IT Marketing on the cheap
(Full disclosure, I'm an IT Sales and Marketing Consultant, and by a miraculous coincidence, you can contact me here - hello@davefrancisconsulting.com)
If you're running an IT development company in the UK, you'll have realised one thing - Sales and Marketing is expensive.
标准理论认为，在英国受到生活成本危机打击的时候，你应该把营业额的10-15%用于营销你的业务(有些模型认为你应该把利润的20%用于营销), increased wage demands by staff, 软件开发的市场减少，来自成本更低的海外开发公司的竞争加剧, 事实可能会证明，你根本不可能找到那么多钱来推广你的公司并推动销售.
At the same time, if you don't invest a large proportion of your company revenue, you may find work drying up, of course. 最大的风险是，你只看了一眼成本——或者别人告诉你的成本是多少——然后什么也不做. As that's "safer". Not in the long run, it isn't.
Tricky, isn't it ?
Do I have to spend so much money ?
Er, no. Absolutely not.
It might come as a relief to you to find out that, if properly handled, you don't have to spend a fortune on marketing your IT business.
“10%到15%的收益”这个经常被引用的数字是错误的原因在于... it's a generic quote.
Looking on the internet, and Linkedin in particular, 你会注意到有大量的自由营销人员和SEO专家都试图向你推销一项服务.
"I wanna be Number 1 !!!"
Yes, you can indeed be number 1 on a search engine for your keyword terms. If you throw enough money at it. You can bring in SEO specialists to optimise your site content six ways from Sunday. At a cost.
What you'll then find is that your competition can step in, pay Google some money, and appear above you in the search rankings. All those "sponsored" Google entries appear above yours, you drop down to page 2 or 3 in the search rankings, and - no matter how good your SEO is or how much money you've spent on SEO services, 你已经输掉了这场游戏，因为你的客户自然不会一路导航到你的入口.
So that didn't work. Despite what all the SEO experts told you. Whilst selling you a service which the internet claimed you needed.
你还会发现谷歌的算法识别出谁在为他们花钱，花了多少钱，什么时候花钱. If, for some reason, they stop spending an expected amount every month, 谷歌似乎把他们的搜索排名拉低了，直到他们重新开始花钱.
Basically, it's become a "let's see who can burn the most money". As that's the way Google makes a profit. It's a business, after all.
You don't wanna be Number 1. It'd be nice if you were, indeed, Number 1. But you'll pay for it, and if you're a small company, paying to be Number 1 is overkill and a very bad (in fact, almost fatal) return on investment. You want to expend just enough to keep your developers busy, and to provide a nice little pipeline of future work.
"Everything is monetised"
当你着眼于销售和市场营销时，你很快就会意识到那里的一切都是货币化的. Want good exposure on a rating site like Clutch or Business of Apps ? Bring money. Want to increase your Domain Authority via backlinks ? Same thing. PPC campaign ? Google Ads ? Linkedin Ads ? Cold mailing or calling ?
Absolutely everything will cost you. 这实际上是一个投资回报的问题:你必须花一些钱让你的名字在那里——除非你是那些相信你可以不用汽油开汽车的人之一——所以.
"How do you market your IT business for less ? "
Going back to basics
Let's return to that "10-15% proportion of revenue" figure, above.
You might start by asking where the figure comes from. Truth be told, I couldn't answer you. It's a generalisation, 老实说，市场营销涉及的领域非常广泛，你真的没有办法对你在这方面的花费给出一个通用的数字.
You can't compare, for example, 一家通过互联网销售女士时装的公司，与一家从事金融科技的专业IT开发公司合作. To put a blanket figure on marketing spend is completely ridiculous.
Well, 除非你是一名专业的自由市场营销人员或代理，你可以在互联网上指出一个通用的数字，并对IT公司说, you should be spending this.
So. Given all the above - how do you market your small IT development company effectively, efficiently and drive more sales and therefore profit ?
既然我是一名自由IT销售和营销顾问，我就不需要绞尽脑汁了，让我给你两个想法来思考一下. They won't cost you much to implement, although the trade off is that they will cost you some time and effort.
