Dan Galante

During my time in field sales, I wanted to obtain the business of Dental Schools and Hospitals. After obtaining meetings and making presentations to prominent Dentists, I was informed that they could not buy from me. After handling objections, showing how my offerings were better than the competition, I found out why. The decision-makers explained that they were under contract with large manufacturers and distributors.

These competitors offered deep discounts to Dental Schools so their students would get comfortable using their products. When students would become licensed Dentists, they would use the products they trained on instead of the competitors. These competitors built lifelong customer loyalty.

When I called on certain Dentists, they said they liked a particular company’s product. I asked them why they liked the product and would they consider switching for something comparable with faster service. The Dentists said no saying that they learned on particular equipment in Dental School and it was the only thing they felt comfortable using.

The Technology Life Cycle

Image via

http://www.matthewsonmarketing.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/chap-1-fig-2-geoffrey-moore-tech-adopt-curve1.png?w=580

Geoffrey Moore discusses the Technology life cycle in Crossing the Chasm.

Dental manufacturers and large distributors used pricing to target the Innovators/Early adopters/which in this case was the dental students and hospitals. To increase market share, they offered discounted pricing in exchange for purchase and long service contracts. These manufacturers and distributors succeeded in targeting dental students right before they would become customers; earning them years of customer loyalty.

Here is how this SAAS marketing program could be executed on the Technology Life cycle curve.

Innovators Preparation Programs

Offer Preparation programs discounted pricing and free trials to try the product.

Have Pre-service Professionals get comfortable using the product.

Early Adopters Early Career Professionals

Offer them free trials and a lower discount.

Early/Late Majority Seasoned Professionals

Offer Trials and discounts to targeted staff and managers

Laggards Senior Staff Members

Continue to innovate the product and messaging to show how the product is being used.

Obtain Testimonials from satisfied staff and managers.

Show how the product exceeds competitors.

When appropriate, offer free and discounted trials to all appropriate prospects.

This is how Tech companies can improve their market share and generate life-long customer loyalty.

Tech Companies have the chance to improve business and generate life-long customer loyalty. This opportunity can be seized by offering discounted pricing and free trials to Innovators/Early Adopters which in this case are the preparation programs.

How this applies to EdTech & E-Learning

This strategy can be applied to the EdTech/E-Learning market because many companies serve this space but only a few companies dominate the market. The opportunity to target Innovators/Early adopters as I described above presents itself as the United States Department of Education is asking for Education Technology to be embedded into K-12 teacher preparation programs.

EdTech/E-Learning companies have the chance to improve the Teaching profession and generate life-long customer loyalty. This opportunity can be seized by offering discounted pricing and free trials to Innovators/Early Adopters which in this case are the teacher preparation programs.

Here is how this marketing program could be executed on the Technology Life cycle curve.

Innovators Teacher Preparation programs

Offer Teacher Preparation programs discounted pricing and free trials to try the product.

Have Pre-service Teachers/Admins get comfortable using the product

Early Adopters Rookie Teachers/Admins

Offer them free trials and a lower discount.

Early/Late Majority Seasoned Teachers/Admins

Offer Trials and discounts to targeted staff and Administrators, Lead Teachers, and Instructional Coaches.

Laggards Senior Staff Members

Continue to innovate the product and messaging to show how the product is being used.

Obtain Testimonials from satisfied Teachers and Administrators

Show how the product exceeds competitors.

This is how EdTech/E-Learning companies can improve the Teaching profession and generate life-long customer loyalty.

What EdTech/E-Learning product do you want to try?

Additional Market Research

Why & How People Buy Tech

When marketing and selling a tech product or service, it is important to ask two questions to understand your buyers.

1. What motivates people to buy a tech product or service?

2. How do people find a tech product or service to buy?

I surveyed my LinkedIn audience for answers.

1. What motivates people to buy a tech product or service?

People buy a technology product or service for many reasons.

2. How do people find a tech product or service to buy?

People find and buy technology products or services in different ways.

How Buyers Find EdTech & E-Learning Products & Solutions

I asked my audience how they find Education Technology products and solutions. According to a survey I conducted on LinkedIn, 58% used google, viewed product demos, and read reviews. Next was Social Media and word of mouth at 33%. This suggests that the education technology buying cycles are customer-centric. A great product demo is only as good as product reviews, word of mouth, and the customer experience for established brands. Only 8 % found products from seller-centric activities such as seller calls emails and catalogs. Customers are educating themselves and seeking out sellers at the end of the buying process, not the beginning.

When marketing and selling an EdTech or tech product or service, it is important to ask two questions to understand your buyers.

1. What motivates people to buy your tech product or service?

2. How do people find a tech product or service to buy?

These findings suggest businesses need to create customer-centric offerings to survive in a competitive marketplace. Answering these questions will help businesses develop, create, and, position offerings people want to purchase.

Why & How People Buy In General

When marketing and selling a product or service, it is important to ask two questions to understand your buyers.

1. What motivates people to buy a product or service?

2. How do people find a product or service to buy?

1. What motivates people to buy a product or service?

People buy a product or service for many reasons.

