How to Deliver Value To Your Customers in Every Stage of the Lifecycle

If you’re new to the customer lifecycle, you might be wondering, A) What even is it? And B) How do I optimize it?

In this post, I’ll break down what it is, why it’s crucial to your business, and what content you need in each stage to ensure that your customers are getting the maximum value.

What is the Customer Lifecycle?

The customer lifecycle is made up of seven stages: awareness, education, conversion, onboarding, retention, brand advocacy, and word-of-mouth marketing. 

It’s a series of steps the buyer takes (with your business or without it) through every transaction they make. You can read a more in-depth description of it here.

Marketers follow the lifecycle so they can learn what takes someone from lead to customer to brand advocate. 

Then, they’ll think methodically about each touchpoint, customizing it for the best possible outcome. 

That means lots of listening and personalization. They’re masterminding an excellent experience for their customers that will increase both customer satisfaction and ROI.

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Why The Customer Lifecycle is Crucial to Your Business

With almost four billion people connected to the internet and 74% of people buying based on their experience, marketers need a way to understand how to make it flawless.

If you invest in this experience-based system, you’ll deliver more value to your customers and increase your ROI.

How to Optimize Each Stage of the Customer Lifecycle

If you want to create a customized lifecycle experience, you need to eliminate friction -- and hone in on what your customers want -- across several touchpoints. 

[[callout or graphic]] Tip: Remember that your content should be all about your customers, not about yourself.

Lack of personalized service is one of the top reasons customers leave. So your content across the board should reflect their interests.

This includes everything from your website to your email campaigns to your LinkedIn profile.

Now, let’s dive into what we’re all here for.

Awareness

Awareness is the primary kick-off point for all customers. It follows that to eventually become a customer, one first has to become aware of your business. 

To help them along the path to purchase, you need a few types of killer content. 

• Short videos
  

It’s said that viewers retain 95% of what they learn in a video. When you’re trying to get someone’s attention, that statistic starts looking pretty good. 

At this stage, you won’t want in-depth, Masterclass-style content. You’ll want to start with snappy content that speaks to their pain points, showing them how you can make it better.

Like this:
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• Engaging social media posts
  

Social media drives much of the awareness people have because of viral content. To keep your edge, you need a social media plan.

Research the platforms your target audience uses, find out the time they’re most likely to be scrolling, and what would be most likely to stop the scroll.

Do they like Instagram? Make reels and graphics. LinkedIn? Publish industry insight blog posts to build your authority.

• Short-form blog posts
  

HubSpot estimated that Google processes around 63,000 search queries per second, meaning 5.6 billion searches every day and around 2 trillion global searches per year. 

Searches = the potential to be seen!

As you gain awareness, you don’t want to overwhelm your readers with concept pieces. Think about what pain points your target audience searches for, then demonstrate your ability.

A few examples are:

• How-Tos
• Listicles
• Product Reviews
• Tutorials
  

• Free downloads
  

These are what you would call lead generation offers. As potentials supply their email addresses, you start list-building.

Depending on your business MO, you could do some of the following:

• Video course
• Ebook
• Printable
• Email course
• Content bundles
  

You get a two-in-one deal. Exposure, plus a foot in the door for the education stage.

Education

Education is the stage when customers know what will solve their problem and start researching the product or service. They want to know which one would best suit their needs.

Your job is to show them why yours should win the competition.

• Up-to-date website pages
  

Keep in mind that your lead is going to be scrounging your website to find out who you are, your values, what you can do for them, and how you’ll do it.

• Clear homepage
• Services page
• About page
• Blog section
• Testimonials & Case Studies pages
  

And always include a call to action.

• In-depth blog posts
  

Now is the time to up your blog post game. You want to effectively educate the lead to conversion.

SEMrush found that webinars, roundups, interviews, gated content, guides, and ebooks are the most effective content types.

You might consider interviewing an expert in your field to communicate authority, writing Ebooks to show your expertise, or creating guides to help the audience make an informed decision.

• Webinar
  

As I mentioned, webinars are among the most effective content. They can tap into the lead’s curiosity to help them thoroughly understand how you will solve their problem. And why it should be you.

Some ideas for digital marketing:

• List Building
• Brand Creation
• Graphic Design Basics
• Email Nurture Campaigns
• Data & Analytics
• SEO for Better Engagement
  

• Nurture emails
  

Because they’ve signed up for your email list through a free offer, they’re now candidates for lead nurturing. 

Nurture emails (or nurture campaigns) are “time-based emails that send out to your audience to inform them of an offer, and, over time, motivate them to take some sort of action, like taking advantage of your offer.” (source: Campaign Monitor)

This email campaign outline is based on a 3-video free offer. You’ll give, give, give, and finally ask for something in return. Always give more than you take and include a call to action.

• Email #1: Welcome + Empathy
• Email #2: Expertise + Freebie
• Email #3: Freebie
• Email #4: Testimonials + Authority
• Email #5: Final Freebie 
• Email #6: Empathy + We Can Help
• Email #7: Call to Action
  

• Comparison Guides
  

A comparison guide is a chart or table that places your product or service next to another. It will weigh the pros and cons of each. 

It should also establish your authority and place you above your competitors.

Conversion

Conversion is arguably the most important stage of the lifecycle. Based on your awareness and education campaigns, your lead has decided to make a purchase.

The purchase process must be frictionless and easy.

