An effective marketing strategy is the cornerstone of any successful business. According to market research, the MSP market is expected to reach $372.6 billion by 2028. This is an enormous growth opportunity for any MSP to pursue. You and every MSP will be jockeying to position yourselves at the top, so creating the best MSP marketing strategy will be as crucial as ever.
MSP Marketing Explained
MSP marketing focuses on the typical IT issues or services businesses face and how offloading them to a managed service provider (MSP) can simplify things for them. An MSP marketing strategy is similar to traditional marketing for generic businesses except for one crucial point: what you are offering is directly solving problems. The strategy must make it clear that they need you instead of it being nice to have. From that baseline forward, every aspect of the plan needs to tie back to solving their problems:
- Lessening IT department costs
- Reduction in downtime
- Always having the newest and best features
- Remote issue monitoring
You are a partner in their business, not just another service they can do without; you are indispensable.
How do MSP Marketing and MSP Sales Strategies Differ?
The main difference between an MSP marketing strategy and an MSP sales strategy is where they land in the conversion funnel. It would help to have a clearly defined funnel to attract and close clients when it's time. You have to build trust. Here is an example conversion funnel, known as the AIDA funnel:
- Attention: Providing value and name recognition based on searches, blogs, social media, planting the seed
- Interest: More in-depth, trust building, provide value through customer reviews, case studies, being featured on industry blogs
- Desire: Targeted ads, target commercial keyword phrases to drive traffic
- Action: Free eBook, promo code, limited-time offer
MSP marketing will generally occur in the Attention and Interest zones, whereas MSP sales will be more situated in the Desire and Action zones. Both business segments need to be aligned on an overall strategy for maximum effectiveness.
What is an MSP Marketing Strategy?
Not to oversimplify it, but the core of MSP marketing strategy is defining your target audience and creating engaging content they want to see once you know who; next is figuring out the problem you are solving for them. Why are they going to choose you? Then, design a strategy around the problem you solve, who they are, and where: social media sites, industry blogs, and so on, or physical locations to target before building a concrete strategy.
Why an MSP Marketing Strategy is a Must
Newspaper and television ads are an expensive and dying industry. Internet-based marketing plans offer cheaper, personalized, and easily distributable content across the web. Avenues for reaching new customers and building relationships with existing customers are growing daily. DemandMetric says companies with active blogs produce 67 percent more leads than businesses without. With access to attention at a premium, developing an efficient MSP marketing strategy will catapult you ahead of your competition. Focusing on inbound alone won't cut it; adding a referral program will help keep you on top of mind throughout the decision-making process.
Important MSP Marketing Terminology
Before moving any further, it will be good to clear up any questions about important MSP marketing terminology:
- PPC: Pay-per-click advertisement, Google or Facebook ads
- Content: Blog, social media post
- CTA: Call to Action, ask for an action to take place in a piece of content or webpage
- SEO: Search Engine Optimization is a technique used to rank in search engines
- Lead Nurturing: Value-driven content, or freebies, to help prospects trust you more
- Welcome sequence: new subscribers to an email list, the sequence of emails over a specified time they will receive welcoming you and giving more info about the company
5 MSP Marketing Tactics to Understand
There are plenty of different techniques to use and segments to target, so your MSP marketing strategy could be straightforward or complex depending on where you are in your business marketing journey. Here are five areas to focus on when building your plan.
SEO
The foundation of most MSP marketing strategies will begin with proper SEO. Search engine optimization consists of strategies used through website content to direct search results to your site. Keyword research, page layout, meta title and description, and URL formatting all play an essential factor in the technical aspects of SEO. For example, Google has a way to look at published items. EEAT (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) are guidelines they use to help train people on what to look for when scouring content. SEO paves the wave for the coveted organic search traffic to find your site.
Pay-Per-Click
PPC refers to ads purchased, Google AdWords or Facebook Ads, to show when specific phrases are searched. Then, you pay for that interaction if the person searches and clicks on the sponsored search link. This is a strategy some people use to work with their SEO strategy since it can get traffic quicker than waiting for the time needed for SEO to kick in.
Content, Email, Social Media Marketing
Create topic-specific pieces and then distribute them through various venues. For example, a long-form piece of content like a blog could be broken down and the information used in multiple social media posts or an email campaign. That blog could also be the basis for a video on YouTube or posted on the website. Repurposing is a common practice to get the most out of an idea.
Online Reviews
Search engines are starting to shift from predominately SEO-driven results to including user-generated content. For example, suppose someone creates a YouTube tutorial or LinkedIn article or gives feedback in a Reddit post. In that case, these are all being pushed toward the top of search results because they carry weight from an outsider's perspective.
MSP Website
Getting crystal clear on the offer you provide through engaging website content will keep traffic there reading and clicking through. Search engines track the time you stay on a page and how quickly you move away or click deeper into the site; this all plays a part in how the search algorithms score the quality of a site.
Increase Your Reach with a Solid Marketing Funnel
The time spent mapping out an MSP marketing strategy will pay off once the plan is enacted. The strength of targeted content and valuable offerings, all connected through a common plan, will make you an unstoppable force in the MSP arena. White label Ringlogix's services and confidently establish your brand as an MSP. Contact us today to start your journey.
