“Eighty percent of life is showing up,” Alvy Singer, Annie Hall. MGM, 1977.
Today’s high-velocity technology allows many organizations to try and advertise products across varying mediums
—click-ads, social media like Twitter and LinkedIn and industry-specific association directories and newsletters. Organizations metaphorically “show up” in the form of product ads or a physical location and compete on with lower prices (and smaller margins).
What if a more cost and time efficient idea would work just fine?
Also . . . what if a product or service is more complicated to explain than dry cleaning, a pizza parlor, payroll solutions or dentistry where the mass general public is familiar with such items?
For example, say you sell the software that controls the payroll service’s direct deposit mechanism, the $20,000 industrial-grade oven that cooks the Italian restaurant’s pizza or lease $200,000 x-ray machines to dental or medical centers?
Way different level of conversation to advertise to trained medical professionals, restaurant owners or head of purchasing / product manager at the payroll company, is it not?
Far too many medium and large organizations advertising in business-to-business sectors make a big mistake in going with generalist advertisements and online content marketing in order to influence sophisticated buyers trained and technically savvy on such things.
Says one deputy program manager for a Fortune 200 aerospace and defense contractor:
“His [Corey’s] proposition makes a valid point, even for an established multinational business segment like mine.”
“A strong product does not mean foolproof profits anymore,” she added. “Often, fear of shelling out marketing dollars only to be disappointed causes organizations already spending two percent or more on advertising in business-to-business channels to hold off on pulling the trigger on a mailer, business journal advertisement or live educational event, et cetera.”
“A writer with a competitive business background and an appreciation for my industry’s competitive landscape,” she concluded, “is a breath of fresh air to have a phone call away. Our target buyer is probably a project manager, professional procurement officer or someone else expecting specific details about a product to make a buying decision.”
In certain instances, creative advertising—the kind seen on TV with Flo singing in Progressive commercials or when GlaxoSmithkline announces a new blood pressure medicine may be entertaining messaging. They are way different than advertising relatively expensive products to other companies.
To be cost efficient and reliable, the advertising and educational materials have to be specific and more “meat and potatoes” than what is seen on TV usually.