Top Mediums for Generating Interest

As you evaluate how to grow your programs and services for teens, you must consider how to help your prospects through the sales cycle. One crucial step in the sales cycle is generating interest. It generally comes after the prospect becomes aware of your programs. But it isn't as simple as just putting your programs in front of the prospect. You need to demonstrate your value and what you're offering. Because teens and parents don't buy programs, they buy outcomes, such as better grades, improved chances at scholarships, completing graduation requirements, etc. Learn the ideal locations to generate interest to turn visitors into prospects to drive more leads and increase your conversion rates.

Sales Cycles Explained

Before we get too deep into explaining the best marketing mediums for generating interest, let’s take a look at the sales cycle.

Sales cycles often include seven phases.

1. Prospecting or finding leads
2. Connecting with leads
3. Qualifying leads
4. Nurturing the leads
5. Sharing more about what you’re offering
6. Overcoming the prospect's objections
7. Closing the sale

With your teen-centered business, you might give these phases little consideration because you move through them rather quickly as parents seek a solution for their teen's needs. But if you slow down and consider what’s happening in phases four and five, you’ll discover the most crucial prospect interactions that could make or break whether the parent enrolls their child. During the phase of sharing more about yourself, you’ll be generating interest by showcasing the benefits your program offers. At these phases of the sales cycle, there are many ideal mediums you should be engaging with the prospect on.

Best Mediums for Generating Interest

As you move from initially meeting a prospect or getting their contact information to getting them interested in your programs, you should be engaging them on the following marketing mediums.

1. Website

Your website is like the hub of all your marketing. Most marketing initiatives point back to your website. Take some time to evaluate what is out there and how well it communicates the value you offer. Evaluate the key message you want to communicate on each webpage and do so in simple language that is easy to read and simple to understand. Consider what a student or parent might need to know to consider a conversation with a counselor or other staff member. Try to answer common questions on your website and think about search engine optimization to answer common queries.

Scrutinize every headline and try to use this space to communicate your program's benefits and not its features. This practice takes some time to master, but once you consider less about the content of your programs and more about what a student gains from that content, you'll have more impactful and eye-catching headlines to encourage the next step.

2. Social Media

If you run social media ad campaigns, there’s a good chance you’ll meet new prospects on that platform. And once you earn a like or follow, you must consider what comes next. From time to time, you need to post content designed to help prospects go from awareness about your teen programs or services to being interested in them. Share recent blog posts, student experiences and other content that demonstrates the value you provide families. Social media should entertain, educate and offer chances for interactions.

Because visitors spend time on social media to be entertained, they are in a more relaxed state to learn small snippets and tidbits about your teen programs or services every time they go out to social media. Try to keep the content light and short for those reasons while still sharing something new about your programs.

3. Blogs

Although you’ll tweak your main website pages from time to time, they are generally static content. Blogs offer an opportunity to put new information out that can drive prospects back to your website to learn more about your programs. When creating a content calendar, you want your blogs to cover content that answers questions and search queries. While the sales cycle has several steps before generating interest, you might accomplish all those steps with one blog post. A website visitor reads a blog, becomes a prospect and reaches out to learn more about your programs because they are interested. Well-written blog posts can be a powerful and impactful part of your marketing programs. Aim for monthly posts at a minimum, and distribute the content across your other interest channels, including social media and marketing automation.

4. Referrals

One of the best marketing tactics is to earn referrals from past students and parents. That’s because it doesn’t cost a thing and referrals are more likely to convert because they’ve already gotten a glowing review of your organization from someone they trust. You only have so much control over referrals though. The best thing you can do is encourage them and remind past customers regularly how helpful referrals can be. Maintain a database of past customers and send reminders during enrollment season that referrals are a win-win-win for the past customer, potential customer and your program. Before you ask for these referrals though, be sure everything is in place for the prospect to get in touch with ease and take the next step with enrolling. Referrals should be a frictionless process.

5. Marketing Automation Software

Marketing automation software supports all types of prospects from a variety of channels. But it’s outstanding for helping transition prospects from just getting to know you to understanding what you have to offer and what the family might gain from it. Once you meet a prospect through a website form, referral, social media ad, etc., you can enter those contacts into your marketing automation software to begin educating them to help generate interest.

6. PPC

Often, PPC (pay per click) is a tactic for awareness during crucial moments when customers are searching for content related to your services. But you can also use it to generate interest in your programs by targeting a variety of keywords based on where the prospect is at in the customer buying journey. Targeting top-of-the-funnel keywords will be better for general awareness while more middle-of-the-funnel keywords will help support generating interest and educating prospects further. You might develop blog content that helps answer common questions during this phase and use that in your PPC ads. Or, you can use PPC to retarget those who have already visited your site. That way, you know they are aware of your organization, but they might not know enough to be ready to reach out.

7. Events

Open houses are very effective for helping clients learn more about you to take them from the awareness phase of the customer buying journey to the consideration phase. There are many options for hosting events. You can take your event to the students at their school or take part in third-party events, such as local festivals where families in your area tend to gather. Those events can help you with both building awareness and interest in your programs. Just be sure that a skilled team member is there to answer even the most complex questions for your prospects. Or that they know who to share that question with to get a fast response for the parent or student.

8. Online Reviews

Online reviews are excellent for helping move from awareness to interest in your programs. While they aren’t a direct referral from someone they know, reviews are first-person accounts of a student or parent’s experience. Never pay for reviews or for services that promise tons of positive reviews because these won’t include real-life accounts. And your account might get marked as spam if you get too many suspicious reviews. Instead, encourage reviews once a student completes one of your programs or run contests for past students to fill out a review within a set timeframe to be entered into a drawing for a gift card.

Generating Interest in Your Programs or Services for Teens

As you look for the best ways to attract new parents and students to your programs, you want to ensure you’re advertising in the right places. TeenLife has an engaged audience and welcomes more than 1.5 million website visitors each year. Add your listing or advertise today.