2. How do people find a product or service to buy?

People find and buy products or services in different ways.

These findings suggest businesses need to create customer-centric offerings to survive in a competitive marketplace.

Answering these questions will help businesses develop, create, and, position offerings people want to purchase.

Additional places to find my content and blog

WordPress: http://dangalante.me/

Tumblr: http://www.askdangalante.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/today/author/DanGalante

Medium https://medium.com/@DanGalante

YouTube https://www.youtube.com/trendsettingsm

Anchor https://anchor.fm/dangalante

About Me

I’m a Strategic Marketer with Field Sales, Sales Enablement, Content Creation, and, Classroom Teacher/Trainer skill-sets using Marketing to drive Sales/Growth.

As a Marketer, I’ve worked with Start-Ups, a Political Campaign, and a Digital Marketing Conference. I’m certified in Inbound Marketing with classes in Marketing, Product Management, Product Marketing, SEO, SEM.

Before teaching, I was an Outside Sales and Marketing Rep. selling and marketing dental products to Dentists using consultative selling, trade show marketing, field marketing, and market research.

I publish Sales, Marketing & Social Media Today a blog covering industry events and trends.

Articles and insights have been featured, mentioned, and, referenced in:

Tractica in the News

The Future of AI

https://medium.com/@DanGalante/the-future-of-ai-insights-from-the-ai-summit-ab6267eca70b

Digital Marketing World Forum

https://www.digitalmarketing-conference.com/key-insights-from-digital-marketing-world-forum-north-america/

Voice Summit

Compilation: Our Favorite Post-VOICE Coverage So Far

https://www.voicesummit.ai/blog/compilation-our-favorite-post-voice-coverage

Engage Bay

7 Steps to Align your Marketing Automation Strategy

https://www.engagebay.com/blog/marketing-automation-strategy/

Relay 42

The Role of Technology in Customer-Centricity

https://relay42.com/resources/blog/the-role-of-technology-in-customer-centricity

Databox

How to Improve Marketing and Sales Alignment (Gave background)

https://databox.com/how-to-improve-sales-marketing-alignment

Onalytica

Named as a Top STEM Influencer for EdTech and Education Industry Insights.

http://www.onalytica.com/blog/posts/stem-top-influencers-brands-publications/

The Arizona Republic

http://yourbusiness.azcentral.com/handle-top-10-sme-sales-objections-24845.html

Twitter Ads Blog

https://blog.twitter.com/2014/how-smartphone-users-engage-on-twitter-three-key-findings

Paper.li’s Wall Of Fame via Scoop.it

http://www.scoop.it/t/all-things-paper-li/?tag=Dan+Galante

I’ve been honored for my Social Profiles

•LinkedIn SSI Score in the Top 1%

•SlideShare for being in the top 5% of profiles viewed in 2014

•LinkedIn Profile was in the top 1% of profiles viewed out of 200 million members in 2012

I’m seeking a full-time role in:

Inbound Marketing, Digital Marketing, Content Marketing, Product Marketing, Demand Generation, Social Media Marketing, Sales Enablement Enablement, Sales Strategy, Marketing Strategy, Employer Branding, Recruitment Marketing. Reach out to start a conversation on LinkedIn or email me at dan@dangalante.com

I asked my LinkedIn audience If the Sales and Marketing function merged and run by Sales, What would be your main focus? Why?

As you can see, 68% of those surveyed said that increase lead generation and demand generation was a top priority. What this means is that people see Marketing as a vehicle to increase Sales and Revenue.

Marketing also serves as an Enablement for Sales Teams, Customer Success, support, and even employer branding. Many companies have created a dedicated enablement function. Companies sit employer branding and Recruitment Marketing in HR. However, there are still a lot of companies without dedicated enablment and employer branding functions.

Everyone looks to the marketing department. The lines between product, marketing, sales, and customer success are blurring.

Marketers do traditional work of branding, advertising, market research, content creation, and enablement, but these tasks support the larger goal of increased Sales and Revenue. Marketers impact Sales and by filing up the Sales pipeline, pre and post-sale. In the end, Marketers need to make a business case to justify their existence.

Sales reps can only be as good as the product and message they represent. Before companies can hire Sales reps, they need a great product with messaging that conveys the benefits to customers. Sales reps need support from marketing in the cross-functional organization of today. The messaging should be able to prevent customer objections. Unfortunately, this is where many Marketing departments fall short.

According to Salesforce.com, “studies show that 82 % of Sellers are out of sync with buyers.”

Many marketing hires lack sales experience; they do not know how to handle and anticipate customer objections. As a result, Sales and Marketing collateral designed to enable front-line teams like Sales are not helpful enough.

Research conducted by CEB Gartner found “80% of Marketing Collateral is trashed and 30% of Sales time is wasted creating the collateral just trashed.”

In addition, many people in Marketing lack the background and understanding of how people learn. Teachers and psychologists have this training. Understanding how people learn can make product messaging more effective because it can be presented in multiple formats. Many people in marketing lack practitioner experience and as a result, marketing is not as effective.

