand. Moreover, there are now Freelance marketplace platforms that facilitate the building of a vital client list. That’s all good, but life as a Freelance on-your-own business owner requires significant confidence and discipline, along with expertise in your field.

Being able to manage stress and stay motivated are a couple more must-have characteristics. You’ll also have to be ready to wear many hats, for example marketing, sales, customer service, accounting/finance and operations. Oh, yes, and as CEO, you are the face of the company. There’s no one else to delegate tasks to, so being incredibly resourceful, strategic in managing their time and all-around resilient are other qualities Freelance solopreneurs must live up to.

It can be successfully done if that is the way you want it! Below are a few technological resources that will help you stay on top of things and maintain a positive mindset while you do.

1. Financial Reporting and Analysis: AI-powered financial tools are foundational for sound decision-making that is informed by your company’s key performance metrics. AI powered financial tools can deliver timely, relevant perspectives to financial analysis and give eye-opening insights into what drives revenue and profit. However, AI financial tools are not one-size-fits-all and the service you choose must align with the your reporting and analysis needs. Predictive analytics for financial forecasting might be a priority.

2. Customer Relations Management: CRM integrates your marketing strategies with AI-powered technology and brings highly useful capabilities by using advanced analytics, market research and automation to deliver personalized customer experiences that increase sales conversions, increase customer loyalty, encourage repeat business and reduce churn. AI can enhance customer acquisition by facilitating targeted marketing campaigns, improving conversion through predictive analytics and making recommendations that help you optimize sales strategies. As well, CRM will ensure comprehensive customer service and a pleasantly memorable customer experience, by tracking and managing all customer touch points—for example, purchases and inquiries—to deliver consistent support.

3. Operations and Workflow Management: AI software systems are powerful tools that can, among other capabilities, streamline work processes and improve operational efficiency by mapping, automating and tracking your workflows to monitor your output and progress. An AI agent can also provide actionable recommendations to address critical operational issues and even augment or correct incomplete or inconsistent data, to help you obtain accurate insights and achieve informed decision-making. By training on historical data, AI models can quickly identify unusual patterns and outliers that might signal quality control issues. 

4. Sales/Marketing Funnel & Leadgen: AI-driven leadgen marketing/sales funnels are able to adjust timing, marketing or sales channels and personalized messages that respond to the behavior of prospective buyers In Real Time. Responsiveness is valuable to you because a lost lead is lost revenue. According to research by Mc Kinsey, adaptive AI-powered marketing/sales funnels reduce prospect drop-off and make a sale more likely. AI can manage customer relations management entries, qualify leads and even handle initial sales interactions via your AI-powered chatbot. AI lead qualification can ask the initial questions, score intent, tag high-quality leads and push the most promising prospects into your pipeline automatically.

Be sure to add a Follow-Up Agent, a software tool that automates the process of staying in touch so that promising leads are not lost due to insufficient follow-up. Instead of relying on manual reminders sent by you, the follow-up agent uses AI to “read” ongoing conversations and determine when and how to reach out, adapting the timing of follow-up and conversational tone depending on how the lead interacts. The system is designed to track engagement signals such as email opens, clicks, or unanswered messages. Based on this information, the follow-up agent does exactly that by composing personalized messages that reflect the context of the conversation and even the role of the recipient.

5. Content Strategy and Creation: AI can draft newsletters, blog posts, social media updates, marketing emails for campaigns and advertising copy, all tailored to specific audience segments and optimized for Search Engine Optimization. AI software can also analyze customer data to segment audiences and automate personalized marketing messages. A Content Repurposing Agent– will transform long-form content (blogs, YouTube, newsletters) into short clips that enable you to extract the full value of your strategies and messages and reinforce their impact by recycling it to the other platforms. Now you can produce social media posts, marketing emails—or even videos that feature you discussing key points of your message and what it means to customers—and using a script that’s inspired by the repurposing agent.

