Have you heard about the wonders of They Ask, You Answer and are ready to get stuck in but have no idea where to start? Are you looking to find out where things could potentially go wrong during implementation?
Despite having a simple premise, which is literally answering the questions your audience is asking, many elements are involved. This can make it feel overwhelming when getting started.
As we’ve been there ourselves and experienced the ups and downs, we wanted to create a guide to help you get started.
In this article, we’ll assume you are already clued up on what They Ask, You Answer is, but if you’re not, click the link earlier in this sentence to read more.
What materials do you need to get started?
In today’s digital age, buyers are quickly moving online, with 44% of millennials saying they would prefer a “sales-free” sales experience, which is 2.2 times more than the generation before. The message here is clear – this digital trend is only growing!
With this rise in digital engagement, there now needs to be more reliance on content marketing to build trust with your healthcare audience and guide them through their adoption/buyer’s journey. This is where the They Ask, You Answer framework comes in.
To fully embrace this transformational business philosophy and get started, you’ll need the following:
Marcus Sheridan’s book They Ask, You Answer
While this article is a helpful overview for getting started, we’d really recommend reading the full book. In the book, Marcus recounts his journey to marketing success and explains to readers exactly how they can do it themselves.
A website optimised to convert
You’ll need access to a range of marketing channels, but most importantly, you need to have a website that’s optimised for conversions, as that is where your content will be hosted.
Your website’s purpose is to educate your audience and guide them on their adoption journey. To help, we published an article on how to build the best medical device websites.
What are your first steps?
Now that we’ve run through all the materials you need to kickstart your journey, let’s talk through the practical first steps to ensure you lay strong foundations.
Need help implementing revenue-driving content?
Hiring a content manager
Running They Ask, You Answer content production is a full-time job, so you need to make sure you have a person ready to take on that workload. For the most effective results, this needs to be their only role, so they can give it their complete and undivided attention.
This person needs to not only be a fantastic writer but also an ambitious, driven individual who is passionate about implementing They Ask, You Answer throughout the rest of the company.
They’ll be working with subject matter experts (SMEs) across all divisions of your company, so they’ll need to be confident and likeable. Getting the right person for the job is one of the keys to success, so take your time and don’t rush it.
A great person for this role is often a graduate who studied journalism, as they can interview subject matter experts effectively and then relay that information in a well-written, unbiased, and educational manner. As momentum grows, you may also consider adding additional members to the team, such as a videographer and additional copywriters or content managers.
Writing articles
Once you’ve got the right person/people in place, it’s time to get started with your content production.
You need to consistently write and post at least three articles a week. The articles should be completely steered by the questions your audience is asking during their adoption journey; otherwise, they’re not going to help you reach your revenue goals.
Three articles a week might sound like a lot, but you’ll be surprised by how easy it is to come up with ideas once you get the ball rolling.
Using the Big 5 will help you create an infinite list of article titles that your audience will engage with, but make sure they are questions your audience is actually asking during their buyer’s/adoption journey. If not, you’ll be wasting your time and that of your team.
Creating a dedicated space on your website
Once you start writing your articles, you need to make sure you have a space to house them, so you can share and monitor them, and your audience can find them with ease. Creating a learning hub or learning centre on your website is a good place to start.
It’s important to make sure this space is highly visible and easily accessible from all pages on your website, so we recommend putting a link to it in your navigation panel. After all, if people can’t find your content, what’s the point of all your hard work?
Integrating They Ask, You Answer into your workplace culture
While having the right materials is super important when setting out on your They Ask, You Answer journey, you also need full company commitment. Unfortunately, it simply won’t work if implemented half-heartedly, as your content manager can’t do it alone.
This means you must incorporate the They Ask, You Answer mindset into every aspect of your business. It needs to become part of your company culture to be truly successful.
So how do you get everyone else involved?
Company workshop
To kickstart your They Ask, You Answer journey, we’d recommend hosting a workshop with members from different teams in your organisation to help integrate this philosophy into your company.
During this workshop, you should brainstorm potential questions and topics that your audience is regularly asking during their buyer’s journey.
Typically, the main aims of this workshop should be to introduce They Ask, You Answer to the wider company, work together to create the first 90-day content plan, and lay the foundations for future collaborations.
Set up a dedicated revenue team
Although often siloed, sales and marketing teams have the same goal, which is essentially to make money. Bringing them together to create a revenue team that meets every couple of weeks to share ideas can be a great way to get them working together.
Furthermore, who knows your audience better than the people who are out there talking to them every day (also known as subject matter experts – SMEs)?
Your content manager should be the person to run the revenue meetings, where they can demonstrate the difference that content is already making and facilitate discussions about new questions that the SMEs are hearing in the sales process, so these can be written up as articles or captured as video.
Assignment selling
Setting up a revenue team isn’t enough to get buy-in from sales though; they’ll probably need to see first-hand just how useful the content created as part of They Ask, You Answer is to them.
Assignment selling is where your sales professionals use content to have more productive and fruitful sales meetings by setting the customer some reading (“an assignment”) to do before they come into the meeting.
This means that the sales professional doesn’t have to spend time answering the same questions they hear day in and day out because it’s already been covered by the content they send out. Instead, they can jump right into the important stuff.
Subject matter experts
So, we’ve covered how to get sales involved—what about the rest of the company?
Since they’re the experts on your business, they should be the ones answering the audience’s questions. Your content manager or writers should turn to the experts in the company for interviews before writing articles.
Our main takeaways
Hopefully, this has given you a good idea of how to get started on your They Ask, You Answer journey and the key things you need to keep in mind when you begin.
If there is one main thing we’d like to remind you of, it’s that you cannot see success overnight. It’s a long game, but keep going as the results are truly worth it.
If you’re looking for a way to kickstart your progress and ensure you’re on the right track, you can hire a coach to come in and train your team, as well as support your organisation throughout this transformative journey.
Podymos is a certified They Ask, You Answer coach, trained by Marcus Sheridan’s team at Impact. This means we support medical device companies in embracing this ground-breaking business philosophy. So, get in touch with us if you’re interested in learning more.