4 sales and marketing investments that yield dividends with your prospects

Whether it’s a server replacement, critical infrastructure upgrade or identifying a new IT solution provider, the IT buying experience can be complex for a prospective customer—from the teams exploring and evaluating the desired solution to making the final purchase. Are you investing in the right kinds of sales and marketing capabilities to respond to your buyer’s needs to help them along their journey from exploration to the final purchase?

A recent IDC IT buyer experience survey confirms that IT buyers rely on digital sources like your website, blog and social media to help them with their decision-making. Yet, they still value communication with their peers and your sales team and direct experiences like product demos. Your biggest marketing payoffs will be gained by investing in the following capabilities:

3^rd-party voices: Your customers want you to back up your claims with social proof and outside validation from third-party companies like theirs. Consider:
1. Publishing case studies, success stories and/or testimonials that highlight how your customers successfully overcame their challenges with your company’s services and solutions.
2. Opening your business’s social network reviews, so prospects can see what customers are saying about your business. Also, encourage your customers to publish reviews.
3. Getting your business highlighted in the local business press.
4. Sharing your Net Promoter Score, which measures customer experience and how likely they’d recommend your business.
Help vs. sell: Focus on helping, not selling, so prospects can make a successful decision about their purchase. Consider:
1. Consistently sharing industry insights and knowledge in your blogs and social media channels. You’re the subject matter expert. Leverage industry articles that reflect your core business offerings and knowledge. Share your expertise on relevant subjects, how they affect your customers and what you or your business does to solve their problems. Again—help, don’t sell.
Sales preparedness: Your prospects want to know that your sales team understands their business, their situation and the previous interactions they’ve had with your company. Consider:
1. Arming your sales team with the tools to manage customer relationships. If necessary, invest in a customer relationship management tool to help you manage your business relationships and the data points associated with them.
2. Training your sales team to identify key stakeholders in the IT buying decision and leveraging relevant insights to address their respective concerns. The more complex the solution, the greater likelihood that there are more business decision makers involved in the final purchase.
Proactive help: Provide prospects with timely and relevant information and suggest additional resources that may be of interest. Consider:
1. Leveraging the content you generated in your blog and social media channels, from case studies to industry insights, and sharing it when appropriate.