It's not surprising that some partners are especially confused about marketing right now. There are marketing experts telling you to build content and make your Web site a prospect magnet. And there are marketing gurus telling you to automate your marketing to run e-mail and ad campaigns flawlessly (what a marketing word). So, which should you do?
Both. To make the most of you marketing content, you should deliver it through your Web site and through regular marketing campaigns.
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Posted by Barb Levisay on February 26, 20140 comments
A check of your Web site analytics is likely to reveal that your "About Us" page is one of the top three or four pages that your prospects visit. But even though it receives all this attention from visitors, the About Us page is usually the weakest on content -- cut-and-paste mission and vision statements, a few photos of the leadership team, and done.
The title of the About Us page may suggest that it's all about your company, but that's not really the case. The About Us page should be all about serving your visitor.
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Posted by Barb Levisay on February 12, 20140 comments
Are your corporate colors navy blue and gray, with maybe a little maroon thrown in to spark things up? When most partners were choosing corporate colors more than a decade ago, they wanted to evoke security and stability. Think pinstripes. Those were good decisions at the time.
Now, it's time to update. An ever-increasing number of your buyers are digital natives. Security and stability are still important to them, but when they hit your blue-and-gray Web site, they see stodgy, out-of-date.
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Posted by Barb Levisay on January 30, 20140 comments
If you are marketing Office 365 and not using the features to simplify and improve your own marketing efforts, we have some recommendations from a true evangelist.
As the marketing manager for Pittsburgh-based MSP/Dynamics partner Vertical Solutions, Tina Featheringham makes full use of the Office 365 features to connect with prospects. She shared her most valuable tip for each Office application to get you started.
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Posted by Barb Levisay on January 16, 20140 comments
Do you feel like you made progress in your marketing efforts in 2013? For the most part, channel partners have made the adjustment to the new worlds of content and inbound marketing. Web sites are getting refreshed with content focused on education instead of product descriptions.
This is great progress, but there are still plenty of challenges that partners have to overcome to keep marketing going. Customers and service delivery are your primary concerns, as they should be, but keeping the pipeline full is a constant worry.
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Posted by Barb Levisay on December 18, 20130 comments
Every marketer today is faced with the challenge of creating good content day in and day out. Coming up with new ideas and interesting ways to present information can feel pretty overwhelming on some of those days. That's when it's time to start mining Microsoft's Ready-to-Go (RtG) marketing site.
Through steady improvement over the past several years, RtG has become a marketing content goldmine for partners. Some of the nuggets take a little more digging than others, but we've collected a few worth sharing:
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Posted by Barb Levisay on December 05, 20130 comments
When Microsoft launches new services and devices, partners get the opportunity to build on the national marketing push and increased public awareness.
Yes, Microsoft used to involve partners more, hosting big launch events across the country. Now, partners have two choices: Wish for the past to return or take matters into their own hands. Cyber Advisors, a managed infrastructure partner based in Minneapolis, Minn., chooses the later, with great success.
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Posted by Barb Levisay on November 14, 20130 comments
Committing to a social media marketing strategy is a tough pledge for most partners to make. Paybacks aren't immediate and the time investment can be substantial. Yet as young people begin to move up through the ranks of business to become the buyers you serve, is there a choice?
It Takes One To Know One
After feeling that the money spent on outsourced social media marketing was not delivering adequate returns, Ric Opal, vice president of Peters & Associates, a Chicago-based multi-competency partner, decided to hire a young person to manage the company's social media.
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Posted by Barb Levisay on October 31, 20130 comments
Recruitment is often cited as the No. 1 challenge for partners. Is your Web site helping?
As a quick exercise, pretend you are a student graduating this spring with a degree in business information technology. (Even better if you can imagine that you are something other than a white male student.) Now, go to your company Web site.
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Posted by Barb Levisay on October 16, 20130 comments
Hot on the heels of the infographic explosion comes the eBook -- the latest incarnation of marketing content delivery. While our industry has a long history of using whitepapers for lead generation, the eBook is gaining traction with partner marketers. So, what's the difference and does it matter?
As with most things marketing, whether it matters lies in the perception of the target audience. Whitepapers have long been regarded as in-depth explorations of subjects written by experts. A decade ago, Microsoft would release 64-page technical whitepapers written for IT managers who were assigned the acronym TDM, which stood for technical decision maker. As non-technical line-of-business managers became more involved in technology decisions, whitepapers got less technical, targeting BDMs, or business decision makers.
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Posted by Barb Levisay on October 01, 20130 comments