At Dell, we’re investing in solutions to meet the dynamic needs of our customers, and one of the ways we are doing that is by building a world-class channel program.
We could list awards from around the globe like CRN’s Best Companies to Partner With, GTDC 2011 Rising Star Award, Computer Partner World Top 100 IT Supplier or SME Channels Top SME Solutions Vendor, to prove this; but doesn’t it make more sense to hear about it straight from our partners?
That’s what led us to invite some of them to be our guests here on Direct2Dell. The first one to raise their hand was Paranet Solutions, an IT Outsourcing Company. Quinn Devery is the Digital Marketing and Channel Sales Manager at Paranet where he manages the company’s online content creation and Dell Partnership relationship.
We appreciate his willingness to share and hope Paranet’s tips for leveraging Dell’s PartnerDirect program will be helpful. And, if you’re a Dell Global Commercial Channels partner who would like to contribute, just let us know in the comments and we’ll be in touch!
Most businesses are under pressure to increase their revenue in 2012 with limited time, resources and money. You probably already have existing campaigns running but in my experience cold calling is very time intensive with a low payoff, social media is easy but hard to generate ROI, and conferences are expensive at best. Traditional outbound marketing methods are getting harder and less effective every day. That’s why I wanted to share an inbound marketing technique that’s increased the number of leads my team generates by 100%.
At Paranet, we work to develop and improve our inbound marketing strategy and a big part of that strategy is content creation. Now I know half of you think content creation isn’t worthwhile and the other half think you don’t have the time to create original, interesting digital content. That’s where Dell comes in, the Dell partner portal give you access to hundreds of whitepapers, product sheets, and case studies that prospects love. Follow the steps outlined in this blog and you too will be on your way to getting more leads each month without using your budget.
Find the Asset you are Looking For
The first task is finding a Digital asset that your prospects would be interested in downloading and reading. If one of your core offerings is disaster recovery then you might want to look at the EqualLogic and VMware Site Recovery Manager Installation and Configuration guide Dell put together. If your services are more aligned to Networking, Workstations or Servers then find the most relevant case studies or solution guides in the partner portal.
Two Dell Assets I found on the Dell Partner Portal
Add It To Your Website
Once you have identified the asset or assets that best suit your services you need to put that asset behind a form on your website. If your website runs on a Content Management System platform like SharePoint, Hubspot, Drupal or WordPress then this should be fairly easy. It is important that you use an asset that your prospects would be interested in sharing their contact information for in order to get document. Product datasheets are usually not effective because of their availability on corporate sites.
You should balance the amount of information requested against the value of the asset. The less valuable an asset the less contact information should be required to download the asset. Expect a lower conversion ratio from pages that require more information from the prospect before downloading. Here is an example of our EqualLogic and Site Recovery Manager Landing Page.
Market the Assets in your Channels
Now that you’ve finally added the whitepaper or case study to your website you can start marketing the offer. I’ve included some of the more common methods we use at Paranet.
Website
You can add a call to action to a relevant page on your website to help convert a higher percentage of existing website traffic. For example, we added the EqualLogic Site Recovery manager to our virtualization page.
On twitter you can send a compelling tweet for your new digital asset to all of your followers. You can also extend your reach by adding relevant “Hash Tags” to your posts. Here is an example of a post using hash tags.
If your company has a Facebook page you should share the website page you added your whitepaper to with your fans.
Google+
Although a newer network, Google+ has the benefit of fewer competitors. Like Facebook, you can share your offer with your followers as well as the public.
If you have a newsletter that goes out to your customer or prospects you should add a link to your landing page to leverage your user base.
Conversion and Lead Nurturing
If you’ve picked a highly sought after asset and taken the time to market your offering you will get lead conversions. Unlike other leads that come to your site requesting a bid or quote these leads are earlier in their buying cycle. You will need to nurture these leads by sending periodic emails with compelling calls to action to entice them. Unlike other leads that may be price shopping, nurtured leads will often work exclusively with your firm once you have established authority in their area of interest.
Rinse, Repeat, Monitor
There really is no limit to how many assets you can use to increase the number of leads you get. To start I would pick one asset and focus on driving traffic to your landing page and developing a compelling series of 3 to 5 lead nurturing emails to help them convert. You’ll want to review the number of visitors reaching your landing page and the ratio at which they convert. If your conversion ratio is below 5% you’ll want to tweak your page to improve conversions.
http://www.paranet.com/vcenter-site-recovery-mananger-config-and-install-guide/