Gone are the days where IT can practically sell itself. Demand for IT is there, but so are competitors. In order to succeed, you’ll have to stand out from the crowd. Want to create IT marketing that wows? Then heed these important dos and don’ts.
3 IT Marketing Do’s
Create a target audience, be ethical, and become an expert: 3 important IT marketing do’s. Read on for some solid advice.
Do Find Your Target Audience
As with all marketing, you need to establish a target audience before anything else. As traditional marketing loses favor, we’re moving away from mass, non-personalized marketing and into more niched and focused marketing. Who are you trying to sell to? What are they looking for? How can you provide that solution? How do you communicate that message? Try to create customer personas and include your ideal customer’s demographics, geographics, and interests. This will vastly improve the effectiveness of your marketing.
Do the Right Thing
It may seem obvious, but always be ethical. That’s first. Now, also remember to always consider your client’s needs and fulfill them. Outline clearly and in writing the services you will provide and for how much. Only offer them services helpful to them and don’t go beyond that. Providing the best to your customers will keep them happy, which means repeat business and referrals. Going against this means negative reviews, word-of-mouth, and all sorts of other nasty consequences. So doing right will do you some good.
Do Become an Expert
Create exceptional articles, whitepapers, and case studies. Host webinars to showcase your expertise. Participate in industry conferences, striving to get on a panel or earn a speaking role. This will prove to potential customers that you (and your business) are an expert, building the case for your competence, credibility, and trustworthiness.
3 IT Marketing Don’ts
Make marketing an ongoing mission, find your best marketing mediums, and avoid coming across as a car salesperson. These are all important don’t to consider when marketing your IT business.
Don’t Wait for Referrals to Run Out Before Marketing Your IT Services
Marketing is an ongoing task you should focus on, regardless if business is booming or barely getting off the ground. Don’t minimize your effort simply because you’re doing well. Your goal should be to get new clients, but also serve current clients to get repeat business (and new referrals). Your marketing messages should help with that.
Don’t Fast-Talk Potential Buyers
Everyone can envision the slick, car salesperson with a single end goal of selling as many cars as possible. His or her interests are not in the best interest of the customer. No one likes this kind of salesperson, so why would you take a similar approach when selling your IT services?
It usually serves IT companies better to listen to and research their potential customers. Offer them the solutions to their problems, and they’ll be far more likely to come to you. The right sales approach is not only helpful to your customer, helping them find their best options; it’s helpful to you, because they’ll be that much more likely to choose you.
Keep this in mind with your marketing messages as well. What do your clients usually want? What are people demanding from the industry? Discover this and address it in your marketing messages. This way, it’ll be relevant to them. Also, be sure to craft these messages in entertaining and compelling ways to better grab attention.
Don’t Blame the Marketing Medium
Don’t assume that certain marketing mediums don’t work, even if they haven’t previously worked for you. Medium examples that people frequently say don’t work: direct mail, newsletters, Google AdWords, and Yellow Page ads. The reality is, this is not necessarily true. In general, certain platforms tend to be more effective, but ultimately, their effectiveness depends on a variety of factors, including timeliness and the copy of the communication itself.
Make sure any marketing copy is interesting and relevant. Also, make sure it makes sense for your chosen platform. Test a variety of mediums with a variety of marketing messages. This will help you get a sense of which mediums work, which don’t, and which need a few tweaks.
Make IT Marketing a Priority
As stated previously, marketing should be ongoing, regardless of how well or poorly your IT business is doing. Create strong marketing content and test a variety of platforms. Use this to prove your business as an industry leader. Keeping all this in mind, there’s no way your IT business wouldn’t succeed.
Other IT Marketing Resources:
5 Tips for Marketing IT Services
