MSP Marketing: What you should know

Managed services provision (MSP) means that IT support is made accessible to numerous companies, regardless of their size or structure. However, if you don’t have effective MSP marketing, there’s a chance you’ll miss out on opportunities to grow your company through monthly recurring revenue. If your aim is to win more clients, you’ll need an MSP marketing strategy that is well-executed in order to draw in your target customer base and gain sales. Frequently, it is believed by MSPs that sales and marketing activities are the same and/or can be done simultaneously. This isn’t how it works. In reality, MSP marketing refers to a marketing plan that is designed to facilitate sales. How can you best do that? Keep it simple.

Keeping it Simple

In fact, by keeping it simple, Ulistic has expanded its services from the United States, Australia, Canada, and, most recently, the United Kingdom. Traditionally, MSPs and, well, anyone that engages in marketing, seek to find ways that make them appear to be smarter than they actually are. However, the most effective marketing strategy that can be adopted by any company, including MSPs, is to dumb down the message.

One way you can do this is to have your gimmick or purpose front and center on your webpage. That way, site visitors and potential customers know within the first 10 seconds the purpose of your service or product. By making the purpose simple, the message is explicitly clear and ensures that site visitors know exactly what you have to offer them.

Another tool that is beneficial is the assessment of the viability of a working relationship. For example, Ulistic does not guarantee that each notice of interest (such as through filling out the form or chatting with an agent) will lead to a working relationship. It may be that your service doesn’t meet the needs of the customer or their needs are outside your scope. Through a qualification process, you can prevent negative experiences for both you and the customer.

By looking at random MSP webpages, it was noted that most of them have too much information and the information that is provided is irrelevant. Information that was relevant, such as contact information, was mixed up with the other information, making the message lost to site visitors. Site organization, then, is just as important as the message. For instance, you’ll want to have testimonials up top where prospective customers can see your success stories, then a video about what you’re about. Not paragraphs of text, then video and testimonials. The ordering doesn’t show why customers should choose you.

Simplicity is key to an effective marketing strategy. This can be promoted through the placement of text and videos. Equally important is the formatting of the text. For example, contact information and key elements of your offerings should be bold or larger. It’s also a good idea to have them easily found on the webpage. This means that your best marketing isn’t really about what you say, but how you say it. Say it simply. Make it pop. Then, watch your marketing strategy become successful.

Start Marketing

Currently, it’s an exciting time to be in the MSP industry because of the projected growth from 2019 (about $186 billion) to 2025 (estimated to be about $356.24 billion) per Statista. Like most all other industries, one of the hardest parts of being in this industry is marketing and taking advantage of growth opportunities using effective marketing strategies. At its core, MSP marketing, as you know, involves generating interest in your business so that potential customers actually contact you. The same basic principles of business-to-business (B2B) marketing can be applied to MSPs, but, at the same time, there are unique challenges faced by the industry.

Most successful MSP marketing is based on using a mixture of traditional and online marketing strategies. Marketing strategies can be shaped using a buyer persona and local searches may be used to find MSPs for potential customers. MSP marketing is about more than selling services. True marketing in this industry means that you aren’t selling anything, but your MSP is being marketed in such a way that trust is built.

MSP marketing means that you talk to potential customers, meaning, they’re not ready to be sold to and those that are ready already know the technical details of what MSPs can do. The reality is that MSP marketing is about ensuring customers find out as much as possible what the services you offer can do for them. In short, the focus of MSRP marketing should be the communication of value you can provide so that the prospective customer gets where they are ready to be sold on your services.

Although we live in a digital world, word-of-mouth marketing is still powerful. You can take advantage of current customers to garner word-of-mouth advertising as your current customers recount their successes with you to colleagues. This builds a domino effect where new people come to you for services. In fact, this method — word-of-mouth — is preferred by MSPs because current customers already have a trusting relationship and their colleagues have a trusting relationship with them and, by extension, with you or are more likely to trust you. Even with these benefits of word-of-mouth marketing, it’s frequently not enough to create dramatic growth in your company.

So, to get started, promote your MSP using Facebook and LinkedIn daily. This will help generate an audience and build trust. This is the most important thing that you can do prior to establishing a formal marketing strategy. Get to know your potential customers. See what it is they need. Then see how your services meet those needs. See how you create value for them. This shows that you care what they need and how you can help them accomplish their objectives.

You’ve got information for a start to effective MSP marketing. Work on building trust with your potential customers. Make sure your website is simple. But here’s the best option: contact Ulistic — a trusted digital marketing firm.