Until this “bump” in the road, they didn’t need a Customer Development effort.  Their users sold their software for them.  Until that wasn’t enough.

They sell research paper formatting software to college students. They grew into the market leader of a small but healthy niche and word-of-mouth took care the rest, until it didn’t.

Or the software developer selling flat-rate pricing software to contractors in a very crowded market that wanted more leads.  Or the software developer selling wire EDM CAD/CAM software to machine tool manufacturers that needed to grow sales. Or the software developer that sells small scale ERP software to golf course maintenance departments. . .

There comes a time for every software business when you need more than word-of-mouth; when you want to grow faster than your referrals can take you.

The paper formatting software firm invited me in to be their Virtual Director of Customer Development. This is pretty normal.  Other times I’m invited in simply to generate leads.

I asked a lot of questions, talked to handful of customers and went through the process of searching for the type of software they build – – including a lot of time using their website as well as their competitors’.

The news was mostly good. Their customers loved them and their website made it relatively easy to buy. But…

Their website didn’t do much more than provide a way for people who had the product recommended to them buy. If you weren’t there because someone said you HAVE a buy their software chances are you wouldn’t buy their software. They weren’t telling their story. And they had a good one!  The Google Adwords campaign had been running essentially unattended since it was first installed. While it was generating sales, the cost per sale was $26.19 (on a $29.95 product). Ouch!

Plus, they weren’t in conversation with their customers. No real engagement. They dearly loved their customers, they bend over backwards for them, but there was no ongoing communication – – no engagement. No relationship building.

The happy ending is that every semester since we started working together has been the biggest semester in the company’s history (the business spikes twice a year at the beginning of each college semester).

So, how did we do it? We made a couple of big changes: we fixed their website; we fixed their Adwords campaign; we started communicating with their loyal customer base on a regular basis. But mostly, we started chipping away on a weekly basis at all things marketing – – the dozens of little things that make or break the customer experience.

I doubt we’ll ever be finished (are you ever finished?), but what they’re spending on marketing has actually gone down, sales are up and continue to grow, their story is being told much more clearly and more students each semester are telling their friends and classmates what a fantastic piece of software the company makes.

I’d say clearly, the quality of their marketing has caught up with the quality of what they sell. And when that happens, look out!

. . .and what about the client with the flat-rate pricing software?  A refined message, cleaner website, improved prospecting system and better sales follow-up and their marketing has caught up to the quality of their software.  Which has meant more, better quality leads.  My CAD/CAM client?  Cleaned up site and message and more people through it has translated into more business.

The problem with so much software is everybody’s saying the same thing about ease of use and user experience, so it becomes a feature arms race.  I’ve had success really digging into why people are buying (the buyers’ perceptions, not yours!) and telling THAT story.  This cuts through the clutter and speaks to people on a more direct, powerful level.  

I’d be happy to explore how we can help you do that. Send me an email or call my cell at 602–369–1009. If you’d like talk to any of these owners, I’d be happy to share contact information.

. . .and, oh, how about my golf course maintenance software client??  They generated more prospects in six months than they had in the previous three years.  And sales doubled.

This is the “story” contractors are up against before their estimator steps one foot inside a prospect’s home.

That’s what’s so great about referrals. A friend or neighbor used you and you did great work.  So 90% of the risk is taken out of the decision to hire you for the homeowner.

What’s not so great is when a contractor wants to grow faster than his referrals will take him.  

You’re forced to start with the big-scary-guy story with prospects instead of the my-friend-used-you-and-is-happy story.  Big difference.  And that was the story we had to overcome for this remodeling contractor.  Nobody cared about their new nifty patented material until they got past the big-scary-guy story in their head.

I told the client I’ll build a marketing program that builds trust, and your salespeople can talk about your new nifty patented material. Because if we can’t build trust, there won’t be any prospects to talk to about your new nifty patented material.

So that’s a we did. We told their story in very traditional ways, but with a very non-traditional message. We let people know we understood how they felt about contractors. We told them that we would work hard to gain their trust. We told them exactly how the process would work; what they could expect. We told them that remodeling is major construction and major construction can be difficult sometimes. We told them we’re not perfect.  And we told them if they’re not happy, if we make a mistake, we’ll fix it.

We did our best to bring up and head off all the things that every contractor knows are in the minds of their prospects.  Except nobody else was talking to people this way.

We also gave them videos of happy customers and of the owners in the field checking jobs.

We. Built. Trust. In every piece of mail we sent, in every ad we placed, on every door hanger that was hung and on every page of their website.

Sure, quality is important.  So is your knowledge and experience. Yet, I’ve never met a contractor who didn’t talk about how much they care about quality and how much they know about their profession.

So how do people if you didn’t come from a referral? They buy from trust and comfort level. Sure, some people buy price alone. But you don’t want them and I don’t want to attract them for you.

Do you want to grow faster than your referrals are taking? I’d be happy to explore how we can help you do that. Send me an email or call my cell at 602–369–1009.

What do you do when the company you wanted to build, the thing you wanted to become, just isn’t selling?  Admit it and pivot!!

Which is where this corporate training startup was when they first reached out to me. They were less than a year old and had unsuccessfully marketed themselves as a complete training solution; from time management and business writing to conflict resolution. If you had a training need, they could satisfy it.

The only problem I saw with this was it put them squarely in competition with much larger, more established training providers. When I asked the owner what the company did best – – what he felt they offered that was better than anything else available – – he said “well that’s easy, business writing training.”

The strategy then became to focus on that as their “Trojan Horse.” With the expectation that once inside an organization with this training, they could ask the question, “what other kinds of training needs can we help you with?”

After interviewing a handful of their target customers (CEOs and directors of training of mid-market sized companies) we chose direct mail as the method to reach out to this group and started a coordinated, multiple touch campaign.

The campaign worked so well promoting business writing training that the company has never had to ask the question “what other kinds of training needs can we help you with?”

Please watch the video by Jonathan Clark, the owner of the company. He says it all. But my favorite story is a COO telephoned Jonathan with one of our letters still in her hand. She basically hired him on the spot. When he asked “but don’t you want to know what my fee is first? She said “if you can teach my people to write as well as this letter is written, we’ll figure out a price that works for both of us – – let’s worry about that later.”

I’ve been Jonathan’s Virtual Director of Marketing ever since. And 2013 was the best year of his career.

Precious time and money are wasted not accepting something this fundamental to your business could be wrong. That’s natural, it’s human. It’s daunting to think that something so basic as why you’re different just isn’t working. In Jonathan’s situation we had to first determine whether the problem was what they we’re saying or how they were saying it. You know, is the problem people aren’t interested in what you’re selling or that people just don’t know (your story isn’t getting through – – isn’t being heard)? We determined that it was the latter, and started chipping away at it.

I’d be happy to explore how we can help you understand more about your market situation and how to move it forward. Send me an email (hamilton@hamiltonwallace.com) or call my cell at 602–369–1009.