10 Marketing Tactics That Will Drive More MSP Sales
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You’ve got limited time and money to put into marketing. Learn 10 tactics that will generate more qualified leads and drive more sales for your managed services. This presentatoin will give you an actionable plan that you can implement right away so prospects find you, like you and want to buy from you. Join us to learn: * How to package your services so they are easier to buy * How to get a prospect to reveal what they really want * What to write in your proposal that will set you apart from your competition * Ways to make your prospect feel more comfortable with you than anyone else * How to use incentives to get prospects to contact you More details are at http://presstacular.com
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10 Marketing Tactics That Will Drive More MSP Sales
- 1. 10 Marketing Tactics That Will Drive More MSP Sales Raj Khera MailerMailer (makers of Presstacular) raj@mailermailer.com @presstacular
- 2. About the Presenter, Raj Khera • Engineer turned business guy CEO, GovCon – sold in 1999 for $12M Partner, FilterPoint – sold in 2009 Partner, MoreBusiness.com • Co-Founder/Partner, MailerMailer Presstacular –marketing tool for IT companies Author #1 Amazon Bestseller: IT Marketing Crash Course Sold DiscussThis.com, 2014. Acquired Listcast, 2015.
- 3. Typical sales call Hi, nice to meet you. Will you marry me?
- 4. Typical sales call Hi, nice to meet you. Look at my muscles. Now will you marry me?
- 5. How Prospects Buy IT Services… Education Awareness Trust Purchase
- 6. Starting point: What exactly do you sell? Too Many Options = Clutter Clutter = Slower Decisions
- 7. Reduce buying option clutter • Study: more choices leads to more “ooohs and aaahs” but fewer purchases (3% v 30%) • Package your IT services as product bundles with specific options • Package A: xy • Package B: xyz “When Choice is Demotivating,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Iyengar and Lepper, 2000. Tactic 1
- 8. Mimic client behavior in meetings • People look for environmental cues to decide who to trust • Study: 79% retail shoppers bought from mimicking sales reps vs. 62% “Imitation is the Best Form of Flattery – and a Good Negotiation Strategy,” Kellogg News (Northwestern University), 2007. “Retail Salespeople’s Mimicry of Customers: Effects on Behavior,” Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Jacob et. al., Sept 2011 Tactic 2
- 9. Repeat clients words in proposals and presentations • Say “Tell me more” as your answer to yes/no questions • Study: waitresses who repeated diner’s orders word-for-word got 70% more tips “Mimicry for Money: Behavioral Consequences of Imitation,” Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, van Baaren, Holland, Steenaert and van Knippenberg, July 2003. Tactic 3
- 10. Attend at least 6 networking events each year (more is better) Tactic 4
- 11. Identify which events your clients never miss Be a speaker there
- 12. Ways to get a call back • Exchange cards, stay in touch • Educate on how to relieve headaches, save time, save money • Provide them with a lead • Be the connector – it builds trust Tactic 5
- 13. Who do you trust? • What makes you trust a company you don’t know? Those who talk about what they offer and how good they are – “me” Those who listen, educate and comfort you without pressure – “you”
- 14. Me vs. You Marketing Word Choice • Preferred words: – “Our Services” – “Our Clients” – “Our Staff” – “We can help you” Me You • Preferred words: – “How to…” – “White Paper on…” – “Free Report on…” – “We can help you”
- 15. What Does Your Marketing Say? • Our services • Our capabilities • Our clients • Our projects • Our staff • Our promotions
- 16. What Matters to Clients? • Them • Their problems • Solutions to their problems • Benefits of your products and services Important:Not important: • You • Features of your products and services
- 17. What Matters to Clients? • Content Examples • 5 handy Windows productivity tricks that you didn’t know • Tip: Using airport wi-fi safely and securely • How to prepare your office for the storm arriving this week • Alert: What the <breach of the day> security issue means for your business
- 18. Send security alerts Cryptowall Russian Hacker Password Heist Server 2003 EOL Ransomware Malware in Macros Tactic 6
- 20. Offer an incentive to contact you Tactic 8
- 21. Send an email newsletter every month Tactic 9
- 22. Educate first Then people will be open to your promotions
- 23. Monitor opens and clicks for warm leads
- 24. Write or Acquire Educational Content • Generates and nurtures leads • Enhances credibility • Encourages sharing • Establishes trust • i.e., Sells without selling
- 25. “100% increase in unique page views, 250% increase in online conversions” Bill Owens CEO, Veracity
- 27. Apply for awards Ask for testimonials Publicize in press releases, newsletters, blogs Tactic 10
- 28. Please, please, please… Remember to follow up with leads Marketing IS NOT Set it and forget it
- 29. The IT Marketing Crash Course How to Get Clients for Your Technology Business www.ITMarketingBook.com US $2.99 on Kindle
- 30. Your Complete IT Marketing Toolkit
- 31. Get More IT Clients Use Presstacular’s library of pre-written content Special Offer for Webinar Attendees: Request a Demo and Get a Free IT Article for Your Website Visit Presstacular.com - Security Alerts - Blogs - Email Newsletters - White Papers
Editor's Notes
- Hi Everyone, and welcome to today’s webinar, “10 Marketing Tactics that Will Drive More MSP Sales” My name is Sarah Duffy, and I’m the Marketing Manager here at Intronis. I will be moderating today’s webinar. I’m joined by Raj Khera, Presentation of MailerMailer. Today Raj will provide expert tactics on how you can best market your MSP with your prospects and your reoccurring customers to drive more sales.
