Do you feel like creating a marketing plan is an impossible task? We hear you. Residential and commercial/industrial manufacturers often have a set of unique challenges when it comes to marketing.
To help you get started, we came up with a list of some of the most common challenges manufacturers encounter and how to overcome them.
Tactical Uncertainty
There are so many options when it comes to marketing tactics – social media, websites, direct mail, and more. Deciding which to utilize may seem daunting, especially regarding the technology you may not be used to. It can be overwhelming since each marketing tool requires a different game plan and can be used to reach different audiences.
Solution
There’s nothing wrong with giving a couple of different marketing tools a shot. For example, you could focus on a blog and social media. Or you could choose direct mail and social media. The goal is to build your brand and get leads familiarized with you and your services.
Today’s buyers like to do a lot of research before making a choice, and they want information that is readily available at their convenience. That means regardless of the marketing tools you use, they need to direct leads to a website. This website should be easy to navigate, capture lead information, and provide leads with lots of useful information.
Long Sales Cycles
Residential and commercial/industrial manufacturers have a longer and more complex sales cycle than other industries. Other industries may be able to capitalize on impulse buyers to give them business. These shoppers can be attracted through a PPC campaign or targeted ads on social media. Unfortunately, that’s not the case for your business.
Solution
To be honest, there isn’t a way to shorten the sales cycle. But once you have a consistent marketing plan in place, you’ll be able to more accurately predict how long it will take to close a deal from each campaign, and you’ll be able to plan accordingly.
Following Up With Leads
Attracting leads is the easy part of marketing. What you do with them afterward is difficult. Since home product manufacturers need to spend more time building up trust and confidence with their leads, you need to have a solid follow-up strategy.
Solution
There are a lot of ways you can follow up with your leads. You can create an email list that
keeps in touch with all of your leads through a drip campaign. You can also set reminders to call them monthly or quarterly. It would help if you also had a similar plan in place with past clients and referral partners – automation is critical here to simplify the process.
Short On Time
You have so much to do, and marketing sometimes has to take a backseat to more pressing issues. The trouble is, when you don’t market, your business does not grow as quickly or consistently as you’d like.
Solution
As we mentioned before, automate as much of the content and marketing materials as you can. You can also hire a specialist to do the hard work for you. If you’d like more information on strategic marketing initiatives that are specific to your manufacturing firm, please feel free to call us at 828.328.8956. We would certainly enjoy speaking with you.