Welcome to the third edition of the Marketing with Intent newsletter, by Resultful.
This time, we’re tackling propositions. Arguably one of the most important – and useful – ways to differentiate yourself from the competition.
We’ll be covering some of the challenges that face partners who blend in, with some tips for standing out among a big crowd.
Let me know what you think – and, as always, if you need any help, or just want to chew through some ideas over a 15-minute chat (with no obligation), don’t hesitate to get in touch.
Director & Founder, Resultful
Propositions… why should you care?
Frankly, you should care because end customers care. Now, they might not actually think about it as your proposition – although some will – but your proposition should be obvious from day one.
Whether you’re a “digital transformation partner" or an “award-winning IT support partner” (for example - two of the common ones I see), it should be clear from the moment a prospect lands on your website or social page (just two simple examples!) what it is you offer – and ideally, who you offer it to.
In a world of pigeons, be a flamingo
One of the primary motivators for launching Resultful last year was a frustration that so many partners look and sound the same. There are somewhere between 35,000 - 40,000 IT consultancy businesses in the UK. Sure, a good number of these will be one-person bands, and I’m sure a number of them are registered with Companies House but not even trading.
But even if we reduced that number down to 25,000 active businesses with 5+, that’s a lot of noise.
Standing out in the reseller world is tough. The majority of partners are reselling the same solutions, and, given that these solutions belong first and foremost to third-party vendors, you don’t have much room to talk about them in a unique way.
But you can talk about how you work – how you support customers – the “insert company name here” experience, which I know a lot of partners love to write home about.
Not everybody, for example, can truly say they care. Or they’ll go the extra mile. I mean, don’t get me wrong, many can say it. But any good proposition can be evidenced through customer stories and data.
There are plenty of partners that are getting it right. For me, here are a few off the cuff:
- Bistech’s “Technology that means business”
- Air IT’s “Success through technology”
- Ingentive’s “Built around you”
- Pragmatiq’s “Delivering business outcomes through technology”
- TD SYNNEX's "Making IT personal"
Now, you might think some of these headlines sound generic. And perhaps they do. But it’s the way they evidence them that counts. They’re talking about how they approach working – or the results of working with them – and they’re backing it up with what they do.
We could say we’re the people’s Microsoft marketing agency. But we can’t back it up. There are too many people. Instead, we talk about marketing with intent, and that’s certainly how we work. We’re focused on results, and when you work with us, we won’t just execute marketing for the sake of it. We’re laser-focused on how activity A, B or C contributes to our overall objectives.
Nailing a proposition
Too many partners just stick a generic message on their website – for example, “Digital transformation specialists”. Sure, it explains what you do on the surface, but it doesn’t reveal anything unique about your business or how you approach digital transformation. Not to mention, there are probably dozens of your competitors using the exact same text on their homepage.
It might make sense to you, but if you’re an end customer – and we should always put ourselves in their shoes – how do you choose between twelve or more potential suppliers that all look and sound the same?
It can be so easy to go straight to hero message – what do we want to say? And so many partners start here. But when you go back to basics and think about your mission, purpose and how you want to be perceived, it all starts to fall into place.
For me, it’s important to bring it back to basics – what are your underlying business values? It’s likely you already bring these to life in what you do. So, when you link your value proposition to these (and add in some thinking about customer outcomes), you generally land somewhere you’re comfortable with.
What does a proposition look like?
Typically, a proposition – in its simplest form – is brought to life through two key components: a primary heading message and some supporting text.
The primary heading should be short, snappy and memorable. Your supporting text can be more of a sentence, elaborating on the primary heading.
Beyond that, it should be built out into additional messaging (with proof points). It should inform (and link into) your “about us” copy, your sales pitch decks, and so on. To work, it should be consistent and flow through everything you do. It can’t just sit on the homepage of your website and nowhere else. Instead, it needs to be rolled out across everything - your social posts, sales decks, event collateral and more.
Consistency is key.
Bringing your proposition to life
The words are the easy bit. Bringing it to life is the hard part. And, if you can’t bring it to life, then maybe your proposition isn’t right for where you are right now. If your team can’t confidently talk through it, with examples that come naturally, you’ve probably landed somewhere you’re not ready for.
People are the core part of any service business, so make sure to talk to your broader teams through any proposition development. Generally, they’ll provide some really good insights into what you do, who you are and why you exist – from their eyes – the “boots on the ground”.
Making marketing jargon make sense
This time around, we're looking at "full funnel marketing" - a term used to describe three stages of customers. Now, this isn't the only way to describe this time thing, but it's one of the more common.
Think of a funnel - it's wider at the top and slimmer as we go down. The same can be said for the number of people who are open to engaging in sales conversations - and ultimately ready to buy.
Top of the funnel refers to the "awareness" stage, whereby people are open to engaging with content, but they're generally not aware they have a problem. This stage is all about educating them on the common challenges that people like them face.
Middle of the funnel (the "consideration" stage) is where we start to realise we have a challenge and that we need to find a solution - we start to "consider" our options. They're likely to start researching.
Bottom of the funnel (the "decision stage") is where people start to actively engage in sales conversations. They have much more intent behind their actions. They've possibly identified a solution they want to buy and now they're trying to find the right partner to buy from.
Spotlight: Cloudy Foundation
In this newsletter, we’re spotlighting the Cloudy Foundation, created by CloudyIT, to “change and transform the lives and futures of young people by supporting their access to digital skills opportunities and engaging them with business and the wider community.”
The Cloudy Foundation solves real-world problems through tech, and is supported by Microsoft, leading distributors and businesses like ours.
I’m looking forward to supporting their latest cohort in Manchester in a couple of weeks!
Find out more about what they do here.
About us
We’re Resultful, a Microsoft-focused marketing agency. We’re passionate about three core areas:
- Supporting partner growth
- Increasing partner marketing capability
- Making marketing accessible