Much is said and written about marketing in general. However, eight out of ten marketing recommendations do not apply to tech companies that provide complex products and services. This makes industrial marketing a very special field. So special, in fact, that it truly demands a different vision and approach.
When industrial marketing is used for the right purposes, incredible results can be achieved. To make that happen, you first have to know what works and what absolutely doesn't work. This is why we have created a list of the five most common mistakes and how you can avoid them.
Industrial marketing mistake #1:
The wrong goal
For some entrepreneurs, everything revolves around marketing, including how new products and services are developed. Some entrepreneurs even often use the word marketing as a synonym for ‘promotion’. As an industrial marketing company, If we ask the management or the sales department of the average industrial company why they use marketing, we often get the answer: 'to increase our brand awareness'.
But at what point can you say that you have enough brand awareness?
Visibility
A common mistake made by tech companies is getting started with marketing with the wrong goal in mind. They know the general marketing principles for B2C and B2B and use them as a starting point. This approach is taken in order to create as much ‘visibility’ as possible and to reach as many people as possible.
But visibility alone doesn't win you anything at all.
Tech companies tend to operate in niche markets, and reaching as many people as possible just doesn’t make any sense at all. After all, industrial companies provide specific products and services, meaning that the number of potential customers is also limited.
General marketing principles for B2C and B2B
do not apply to tech companies.
In our view, marketing for the industry has only one goal: to get in contact with potential new customers.
Industrial marketing is emphatically not about reaching as many people as possible, but about purposefully reaching the right people, at the right time, and with the right information. All with a long-term view, particularly because of the length of both the customer journey and the purchase process in the industry.
TIP: As an industrial company, only invest in marketing when you have a concrete and achievable goal in mind.