Your suspects have become prospects, and then qualified prospects. They have landed smack in the middle of your sales funnel. They have even met with your account rep and senior executives. You’re on their short list. Does that mean that your work providing marketing content is done?

Hardly.

Your buyer is Engaged. He already knows about your company, your industry, and your competition. But he still needs plenty of information--enough to feel safe.

Content for the Engaged Buyer must be validating. Now is the time to confirm the Engaged Buyer’s good impression, answer questions and objections, and make your offering compelling.

How can you provide content specifically for the Engaged Buyer? Here are a few examples of content that works well at this stage:

• Case studies. Help the buyer relate to your current customer. By describing your established success, you relieve feelings of risk the buyer might have.
• Third party articles. Outside influencers, such as journalists and analysts, carry more weight than you do. Even if an article’s focus is more “corporate” than “solution” based, remember that the Engaged Buyer is researching your company’s vision as well as your product. 
• Competitive comparisions. Break out the spreadsheet comparing speeds and feeds, product features and price/performance versus the competition.
• Customer-friendly legal documents. Sounds like an oxymoron, doesn’t it? But it doesn’t have to be. Plain English agreements eliminate the win/lose mentality of the typical contract.

Many companies make the mistake of using validating content too early in the cycle, when the buyer is Tentative and not yet Engaged. But validating the company and the offering too early is akin to a sales pitch. The Tentative Buyer has his own problems to solve. Assume that he doesn’t care about your company until he suspects you might help solve his problem. Then he is Engaged, and seeks content that portrays you as the safe choice.

Content at this stage is more advanced than for previous stages, and doesn't yet include your buyer in the elite status of your customers. Read more about the four stages of the buying cycle:

Click here for Stage 1: The Unaware Buyer.
Click here for Stage 2: The Tentative Buyer.
Click here for Stage 4: The Invested Buyer.
Click here for the Introduction to the Four Stage Series.