Boost your Lead Conversion with Content Marketing

Hi!

Welcome to Sparksense's Newsletter! Every month, I personally bring insights to fuel your sales strategies, drive business growth, and succeed on your entrepreneurial journey. Sparksense has grown into a talented 25+ Business Development Advisor team to serve ambitious Deep Tech Entrepreneurs.

YOU HAVE developed a great tech solution and are ready to sell.?

But YOU DON’T have customers knocking at your door begging you to sell them your solution? Of course not. The hard reality is that getting prospects’ attention and maintaining it to drive conversions can feel daunting.?

Let’s accelerate your sales & ensure your efforts are rewarded.?

Imagine content tailored for your startup utilised in most effective inbound marketing channels.

Imagine content marketing effectively mixed with outbound efforts.

Imagine a clear path that guides you from gaining attention to driving conversions.

Imagine no more.

Turn interest into engagement and prospects into customers.

Every decision maker you’re trying to engage with spends 90% of their working life in F.E.A.R. They are: Frustrated, Evasive, Apathetic and Risk averse. - Paul Cash, Rooster Punk

5 Rules Tech Entrepreneurs should follow for content marketing

Outbound marketing & sales are great and necessary! You dig through your network e.g. Linkedin & co. to get some target names. You reach out to them, email or chat, for a chance to sell your solution. It’s an important step, but has some flaws:

• You spend most of your time establishing first contacts
• You are interrupting your audience in their day-to-day business
• Missing problems where your solution could be of greater value
• Very low sales conversion rate and huge time spent

That’s why you shouldn’t focus ALL your efforts on outbound strategies. Save time and effort to drive conversions!

If you have more money than brains, you should focus on Outbound Marketing. If you have more brains than money, you should focus on Inbound Marketing. - Guy Kawasaki

To start with inbound marketing, consider key characteristics of one’s early stage Startups, as it affect the content marketing strategy:

• Mostly unknown to your target market
• Still validating and discovering real market needs
• Time-to-revenues and acquiring new customers is key
• Cannot afford fully fledged digital marketing campaigns

Before we dive in… be careful! Your target is NOT the Innovation Manager, who is scouting for innovative ideas. Your target persona is the Business Manager busy tackling day-to-day operations, who has probably lived many years with the Status Quo. When the target decides to solve a problem, one wants tangible benefits: increased sales, reduced cost or improved quality.

Now, let’s dive into the practical rules to follow:

#1 Make your content relevant to your target audience

Know-Your-Customer with empathy. Focus on understanding your target market needs, problems and expectations. Work out various options to address this issue incl. your solution. But keep it low-key on branding and hard selling.

#2 Build credibility and trust

Working in F.E.A.R., the Decision Maker is concerned by the risk of working with you as a new supplier. Testimonials and facts from pilots, existing customers, research partners or opinion leaders increase your credibility.

#3 Illustrate your content

You should grab attention through relevant pictures or visuals. Licence-free pictures and video material can be found on Pexels, Unsplash, Pxhere and many more on a pay-for-licence e.g. shutterstock & co.

#4 Your Call To Action

Prepare your Call To Action well before your content marketing release. Keep in mind that your goal is to generate awareness so that your target audience connects with you. You need to have a clear path to bring these new leads into your commercial funnel.

#5 Measure impact and iterate

We are competing for attention with a million other content. While the costs of ‘distribution’ have dropped to almost zero, the ‘production’ time & costs have increased to deliver quality content. Regularly measure impact to fine tune type of content, messages and distribution channels.

Now that you have built your content, let us look at ways it can be distributed to your audience, leveraging specific use cases.

SHARE - Where should I publish my content and how to combine it with outbound marketing?

It should be where your target audience is looking for information. Do you address a large, fragmented market? Or rather an industry with few big buyers? How much time and money are you prepared to dedicate?

Below are some of the main distribution strategies implemented for tech Startups.

• Social Media

For most Tech businesses, preferred routes will be Linkedin, Medium, Youtube and Industry specific blogs. If your business involves design or visual value creation, consider adding Instagram or Facebook.

• Meetup & Network events

In 2018, Atomico reports about 15' 000 Tech related meetups in each Paris and Berlin, 30' 000 in London alone. Meetups can be a very powerful and cheap way to connect with your audience. It allows you to explain your solution and build a community around your brand.

• Live or Online Training Seminar

Workshop format built around your solution. You might consider also providing some online training as lead generation to your main business. Based on the right content, it can be scalable and promotes you as an expert in a field. Consider Udemy, Teachable and more.

• Product Configurator

An online product Configurator is great to automate your product features selection. Gartner estimates in 2018, 40% of B2B digital commerce sites use Configure, Price, Quote (CPQ) tools.

Your challenge is adoption. Start small using Google Form or a Web Editor before expanding functionalities.

• Open Source & Freemium Models

Providing a free(mium) Open Source solution can drive great business traction. It is powerful to ‘Try-before-your-buy’, build a community of users as an asset or generate a larger hardware installed base.

• Industry Trade Show

As a startup, forget your expensive booth! Instead, join the booth of a large established player. Apply for Call For Paper to be on stage, alongside a well-known partner if possible! Or take on comfortable shoes to walk the floor and meet prospective customers.

Read our sparksense guide to get more actionable tips on marketing efforts including more distribution channels, easy-to-use, cost-effective tools to get you started. And creating a CTA to drive qualified leads and boost conversions.