How can Marketing be improved?

Hire Sales Reps, Teachers, and Industry practitioners in marketing roles.

Now I will make a case for hiring Sales Reps, Teachers, and Industry practitioners in marketing.

Case for hiring ex Sales Reps

• Knows how to handle objections which can be applied to message
• Experience dealing with customers knows customer pain points
• Sees how end-user uses the product
• Can increase sales using Sales expertise to make messaging customer-centric
• Can assist with Sales and Marketing Alignment as companies need to work cross-functionally
• Understands the issues Sales Reps face and has the credibility of being a Rep when collaborating with Sales Teams

Experienced obtaining, qualifying, and converting leads to Sales ie Lead gen/demand gen

Hiring Industry practice experts

• They are the customers and understand the pain points better than any market research -should be in leadership roles

Case For hiring Ex Teachers

• understands how people learned
• skilled at tailoring content for understanding based on learning needs
• Today’s marketing is about educating customers and earning the right to market to them as they can educate customers

Why it is not Good enough to only place Industry practice experts and ex Teachers in the Sales Org

People in Sales are not involved in the creative process and cannot change their cards and company messaging.

They cannot address weaknesses in messaging and products.

The Marketer of Tomorrow

1. Understands Marketing as a Service or MAAS
2. Thrives in Data-Driven and Metric Driven Environments
3. Has Writing Ability
4 Has Sales Experience understanding Pain Points of Customer Facing Staff and Customers

My background

I have Marketing experience along with all of the above in my background.

Are you ready to increase Sales by improving Marketing?

Your sales and service teams deserve better!

Change today!

How have you increased Sales by improving messaging?

Comment and share below.

About Me

I’m a Strategic Marketer with Field Sales, Sales Enablement, Content Creation and, Classroom Teacher/Trainer skill-sets using Marketing to drive Sales/Growth.

As a Marketer, I’ve worked with Start-Ups, a Political Campaign, and a Digital Marketing Conference.

I’m certified in Inbound Marketing with classes in Marketing, Product Management, Product Marketing, SEO, SEM.

Before teaching, I was an Outside Sales and Marketing Rep. selling and marketing dental products to Dentists using consultative selling, trade show marketing, field marketing, and market research.

I publish Sales, Marketing & Social Media Today a blog covering industry events and trends.

Articles and insights have been featured, mentioned and, referenced in:

Tractica in the News
The Future of AI
https://medium.com/@DanGalante/the-future-of-ai-insights-from-the-ai-summit-ab6267eca70b

Digital Marketing World Forum
https://www.digitalmarketing-conference.com/key-insights-from-digital-marketing-world-forum-north-america/

Voice Summit
Compilation: Our Favorite Post-VOICE Coverage So Far
https://www.voicesummit.ai/blog/compilation-our-favorite-post-voice-coverage

Engage Bay
7 Steps to Align your Marketing Automation Strategy
https://www.engagebay.com/blog/marketing-automation-strategy/

Relay 42
The Role of Technology in Customer-Centricity
https://relay42.com/resources/blog/the-role-of-technology-in-customer-centricity

Databox
How to Improve Marketing and Sales Alignment (Gave background)
https://databox.com/how-to-improve-sales-marketing-alignment

Onalytica
Named as a Top STEM Influencer for EdTech and Education Industry Insights.
http://www.onalytica.com/blog/posts/stem-top-influencers-brands-publications/

The Arizona Republic
http://yourbusiness.azcentral.com/handle-top-10-sme-sales-objections-24845.html

Twitter Ads Blog
https://blog.twitter.com/2014/how-smartphone-users-engage-on-twitter-three-key-findings

Paper.li’s Wall Of Fame via Scoop.it
http://www.scoop.it/t/all-things-paper-li/?tag=Dan+Galante

I’ve been honored for my Social Profiles
•LinkedIn SSI Score in the Top 1%
•SlideShare for being in the top 5% of profiles viewed in 2014
•LinkedIn Profile was in the top 1% of profiles viewed out of 200 million members in 2012

I’m seeking a full-time role in:
Inbound Marketing, Digital Marketing, Content Marketing, Product Marketing, Demand Generation, Social Media Marketing, Sales Enablement Enablement, Sales Strategy, Marketing Strategy, Employer Branding, Recruitment Marketing.
Open on title, industry, company, location, and level. Reach out on LinkedIn or at dan@dangalante.com to start a conversation.

Sales has taught me to:

1.To go after what I want in life. Ask for the order if you will.

2. To stand tall in the face of rejection and negativity.

3. To look at rejection as a learning experience instead of a defeat.

4. To understand Customer needs. (Objections vs Stalls). (Buyer Motives)

5. To persist through obstacles and not to quit!

6. To examine and understand how a business operates.

Every person should try selling products at least once in their lives. It is a valuable learning experience.

Before my time as a Marketer, I worked as an Outside Sales Rep in the Dental Industry in Manhattan.

Field Sales/Field Marketing has taught me so much about myself.

What did selling teach you?

Comment and share.