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Marketing 360 — Essential Strategies for the One Person Technology Marketing Team
Most marketing professionals specialize in one or another marketing professions -- campaign management, content or social media; but if you are in a small company or startup, you may well be in charge of all of the above
Most marketing professionals specialize in one or another marketing professions – campaign management, content or social media. If you are in a small company or startup, you may well be in charge of all of the above. I call it “Marketing 360” — deciding where to invest assets, conceiving the marketing plan and strategies, content, campaigns and lead gen. From zero traffic to constant sales-qualified leads in six months.
Keep It Simple
When you build your website, CRM, campaigns, content marketing and everything else, you have only one option – keep it simple. Every decision is a compromise. You’re not going to have time to code or design your dream website, so use a powerful but easy to use content engine like WordPress, an easy to use CRM and learn about your target audience. Hire a CRM expert to come in and do a “one time easy to use implementation”.
When it comes to content and campaigns, speak to everyone on the team. It is critical to learn about the product and any background information that you can expose yourself to. Be ready to churn out content with minimal editing.
Communicate!
Your website and campaigns need to connect to your CRM, just as your content needs to connect with your audience. There is zero compromise on quality content. I’ve heard many colleagues tell me they “just can’t write”. Writing your own content is the only way to get your message across. When your company grows and this is no longer feasible, the content you wrote will be the roadmap for future content writers. Start out excellent.
“It’s a big misunderstanding, I’m not really a writer,” I used to tell my colleagues when I was a content writer. Anyone can learn how to run LinkedIn, Facebook and Google campaigns, but not everyone can communicate. Learn how to communicate.
Know Your Audience
Now that you’re a content writer, your next step is to know your audience. Who are your decision makers? Beyond “how can you help them,” consider “how should you communicate your solution to them?” For an audience of executives, my advice is to show respect. My blog posts are a mix of interesting and light. Save the heavy stuff for the datasheets and product pages. Take a deep breath – executives know how to see through corporate pitches.
Keep Your Vendors Closer
As a one person marketing team, you don’t have a designer, web developers and other vendors in your office. You work with them via email and occasional phone calls. Find good vendors and be nice to them – you want the good ones to work with you for years. Remember that vendors don’t know what you and your startup colleagues know about your product – provide them with smart info, and know when to invite them for a one-on-one meeting.
Campaigns and Budgets
Start with small budget campaigns to learn what works. If you are using blogs as a landing page, then your blog headlines are also your campaign headlines. Campaigns are often “born” as a headline – the blog post landing page and campaign headline and content follow the leader.
Measure your results – page views, clicks, leads, qualified leads and all the way to sales. Where do your numbers drop? Where are your numbers off the charts?
Most Important – Work With Sales
Marketing and sales teams often work in two different worlds. Marketing has a “check list” of things to do, and the VP Marketing tells the CEO, “I did x, y and z and brought a lot of leads.” That’s not enough. The most important part of my day is my daily call with my Sales Director or VP Sales.
When Marketing actually communicates with Sales, you end up with inspiration for campaigns. Better yet, agree on a list of a few hundred target companies and/or decision makers, and you hit the jackpot. When Marketing and Sales are totally in sync – to the microscopic level – both sides win.
Startup Marketing 360 – Juggling
Startup marketing is a juggling act. You conceive a campaign, allocate budget, write the content and initiate and manage the online campaigns. There are also many mini-roles involved – conferences, social media, PR and more.
When you are successfully juggling all aspects of marketing, you can start innovating. I came up with “Blog as a Landing Page” because of my understanding of my audience and a challenge I faced in signing them up for a new technology. Connect all the dots and scale up your startup with Marketing 360.
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