6. Graphic Design: AI is revolutionizing the design industry, making it possible for those who are not design professionals to produce credible graphic designs for your marketing materials that enhance personalization and improve engagement that promotes sales conversations. In a recent McKinsey Global Survey, 65% of participants noted their company regularly use generative AI—nearly double the percentage recorded 10 months before and 69% of marketing and other creative professionals believe AI-enhanced tools boost their team’s creativity. AI can generate numerous ideas and variations based on initial input, helping graphic designers break through creative blocks and explore directions they might not have considered otherwise. AI is also lowering the barrier to entry for non-designers who need to produce visual content. User-friendly design assistants can guide novices through the creative process, offering suggestions and automating complex tasks. Take a look at some highly favored design software.

7. Cybersecurity & Data Privacy: Managing a primarily AI-driven business presents significant cybersecurity precautions. Small and medium-sized businesses, a category that includes Freelance solopreneurs, are more frequent targets of cybercrime than larger companies, industry research shows. The good news is agentic AI and AI agents are beefing up cybersecurity by automating decision-making. Not only will an AI-powered cybersecurity system enable dynamic access management by adjusting user access based on behavior and risk, in that way aligning with zero trust principles, but also agentic AI will continuously monitor activities, and reveal atypical patterns to identify and mitigate insider threats before they escalate.  Furthermore, agentic AI enhances workflow efficiency by automating tasks like alert triage and incident response, with applications in cybersecurity for autonomous threat detection and response (Lisowski, 2024). Organizations adopting agentic AI for security and governance are reporting significant benefits, including faster decision-making and improved risk management (Chiodi, 2025).

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: Freepik

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Newsletters Are Back

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Marketing mavens have rediscovered the newsletter. After a period of what could be called benign neglect, when this once standard marketing tool fell out of favor and was sidelined, the reappearance of newsletters represents a long overdue acknowledgement of data-verified performance results. Without question, the newsletter has for several decades been among the most effective promotional and relationship-building resources in a marketer’s arsenal.

Some of you reading now may have once looked forward to receiving a favorite newsletter that was delivered by your postal service. Then, in the early 2000s, your humble newsletter demonstrated its agility and responded to the new technology known as email, and seamlessly adapted from hard-copy to digital format. In fact, it can be successfully argued that the multi-faceted, hard-working newsletter was the original email marketing content. The format has again demonstrated that it is an effective, and therefore valuable, component of well-conceived marketing strategies and campaigns. Marketing thought leaders have joined the cheering section, calling digitally distributed (i.e., email) content marketing as foundational to long-term business growth.

Newsletters by definition are communication tools that facilitate engagement and relationship development with readers—that is, current clients, past clients, prospects and also colleagues and peers who’d like to familiarize themselves with your business—and you. According to a 2026 report published by Newsletter Industry Statistics, 78% of B2B marketers use newsletters to generate leads and 60% say newsletters are their top driver of customer retention—which, BTW, invites repeat business. A well-composed newsletter can showcase your entity, and you, in many ways:

  • A platform for you to tell your brand story
  • Cultivate client relationships, inspire trust in prospects, re-engage past clients
  • Demonstrate your thought leader expertise
  • Nurture brand loyalty
  • Make announcements and updates
  • Present product or service spotlights
  • Generate website traffic and sales

Because your newsletter is capable of influencing more people than you may realize, and in more ways than you might imagine, it is imperative that you make it a good read. You have a story to tell; ensure that the information you share is relevant, timely and compelling. Spice up the text with a splash of appealing visuals that aligns with your narrative, using both still images and (short) video clips. Be sensitive to reader attention spans as you compose your newsletter: three pages, or about 500-600 words, is probably suitable for most but still images will expand the page count. Furthermore, your newsletter (and all of your marketing emails) should adhere to mobile device specs, because 60% will be opened on mobile. As for scheduling your newsletter, monthly is an acceptable frequency known to build and maintain reader engagement.

Make it relevant, visually interesting and personal

Before you commit to producing a newsletter for your Freelance entity, decide what you’d like your newsletter to do for your business? Would you like to increase brand awareness, generate leads, nurture relationships, or boost sales? In most cases it’s all of the above, but it makes sense to know your destination before you set off on a journey.

