For that reason, I advise my clients to get as much information as they can about prospects’ and customers’ priorities–and then develop marketing messages that address those priorities.  Nevertheless, I left out one important tip.

Here’s the tip: look to your customer service department for help.  Earlier this month, I learned this lesson by direct example.

Speak to prospects’ priorities

My landscaper came to trim the hedges.  While he was here, he noticed that a city tree, adjacent to my property, had branches weaving in and out of the electric wires.

At his suggestion, I called the city.  The forestry department said they would send over someone to look at it.  Sure enough, I soon received a note on my door letting me know that the tree was now scheduled for trimming.

A few weeks later, after the holidays, I called back to check on the progress.  This time, I learned that there was a two-year waiting list.  The representative, therefore, suggested that I contact the electric company.

Actions speak louder than words

I then contacted electric company.  An hour later, someone rang the doorbell and asked me to move my car.  To my surprise, it was a representative from the electric company who had come to trim the tree.

Since several branches surrounded the wire, I asked if he could do some preventive trimming.  He said he would cut an 18″ box around the tree–and then went to work.

The right message at the right time

A couple days later I received a letter from the electric company.  Figuring it was related to a service contract, I opened it up.

Imagine my surprise–and delight–when I read the following message:

“Thank you for taking the time to contact us regarding tree trimming and/or vegetation concerns in your area.  As a result of your inquiry, we were able to identify and correct the issue you reported.

Your attentiveness is appreciated as it helps us  work to prevent future tree-related service interruptions.  If you have other questions or concerns regarding vegetation issues, you may contact us at the following number.”

Content that reinforces value derived captures attention

Wow! Nstar really gets it.

They fixed a problem that I found important enough to report.   That made a good impression.

They did so immediately.  That was impressive.

Then, they thanked me for letting me know.  That message reinforced the value they had delivered.

Content that resonates with prospects’ priorities elevates your brand

Their thank you note paraphrased my concern about preventive maintenance.  Not only does that capture attention, it makes a lasting impression.

I had always been pleased with Nstar’s services, and therefore had not responded to competitors’ offers.  That said, I had no distinct impression of their brand.

I do now.

The media is not always the message

The business-to-business letter with first class postage, reminding me of the value I derive from Nstar, was more memorable than any dimensional piece they might send me to retain my business.

What steps can you take to get into your buyers’ mind?  More important, do you follow up when they shout their concerns from the rooftops?  If you do, how do the costs associated with your follow up actions compare to your promotion costs?

No related posts.

The short answer:  you need to stay in touch,  talk about things that really matter to those you want to remember you, and remind them that your business is a valuable resource they can tap in each of the areas where you’d like to work with them.

Drip campaigns reinforce your brand

The problem is that you want them to think of you for multiple products or services, not just the one with which they currently associate your business.  To do so, you need to communicate a lot of information–but your audience are too busy to absorb much that isn’t directly relevant to whatever is now top of mind.

You need to them to notice your communications–and to read them.  The solution is a “drip campaign“:  a series of concise messages that together accomplish your objectives and reinforce your brand.

One advantage of a drip campaign is that the individual communications are brief and easy to absorb.  A second advantage is that even if your target audience misses one communication, you have multiple opportunities to make an impression.

Most important, however, is that a drip campaign creates the multiple impressions it takes to make an impact–and motivate others to change their behavior.  Here are 5 steps you can use to develop compelling drip campaigns:

1. Identify a pressing concern

One of the best ways to identify a pressing concern is to monitor news in your target audience’s industry.  Is a new competitor entering the market?  Are there pending regulatory changes?  Has someone announced a disruptive technology?

In short, look for change, because change demands action.  Then, zero in on changes that offer opportunities for your company to add real value.

2. Make it personal

Share the news tip, but make it personal.  Let your correspondents know that when you heard what was going on, you immediately thought of them.

3. Create a sense of urgency

Tell them why you thought of them and how the market disruption will affect their business.  Point out opportunities you believe it will create for them–or consequences they may now face.

This step is essential, because this is where you add value.  Even if they were aware of the new circumstances, they may not yet have thought about what it will mean for them and their business.

4. Offer a solution

Strike while the iron’s hot–and before they have an opportunity to consider alternatives.  Describe the solution you will provide to make the problem go away.  Offer enough detail so that they can visualize its impact and get excited about the results.  Consider using a case example of how others have benefited from a similar solution.

5. Add a call to action

Highlighting a problem, and even offering a solution, is just the beginning.  If you don’t ask people to act right away, they often don’t.

