My new client was disappointed with his former marketing consultant. He expressed frustration that they weren’t making enough progress. They needed to try something new. They asked me to audit their past marketing activities and to make a recommendation. I had two words for them: warm introductions.
The client is a B2B supplier to light industrial businesses to help manage maintenance departments. They tried advertising, email marketing, and blogging, and all of them built awareness but not enough leads.
One suggestion I had was they look for ways they could help non-competitive business who also want to reach people in manufacturing by partnering with them. We created a small alliance of several companies, and we looked at everyone’s client list. Each firm agreed to make ten warm introductions to the two other alliance members.
Getting Warmer
The results helped my client because they were quickly getting to the right person through a warm introduction. Instead of bombarding people with messages, a human being said, hey Jane – I want to introduce you to my friend James who might be able to help you with a problem I observe with your maintenance challenges. Warms introduction can quickly lead to meetings and there can be powerful results from a strategic alliance.
A warm introduction can make the difference between being heard versus being ignored.
Three Action Steps:
- Who do you know who targets the same type of company? Identify a few companies.
- Can you reach out to them and see if they are open to sharing introductions? Make it clear that you don’t compete with them since you offer different products and services and you share a common target.
- Work hard to help your colleagues in the alliance, so they will work hard for you. Go the extra mile. Learn about their services so you can speak with some knowledge and authority.
Maybe it is time to come out of the world of cold calls into a warmer world.
You can set up a time to chat with me about your marketing challenges using my calendar. Email me jeffslater@themarketingsage.com Call me. 919 720 0995. Visit my website at www.themarketingsage.com The conversation is free, and we can explore working together.
Photo by Maarten van den Heuvel on Unsplash
