Target Audience

Top of the funnel (ToFu)

The top of the funnel is the initial stage of the customer journey, where the customer is first introduced to a product or service. At this stage, the customer is not yet ready to make a purchase but is in the process of gathering information and evaluating their options. The goal of ToFu marketing is to capture the customer’s attention and provide them with the information they need to make an informed decision.

Examples of ToFu marketing strategies include content marketing, social media advertising, and search engine optimization (SEO).

Bottom of funnel (BoFu)

The bottom of the funnel is the final stage of the customer journey, where the customer is ready to make a purchase. At this stage, the customer has already made a decision and is now evaluating their options to find the best solution. The goal of BoFu marketing is to close the sale and convert the customer into a paying customer.

Examples of BoFu marketing strategies include email marketing, retargeting, and sales calls.

Stages of the funnel

The customer journey through the funnel can be broken down into several stages, each with its own goals and marketing strategies. The stages of a funnel can be:

• Awareness: The customer is introduced to a product or service and begins to gather information.

• Interest: The customer is interested in the product or service and begins to evaluate their options.

• Desire: The customer wants the product or service and is now evaluating the best solution.

• Action: The customer takes action and makes a purchase.

• Loyalty: The customer becomes a repeat customer and may even become a brand advocate.

Each stage of the funnel requires a different marketing approach, and it is important to understand the customer’s needs and goals at each stage in order to create effective content. Going back to our example of Educative, we can imagine a software engineer looking to change jobs. At first, they’ll likely use a search engine to read resources on how to switch their job and which companies to target. At this stage, an Educative article detailing the prep-process, the job market landscape, etc. may help them get introduced to the Educative brand. In the next stage, an article on how Educative compares with its competitors can help them realize the usefulness of the platform and its efficacy for interview preparation. Finally, when they’re closer to making a purchase decision, the user should be served content containing testimonials from existing customers to land a conversion.

Rearrange the blocks so that the customer journey is in the correct sequence.

International SEO

International SEO refers to optimizing a website for users and search engines in multiple countries and languages. International SEO allows businesses to reach a wider audience and tap into new markets. With the rise of e-commerce and globalization, international SEO has become an increasingly important aspect of digital marketing.

Implementing international SEO

Implementing international SEO can seem overwhelming, but with the right strategy, it can be a straightforward process. Here are some steps to help us get started:

Determine the target markets: The first step in implementing international SEO is to determine which countries and languages we want to target. This will help us focus our efforts and ensure that our website is optimized for the right audience.

Create a multilingual website: The next step is to create a multilingual website that is optimized for our target markets. We can do this by using subdirectories, subdomains, or separate top-level domains for each language.

Optimize for local search: Optimizing for local search is crucial for international SEO. We can do this by using keywords that are relevant to each target market, and by including location-specific information on our website, such as our address and phone number.

Use hreflang tags: hreflang tags are HTML attributes that help search engines understand the language and location of our website’s content. By using hreflang tags, we can ensure that our website is shown to the right audience and in the right language.

Monitor the performance: Finally, it’s important to monitor our performance to see how our website is performing in each target market. We can use tools like Google Analytics to track our website’s traffic, conversions, and other metrics.

Conclusion

In summary, it is important to create and tweak content according to the user profile we are targeting and also the stage of search a user is currently in. While doing this, one should also be mindful of the opportunities international markets offer and accordingly tailor content to serve those markets.

Test your knowledge

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