Now Market It

 Facebook, LinkedIn, twitter and all the other forums for social media are all the buzz.  And rightfully so - it is changing peoples' communications habits.  There are now ongoing conversations taking place on-line about every topic, and as a marketer you want to be included in the conversation.   Social media is a great opportunity to communicate with your constituencies and prospects and stay fresh, relevant and top of mind.  Better yet, you can become the topic of conversation.

For B2B marketers, the challenge of being the topic of conversation is a bit greater.  You want to be the topic of conversation in places where buyers go to look to make decisions about products like yours.  Like other elements of the marketing mix, it is critical to view social media as part of an overall communications plan directed by a marketing strategy.  But, as is too often the case - organizations move right to tactics that are implemented without a strategy or cohesive plan.  Social Media is no different than other elements of your communications plan.  "We need to get on LinkedIn, Facebook and twitter" is not a plan.

As with the entire marketing mix, it starts with your target customers.  How are they making their decisions, what information do they need, who influences them?  You want them to have all the information they need at the time they are looking to make a decision.  The ability to do this will be based on your ability to be viewed as a reliable authority.  Being knowledgeable and acknowledged as such by the relevant community provides that credibility.  This requires not just providing valuable relevant content, but being active in the conversation.

Delivering a consistent message in the right places, at the right times, with valuable content and active participation will all add up to success.  This requires having a supporting theme and a coordinated approach in all communications including: the company website, e-mail, blogs and social media, in such a way that they work together, complement each other and support one another. 

 Service providers face a challenging problem as they compete for differentiation.  The service providers are deploying and promoting innovative high speed 4G wireless networks that provide high speed internet connectivity to smarter more capable endpoint devices - both for mobile and fixed services (such as Verizon Hub).  The result is further commoditization of voice and text messaging.  With more bandwidth comes the ability to further bypass the service provider by taking applications "over the top" on an all IP network.    The service providers will be challenged to create new applications in a world of Internet based content and applications - so the question arises - where are the opportunities for the service provider to add revenue-generating value in a world of mobile high bandwidth access?

The service providers certainly are in the position to collect and mine lots of information about their customers.  Can this be packaged and provide to content providers allowing them to better target and access their target markets?  Are they able to use the information to enable the creation of unique services and applications that could generate additional revenue?

Service providers have always been key partners for enterprise and business customers that have complex communications needs.  As advanced communications is providing improved productivity tools, is there an opportunity for the role of the service provider to become an even more important partner - with more systems integration to bring together voice, data, mobile, and existing internal networks?  Will the complexity of the new communications networks with capabilities such as Unified Communication provide a greater opportunity for hosting solutions for businesses that do not want to manage the internal networks required?

Will they be able to leverage the ability to bundle communications services together - creating offers for video based services, internet and phone - both fixed and mobile?  Perhaps the value is in the customer experience rather than the content or applications?  Can the service providers create an ability to manage and interface with the variety of communications services in such a way that makes the experience easier and even fun - thus creating a unified experience that adds value that consumers and businesses are willing to pay for?      

Perhaps the most likely outcome is that we will see some of all of the above.  What scenarios do you think will dominate? 

What areas do you see as an opportunity for the service provider to generate additional revenue?                                                    

 Things do not to appear to be as grim as they had a couple of months ago.  Is the worst of our economic woes over? I don't really know.  But, the business cycle continues as it has in the past.  We continue to have booms followed by busts followed again by economic growth.   At the peaks of the booms and the bottom of the busts it seems the refrain is much the same - "this time it is different."   However, though things do change, the fundamental principles remain much the same. 

The recession has had executives running for cover until the economic storm has passed.  They make short-term business decisions that manifest themselves in extensive cost cutting measures such as layoffs, furloughs, and typically near the top of the list - the marketing budget.  The uncertainty of the times strikes at the hearts of individuals' insecurities, so holding on to what you have becomes the behavior of both consumers and businesses.

However, economic growth will return, and the recession offers a potentially excellent opportunity for companies to significantly improve their market position.  This may also be a great time to pick up ground on the competition.  They may be hiding from the storm like so many other companies led by fair weathered captains of industry.  What if you were to continue to invest in your business?  Get more aggressive with development plans to build additional differentiation against the competition that has cut its R&D.  Avoid layoffs of the people needed to operate the business so that you don't find yourself hiring new untrained individuals who need to learn your business at the same time the economy is recovering.

Marketing may appear to be a sensible place to reduce expenses since fewer people are buying and those who are typically are spending less.  Everyone else is cutting back on marketing, why not do the same?  The problem is that your partners, customers and prospects may also notice this, and the message it sends is not one of reassurance. 

This economy provides an opportunity for those who have some financial strength to improve their market position.  The opportunity is actually twofold for marketing: the noise level is lower and the cost of delivering your message louder is greater.

This is a great time to deliver your message while the overall advertising noise level is substantially lower.  Advertising is reduced everywhere, as are the publication of whitepapers, etc.  Any company delivering its message in this environment will have a lot less noise to compete with and thus are more likely to be heard.

The cost of reaching the customer is also lower.  Like in many industries, advertising revenues have been reduced for all media outlets, making it a great time to negotiate deals.   Advertising costs are lower.  The ability to negotiate packages and lower long-term rates is greater.  The competition for on-line ad words is lower, thus the cost per-click through is lower. 

For those who have the financial strength to maintain their marketing programs, it is to their advantage, as they are able to get their message out more often and in more places at a time when the competitive noise is reduced.

What if you were to be so BOLD as to INCREASE the marketing budget during the recession?  Buy more advertising and more opportunities to deliver your message when the noise is the lowest.  How might this impact the position of your business as compared to the competition?  How might this impact the revenue of your business as compared to the competition - particularly during the recovery when projects that have been on hold are restarted?

Instead of focusing on what your business looks like during the recession, imagine how you would like your business to look as the economy improves.  It might be the best time to think about how to take advantage of your competitors' short-term behavior to gain long-term market share.

 

Hello TMC readers - I would like to take this opportunity to provide an introduction to my blog. 

Now, Market It - what does this mean?  As a high tech marketing person, I am always interested in how high tech companies utilize marketing.  Though much has been written about marketing in high tech companies, I have found the spectrum of views on high tech marketing remarkably vast.  In some companies marketing is core to its strategy - and in others it is the organization that manages the website and trade shows.

In high tech industries there is so much focus on the technology that I don't think marketing is always an integral part of the strategic planning process.  Often marketing is thought about when it is time to bring a solution to market.  The technology has been transformed into a product or service - "Now, Market It".

As with so many things in high tech businesses, marketing has unique challenges.  Marketing is both a science and an art - it requires an understanding of the analytical and the creative.  It is complicated by the fact that different marketing strategies are required based on a variety of factors including where the technology is in the Technology Adoption Life Cycle.  Marketing is dynamic and multi-dimensional.  It requires continual adaptation and an understanding that markets are both global and local. 

Marketing is appropriately a key component to strategic planning and for supporting innovation in any high tech company.

Convergence technology has developed into a very dynamic industry that covers a wide variety of applications being pursued by both established players and start-ups.  I am interested in generating an ongoing discussion about how marketing is practiced and how it differs from marketing theory.  

How is marketing viewed at your company?