- Thanks, Sarah and welcome everyone. Before we get started, I thought it might be useful to share a little background on who I am. I have a couple of degrees in electronics engineering – I used to build semiconductor chips and wrote a lot of software. Then after 9 years of being an engineer I got the itch to start my own company 20 years ago. I’ve been there – being a technical person and learning about marketing to grow my business – and it can be challenging. Today I’m going to share with you a few of the things I’ve picked up along the way, many of which are in my book, the IT Marketing Crash Course.
- <read> Some people have a modified version of this phrase. It goes something like this…
- <read> What I mean by this is that too often, we meet somebody and try to find out quickly if they need IT services and then we start talking about how good we are and try to sell them what we offer. We try to get married on the first date. IT services usually aren’t cheap, and so people need to get to know you before making a commitment. When you think about it, it’s just like dating. You want to get to know who you are getting involved with. I mean, you wouldn’t just go to someone and say “hi, nice to meet you. Will you marry me?” This just isn’t how things work.
- Your prospects are no different. Here’s how most people make buying decisions. This holds true if you’re buying a TV or buying IT services. A prospect first becomes aware that they have a need, that there is a problem that they need to solve. But they don’t jump from becoming aware about an issue to making a purchase. There are a couple of steps in between. They first try to educate themselves. When they identify good sources of education, that builds trust in their minds – because they feel like they are making an informed decision. That’s when they become ready to buy. People buy from those they trust. Your ability to drive more leads and close more sales depends on your ability walk a prospect through this sales process. Everything I’m going to talk about today is about guiding your lead through this process, building trust so they want to buy from you. We’re going to dive into specific tactics that you can implement starting today or tomorrow. Let’s dive in.
- <read title> I see a lot of web sites for IT companies. Many provide so much information on every type of service they offer. They list out data backup, other cloud services, remote desktop support, anti-virus, malware, the list goes on. If you’re a prospect looking at this, how different is this than everyone else’s web site? It’s all a huge smorgasbord of options. You would have no idea where to start, especially if you aren’t technical. It creates clutter in the prospects’ minds. Clutter leads to slower decision making.
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- To get more customers, you have to get in front of people. I’ll show you ways to pull traffic to your web site. That takes a little time to build up. The fastest way is to go where your clients – and therefore your prospects – hang out.
- <read, discuss value of speaking – local chamber, associations, host lunch and learns – The Most Commonly Overlooked IT Security Practices That Law Firms Make (can tie to compliance which people are always worried about – FUD factor), buy a list, send a mailer, hire a student to call>. Let’s say you meet someone, they’re interested but then you can’t get them to call you back.
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- Different word choice, same end goal: we can help you. Remember, we’re trying to walk someone through awareness, education, trust to purchase. The “Me” approach is the “hi, nice to meet you, look at my muscles, will you marry me?” Which one of these approaches would you trust if you were the buyer?
- <use gestures, muscles, power stance> Turn the table now to you. Is your web site just a brochure? When is the last time you got a client because they read your online brochure? If your website is brochure-ware or if all of your marketing material only talks about how good you are, you are missing a major opportunity. Plus, your competitors will sneak past you – and maybe even steal your clients.
- How? Because what matters to clients are the issues they are facing in their own business right now, not you and not necessarily what you are selling. Focus on benefits, not features. You and I know what cloud computing is. Your clients might not. Don’t say “store your data in the cloud”. That’s meaningless to a non-technical person. Instead, say “access your data anytime you want it and from any device – your iPad, your work computer or home PC”. That’s what people buy.
- Focus on what matters to your prospects and clients. One of my favorites is the last one – there’s no shortage of information to share when it comes to security breaches. Headline news every month.
- One of our clients sent an alert on ransomeware to contacts that already were using other IT companies. Those companies started scratching their heads wondering why their IT firm wasn’t keeping them updated on this stuff because it looked pretty important. So they called our client after he sent the alert and he was able to close $5000 in new project business within a week, and then convert those new clients into $75k in annual recurring revenue. This stuff works!