When you’ve clarified the purpose, you can confidently choose topics for articles and other content that will guide your creation of an effective marketing tool. Your customer relations management data will reveal what your clients want to know and, even better, can segment clients into groups based on relevant distinguishing criteria, such as for-profit or not-for-profit designation, pain points or goals that motivate clients to seek out your solution, purchase history, or frequency. By segmenting your audience, you can then tailor certain elements of your newsletter content to each group and in that way enhance the relevance, personalization, engagement and, ultimately, sales revenue generated. Artificial Intelligence software will optimize the insights provided by your CRM data, that can accurately pinpoint client preferences, priorities, behaviors and challenges. Moreover, AI software such as ChatGPT, Grammarly, Ideamap, or Microsoft Copilot, for example, can facilitate the brainstorming and idea generation process and present to you potentially dozens of interesting newsletter topics that would address the focus of your target newsletter reader groups.

According to data reported by Exploding Topics, approximately 72% of newsletter subscribers are motivated by a desire to either stay up-to-date with company happenings or learn about a topic of interest when they choose to subscribe to a newsletter. Surprisingly, when given the option of receiving updates about your brand by way of social media or an email newsletter that slips into their inbox, 90% of readers choose to receive your newsletter.

So there is your mission—identify headline topics that will be segmented by personalized interests and priorities and made available to readers based on what resonates most, as a way to encourage relevance and value that readers will associate with your newsletter, as well as your company. With assistance from your CRM and AI resources, you will learn which topics that a critical mass of readers would like to take a deep-dive exploration into, and also topics for which they’ll be pleased to receive just basic info. Lastly, readers will appreciate quick and visible access to links that announce upcoming events, perhaps some in which you’ll have a featured presence, such as a podcast, webinar, or teaching assignment. Ideally, your newsletter will function as a portal for conversation with your clients and prospects. Make it interactive by including a mix of content that they’ll anticipate reading every month, such as:

  • Links to your blog or other useful articles
  • One deep-dive article
  • Poll or survey
  • Product or service spotlights
  • Call-to-action
  • Special events—your speaking or teaching engagements, participation in charity events

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: courtesy of the Louvre Museum, Paris, France. Muse Reading Greek (Boeotia) circa 435-425 BC

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Don’t Close the Sale, Educate the Client

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What does it take for you to bring in sales that convert prospects into clients? Perhaps you are a silver-tongued charmer who is capable of successfully “closing” a sale with almost any prospect? Or is the usual outcome of your sales process sort of hit or miss—not a disaster, but no one would wonder if you have a license to print money?

As you’ve done when unraveling other business obstacles, dissecting and analyzing how you sell, meaning that you’ll study the usual trajectory prospects follow when they include your service or product in their buyer journey—from the initial demonstration of the prospect’s interest to the outcome, when the prospect either becomes a client, or moves on to your competitor. Whatever you learn will indicate which of your intentions are not landing and may also direct you to the remedy. Begin with a review of sales basics.

  • Have you identified your ideal client and how to access them?
  • Do you know the usual pain points or goals that motivate prospects to consider your company?
  • Have you priced your offering appropriately?
  • How clear and convincing are you when articulating your unique sales proposition?
  • What’s your sales success rate when you must respond to an objection?
  • Are you able to detect buying signs that tell you when it’s time to ask for the sale (which could mean the prospect must contact the decision team and recommend a yes vote)?

If your analysis reveals that either your USP is vague and falls short of articulating the strengths of your offering, and maybe even leaves you vulnerable to objections that signal questions about its performance, you have a messaging problem. Attempting to defuse objections is not the cure for prospect hesitation; and bringing in a sale is no longer about dropping magic words that you hope will result in converting the prospect into your client. Enabling B2B sales in the post-pandemic ecosystem often requires that you educate prospects by presenting content marketing info that addresses their priorities and concerns and will, brick by brick, demonstrate that your solution is effective and reliable.