You’ll want to reassure them that they’ve made the right decision.

• Testimonials

Testimonials are good reviews from happy customers.

88% of people trust testimonials as much as recommendations from friends and family. Plus, 72% of consumers say positive testimonials and reviews increase their trust in a business. 

Sounds like testimonials are important, huh? 

Ask for testimonials from your former and current clients. Include statistics and revenue generated, if possible.

• Case Studies
  

Case studies and testimonials both show authority and expertise, but they are different. 

A testimonial comes directly from the client, but a case study is written by the company itself to highlight specifically how they solved a client’s problem.

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Onboarding

Congratulations, you’re onboarding new customers! That means that you have successfully marketed from awareness to purchase. 

You need to make sure that your new customers get the most value out of their purchases.

• In-depth Blog Posts
  

Analyze your new customers to find out what they’re most interested in. 

Then include blog posts like how-tos and guides, like this one.

• Welcome or Thank You Emails
  

Have you ever purchased something only to find that there was no follow-up past receipt? That makes the transaction feel less than personal.

Welcome emails have a 91.8% open rate, more than almost any other type of email.

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You should have also sent them a welcome email when they subscribed via your free offer. However, an onboarding email should be more personalized. 

Make your customers feel welcome and heard by sending a welcome email. This should lead to an onboarding campaign that will answer all of their questions. 

They’ll understand that you want what’s best for them, not just your business. 

• Tutorials
  

Because the customer is new to your product or service, they will want to know exactly how it’s going to work. Try one of these next time:

• Virtual tour
• How-To Guide (blog post or email)
• Instructional whitepaper
  

• Videos
  

Videos help people retain more information. 

Your welcome email could include a personal welcome video, a series about how to get started or act as a resource about where to go from here.

• Infographics
  

Like videos, infographics help people understand and retain more information. People are less likely to read a long wall of text without something to break it up.

Your infographics could show the next steps or a diagram of how to use your product. Like this:

Retention

This is your chance to upsell and cross-sell whenever possible. 

You should know your customers better by now. Offer them additions that will interest them, not annoy them, plus continually educate them on your services. This will reduce your churn rate.

• Email Campaigns
  

Customers can drop off at any point, so you’ll want to continually re-engage them. 

Create separate automation for customers in the retention phase. This way they won’t get emails about products they already have or won’t need (i.e. something that they just bought)

• “You Might Also Like…” 
• Review requests
• Subscription reminders
• “What You’ve Missed’ newsletters
• Special incentives
  

• Apps
  

In 2017, Entrepreneur found that 39% of apps are used 11 times or more. If you offer a service that would jive better with an app, create one!

You could compete in the modern digital landscape and market to a variety of users.

• Forums
  

Human connection makes people feel like they’re part of a community. Why not create that community within your brand?

• Facebook groups
• Slack groups
• Discord groups
• Custom group on your site
  

• Surveys
  

While working to retain customers, the best thing you can do is constantly improve.

Surveys will help you measure their level of commitment to your brand. You will then understand what you need to do to make their experience better.

Brand Advocacy

Many of the customers you’ve retained will become brand advocates. They’ll essentially be unpaid ambassadors for your brand because they love it.

They’ll want to feel heard and valued. 

• User-Generated Content
  

This is any content found online that’s made by users -- comments, shares, posts, reviews, text, videos, images. Make use of it.

For example, if you’re a small custom embroidery business, you might encourage users to post their styled clothing along with a branded hashtag on Instagram.

If you allow reviews on your site, add a section for photos or videos where they can showcase their satisfaction. Plus, you’ll get a higher engagement rate.

• Social Features
  

Following up UGC, a good way to get engagement is to feature their content on your social media accounts.

• Rewards Programs
  

68% of customers will join a loyalty program if one is offered to them. (No wonder my inbox is full of promotions…) 

There are several ways to reward loyal customers.

• Badges or tiers on social
• Birthday discounts
• Member discounts
• Points toward future services

Word-of-Mouth

Word-of-mouth is the final stage in the lifecycle before it starts over. Your brand advocates will start spreading the word about how much they love your brand.

You got it: that’s when newbies start with awareness.

But before refocusing on a new cycle, you’ll want to pay this stage some attention (after all, people are 4x more likely to listen to friends and family than to you).

It’s time to create a buzz.

• Blog Posts
  

The “share” button has become a major part of today’s landscape. The more shares you get, the more exposure you get.

Create those blog posts that are both good for awareness and interesting to a broader audience. This will help you to continue establishing your credibility. 

• Social media
  

A lot of big companies use social media, especially Twitter, to engage with their followers (ahem, Wendy’s). They post content that gets people’s attention and keeps the narrative going.

Vision Critical found that 80% of purchases were made within three weeks of a social media share. You’re not wasting time or money when you invest in social media marketing.

• Referral rewards
  

If you want to be sure that your customers will tell their friends, why not reward them for it? 

• Swag for a set number of referrals
• Discounts or discount codes
• A free month per referral
• Gift cards
• Donations to their favorite charity

Customer Lifecycle + Content = Happy Customers

This probably seems majorly overwhelming. But you can do it with the help of automation platforms (like Iterable), templates, and the right team. 

Take it one stage at a time. The more you practice, the easier it will get. 

And hey… don’t say we never gave you anything. 

Looking for more guidance? Schedule a call or explore more of our posts!