With the current pace of technology, invention, innovation, and software development, there are few industries more lively and competitive than the tech industry.
From software development to IT support to cloud hosting services, there are thousands of small to medium tech companies across the country and several dozen larger enterprises all competing for the attention of online consumers.
Some tech companies offer primarily B2B solutions while others offer services and software directly to the masses of individual consumers.
Tech companies can be focused on any pursuit from manufacturing programs to visual art creation and everything in between. So what exactly do almost all tech companies have in common?
An interesting challenge when it comes to inbound marketing. The marketing department of any tech company must walk a fine line between professional jargon and carefully softening the message for non-technician customers.
In other industries, it's easy to simply show off expertise with how-to videos and tutorials but when it comes to tech, there is always a tough decision as to how specific to get, how much detail to explain, or whether you should just show the customers how it works and leave it at that.
Whether you have been struggling to build a marketing campaign or are just looking for a few new marketing ideas, we have ten fun suggestions ready for catchy tech inbound marketing.
Among the many uses of inbound marketing is the ability to humanize your brand and product, something that is often particularly difficult for tech companies.
While there will be plenty of opportunities to showcase your product, brand, and positive company policies, don't forget to put a human face or several human faces on your inbound marketing campaigns.
Encourage your staff members to write a little content, get involved in the social media campaign, or even interview them on video to show the real people behind the software.
Unless your clientele are fellow engineers who expect to see a lot of technical expertise displayed in your marketing copy, chances are that your customers care more about how your product works than why it works the way it does.
Rather than jumping straight into the jargon and behind-the-scenes explanations, instead try focusing on how the product is used and, most importantly, how it has already helped others in specific industry situations.
When your customers can see their own business or needs reflected in success stories you share, they will also have an easier time imagining how much easier their work will be with the help of your product.
While the term inbound marketing has come to mean a lot of things, it's important to remember that the central purpose is to make use of SEO to provide customers and potential customers with information they will be searching for.
For tech companies, this will mean that your most common search engine keywords are probably going to relate to people looking for how to use your product in specific ways.
This might happen early in the conversion process, as people try to determine if your product is right for them, and then later after purchase as customers look for specific techniques to use your product.
By providing fun tutorials in the form of blog articles and videos, you can simultaneously achieve useful SEO, help your customers, and do some very effective inbound marketing.
Want to create useful marketing content from customers who already know, love, and understand your products? One fun way to do this is to step out onto your social media platforms and play a few trivia games.
Post polls and surveys and pose discussion questions that intrigue, entertain, and inspire your online audience to discuss your products.
You can use trivia questions like "which feature would you use to....?" with multiple choice answers or pose even more engaging open-ended questions like challenging your customers to share how they might solve complex or unique problems with your software.
This is not only a fun game, it's also a great advertisement for your product's versatility and features.
Tech companies are in a unique situation when it comes to choosing how to use inbound marketing and social videos.
While you can put real people on screen, your customers are also pretty used to dealing with you primarily through UI, icons, and graphics.
You can play to this brand identity theme by creating amusing and high-tech videos like white-board animations or even content delivered by adorable cartoons depending on your audience and brand personality.
One could easily say that the FAQ was the first type of inbound marketing ever created, long before we realized that inbound marketing was an official 'thing'.
This is where customers go when they have a question about your product before dialing customer service and, after search engines became a part of our daily lives,
FAQs used to be the most visited pages in response to literal frequently asked customer questions.
Therefore, now that we are in the age of inbound marketing, why not use these well-trodden customer service pathways to create a little SEO and provide more detailed answers by combining your FAQ and blog.
Speaking of blogging, many tech companies find themselves torn between the desire to share all the really neat ways their product works behind the scenes and simplifying the marketing content for the non-tech majority of consumers.
For those who love to write the most technical content possible, rest assured, there is a place for that.
With the right tags and categorization, you can write detailed technical articles to your heart's content, there to please your most technically skilled customers who are interested in what's under the hood.
Of course, with your urge to show off the data sated with technical articles, don't forget to use the same tagging and categorization techniques to write jargon-free copy for your non-technical audiences.
From individual consumers to managers who just want their software to work, make sure to showcase features, UI, and use cases while carefully leaving all the fun technical details for your articles targeted at fellow engineers and developers.
Finally, don't forget that as much as you love to share the wonderful qualities, features, and uses of your product, that your customers also have something to add.
By asking for and sharing user-created content, you are showing your online community that their opinions, thoughts, experiences, and solutions matter a great deal.
In fact, because you designed your product for a few specific purposes, you might even discover that your customers have found uses for your software that you didn't even realize were possible.
Marketing a tech company can be challenging, but it doesn't have to be. With a positive attitude and a clear brand identity, you can use everything from your FAQ to the creative minds of your customers to enhance your inbound marketing reach and effectiveness.
For more ideas on how to inbound market your tech company, contact us today!