“My widget saves you money.” Yeah, sure. Thanks for telling me that.
Non-specific remarks tend to annoy people. The same goes for blanket ROI statements. They can make you sound like you’re lying or being evasive - even if you’re not. Presumably, the vaunted widget saves money by solving a problem.
That’s where your messaging starts.
Messaging is the foundation of any marketing and sales program. Comprehensive messaging unifies your internal and external communications and customer interactions. This provides a single face for your organization, ensuring that the targeted audiences hear the appropriate niche messages – based on their industry and role within the individual company (account-based marketing) from every member of your organization – from inside sales to tech support.
Before you start any marketing, you must have comprehensive messaging in place.
As part of the messaging process, you need to think through the whole purpose of your company. How do you make your voice heard above the din to drive recognition of the value your tech provides? How do you show that your product or service is superior to any your competitors may be promoting? Perhaps you need to secure additional rounds of finance, engineer a successful exit, or pull off a profitable IPO?
The secret is crafting the right messages. To rise above the market noise, get the attention of investors, and boost lead generation, your corporate messages should:
Target your buyer personas
Forget messages like we’re the best. We’re unique. Instead, ask yourself: for whom will my solution benefit best or solve the most problems? Enterprise-level clients or small- to medium-sized businesses? In other words, mine your personas -- the fictionalized representations of your ideal customer -- to grasp the needs, goals, and priorities that your message should address. You’ll need to tailor your message specifically to your targets (account-based marketing - ABM) - the risk manager, CISO, CEO, CTO, IT manager, legal team, or others. The more clearly defined your target, the more focused -- technical-centric? business-centric? infrastructure-centric? -- and desirable your solution will be.
Understand your personas’ pain points
Your personas face challenges that your services and tech address. See what moves them, and clearly demonstrate that you provide the solution. Each persona has different challenges, so ensure you get specific. (ABM)
Positive messages - positioning your technology as a solution to the customer’s problems - rather than scare tactics have been proven to promote better audience connection and engagement with the provider.
Keep up with industry jargon
If you want your tech to be perceived as the “newest,” “most stable,” “pivoted,” or “totally integrated,” your marketing language should follow. The tech landscape is continuously evolving and is jargon heavy, with new concepts popping up constantly.
Keep it Simple
The result of this exercise is a clear definition of who you are, what you do, for whom you are doing it, what problems you solve for your customers, and what truly makes you unique in the marketplace. It will clearly outline your unique selling proposition, your competitive advantage, and your critical success factors.
Once complete, you’ll have a document anywhere from 3-10 pages, based on how complex your solution is, the number of “titles” within the organization who can benefit from the technology, and the volume of business and technology messages.
As companies evolve, this document will grow and change, as well. However, for a start-up, this will serve as the communications roadmap for everyone in the organization to ensure consistency of messages across the entire organization.
By ensuring everyone is on the same page, you’ll be able to project a single, positive face to your customers, investors, and anyone else critical to your success.
By Amy Kenigsberg, GVI head mentor in marketing strategy &COO & Co-founder, K2 Global Communications