So, ask for an appointment.  Or, if you don’t think they’re ready to meet, offer to send them more information.  Once they accept, you can “drip” on them again–and create one more of the impressions you’ll need to motivate action.

A great example of one drip in an ongoing campaign

Here’s an example of a “drip campaign” (identifying details changed to maintain anonymity) that my colleague, Laura Duffy, Principal at Laura Duffy and Associates, sent to a client to motivate him to move forward with a campaign.  She sent this after learning that one of his competitors had merged with a larger medical practice.

The goal was to remind him that he needed to emphasize the unique benefits his own practice offers to retain the competitive edge–and that our team is uniquely qualified to help.  Tight and well written, I believe it will hit the mark.

“Jane’s on vacation, Barbara’s back, and I leave tomorrow.  But that doesn’t mean we haven’t thought about the shifting landscape of dermatology!

In response to the new world order, we suggest you increase your practice’s visibility with a smart marketing initiative–perhaps a mailing every other month that presents a featured case on a nicely designed sheet, accompanied by a letter from you.

The featured case should be interesting–even intriguing–and might include the patient’s presenting symptoms, the referring physician’s name and preliminary thoughts, your recommendations, and the patient’s outcome.

Maybe the designed sheet has room to tout what’s going on at your practice–your new partners, your convenient location, the product lines you offer, etc., things that keeps your brand in front of readers and remind them that your practice is at the leading edge.  Your letter could provide interesting commentary on the state of dermatology, such as staff publications and news from professional meetings.

By hitting your universe of people on a regular basis and making the communication strategic–educational, interesting, useful, but also featuring the John Doe they know, love and trust–you’ll keep them aware that your practice is first-rate, available, and dependable.

Please give this some thought.  If you want to sit down and discuss this, please let me know some good times for us to meet.

Enjoy the rest of the summer!

Laura”

What do you think?  Would a campaign like this work for your business?  If you’re already using drip campaigns, what are your secrets to success?

Related posts:

1. Shorten the sales cycle: one marketing message at a time
2. Digital Marketing: 4 steps to success
3. How to create a compelling value proposition: Do it yourself in 3 steps
4. Good lead generation campaigns are much more than a shot in the dark

My questions appear in bold followed by his answers.  Here’s what he had to say:

Why did PTC create your position?

Twelve to eighteen months ago, the company’s senior marketing executives realized that conversations happen online whether or not PTC participates–and determined the company needed to take a more active role.  They considered various approaches but ultimately decided they needed a full-time resource.  For one thing, PTC is a large organization with almost $1 billion in revenues. For another, it was clear that social media was here to stay.

What does PTC hope you’ll achieve?

Better engagement with customers.  People that participate online tend to be more engaged than those that don’t.

Engagement is the name of the game.  Engagement equals a valuable brand.  Valuable brands attract more customers.

My job is helping PTC marketers determine where to spend time and how to spend it.  The key is figuring out how to create and promote good content.  If you pump out seven blogs in a week, you run the risk of overwhelming your audience.

How does your company view social media complementing other initiatives?

There are several ways.  For one, social media will augment other marketing activities.

Because of the nature of social media, perhaps it will reduce spend.  I use the word “perhaps” intentionally as it will only reduce costs if we can get more data for less money.

Social media can also help you get better qualified leads.  At a recent Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council meeting, Amy Black from Kadient said something along the lines of “A discussion through social media beats a cold call every day.”  If you do something that causes someone to take action–and let you know they’re interested–that’s better than pursuing them.

Today, the focus is on marketing.  In the future, my personal hope is that the entire corporation will incorporate social media into their operations.

What are your primary responsibilities as Director of Social Media Marketing?

My primary responsibility is to help the company leverage social media in its marketing efforts.  I consult with marketers about how they can integrate social media into campaigns they are planning, and how they can put more power behind existing programs.

I also monitor social communications, “separating the signal from the noise”, to identify opportunities for PTC to take a more active role.  For example, I look for mentions of PTC, our products, and keywords, such as “PLM software” (product lifecycle management) that relate to our business.

Because we’re a global company, I also determine what tools to use in other countries by reviewing third-party research, interviewing local marketing experts, and traveling to other countries to learn more about what people are using there. Different cultures consume information in different ways.  For example, some countries, such as Germany, place a different value on face-to-face conversations than others.  If online activity doesn’t influence the conversation, then it doesn’t make sense to invest heavily in social media in those places.

What listening tools are you using?

I’m glad you asked that, because listening is so important.  We use a number of free tools such as Twitter’s advanced search, BackTweets (which effectively reverses “the shorten URL process” to find terms that were in the original URL but are no longer visible), Social Mention, and OMGILI (an aggregator that displays results visually).  We also use BoardTracker to search discussion boards.

