Over the past 15 years, I have spent a lot of time planning and structuring campaigns for Tech Vendors, Distributors and Partners. There were times when a single marketing tactic involved nothing more than buying a database and telemarketing it to death (Tech Partners in particular were “guilty” of favouring this approach). But in 2020 things don’t work like this anymore. We live in a world of comparisons. We compare brands, pricing, customer reviews and scores ahead of time, even before buying just a pair of pants. Are we expecting marketing to generate leads where clients are ready to buy from you? After all, some still assume campaigns to result in POs…
NO. I don’t think it’s reasonable or realistic to expect Marketing to deliver a client with their wallet wide open based on a single sad and outdated tactic – and one that’s not supported by any thought process at that. Here are some of the things I believe need attention before you can start marketing your business.
When we get into a branding/strategy workshop with our clients, what we uncover is beyond wild. A lot of times we are trying to dig for new opportunities in all the wrong places. Either the Buyer Personas aren’t mapped right, so they don’t fit clients we’re after OR the messaging / tone of voice is out of touch. There are no strong compelling reasons (or there are just no compelling reasons. Period.) that would drive the audience to act and create meaningful engagement. Most of CTAs we come across can be summarised as “Download this (gated) infographic and our tele guys will call you”. In other words, for those familiar with the cult American sitcom How I Met Your Mother, we’re pulling a Ted Mosby by declaring “I LOVE YOU” and “READY TO SPEND THE REST OF MY LIFE WITH YOU” on the first date. BORING! And what’s even more important, also inappropriate.
There are numerous ways to steer your business in the right direction. One of them starts with having quality Data in your CRM (one that tracks all user history and movements). We call this process Lead scoring. You need properly defined workflows with simple Yes & No scenarios based on what you expect a potential client to do when they respond to your comms/ marketing program. Connecting your CRM to an automation tool will get you focused on leveraging your data insights and not scrambling to put it together every time you send a new EDM.
OK, so assuming you have already done most of the things I outlined above, we can now look into the What, When & How of your client communications. This shouldn’t be looked at as a simple equation, but more of a complex algorithm that will change based on clients, solutions, segment, timing, etc. I am not here to give you a direct answer (to all your marketing prayers), this is where we follow an uncomplicated process to Attract – Convert – Close – Delight. Yes, you have heard this one probably over a million times, so you can rest assured, hearing it one more time won’t hurt.
The idea is to get on your potential clients’ radar and become one of the options they’re considering (even if this consideration is at its very early stages). To do that you need to give then enough opportunities to FIND you and GET TO KNOW you. We call it Top of the Marketing Funnel. Happy to walk you through some examples if you want, but hey I am not here to sell myself. (or am I?)
With the amount of Data flowing through cookies these days, we have an enormous volume of insights we can gather even before we decide to go to market. We have recently partnered with the only distributor in ANZ of Intent-based marketing data globally that tracks insights from over 3 billion B2B devices and listening to over 3.6 million enterprises globally. This data then identifies companies who are actively looking for solutions and products signalling their intent. (Yes, in 2020, just privacy is just a nice memory and basically a myth.)