Ready to capture your market insights? Our top tool for free!

SaaS subscriptions can be a real drain on your liquidity ??. That’s why we love to share tools we use at Sparksense, which are 100% FREE or very affordable to support your growth.?

As you accelerate your prospect activities, you will need ONE place to easily capture your deals and what you learn as a team! HubSpot is perfect for startups looking to manage customer relationships without the hefty price tag.

It's free to use for up to 1 million contacts and has great simple features:

• Manage contacts - Say goodbye to scattered notes and missed activities. HubSpot helps you coordinate crucial information and latest interactions among your team.

• Prioritise Leads - Don't waste precious time on lukewarm leads. With HubSpot, identify your hottest prospects to focus your sales efforts where they matter most.

• Measure Email impact - Craft and deliver compelling email campaigns or a Newsletter that resonate with your contacts. See real-time open and click-rates.?

• Monitor your Sales funnel - Stay on top of your sales performance with simple reporting tools. Identify pipeline "leakage", conversion issues to fine-tune your ICP.

Personally, we can’t imagine our team day-to-day without it!

Q.ANT combines Inbound & Outbound Marketing to conquer the sensor market

We partner with Q.ANT, a spin-off of Trumpf based in Germany, to launch quantum sensors for industrial use. They are opening up opportunities in the fields of micro particle sensing.

Q.ANT combines our outbound sales with active inbound marketing:

We partner with Q.ANT, a spin-off of Trumpf based in Germany, to launch quantum sensors for industrial use. They are opening up opportunities in the fields of micro particle sensing.

Q.ANT combines our outbound sales with active inbound marketing:

• Targeted Outbound sales: Q.ANT pinpoints their prospects with problem-focused messaging and builds connections with multiple decision-makers, opening doors to industry influencers.

• Strong Inbound Content: Through consistent news releases, press releases, and active engagement on LinkedIn, Q.ANT shares updates, thought leadership, and success stories to attract and engage their audience.

• Active Engagement in Industry Events: Q.ANT engages at trade shows and industry events to showcase their technology and network with industry leaders.

Dive Deeper and watch Dr. Andreas's interview for insights into Q.ANT's journey and how they're shaping the future of photonics tech.

Tap into hidden market opportunities in … Automotive Industry

Are you feeling like you're not getting the traction you need to grow your business? Or maybe you are having trouble competing with larger competitors? That’s why we work with entrepreneurs to find hidden champions or second tier players who offer untapped potential.

Do you want to have access to more decision makers? Let’s work together to identify the Hidden Champions that need YOUR STARTUP’s solution.

Book a call with us & gain access to key decision makers.

Ignite Your Network: ?Let’s meet at upcoming industry gatherings

In the dynamic world of B2B tech entrepreneurship, being in the know is your ticket to success. The question is, will we have the pleasure of meeting you at these transformative gatherings?

HTGF Family Day, Berlin, Germany, June 11th - 12th (NOW), 2024

Join us at the HTGF Family Day - one of the leading seed investors in Europe! This event brings together a community of entrepreneurs and investors, fostering innovation and collaboration. And as always we couldn’t miss it!

The Battery Show Europe, Stuttgart, Germany, June 18th - 20th, 2024

Join us at The Battery Show Europe, the leading meeting place for the advanced battery and H/EV tech community. Can’t wait to see cutting-edge solutions for electric and hybrid vehicles, engage with experts, attend insightful sessions, and see what’s new in battery technology from 1,100+ battery manufacturers across the industry supply chain.

Optica Quantum 2.0, Rotterdam, Netherlands, June 23rd - 27th, 2024

Join us at Optica Quantum, a conference that brings together academics, industry and government scientists, national labs to advance quantum science and tech. The goal is to promote the development of mature quantum technologies that will allow experts to build Quantum 2.0* systems capable of quantum advantage. Excited to build collaborations leading to new concepts or development opportunities.

*Quantum 2.0 refers to the development and use of quantum superposition and entanglement in large engineered systems (quantum computers and simulators, quantum communication networks and arrays of quantum sensors).?

Leti Innovation Days, Grenoble, France, June 25th - 27th, 2024

We are thrilled to attend Leti Innovation Days and join more than 1,000 semiconductor industry professionals. This event focuses on disruptive innovations in micro and nanotechnologies with representatives from 300 companies.?

Mark your calendar and let's connect at these game-changing events! If you are thinking of going - contact us here or email me directly.

Talk to us to learn how we can accelerate your sales – No Strings Attached!

Do you want to generate qualified business leads? Our business development Advisors bring technical background to understand your technology. We execute a robust sales process to deliver tangible results. We shorten your sales cycle, increase conversion to achieve faster sales.

Here are some key Industries where we can help you access decision makers:

Entrepreneurs engage with us to generate qualified leads in flexible ways:

• STARTER to help you access launch customers, pilots and deliver first revenues.
• GROWTH to build your customer base, recurring revenues, and gain market insights.
• SCALE into global markets, find new applications with in-depth analytics and insights.

Read more about our services and packages here. Additionally, you can download our comprehensive Business Development Guide ebook, offering valuable insights and strategies to enhance your entrepreneurial journey.

Download your Business Development Guide ebook

Let’s talk to find out how we can help take your business to the next level. Book a free call with me today!

Thank you for reading! If you have any questions please feel free to email me directly.

Sincerely,

Hervé Flutto,

Managing Director and Founder, Sparksense

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