We’ve all once Googled something silly, like “Where is France?” or, “What’s 24 minus 8?” We go straight to Google for the things we need answered quickly, no matter how big or small. But did you know Google has a very handy tool to help you prospect personally and smartly so you can close more clients?
Google Alerts! A little nifty feature that can assist you with prospecting and research! Yup, that’s right! Let me break this down.
Google Alerts is a (grossly underrated) tool that detects a change in content and alerts you of these changes based on what you’re looking for. Meaning, you can see when there is a change in content online, you will be triggered with a notification.
Guided by your inputs, Google Alerts can help you track:
- Mentions of your prospects in blogs, news, forums and socials, etc.
- Company news such as financial and investments announcements
- Announcements relating to new products and product improvements
- Industry news to keep up with developments
Some other things that are worthwhile tracking could include C-suite movements, common industry questions (so you can respond and assert your authority) and your competitors’ movement and media coverage.
What does this mean?
Trigger events can be set up to signify to you a potential or likely prospecting opportunity. For example, if you sell to orthopedic surgeons for example, you can set up a Google alert to notify you every time an orthopedic surgeon in Australia appears in the news. Finding out this information as it occurs means you have the perosnalised and timely information about what is happening with your target market right here and now.
The research about your target market, comes to you. Cha-ching!
Tracking the right trigger events is the key to hacking Google Alerts and making them work hard for your business. Being able to see in real time what’s happening in your industry (and your clients’ industries) will help you to distinguish warm leads from cold ones, so you can maximise the effectiveness of your sales approaches and target the right prospects at the right time, with the right value messaging.
“maximise the effectiveness of your sales approaches and target the right prospects at the right time, with the right value messaging.”
Also, having these relevant trigger events will mean you’re ready and prepared with your prospect research so you can woo them with your knowledge of their news.
Okay, that’s great and all, but tell me how to do it already!
1. Make it work for you.
Think of Google Alerts sort of like an assistant you’ve hired to constantly trawl the web, looking for potential business opportunities (except free and like, 500 times faster). To make your Google Alerts assistant work as hard as possible, maximise its capabilities by:
- Using quotation marks for an exact search match. E.g. “digital marketing agency”
- Including common misspellings, just to cover all your bases
- Ensuring quantity: Google allows for up to 1,000 alerts, so go for your life! Just make sure they are precise and use them to identify opportunities and solve problems. A good way to do this is to have alerts such as “[Your Brand] + love” or “[Your Brand] + hate”
Track your competitors movements on autopilot:
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Watching your competitors: Try a range of alerts such as their url, their name, “I think [insert competitor name]”, “Has anyone tried [insert competitor name]” etc. This will help you keep track of their moves (and then overtake ;)).
2. Track and Monitor
Your triggers/ alerts will notify you automatically by email.
3. Let it work its magic
Once you’ve set up all the alerts you want, the tool will select web pages, news articles, blogs, videos and even research that is concerned with the topics you need and present the information to you by way of a little ‘Ping!’ –A notification will pop up, and you’ll have just what you need, right at your fingertips.
Important! Google Alerts is less about the nitty gritty details and technicalities and more about the relevance of your search terms. Tracking the trigger events relating to your most important sales goals is where you hit the goldmine. This is how you gain the right intelligence on leads and developments that can strengthen your strategies, relationships and deals.
Cool, I’ve done all of that and I’m getting some good info. Now what?
Ah, you have now reached the point where your alerts are bringing you back their treasures from galavanting across the world wide web. This is the moment you’ve been waiting for!
Use alerts to inform how and when you reach out to prospects.
Now that you’re getting some (or a truckload, depending on your strategy) of alerts, it’s time to reach out to prospects! Reference the news or exposure they have just appeared in to personalise the contact, introduce yourself and get a convo going. Rinse and repeat as needed and turn those leads into clients!
If you’re looking to find out more about tracking prospects and how to drive a conversation, shoot us an email at info@j2group.com.au or give us a call and we discuss how this may apply to your business!