In addition, it’s important to search on sites that are specific to your industry–and look through the sites themselves.  For example, I bookmark PLM–and CAD-related websites and then enter my keywords in their search bars.

We listen to traffic on three large networks:  Facebook, Linked In and Twitter; because that’s where audiences have conversations about business–or blur the line between business and personal.  When it comes to Twitter, my main interest is the links that people share.

You need to use a suite of tools.  You can’t rely on a single tool, because none of them do everything. You also need to accept that, initially, you will get overwhelmed–but you need to get over it.  You can refine your process over time–and use aggregators like Social Mention.

You want to get a rough sense of where things are happening.  If you record all the mentions of your search terms, you’ll go batty.

You just want to understand where the conversation is happening, what people are saying about you:  the questions they have, the tips they offer others, how they feel about you) and the media they use (audio, visual, file exchanges), etc.  If we can answer those questions, then we know where to focus our time, what content we are seeking, and how to deliver it.

I also should add that not all the information we get is free.  Our PR agency uses a third-party tool to produce a thick report of all the times that our company gets mentioned and nice-looking graphs.

We pay for this service to leverage our time.  They search many sites (both relevant and less relevant); and we use this data to understand trends, such as where certain types of conversations are happening, and the general content of those conversations (such as the media they use, as mentioned previously).

Where are you focusing your initial efforts and why?

We are listening to hear where the conversations happen so we know where and how to engage: what channels to use, what content to create, who to follow, what media to use.  I’m also teaching the corporation how to engage with social media.

How will PTC know if you’re successful?

The first indication will be 1.0 metrics such as page views over time and unique visitors. Moving forward, though, you need to change what you measure, and measure what you change.

To bridge the gap to 2.0 metrics, we’ll look at better forms of engagement (such as the ratio of comments to posts to measure how deep the conversation is and average unique comment per post that tells you how many people you’ve engaged).

Then, there are intermediary measures.  For example, Facebook now allows users who won’t comment to just click to indicate that they “like” a particular post.

Initially, you’ll want to look at the aggregate, rather than the specific.  There are no widely agreed-upon metrics that I’ve found — but since everything is online, it’s still easier to measure the ROI of social media than the ROI of a billboard.

What’s been the biggest surprise in your new role?

Although there is a general awareness of social media, inside our company, it is very new to most people and initially, they weren’t clear as to how to apply it in their day-to-day marketing efforts. As I’ve dug into this role, I’ve learned that this is not uncommon amongst B2B companies.  Social media is so new that there is a lot of education needed inside a company to aid adoption.

Why do you think that is?

The adoption of online social networking was very rapid, likely attributable to Facebook (and others).  Since Facebook is primarily seen as a casual or truly social site (as in, non-professional), I think people associated it with kids and socializing.  They likely extended this thinking into other forms of online social networking.  However, Facebook is just one form of online social networking.

Other forms of social networking (online and offline) exist, too – for example, moving into a new neighborhood and asking for a good plumber – that’s an example of and ‘old fashioned’ offline social network.  But the social mores and rules are the same.

In addition, some people may have tried something small in one or two social arenas (for example, purchasing ads or trying a reach-out campaign), and may not have gotten the results they were seeking.  In doing so, they may ascribe their less-than-desirable results in one social arena to all social arenas.  For example, I thought that a recent article in the New York Times about how people often base their impressions on a single data point was a great take on this phenomenon.

What’s your largest unanswered question about social media at PTC?

How long until it “pays off”?  By that I mean, “When will I be able to make a stronger correlation between our marketing efforts to stimulate engagement, and its ultimate effect on sales, revenue, and profit?”.

Altimeter produced a report that shows that the more engaged a brand is with customers, the greater their annual revenues are.  Companies that do participate online are more engaged with their customers.

Customer engagement equals a valuable brand.  A valuable brand leads to increased sales.  It also goes without saying that this leads to happier customers.

We’ve covered a lot of ground about your perspectives on social media.  What else should we cover?

I’m glad that you asked about listening platforms earlier.  That’s where it starts.

One of the greatest challenges is getting people to listen before acting.  I wrote a fairly comprehensive strategy from scratch.  You need to figure out what you want to accomplish first. Else, the first time you fail, someone will ask, “Why did you do that?  It doesn’t make sense.”

My own research shows that people who want a social media strategy often want to jump into interaction.  If you don’t know what’s important to your customers, prospects, or users, or where the conversations are happening, how can you have an impact?