You must keep in mind, though, that the B2B sales process has become opaque; prospects developed an appetite for no-contact buying during the pandemic and the habit has become entrenched. Research from Gartner found that B2B buyers prefer a buyer journey that requires little to no contact with sales reps or other vendors (e.g., Freelancers); findings showed that 75% of buyers prefer to have little interaction with sellers. For that reason, B2B buying journeys and decisions are increasingly made without Freelancers or sales reps. If prospects must make contact to explore a question or two when evaluating from whom they might purchase, they hold tight to the self-serve, Do It Yourself mode. “I can handle this,” they say and you have little to no opportunity to influence, or even interact, with your prospect.

If interaction with the Freelancer or sales rep is unavoidable, a short list of “finalist” vendor candidates is typically contacted to schedule a product demonstration or learn the details of implementing and obtaining the service. But by the time you or any other vendor learns that a possible sale is in progress, the sale is already in BOFU, bottom of the sales funnel; too much has transpired to allow you to exert some control and influence over the sale. Any “sale closing spiel” is circumvented as you realize that you’ve stumbled into a decision that’s well underway—-without you. But Gartner research also revealed an upside, if you choose to see it that way—DIY online purchases are far more likely to result in buyer’s remorse.

Closing versus education 

Of course! Unless the prospect is re-ordering a service or product with which there’s been direct experience, it is unwise for prospects to assume they can successfully navigate the ins and outs of the purchase without guidance. They don’t know what they don’t know.

You designed your marketing/sales funnel to facilitate the initial stages of a buyer journey that’s conducted online and in DIY independent mode. Prospects whose level of interest brings them to MOFU and its gated content should feel comfortable to make email contact to identify themselves and request the info they’d like to view. The plan was for the Freelancer to thank the prospect for his/her interest, send the gated content and begin to discreetly monitor and guide the sales process. In so doing, Freelancers could also save any wayward prospects from themselves by being available to answer questions and make recommendations that encourage a successful experience with the product or service.

In fact, Gartner research indicates that those with sales responsibility should provide marketing content that captures the attention of prospects because the info communicates the value of your service or product and facilitates the decision process. The content must be relevant and aligned with the pain point that the prospect must resolve or goal that must be attained. That’s how a well-designed sales/marketing funnel should work.

More than ever, high-pressure sale “closing” tactics are not what typical B2B clients respond to today. The best way to bring in a sale in the current zeitgeist is to present a rational, evidence-backed case that reveals how and why your solution will effectively and efficiently resolve the prospect’s pain point or facilitate achievement of the goal. Rather than dwelling on product or service features and benefits, a strategy that was a given in 20th century selling, the best recipe now for Freelancers to obtain a degree of influence over the sale is to guide the prospect through a discovery process.

  • Diagnose the pain point and discover its origin
  • Document current, or previous, solutions that disappointed
  • Describe what doing business will look like when your solution resolves the pain point or enables the goal to be realized
  • Determine which solution appears to be most capable of producing the prospect’s desired results and outcomes

When a prospect contacts you for information about your solution, and you learn that a serious buyer journey that involves one of your solutions is in progress, you have nothing to lose and everything to gain by stepping up and seizing what may be your only opportunity to signal that you understand prospect needs and discuss and send “how-to” content and performance data, which can include one or more of the resources listed below. Your thought leader credibility will yet again prove its usefulness when it supports the value-affirming sales interactions that are most effective with prospects now and are the best option to move the sale forward. Helping prospective buyers feel confident and in control of the purchase decision (e.g., by providing a choice of tailored recommendations based on their input and criteria) builds trust that can enhance the perception of your solution and give you the sale.

  • Case studies and success stories
  • Webinars and podcasts where you are a speaker
  • Blogs, e-books or other articles that you contribute to or author

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: Image: © Prague Daily March 2, 2025 The weekly market in Prague’s Lesser Town.

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Sharpen Your Social Media Systems

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A March 25, 2026 verdict by a CA jury held Google and Meta (Facebook) responsible for the mental health difficulties suffered by a woman who since childhood compulsively used social media. The jury awarded $6M to the plaintiff and Meta is responsible for 70% of that amount. Heavy use of social media can lead to unintended consequences, for sure; nevertheless, most US citizens do not feel that social media is a menace to society. Datareportal found that 73% of US adults were active social media users as of October 2025, a response that verifies the often significant benefits that social media can bring to our personal and/or professional lives when it is used with discretion. All of you reading this post know that social media plays an integral role in the business sector, from lead generation to the buyer’s journey to post-sale customer service, positioning it as foundational to effective B2B and B2C sales and marketing.

