Your MSP’s marketing, more importantly Inbound Marketing, is not about selling.
It’s not even about you, nor is it about your awards.
Believe it or not, no one cares about how many Microsoft partner awards you’ve won or how many channel accolades you’ve received.
Your IT clients and prospects don’t care about you or your marketing.
They care about how you can make their lives easier. They long for an IT provider to offer them a lifeline.
They desperately crave to work with an outsourced IT company that will solve their problems.
The biggest marketing failure we see in IT companies is they try and sell rather than try and educate and inform.
Why is this a mistake?
Because B2B buyers that come to your website are looking for solutions to their problems, not to be slapped upside the head with a sales pitch.
They have questions that they need answered before they will be ready to buy anything (including that awesome dinosaur DNA kit). They may also need information to help them justify their buying decision to others within their company.
How do you create content that shares, rather than sells?
In light of these failures, we’ve compiled a list of the top 5 ways to make your small business’s marketing efforts effective, one step at a time.
1) Know Your Audience
Study your customers.
Meet with your IT people and the sales department, chances are they are you strongest source of finding out what questions your customers have.
Follow them online (not like stalking your ex, well, kind of), and see what concerns they have.
2) Consider the buyer’s personal needs, as well as business needs
As we previously stated, knowing your audience’s questions will give you a way to create content that answers their questions.
Your business won’t make a sale if they haven’t addressed the customers concerns.
What are the needs of the B2B buyer?
It depends! Much like all people, business and personal needs will vary per customer. It’s your job to uncover these needs, then address them with your web content, on your website, in your blog, on social media, etc.
Ideally, your company should have the solution to whatever problem that your prospects need solved. Your marketing is where you need to be addressing these needs, in order to be perceived as a helper, not some slimy sales-guy trying to close them.
Become a helper that assists rather than an obstacle through understanding their personal needs, as well as their business needs.
3) Who else is involved in the buying decision and what questions do they have?
Most often, one person is not the sole decision maker, and there are third party players who have their own questions.
Is it a CEO? IT department? Or other employees who will use your service or merchandise? Follow the same process you used to get to know your buyer to discover questions the other decision makers have .
Questions that the literal buyer will have will undoubtedly be different than a CEO’s concerns, for example.
4) Understand your buyers sales cycle and create marketing that guides your buyer
The sales cycle now in the age of the internet begins before you even talk to your potential customer.
Good inbound marketing will have answers all along the sales cycle. Questions that give a general overview of the problems they face and what types of solutions are available.
Early on buyers are testing the waters, so don’t go overboard trying to goad them into a sale. Once your buyer has had their initial questions answered, they will be more open to targeted information about the solutions your business can offer.
Give them webinars or videos, for instance, that go into more depth about your solutions.
When you’ve made the sale, the cycle doesn’t end there, either. Keep providing them with solutions and maintain a nurturing relationship.
Always be their trusted ally, rather than a one night stand.
5) Create content that builds trust
Marketing, more specifically Inbound marketing, is becoming a trusted adviser for your customers.
Your inbound marketing should be the place to find answers rather than to sell. You will end up making more sales if you do this, but you first and foremost should be providing your customers with answers.
This will increase traffic and make the customer ready to hear what your sales team has to say when they call.
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More importantly, if you want to see how your peers have solved their marketing and website problems, take a look at our portfolio , and see what others have said about the result.
And if your IT firm wants to learn more about what steps to take with your own marketing initiatives, or would like a free consultation, contact us here .