Create Free Resources Your Audience Will Love

Gone are the days where seven touchpoints with a potential customer would be enough to convert them. Now, you need between 20 and 500. Someone has to feel familiar with your work, your vibe, even your face, before they’ll part with their time and enter their credit card details. It’s not enough to do what everyone else is doing. In a sea of companies all vying for customers, you need to stand out. Free resources that are high quality and of genuine value could be part of this stack, but they can take a lot of effort to create. Enter ChatGPT.

Here’s how to create free, valuable resources that your audience will be compelled to download.

Why free resources work in online marketing

The internet is littered with free guides, free samples, free resources, and so much more. A fundamental part of reciprocity bias, if someone gives you something, you feel compelled to reciprocate. Explained in detail in Robert Cialdini’s popular book, Influence, this can be applied to internet marketing to similar effect. Quite simply, effective marketing means giving away free stuff.

When someone innocently scrolling social media sees your content, they might go to your bio to learn more. If they see that you’re giving away a free guide, they might sign up to receive it. Now, not only do they receive strong value from your content, but they are genetically wired to return the favour. The people whose email addresses you now have are primed to be customers. They might not realize it, but they’ll be looking for ways to repay. And because your content is digital, you can scale it to infinity.

Use ChatGPT to create free resources

Common digital marketing first offers a lead magnet in return for an email address. The steps that follow might include upsells to low and high ticket offers, email sequences, and regular engagement until they convert. To build this effectively yourself might take years of experience, but you can skip the years of learning by prompting ChatGPT in the right way. The part to get right is that initial free resource, otherwise known as the lead magnet.

Get ideas for your lead magnet with ChatGPT

Your lead magnet is a free, value-adding download that someone receives in exchange for their email address. Paste this prompt into ChatGPT for ideas of what yours should be: “Can you give me some digital lead magnet ideas for [describe your niche]? They should be compelling with high perceived value. They should include my expertise on the topics of [describe your company’s expertise] and speak to my audience’s desires to [explain your audience’s desires] and avoid [explain your audience’s biggest challenges.]”

ChatGPT should now return multiple ideas for your lead magnet. Run through the list and see if any stand out. Step into the shoes of your dream customer and imagine what they would be compelled to download.

Build your lead magnet with ChatGPT

Next, build your lead magnet out. Hire someone on Fiverr or Upwork, instruct a member of your team, or dig through your content and ask ChatGPT to repurpose it in a particular style. Chances are, you have the knowledge and the expertise to bring it to reality.

While you might not want to use ChatGPT to write the entire thing, it can be a starting point for the structure and give reminders of what should be included. If you’re using a large language model for the whole thing, train ChatGPT to write in your style then ask for the resource section by section.

Here are some example prompts. “I want to create [title of the lead magnet ChatGPT came up with], can you outline the main sections and bullet point that each section should include.” Take a look at what ChatGPT suggests, add or edit the pointers as you see fit, then scribble away underneath each one or ask for the copy from the model itself.

This is your topic, so putting this together should be your jam. Aim to create the most useful resource possible. Aim to share all your secrets so that someone can’t believe they didn’t pay thousands for what they have in their hands. Give, give and give some more, and the returns will come back around.

Build a landing page for your lead magnet with ChatGPT

While you can simply add this lead magnet to your website (perhaps on a pop up with ChatGPT-suggested copy), you might want to create a brand new landing page to maximize conversions. Get ChatGPT to create your website copy by asking for the components separately. If you don’t have copywriting experience, use ChatGPT as a starting point then build on its information for the wording you need.

Generate the landing page copy by using this prompt: “I’d like the copy for a landing page where I will share this free resource. Based on what you know about my target audience and the purpose of the resource, can you give me an attention-grabbing headline, a concise subheading that leads on from this, 3 bullet points that show I understand the pains of my audience, then 6 bullet points on what the lead magnet will give them? Finish with a clear call to action that invites someone to download.”

For your landing page you can use Carrd, WordPress, or simply create a new page on your existing site. Add the text, make the page on-brand and use some strong imagery that backs up your content. Require that someone enters their email address to receive the goods. Now you have the resource and the page, you’re good to go.

Improve your lead magnets with ChatGPT

Tell your audience about your new lead magnet in any way you can. Ask ChatGPT to generate some tweets, Instagram posts or LinkedIn updates. Link the landing page from the most visited pages on your website. Add the link to your email signature and share with people who have big audiences that crossover with yours.

When you have traffic and the signups start coming in, look at the metrics. Figure out how well your page converts, understand the rate at which people are signing up. Quiz your audience on more of their pain points and iterate your lead magnet to add even more value.

Use this prompt to make improvements. “I have a lead magnet that [explain what your lead magnet is and does] but I’m getting the feedback that [explain the feedback you have received or your opinion on why the conversion rate isn’t at high]. Can you suggest some more lead magnet ideas that directly address the pain points of [include more of your audience’s pain points.]”

See what comes out, poll some people on which resource they’d find most valuable, and start the process of creation again. Keep improving with feedback until you have a highly compelling, high-converting lead magnet that grows your email list on autopilot.

Prompt ChatGPT in the right way to generate ideas for free resources and bring them to life. Construct the landing page based on what you know about your audience, and watch the leads flow from there. Co-create with large language models to amplify your reach and add value to more people.