Marketing to Government: 7 Reasons to Invest in B2G Content

While every industry or market segment is unique, there are few I’ve encountered that can challenge a marketing team as much as the U.S. public sector. Marketing your products and services to government agencies is not as simple as swapping out the word “mission” for “profitability” and adding photos of eagles, flags, or Gothic columns on your commercial collateral. Sadly, that’s an approach I see many organizations take.

As an executive with experience in both business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-government (B2G) marketing, I’m often asked for insights into the differences between public and private sector marketing, as well as advice on where to invest marketing resources to drive brand awareness, generate demand, and fill the pipeline with marketing-qualified leads.

Buyers and influencers at federal agencies are impacted and governed (pun intended) by forces outside their own control. These include: a confusing, acronym-laden language of their own; restrictions on technology usage and vendor engagement; complex procurement regulations; long acquisition cycles; and a highly political culture that discourages innovation and risk-taking. Throw in bureaucratic inefficiency, constant media scrutiny, and frequent changes in leadership, priorities, and strategy (brought on by those pesky “elections” every few years), and you’ve got a difficult market to crack. Expand your view to include 50 independent states and thousands of city and county markets nationwide, and audience fragmentation becomes exponential.

So why bother? Well, it’s the world’s largest market, with a combined 2019 projected spend of nearly $7.5 Trillion (with a T). These customers spend money on everything from technology and training to tanks and toilet paper, and they always pay their bills. Enough said.

While every situation and plan is different, I believe there’s one category that must be included in every B2G marketing team’s strategy, budget, and toolkit: content marketing.

Today’s marketers are competing for the attention of our prospects and customers like never before. You’re paid (often not well enough, a topic for another article) to cut through the clutter and capture the eyes, ears, and minds of your audience. You have to tell stories that influence the decision-making process while building relationships and establishing trust. You’re pressed to differentiate from your competitors without pushing prospects away early in the sales cycle. You want to qualify them, understand their problems, and track their activity to improve your targeting and sell-through rates.

Your government customers, however, have their own headaches. They have agency missions to fulfill and want to solve their business problems as quickly and easily as possible. They must satisfy market research requirements, solicit competitive bids, and comply with strict federal acquisition processes, and they need credible information to check these boxes. Like employees in any organization, they want to look good in front of the boss and gain a better understanding of their options without being “sold.” But because of their unique environment, it’s critical for them to deal with people they trust and make the right decisions as responsible stewards of taxpayer dollars.

A thoughtful content marketing strategy can bridge many of these gaps between buyers and sellers. When planned and executed effectively, B2G content marketing programs provide seven clear benefits that are difficult to replicate through other marketing investments. Content marketing enables you to:

1. Define the problem (and the potential solution) in terms that favor you - In the B2G world, if you start marketing or selling after the customer’s requirements have been defined and a Request for Proposal has already been posted to FedBizOpps, you’ve likely already lost. Well-placed content can shape a prospect’s thinking around a problem (often before they even know they have one) and show them what’s possible. This critical step can influence how an RFI or RFP is written and get you ahead of the competition right from the beginning.
2. Build credibility, trust, and differentiation - Content marketing enables you to demonstrate your company’s expertise and knowledge in an area that’s important to the customer. It also helps you provide something of value in exchange for their attention, contact information, and continued engagement. That establishes more trust and separates your brand from competitors who start with a pitch that’s all about them.
3. Give them a reason to pay attention, engage, and volunteer information - Salesforce.com says it takes six to eight touches to generate a viable sales lead. Most people won’t show that level of sustained interest and engagement unless there’s something in it for them; they’ve got to be convinced you have something to offer. Crossing that threshold requires you to utilize a diverse mix of marketing channels to hit prospects at different points in the buying cycle. Creative, credible, and impactful content from a trustworthy source will keep them coming back for more, while making them more likely to share your assets with others and reveal information and behavior that further qualify them in your pipeline.
4. Enable self-service discovery and qualification - You’ve probably heard the CEB statistic that “57 percent of the [B2B] purchase decision is already complete before the customer even calls the supplier.” Content that utilizes the right distribution channels provides infinite, 24/7 reach into communities of buyers who do their own homework before they reach out to you. Myriad studies demonstrate that Millennials are even more apt to do this. It’s an important point as they already make up a significant percentage of the federal workforce (nearly 18 percent on average according to GovLoop) and are increasingly taking on leadership roles in the Executive branch. Delivering valuable content via multiple digital channels lets you engage early, often, and at scale with prospects on their terms - which increasingly means on their personal devices or after working hours for federal employees with technology limitations at the office. And when used in conjunction with marketing automation tools, this self-service research helps you qualify potential buyers based on the actions they take and the content they consume.
5. Provide value without a price tag - Savvy B2G marketers know the rules: gifts to government employees cannot exceed $20 per occasion or $50 per calendar year. That makes it tough to invite prospects to dinner at The Ritz or the sporting event of the year (side note: way to go Capitals!). Producing content and making it available to a wide audience lets you provide a set of valuable assets without a corresponding tangible cost that invites restriction or reporting requirements.
6. Contribute to the sales team’s toolkit - It’s rare to find a sales rep who doesn’t want to offer something of value as a conversation starter, a follow-up deliverable, or a reason to reach out and re-engage. Content assets give your sales team something to talk about up front while establishing trust and rapport and facilitating deeper conversations. Content delivered before, during, and/or after the sales pitch provides valuable context for nurturing and validating in-person discussions. It’s a helpful crutch your sales team can lean on to keep things moving.
7. Gain Insight Into Customer Needs - Want to better understand what your prospects care about and what engages them? Combine your content with social media and marketing automation capabilities to track and analyze what they’re downloading, searching for, watching, consuming, liking, and sharing. Encourage them to provide feedback, post questions, check out related content, expand on your information, or set you straight if they disagree with your position. And if you study when and where they do it, you’ll get smarter about the best days, times, and channels you can use to continue your engagement.

Of course, deciding to invest in B2G content marketing is just the beginning of the journey. Before you start, you’ll have to think through what you’re trying to accomplish and create a sustainable, realistic plan, as well as your success metrics and the operational tactics you’ll use to achieve and measure positive outcomes. I’ll provide some tips and suggestions to help you proceed in a series of future posts on this topic.

Allan Rubin has more than 25 years of marketing experience with a special interest in B2B/B2G content marketing. He is Chief Marketing Officer of ORock Technologies and has served as VP, Marketing for Arrow Electronics and immixGroup, Inc. He's doing this for fun and has no marketing services to sell you. Follow him at www.dhirubhai.net/in/allanrubin and provide your insights on what he got right or wrong.