PAR for the course: Presence, Authority, Reputation

When I was a wide-eyed and youthful systems programmer back in the eighties, marketing executives at my company (Lotus Development Corporation) would stand up in front of large crowds and give magnificent presentations (often using 35mm transparencies back in those days) to talk about what great marketing was going on at the company.

I didn't really know how to spell "PPPP" in those days.  But man could I write assembler code.

Marketing people talked then and still do today about "awareness - consideration - preference - action - loyalty," or some variation thereof.  [Image: Forrester Research]

At first blush you might think they are referring to the steps prospects pass through when they are seeking a solution to a business pain.  Wrong!  They are describing the structure of their very own marketing mix, and their hope that by executing tactics to raise awareness, tactics to encourage consideration, et cetera, that some number of the "fish" captured in the marketing "net" will make it into the sales pipeline and maybe even someday into a sales forecast.  Oh yeah and then transform into revenue.

I believe that the foundation of marketing, at least in the software industry, and probably for technology at a price point in excess of $10k more broadly, has changed.  That the new foundation for establishing credibility, building momentum, and achieving critical mass in your addressable market needs to be though about through a new lens.

First: presence.  Today, table stakes for being in the market is having a viable, robust, relevant presence on the web.  More on this later, but this means having an essential and detailed content-based (SEO) and paid (PPC) web marketing strategy.

Next: authority.  No longer satisfied with "if we build it, they will come" dreams, we now realize that emerging from the crowd, breaking through the noise, establishing distinction in crowded and fast-moving markets requires the establishment of authority: for your product, and, at least as importantly, for your people -- your thought leaders and innovators.  Here's where the "C"-word comes into play: communities.  Create your own or, more likely, participate on some already established (especially if you are a new or very small player).  Identify where prospects with the problem you address congregate to address the issue, or an immediately adjacent one, and begin to share your insight and expertise.

Third: reputation.  If steps one and two are executed with brilliance, this one is easy.  But more often than not there is work left to do.  We used to call them public relations and analyst relations, but now we need to think in terms of a thought leadership development program.  At the intersection of a company's technologies and its innovators and evangelists is a "glowing nuclear material" (and I mean that in the most positive and powerful sense :-)) that the world needs to see validated by other geniuses.  I think Macchiavelli would recommend that you let bloggers, journalists, and industry analysts borrow your brilliance, that you praise them for their insight, and that you sit back and let them begin to tell your story as though it were their own -- to the thousands or hundres of thousands of subscribers that constitute their respective communities.  It's a trust fall... but the "halo" effect is well worth the risk.

[Found an interesting presentation by Shiv Singh of AvenueA / Razorfish on related and broader topic.  Worth a look!]