 Satisfy new algorithms with AEO, GEO and SEO

Artificial intelligence has added more acronyms and abbreviations to the alphabet soup that a Freelance professional must memorize to show that you’re in the game, know what’s up and you’re worthy of receiving a new assignment. To achieve your goal of establishing a robust and respected online presence, you must once again get familiar with new search algorithms and then decide under what circumstances you might be persuaded to introduce new approaches that promise to enhance the search functionality of your sites. The obvious answer is to contact a Freelance colleague to discuss potential benefits for your digital platforms and conduct a cost-benefit analysis. Can you afford to dip into the new technology? Can you afford not to?

  • AEO. Answer Engine Optimization. AEO is meant to get your content selected as the prime answer to specific online queries and not just an alternate answer to what’s best-in-class. Incorporating AEO is meant to help your content be chosen as the best answer in our era of AI-powered overviews and voice assistants that are increasingly in the driver’s seat. AEO visibility is determined by how easily machines can read your content. The function of AEO is not to drive clicks as does SEO, but to become the certified best answer that AI agents showcase in all search engines used to post that query.
  • GEO. Generative Engine Optimization. GEO goes a step further than AEO and optimizes content so that AI-driven search engines and large language models (LLMs) like Perplexity and ChatGPT can understand the content and cite it in answers the search engines receive and generate. GEO structures content so that it’s easy to locate, access and cite. The function of GEO isn’t just to help your answer become the first on a list of responses, but goes farther to become a strategic approach that boosts your visibility, authority and citations in AI-generated responses.
  • SEO. Search Engine Optimization. You already know that SEO helps content attain a higher ranking in traditional online search engines like Bing and Google. SEO is driven primarily by keyword targeting, content quality and technical SEO (e.g., page loading time and mobile-friendliness). The function of SEO is to encourage clicks on your content and drive traffic to your website, et al.
  • Continue SEO techniques to boost social media content visibility. Keyword research, alt text, subtitles and long-tail keywords—think sentences—can all make your social media content more search-friendly. Why abandon what works?
  • Experiment with AEO and GEO. Add to your online content short social posts that directly answer questions known to be frequently asked by prospects and clients. Use question-based as titles for posts and provide clear, plainly stated answers. Maintain a conversational, yet professional voice for your Q & A inspired content (think FAQ frequently asked questions).

Social media is becoming the place for first-party data

As the presence of third-party cookies falls out of favor, brands are turning to social media platforms to access first-party data, which is regarded the most desirable. Additional sources of first-party that can be obtained with clear user consent include opt-in leadgen promotions, newsletter or blog subscriptions, webinar RSVPs and calls-to-action. The appetite for first-party data is driven by the desire brands have for customer information that is provided by the consumer him/herself, thus ensuring that the insights derived from that data are trustworthy and can be confidently used as the foundation of your CRM assumptions, strategies and activities. 

Brands are also turning to social media user comments for market and consumer info when trends and other marketplace developments evolve too quickly for traditional research methods to keep up. Social listening tools like Talkwalker use AI to pull specific brand insights from the vast quantities of data available on social media platforms, in real time. Social listening, another manifestation of that practice, tracks online comments made about your brand, industry and competitors across social media platforms. From an analysis of those comments, a the big picture will emerge of the unfiltered perceptions that your customers, prospects and others have about your brand. Social listening can also capture developing trends that are bubbling up and indicate where opportunities (or risks) that impact your entity are hiding. In short, social listening data can impact all areas of your brand.

