Increase IT Services Sales By Making It Easier To Buy
One night in 1936, Sylvan Goldman, owner of the Humpty Dumpty supermarket chain in Oklahoma, sat in his office trying to figure out how to get customers to buy more groceries. Observing clients as they shopped, he noticed that many of them were struggling to carry the normal shopping basket provided, particularly the moms with kids. Once they got to their limit of what they could carry, they stopped shopping. That’s when he came up with the idea of the first shopping cart with wheels.
At first, the idea was not well-received. Men found it effeminate and women thought it was suggestive of pushing a baby carriage. One woman angrily told Goldman, “I’ve pushed my last baby!” To combat this, Goldman hired a number of male and female models to “shop” and push the carts around, as well as having greeters who welcomed shoppers and explained how the carts were to be used. From this little invention, Goldman became a multimillionaire. Read full article and comment →
I WISH I could show you the marketing example I’m about to tell you about, but I must have accidentally thrown it out. It was an EXCELLENT example of why you need to be meticulous about cleaning and validating your lists BEFORE you send any kind of direct mail campaign to it. It was a rather elaborate (expensive) mailer sent to my OLD address advertising pool maintenance services. For starters, the address is over two years old, which shows they didn’t run this through the NCOA (National Change Of Address). Second, they didn’t verify I was a pool owner. Yes, I am NOW, but the letter was mailed to the OLD address where we didn’t have a pool, and my name is not on any “pool supplies” website or list because I’ve never bought pool supplies. We get everything through our current pool company. My guess is they simply rented a list of higher-end homes in the area and mailed it instead of renting a list of people who have purchased pools supplies, toys, tools, etc. Just wasteful and stupid. That’s probably why it was the one and only promotion I’ve ever received from this company – it “didn’t work.” 
At every Rapid Implementation Workshop (
The other day, as we were talking, a client shared with me an e-mail campaign sent out to close to 400 prospects WITH phone follow-up that generated a big fat ZERO. To be clear, not one of MY campaigns, but one they received from a vendor. After reviewing it, I saw that it violated almost every one of the “10 Commandments” of good IT services marketing. Unfortunately, I see this a lot; campaigns hastily slapped together without any strategy or understanding of what it takes to get a response. Time and money wasted. Therefore, I thought it would be beneficial to provide a slightly revised list of “MUSTS” for every campaign. 
Email marketing during the 1990’s was a gold mine.
“Have you ever heard the phrase life is hard, but it’s harder when you’re stupid?” One of my favorite talk show personalities Bill Handle asks listeners this often.
The United States government is the largest customer in the world. They buy millions of dollars in services and products every year.
You’re pulling 80-hour work weeks but not getting the results you want. You think you’re setting smart, business goals but failing to achieve them. You’re frustrated, even unhappy, about the state of your IT services firm and struggling when selling managed services. What can you do?
Direct mail isn’t dead. (And neither is email while we’re on the subject.) Sending a creative, well-executed direct mailer can still generate great marketing results. Here are ten creative, surefire ways to create a great direct mail campaign and attract more clients. 
If you’re looking for quick list building and lead generation for your IT services, then adding strategically targeted trade show marketing is a must.
There is no doubt about it: Robin Robins has helped more MSPs and IT services businesses to double – even triple – sales, profits and MRR growth than any other marketing consultant in the IT services industry, period.As a trusted advisor to over 7,000 IT services business owners for over 12 years, Robin knows a thing or two about what it takes to grow sales, recurring revenue streams and a profitable client base for an IT services business.