I am a “handshake” kind of guy
I prefer meeting my customers face-to-face. My industrial customers are in the same boat…many prefer face-to-face meetings and all have built their businesses on personal relationships. Awesome. I love it. I probably spend more money on gas than I should, but I’m comfortable with that.
The value in personal relationships has not changed nor will it change in the digital age of marketing for our industrial marketing friends.
What has changed is the way your prospects and customers interact with your business, your sales group and marketing materials.
In Jared Fabac’s recently published The Industrial (Marketing) Revolution and outlined in Chapter One, Lead, Follow, or Show Us the Way-The Death of Traditional Marketing, Fabac relates:
“If there’s one big lesson for marketers in this recent turn of events, it’s that the old forms of marketing have been under performing for quite some time now and should not be tolerated as the primary part of your all-important media mix”
Let’s just examine some of the traditional channels to the industrial market.
Trade shows: Almost since the beginning of time (i.e. bazaars are mentioned in Bible) industrial trade shows were a leading source of information gathering. Remember preparation for your last trade show? You compiled a list of vendors you wanted to see to maximize your time for your 2 or 3 day trade show. Now you gather that information, and much more, on the web in an hour or so. (Well…maybe a couple hours.)
In my opinion, the handshake is still the most critical element of your trade show visit and a good reason to still attend. But your web site educated many of your attendees before they even arrived…correct?
Direct mail: Your sales & product brochures, catalogs, etc. help your customers learn about your products and services. Now all that information is available on your web site. At least it better be. A lot of those hard-copy materials lead to handshakes. Now, your company’s information on the web site should do the same…lead to handshakes.
Trade Journals: Your clever insertions in your industry’s trade journals allow a wide audience to experience your company’s brand, your unique selling proposition and detailed product specifications. Of course, your web site now does that exceptionally well…correct?
Many times those clever and informational ads lead to a “marketing qualified” lead that are passed off to your sales super-stars.
Those leads result in a handshake and a closed sale.
Now your web site provides a similar experience for your web user and passes off another “marketing qualified” lead to your sales group. Right?
Sales Group: Because your web site now offers your prospects and customers all they need, prospects greet your sales group more knowledgeable than ever and much closer to a close. Right?
Your sales group has morphed from aggressive super-stars to consultative geniuses. Well…they have, haven’t they?
Sure…there will be a time and place for traditional marketing that works and much of it still does.
However, your web site can provide a much more efficient marketing & lead generation machine.
And you still get to provide the handshakes.
Maybe you are ready to raise your hand and say “Help”. Click the graphic below for a COMPLIMENTARY 30 minute consultation.