Best practices for using social media as a first-party data source

  • Ramp up your social listening capabilities. Talkwalker can help you uncover valuable insights through a few simple AI-guided queries. 
  • Add social listening to your marketing activities. Social listening-derived data has a high probability of discovering marketplace perceptions, trends and developments that might yield potential opportunities for your brand and/or shine a light on possible risks that give you a chance to perhaps dodge a disaster. As noted, social listening has the ability to impact all aspects of your brand.
  • Test social media DM automation and/or gated content campaigns to push leadgen. You can launch a social post and announce publication of white paper, e-book, case study or other gated content resource as you simultaneously use automated DMs to collect leads and obtain first-party data from those who respond to your outreach. 

 How can you optimize social media posts for visibility? How can you adapt to updates in search algorithms?

While Bing and Google are still the go-to sites for online search, social media search is making significant headway as users increasingly conduct online searches on their platforms. Overall, 24% of US adults who use social media also use social media for online search as of April 2024, led by Generation Z (46%) and Millennials (35%). The platforms are keeping up and aggressively courting online search and capabilities are not limited to typing in the search bar. Instagram and TikTok support image and video visual searches and Pinterest Lens enables online visual searches for products by searching from a photo. Facebook supports basic voice search—take that Siri and Alexa!—58.6% of US adults have conducted a voice-activated online search at least once as of 2024. These statistics make clear that social media online search is a growing phenomenon that Freelancers cannot ignore. 2Q2026 is calling you to sharpen your social media systems to ensure that your platforms operate efficiently to give your sites visibility that opens the door to content that attracts viable leads and converts prospects into customers.

  • Content to address the needs of audience sub-groups. First, there are social media frequent followers and most are already buying your services or products–some are repeat customers and some make referrals. A second group is comprised of those who are on a buyer journey. They’ve recently discovered your brand, or they’ve only begun to learn what your company and solutions are all about. It could be that your company was swept into search results thanks to an algorithm update and your content has piqued a prospective buyer’s curiosity. This last group will appreciate product information and content that conveys how and where your solution works best. Include product/service how-tos in your brand story on your social media platforms to demonstrate how your solution delivers results.
  • Customize content for each platform. Because attention spans are short, making it’s more important than ever now. Depending on your business and customers, design content / express your marketing and sales messages to resonate with your audience and have many questions. What speaks to loyal customers and is not the same as what speaks to prospects who are browsing through the site getting to know you better. On all of your social media platforms, include basic information about your product and service because that is the brand story that prospects, especially, would like to see. You need to understand both and create content that speaks to the unique interests and agenda of each group. while both long-term customers and potential customers are interested in your brand story, be aware that those who know your brand well will have a different agenda than those who are learning about your brand and are trying to envision how the experience of working with your company might be.
  • Always have a hook. Catch people’s attention within the first three seconds to show your visitors that your content aligns with their needs and interests.  A focal point, an exciting announcement, an advance look at something new, or an enticing call-to-action can persuade a site visitor to linger and engage.

How should you manage multiple platform identities?

  • Articulate your core identity. Beyond the brand voice developed to resonate with the typical users of each of your platforms, identify the ideal language you’ll use to convey the overall message. Learn to express the core elements of your brand purpose, outcomes and results delivered, as well as the goals and pain points of your prospects. Confirm also how your customers and other followers prefer to engage on each of your platforms. Your LinkedIn and X followers may be more interested in case studies and other data-driven information, while your Facebook and Instagram followers may want to see a video of you discussing why your product or service has helped customers and keeps them coming back. The expression of your brand voice may change across platforms, but be mindful to always stay true to the essence of brand fundamentals.  
  • Map your platform identities to reflect user intent. Use social listening data to learn what users of each of your platforms want from brands that occupy your market niche and shape your content strategy and focus accordingly:
    • On X, you’ll be wise to give a no-nonsense news account using plain language and links to content on your website or other digital sources.
    • On TikTok, you can post create a series of brief, appealing, yet informative explainer videos that convey the use-case for your solution by showcasing one important goal or pain point in each video that your solution can resolve.
    • It’s time to incorporate visual elements into your LinkedIn content! Brainstorm stories you can tell so that you can shoot a 3-5 minute video. You might make an exciting announcement, or share a clip from your guest appearance on a webinar or podcast. LinkedIn data confirms that those who post videos see a 3X growth in followers.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: Chinnapong for Adobe Stock