- To help you get found in search engines, make sure you update your site regularly. And there’s no better way to do this than through a blog. It allows new people to find your site and possibly reach out to you. Plus, when you send you email newsletter which directs people back to your site, you continue to stay top of mind and show off your expertise. And that allows you to nurture those contacts you meet at networking events or those who fill out your site’s contact form. Speaking of which…
- If you want someone to fill out your contact form, don’t just post up a generic form with a Submit button. Give people a reason to fill it out. Those blogs you have can easily be turned into a guide or white paper. Many of our clients use our specialized white papers to capture contact information from web site visitors. This is what some call “gated content”, which is very valuable content that you get for exchanging your email address. In fact, Presstacular has a way to capture this information automatically and send the white paper after someone enters a valid email address. And then it alerts you so you can follow up accordingly. Remember I mentioned educating people about Server 2003 – we have a white paper on that, one on data backup, one on IT terminology for non-technical people.
- A related cousin to sending security alerts is sending a monthly email newsletter. A newsletter does not mean you’re sending out product info or something on a special sale you have. This newsletter is designed to be informative. One of our clients sent a newsletter about the end of support on a Tues morning. $25k in new biz by Friday. Now, we have another big opportunity ahead of us – Server 2003. With over 8 million servers still running 2003 and Microsoft stopped support in July, this is a very timely opportunity to get migration business by alerting people about this issue.
- When a client only sees promotion after promotion, they tune out. When they see educational pieces, they stay tuned in. You have built trust. What comes with trust? If they trust you, they become open to your advertising, open to your sales pitches, open to your promotions. To get the most mileage out of your content, you can create and send the newsletter yourself or you can use a tool to help you out. Here’s an example of a newsletter created using our tool, Presstacular. The really neat thing about this tool is that all of the content is already included. You don’t have to write anything.
- I wouldn’t recommend sending your newsletter through Outlook because you won’t get any tracking details. The beauty of email newsletter tools is that you can get very detailed metrics to help you close more sales. You can find out who is clicking the articles- and which ones they are reading, and who is most likely ready for a sales call. There’s only so much time in day. You want to spend that time talking to people who are likely ready to buy your services.
- Educational IT content does so many things – and remember, this is not sales content about your products or services, this is material that is designed to speak in a client’s terms.<read> and most of all it keeps you top of mind. So don’t sell. Instead, educate.
- Here’s what one of our clients found out through experience. He started using Presstacular’s IT content a little while back and has seen a 100% increase in unique page views to his web site. Plus, a 250% increase in online conversions – these are new people who found useful content on his site and contacted them.
- And to top it off, this is the one thing in your marketing budget that you can stretch to go a very long way. Your educational material can be transformed into multiple forms so you can share blogs, ebooks, white papers, newsletters, checklists, infographics – even tweets and facebook or linkedin posts. Here’s where leveraging other people’s time comes in handy – stop doing $10/hour work yourself: get someone to write articles for you – or subscribe to a service like ours to do that – it’s very cost effective, very professional and saves a lot of time, use a graphic designer to make some infographics for you, maybe reformat some of your pieces into ebooks or slide presentations, maybe hire a student intern to turn some of these into videos. Can also repurpose that into your proposals – remember to be like a parrot and recite client’s words.
- <describe, how one IT company asks for testimonials before they get the contract> When coupled with your educational material, this shows off your expertise, which in turn increases trust.
- A final word… If you implement the strategies I outlined today, you WILL get leads. You will get QUALIFIED leads. Make sure you follow up with them. Use the metrics from your email tracking reports. Put them on your email list, put them into Autotask (you can import directly from Autotask right into Presstacular). Send them a newsletter, guides, white papers. I promise you will get new business. If they’re not sales ready now, they might be later. You just have to nurture them. I regularly get clients who have been monitoring our activities for over a year and then the time is right and they call us. This happens all the time.
- If haven’t downloaded it yet, my book will give you a roadmap on how to build your business. It’s a #1 bestseller on Amazon and one of the only books that goes into modern marketing strategies just for MSPs. It’s available in print and Kindle editions – you can get a free Kindle reader app for your iPad or PC. Just visit ITmarketingbook.com.
- It’s important to warm up a prospect before you call and you can do that very effectively by using educational material. Our tool Presstacular empowers your IT company to create an email newsletter and blog instantly using a library of pre-written articles that you can edit. Live reports show you who’s reading, clicking and ready for a sales call. Get more IT clients by using Presstacular – it’s like having your own marketing department but at a tiny fraction of the cost of hiring staff. We have a special offer from Presstacular for today’s attendees. Simply request a demo and get one free IT article to use on your web site, newsletter or to share with your clients and prospect. Just visit Presstacular.com and click on the green Request a Demo button. During your demo, mention Intronis to get your free article.