The Hidden Revenue Leak in Your Offer Strategy (And How to Fix It)

This blog was originally published on LinkedIn.

Even the strongest marketing strategy will be in vain if the offer strategy isn’t compelling to your specific target audience. And I’ve seen too many companies leak revenue from poorly constructed offers.

To stop the leak and capture the lost revenue, start by objectively assessing how your offer strategy stacks up when compared to those of your competitors—based both on your customers’ needs and desires and your competitors’ offers. 

To effectively evaluate and structure an offer strategy, consider the following steps: 

1. Map your offers across the customer journey: Where do your offers currently fit into each of the four stages of the customer journey—awareness, consideration, conversion, and the post-purchase experience? What value-add, free offers or content do you already make available to prospective customers who are in the awareness stage—those just getting to know your brand? What low-cost trial offers do you make available when they are in the consideration stage, when they may be comparing you to your competition? What offers are available for those wanting to make a first purchase of size with your company? And what offers are available to existing customers to retain them and encourage additional purchases? 

2. Consider ascending offers: Next, consider improving your offer strategy by creating tiers of offers that increase in value, complexity, or commitment, starting from an entry-level proposition to the most premium package. This is called an ascending offer or value-ladder strategy. Be sure the step from “never purchased” to “first purchase” is not too steep; make it easy for a brand-new customer to give you that initial “yes” with a reasonable ask and price point. The idea is to begin with a free or ultra-low-cost lead-generating offer designed to build interest in your brand while your prospect is in the awareness stage of the customer journey. Then, as your customer enters the consideration stage, progress to an initial offer that you perhaps break even on that gives your prospect an opportunity to get to know your brand before making a big commitment. Once they get to know you, move them into the conversion stage with your primary offer. Once they’re a loyal customer, as part of the post-purchase experience, offer them your exclusive VIP offer available only to your best customers. I’ll illustrate how RedRover structures its ascending offer strategy with pricing slowly ascending as a client gains more familiarity with the firm:
   • Free lead magnets: Lead-magnets are designed to be free value-add offers to prospective customers. RedRover’s current lead magnets are twofold: access to the 12 Battles^TM Readiness Assessment followed by an invitation to view our Marketing Results Guaranteed Webinar. 
   • Initial break-even offer: Webinar attendees are then invited to participate in a Marketing Clarity Assessment, which is a deep-dive marketing audit, as a way to allow prospective clients to get to know the team before making a sizable investment. 
   • Primary offers: Marketing Clarity Assessment participants will receive three primary offers for building a results-guaranteed marketing strategy, each designed to meet them where they are—whether they are prepared to go it alone, would prefer to collaborate, or elect to outsource it all:
     • The DIY (do it yourself) offer: An on-demand version of our Marketing Results Guaranteed Boot Camp consisting of 18 hours of recorded content that teaches the client’s team how to research and build their own results-guaranteed marketing strategy. 
     • DWY (do it with you) offer: A live version of the Marketing Results Guaranteed Boot Camp followed by an invitation to join our Marketing Results Guaranteed MasterMind group for weekly training, coaching, and accountability. 
     • DFY (do it for you) offer: An option to outsource the entire research, strategy, and execution effort by engaging RedRover for its GO (growth optimization) Plan service. 
   • Exclusive VIP Offers: Where there is a fit, GO Plan and MasterMind attendees are invited to join a Quarterly Strategic Innovation Council or the Joint Venture Program—RedRover’s two exclusive VIP offers. As you can see, the key to the ascending offer strategy is to earn the right to larger customer engagements by building trust along the way. 

3. Analyze competitor tiers: Look at how competitors structure their ascending offers and identify opportunities or gaps you can fill. You can do this by visiting their websites or through mystery shopping. 

4. Align with customer desires: Ensure each ascending offer addresses evolving customer needs more comprehensively as they move up the tiers. For instance, if you’re in the B2B software industry, your customer interviews and surveys may reveal that as businesses grow, they require more advanced features, scalability, and dedicated customer support. Tailoring your higher-tier offerings to meet these evolving B2B needs can enhance your value proposition and customer satisfaction. 

5. Create an inventory: The vertical axis lists the stages of the customer journey (awareness, consideration, conversion, post-purchase) and the corresponding tiers of the offer (e.g., lead magnet, initial break-even, primary, and exclusive VIP). The horizontal axis features customer needs, your offers, and your competitors’ offers at each tier. Evaluate how each offer aligns with customer expectations and how it stands against competitors at every level. 

You can download an ascending offer strategy inventory on the Battle Reader Hub. Using this matrix, you can pinpoint where to enhance your offers to guide customers organically to higher levels of engagement and investment by crafting a compelling offer at every stage.

By Lori Turner-Wilson, RedRover CEO/Founder, Internationally Best-Selling Author of The B2B Marketing Revolution^TM: A Battle Plan for Guaranteed Outcomes

Taking Action

The ascending offer strategy is one of hundreds of best practices found in The B2B Marketing Revolution^TM: A Battle Plan for Guaranteed Outcomes — the playbook that middle-market B2B CEOs and marketing leaders lean on to scale. Backed by a groundbreaking research study, this book offers time-tested best practices, indispensable KPIs for benchmarking, insights on where your dollars are best spent, and, above all, the proven 12 Battles^TM Framework for generating guaranteed marketing outcomes. The B2B Marketing Revolution^TM is a battle-hardened approach to becoming an outcomes-first leader who’s ready to shake up the status quo, invest in high-payoff market research and optimization, and — yes — even torch what’s not serving your endgame. Download more than 50 templates, scripts and tools from the book on the Battle Reader Hub.

If you’d like to talk about how to build a marketing engine that delivers predictable results — whether you want to build it yourself or tag in our team to lead the way — we’d be delighted to help you get started.