First class blog content
Google ranks sites with good, authoritative, well written content very highly. Yes, 你将无法解决谷歌赞助内容在搜索引擎上压倒你的长期问题, 但你肯定会提高你的搜索引擎排名和域名权威作为好的结果, well written, properly hyperlinked content which you encourage others to share.
Besides all that, it produces a professional looking website. 任何偶然发现的人，如果他们看到你所做的努力，并且碰巧对你感兴趣，他们就会对你的公司有更多的参与, trustworthy, knowledgeable and insightful human beings.
A word about blog content on IT websites. Ignore this at your peril.....
If you sit back at night with a can of fizzy lager, 看了Benson和Hedges的一份报告后，我想写一篇全球最大的博彩平台JIT编译器优缺点的技术文章, object oriented programming or PostgreSQL database transactions......... don't. Please. Don't.
Because. Technical posts attract developers only to your website.
Developers don't buy software.
技术帖子是有时间和地点的，通常是在Stack Overflow这样的地方. "What are you trying to do ? " - attract buyers. 你的网站流量可能会因为你发布了一篇全球最大的博彩平台一些技术细节的杰作而飙升, 但是对于那些想让你帮他们开发软件的人来说，这并没有什么意义. Actually, it'll possibly have the diametric opposite effect.
Think of the commercial uses for your software, reference past customers, add quotes, put in relevant hyperlinks, come across as helpful, friendly, knowledgeable, trustworthy and ... normal, 适应能力强的人，即使不是IT行业的人也会觉得和他们做生意很舒服.
It'll cost you time to sit back and write a blog, 你可能想要考虑聘请一个外部写手(我当时给出了什么暗示)——时间是花钱的交换.
Oh yes. Don't use AI to generate your articles. Because "read what it produces". Which is basically, poor quality, questionable copy. By all means use it to generate a framework or basic idea, 但是，没有人情味的文章不会像由人写的文章那样有冲击力和效果.
At least not at the moment.
Networking
Here's "part 2 of Dave Reveals All".
"What are you trying to achieve with Sales and Marketing ?"
"You're trying to reach decision makers."
"How ?"
"Primarily by the internet and email."
让我请你坐下来，问你自己一个问题——你一天收到多少封邮件 ? 你该如何处理那些你不想听到的人发来的大量邮件，这些邮件试图向你出售你不想要的商品和服务 ?
You junk them. "Move to spam." "Block sender".
Any emails can be blocked. “营销”指的是发送A/B副本，并找出哪一份副本的打开率和点击率最高. It also says send out three mails at, say, weekly spaced intervals.
Just like everyone else does. 如果你要发送成千上万封邮件并出售鞋子之类的东西，这可能没问题. Not so good for specialised IT development services. Point of fact, 你可能会惹恼一小部分听众，他们会因为你和其他人一样令人不快而屏蔽你.
Fact: any decision maker can block or ignore you 直到你真的和他们一起站在一个房间里参加某种形式的社交活动，手里拿着不新鲜的丹麦糕点和一杯廉价的塑料咖啡.
Networking is by far and away the cheapest, 与最终会购买你的软件或服务的人交谈的最有效和最经济的方式. If you're near a major city like London, Birmingham or Manchester, there will be countless numbers of opportunities advertised on Eventbrite or Meetup advertised every month. There are trade shows at places like the NEC , Olympia or Manchester Central. There are specialist organisations - some of which charge membership fees, such as Manchester Digital or local Chambers of Commerce.
There are also a large number of professional networking organisations such as Business Network International and if you're feeling adventurous, 有各种各样的国际贸易博览会和展览，你可以在那里进行团队活动, and come back worse for wear with 200 dodgy cigarettes and an exotic hangover. Great team day out.
Occam's razor - the simplest solution is the best. Get out there. Get the business cards printed, QR code on the back. 与那些会购买你的软件的人交谈，并且无法摆脱交谈.
Back them into a corner. Don't forget the breath freshener spray.
Get in touch
For these, and more helpful hints on how to get more sales without financial ruination, feel free to mail me at hello@davefrancisconsulting.com With 30 years in the IT business, I've seen it all done wrong so many times that I now know how to do it right.
合理的价格和零废话-免费的初步咨询-随时乐意交谈.
Hope you found this useful !
