‘Technical’ people are great at fixing problems and making things, but… they often don’t get the business they deserve
It’s been said the world over: they are smart people who can research and analyse a need, and work alone for long periods to build a solution – but not so good at communicating their ideas and products, especially to non-technical people.
This communication gap can mean loss of business opportunities or contracts from potential clients who may be left frustrated with unmet needs or go to other suppliers who don’t meet their needs as well as you can.
Marketing communication is becoming more and more important in the emerging ‘mobile information age’ where lots of potential clients search the internet for products and services.
Competition also grows as physical location becomes less of an issue, so creating a niche becomes more important to succeed – by capitalizing on your unique selling points.
Missing the value
Technical people can see marketing as ‘fluff’, exaggeration of product capabilities, or hype that doesn’t add any value. Well, yes, this can be true when sales & marketing people get involved who don’t understand the technicalities or relate eye-to-eye with your technical people.
The ‘DIY’ trap
Businesses often end up throwing together their own marketing content, but it’s often ‘self-focused’ and not very customer-friendly, appealing, or ‘stand-out’.
Most websites and brochures say similar stuff to everyone else – what the company does and a whole lot of technical facts and features.
Their target audience can get bored or bamboozled from this and not see the benefits in their own language. They are in a different world, with motivations and interests beyond the technical issues.
It’s actually quite hard for a business owner to see past their own view to their target market’s perspective, and it can take an outsider to do this.
I had a ‘smart buildings’ designer/installer proudly show me his website design – electronic boxes and cables. I could see how it appealed to him, but suggested that his potential clients wouldn’t want to see any of that, but would be looking for a good time entertaining their friends with their home theatre. We pitched the text and imagery to that end and his website took off.
How to bridge the gap to advance your business
Your potential clients may see a number of technically competent firms that could do the job, so how can you stand out? How about carving out your own market of ‘ideal’ clients?
The next 3 articles show you how…