local media insider

Why we are terrible at marketing ourselves

Alisa Cromer
Posted
Seeing the Light? B2B marketing has great possibilities for local media that get in the game.

Local media companies that dominate their markets and attract millions in advertising dollars often hit a creative block when it comes to marketing their own company.

This is true even for when marketing a new and  fast growing revenue stream - sales of digital products and services.

This may seem counter-intuitive, but it's also true. Here are seven reasons why media fail here - and one dirt simple solution to get a handle on B2B marketing  in 2014. 

1. "We don't need to" 

The long-standing idea that a broadcaster or newspaper is its own promotional vehicle - after all, everybody already knows the major media in town - is hard to dislodge. If the market needs to know about new-found digital expertise, well, that's what house ads and sales people are for. 

Really? Here's how one media company asks prospects to log-in for a free consultation:

Which leads to:

How do you invite your prospects to call or email?

2. No clear understanding about what marketing is

A good working definition  of marketing from Wikipedia is  communicating value to help make a sale. It could mean getting on a board of directors or sending out a press release, but new forms of marketing include inbound lead generation. 

Media companies are so used to direct sales, that inbound marketing is not clearly understood, and thus, marketing is perceived as something mushy and untrackable. No wonder marketers are the first to be laid off! What if your company produced the free e-book that your local merchants were using to begin to understand digital marketing?

Here's an example of an ebook that captures leads for 2060 Digital, the inhouse agency of Hubbard media, featured in this week's case study.

3. Lack of clarity about message

Local media messaging is tired and often out of sync with one-to-one, more conversational mediums. 

Most of what we see is: "Our station/broadcast talent is awesome," "Newspapers are still dominant," "We sell these new products, "  and more recently  "If you buy a subscription on a tablet, you can also access it on your desktop"  with a picture of a bunch of devices, aimed at subscribers.

While subscriber-oriented advertising has utility,  campaign messages that pat the media company on its collective head over and over again are not going to cut it.

Keep in mind  this quote from Peter Drucker: "The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself."

To create messaging that inspires merchants to want to buy, know what they are thinking. Just for starters, using the name of the city lets them know it's local and "for them." Hubbard Radio's inhouse agency, 2060 Media, brands itself as "Cincinatti's Social Media Agency." That's a lot better than "WKRQ's Digital Marketing." 

4. Expertise in B2C digital marketing - but a strong need for B2B  digital marketing

Local media are both B2C and B2B marketers. In fact, big teams of  B2B direct sellers - otherwise known as account executives or digital strategists -  have years of expertise in B2B direct sales, but typically in B2C marketing.  Rarely is a true B2B digital marketer available in any media company.

5. Content marketing solutions relatively new

Sponsored updates on LinkedIn, a great way to reach targeted advertisers, only launched in August 2013 - long after the availability of Facebook's sponsored updates. Even the most progressive media's company pages on  LinkedIn are still full of "business news" instead of marketing tips and opportunities.

There is also a perception that local advertisers don't use LinkedIn, which is true of entrepreneurs  in very small markets and niches, but not in  large or mid-sized markets, and in the case doctors, attorneys, general managers, mid-level marketing managers and younger employees. Like other groups, this audience has fragmented and marketing can reach them on a variety of platforms.

6. No one assigned 

With the exception of a sales administrator sending emails  and flyers, there is usually no one assigned to create commercial marketing aimed at merchants via social media, targeted advertising or other digital channels. Expertise aside, someone has to have the job!

7. No budget, not enough resources

If marketing is perceived as "getting the brand out there" it is just another expense and "thing to do." 

But when marketing is linked to lead capture programs, as it can be, this becomes an investment opportunity.

What's the conversion rate of a warm lead?  The average annual value customer? What  percentage of email opt-ins for digital information will attend a work shop?

Knowing the value of a lead will help define the level of resources and ROI required.

A simple solution

We've given you seven reasons why your B2B marketing is probably inadequate. Now here is one easy solution: Make your media a paying client of your inhouse digital services.

If  you don't yet have a digital agency or some other initiative to sell digital services,  we  have recommended you start one by 2014. 

Consider making your media a corporate client of your inhouse services, rather than a house account. The executive team needs to work as hard as a client as they would if they were paying their own budget dollars. And the agency dividion will not perceive company requests as high end charity with unlimited needs.

A side benefit is the ability to sell B2B expertise to merchants. Why not show them how to recruit via LinkedIn?  Create lead gen E-papers via Hubspot? Manage sponsored updates for a law or accounting firm? Business journals take note: When local media start to understand B2B digital marketing, they will be playing in your sandbox!

To get started thinking about B2B marketing tactics, check out these Seven Steps to Using LinkedIn to develop advertising leads.

The author, Alisa Cromer is publisher of a variety of online media, including LocalMediaInsider and  MediaExecsTech,  developed while on a fellowship with the Reynolds Journalism Institute and which has evolved into a leading marketing company for media technology start-ups. In 2017 she founded Worldstir.com, an online magazine,  to showcases perspectives from around the  world on new topic each month, translated from and to the top five languages in the world.

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