Companies Can't Live on Referrals Alone, So You'd Better Learn Some Marketing Skills

“Are you a binge marketer?” asked Chris Wiser, CEO of TechSquad, of attendees at the Managed Services Community meeting during ChannelCon. Are you successful when you binge diet if you’re trying to lose weight? No, because as soon as you go off the diet, the weight comes back. To be successful, you need a plan, he said.

It’s the same with marketing in the IT channel. “Always start with a 90-day plan and make it something you can do,” said Wiser.

The majority of companies grow by referral, but you can’t control your business if you live off referrals. He offered a series of quick marketing tips for channel firms:

1. Have your phones answered by a real human.
2. Create a landing page with a signup form and offer a free report. Use social media ads to push people to the landing page. Don’t forget to look at negative ad words in order to better target your leads.
3. Hold in-person seminars to drive leads.
4. Write a book to cement your image as an expert.
5. Plan eight to 12 events or tactics every month, like a newsletter, seminar or ad. These will drive leads, which then enable sales.
6. Buys leads from Hoovers.com.
7. Learn to be a better prospector on LinkedIn.

Wiser spends about $900 to  $1200 a month on Google AdWords. If you count his two full-time marketing staffers and a few other activities, he spends about $7,000 a month on marketing.

Plan, execute and build systems — that’s the motto for his own marketing, according to Wiser.

Lisa Fasold is CompTIA's senior communications director.