I liken this to a cocktail party…You don’t show up at someone’s house and say, “buy my stuff”.  You show up, survey the landscape, and maybe find someone you know.  You listen in on a few conversations before you add a comment or two.  As the evening progresses, in addition to adding comments into conversations, you strike up your own conversation.  Before the night is over, people are joining your conversations and looking to you for what you have to say.

Online social networking and the use of social media is similar.  Starting by listening and offering comments is a better bet than jumping into a sales pitch or a “go look at our stuff” mentality with respect to a web presence.

Is there anything else you’d like to add?

I love my job.  I appreciate that PTC gave me this opportunity and admire the company for being so forward thinking.

Also, I’d be remiss to talk about social media and not provide people additional ways to find me online.  My Twitter ID is abelniak (@abelniak ; http://www.twitter.com/abelniak), and my blog address is http://www.SubjectivelySpeaking.net

Hear more from Alan this Thursday morning when he’ll be speaking on Social Media: What’s In It For You? in Cambridge, MA at a NEDMA event.  Click here to learn more about concrete steps you can take to succeed with Social media marketing.

Related posts:

1. Social Media Breakfast (SMB15) serves up great insights and recommendations
2. Social media adoption: How will marketing spending patterns change?
3. Social Media Marketing for Job Search
4. Social Media Overload–How to make sense of it all

First impressions count, but don’t do the job

When it comes to others, we only form a general impression. At this point, despite the fact that you may have told them much more, prospective buyers are likely to remember only one thing about you at best. It may the first thing you said; it may be something they heard about from someone else; or it may be the thing that resonated most with their top concern the day they encountered your company. Whatever it is, they need to know a lot more before they buy.

The problem is that prospective buyers are still too busy to learn about your company and its services. In fact, one of the greatest obstacles to a sale is getting your marketing messages through to the intended audience. Hopefully, you’ve made enough of an impression, to elevate your company’s marketing communications above the clutter. If so, your next challenge is staying in touch so that you can help prospective buyers move through their buying process. Any missteps and they’re likely to buy from someone else.

Brand building one step at a time

Before they ultimately buy, decision makers will need to:
• Become aware of all the services you offer
• Associate their needs with these services
• Think of your business as the “obvious” choice
• Remember your company when it comes time to buy

The best way to move prospective buyers through these steps is sequentially: one message per communication. Again, they don’t have the capacity to take in more than one detail about your company at a time.

Email marketing may be the answer

One of the best vehicles for your “drip” campaign is a newsletter—conventional or email depending on your audience. Nevertheless, each communication must be directly relevant to their concerns; else it too will remain unopened.

So, in preparing the subject lines and headlines of your missives, return to the four marketing questions we discussed last week. To increase the relevance to readers, and memorability, consider adding a story that illustrates your point and resonates with what you’ve learned about their experiences. Examples of how your accounts have triumphed using your solutions is often the best way to advance your agenda.

A typical email newsletter might describe a service you offer, provide a case study of how one of your accounts benefited from its application, and appear under a headline mentioning both the company that deployed the solution and the impact it had on their business.

Assuming that the featured business is in the same industry—and has the same issues—as your reader, your readers will be anxious to read all about it so that they, too, can achieve success. The following newsletter will follow a similar format but for a different service. One communication at a time, you’ll ensure that prospective buyers:
• Become aware of all the services you offer
• Associate their needs with these services
• Think of your business as the “obvious” choice
• Remember your company when it comes time to buy
For an example of how to implement this strategy, see this article on clinician marketing. As a bonus, you may be able to apply some of the techniques I’ve described to help your physician clients market their practices.

A drip campaign can shorten the sales cycle

So how does a drip campaign shorten the sales cycle? Although your target audience may contain thousands of people, only a few of them are ready at any point in time to buy. Moreover, even if you had the staff, it would be very expensive to follow up with them individually on a regular basis. Done well, your newsletter is likely to reach a small percentage of your audience just as they are ready to buy. If these companies contact you, you’ve generated a qualified lead—and reached someone who is ready to buy right away–without investing in expensive one-to-one prospecting or in manually helping them through their buying process.

Using an email newsletter or conventional print newsletter serves a second purpose. It serves to brand your company as a helpful and authoritative resource. Even if these companies go out to bid, your organization will stand above the crowd. You may even be able to bypass the time-consuming due diligence that companies use to evaluate prospective providers—because they already feel confident in your ability to deliver.

Related posts:

1. Shorten the sales cycle next year: Year end marketing planning
2. Shortening the sales cycle starts with getting into buyers’ minds
3. How search and social media will shorten the B2B sales cycle.
4. Maximizing Sales Productivity Depends on Meeting Marketing Requirements