Written by Noor Faruki
A thrill seeker, traveler and a Marketer by day and a full time mom by night. Noor Faruki is the marketer at KUWAITNET responsible for marketing programs, brand management, and corporate sponsor-ships.
By definition: a marketing plan is all about knowing what makes one's product or service different from others and establishing different methods to communicate that to potential clients.
The General Outlook
"The times, they are a-changin."
– Bob Dylan
Even with the best technicians and newest IT equipment, a business may not see any profits until people are aware of the services it offers. Many IT business owners are unaware that even the simplest marketing strategy can lead to big payoffs.
Challenges
Many IT companies face some or all of these. You might have too:
Competitors with inferior solutions yet lots of marketing muscle
Sales cycles that are becoming longer, more complex & expensive
Too few of the high quality leads that grow business quickly
Difficulty differentiating from solutions that look similar but aren’t
Non-technical decision makers who don’t see the real benefits
What is strategy?
Good strategies are compounds, not elements.
A simple and effective marketing strategy asks 3 fundamental questions:
What are you selling? (Unique selling position)
Who are you selling it to? (Target market)
How are you selling it? (Marketing methods)
When setting up objectives, it is important to be as targeted as possible, so your outcome is measurable against them. Simple criteria for goal-setting is theSMART method:
Specific - set your goal
Measurable - set quantifiable results
Achievable - set achievable objective
Relevant - continually improve your business
Time-bound - attainable objectives that meet deadlines
Marketing Methods
The final step in setting up a marketing strategy is to figure out the methods to market your business to potential clients. This is the time to bring out the creativity in yourself. Think of out of the box ideas as the customers are smarter than you think they are.
Keep your thought processes nimble and approach issues with an open mind. Remember, you are the BOSS!
There is no argument that one of the most popular marketing platforms today is social media. There’s no point in allocating your budget for printing up flyers for a door to door distribution, right?
Another option is to drive more visitors to your company website by using search engine optimization (SEO) and SEM.
Finally, we all know the power of viral videos. It has the potential of reaching thousands of viewers and converting at least a few into clients. This may not work for an IT company marketing toward local small businesses, but then again, little extra publicity never hurts.
Who we are?
Information technology has many branches. Today we see many people from engineering, technology, and quantitative science backgrounds opting for a marketing job. The skills attained from these fields translates well to marketing.. This is not creativity vs science, but this is science feeding creativity.
The marketer should be knowledgeable and tech-savvy. The marketing strategy for Information Technology services requires the marketer to understand why customers value the solutions the company offers. This helps him/her to create an effective marketing plan, and align the sales and products to meet the client's needs.
The Takeaway
I conclude by saying that, marketing your IT business and services should be a part of your overall business strategy or plan. This will help you start on the path to establishing your IT marketing strategy and growing your company profits. If you nail it, you'll be amazed at how far a little well-placed marketing will take you.
IT Marketing requires crafting a convincing message, figuring out the right platforms, and then optimizing your efforts repeatedly. The most effective marketing comes from having a compelling service or product that can help solve a long-standing problem, fulfill a need or provide a solution for customer pain points, and can be easily marketed to the public. Once you figure that out, your efforts will turn to gold before your very eyes.
DigitalMarketing, HTMLs, IT, Marketing, SEM, SEO, SMART, Strategies, Videos,
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