MSP marketing strategies toward larger clients or management portions of a larger business can be very advantageous if properly approached. The truth is, many cybercriminals specifically target such individuals. Telling truths like this to prospects can plant a seed in their minds which flowers into a conversion. Following are three approaches you can take when dealing with prospects in management:
- Crunch the numbers
- Be frank
- Ensure you communicate the need for ongoing training
Crunch The Numbers
Your MSP marketing should have a sales advantage that is in many ways unique. You have the ability to collect and maintain data pertaining to existing and potential clients. You can use this data to paint a realistic scenario that helps to sell your cybersecurity services. Perhaps, start out by describing a typical data breach for a company at the size of your prospect. Then, illustrate average costs of such a breach, average downtime, and what recovery is going to look like. Next, emphasize collateral fallout, like customer trust and branding. A bad security breach can implode a company through lost clientele and damaged a brand. Your MSP should have a few case-studies on hand to help drive home this point. Once you’ve done that, show how a simple cybersecurity prevention measure could have prevented such a disaster simply, cost-effectively, and conveniently. Finally, if you can find them, provide statistics pertaining to the likelihood of the breach.
Be Frank
People really value honesty, directness, and even bluntness in today’s market. So many “boot-licking” yes-men are out there these days that it becomes hard for an individual to determine what the truth of a matter is. In higher circles of management, frankness is appreciated. So, be blunt, be frank, and tell the truth. Expose risks like those which come from dark web-based attacks that spread customer information for exploitative hackers. Bring numbers back into the equation and paint a picture of the expenses involved in cleaning up such a mess. This will make prevention investment more reasonable to prospective management clientele.
Ensure You Communicate The Need For Training
Oftentimes, security breaches result from the employees of clients who aren’t properly educated in terms of network usage and how that relates to the internet. This can result accidentally downloading viruses to the network which usher in things like ransomware.
You’ve got to communicate that it isn’t just necessary to train employees. but to perpetually train them. This does several things. First, it communicates a static truth about the tech world. Second, it demonstrates in an oblique, almost subconscious way just how valuable your MSP can potentially be.
The truth about technology is this: it is always developing. There are always new innovations, always new upgrades. That trend has been moving forward since the first programs were engineered to decode the Enigma code at Bletchley Park near the end of WWII. It’s not just about ensuring employees know and exercise best practices, it’s about continuous fortification against ever-developing innovation, which can’t be avoided due to things like competition and cost-reductions. Implementing new technology is only cost-effective if it’s properly protected. If they don’t do it soon, prospect competition will gain an edge. Your clients understand this intrinsically, so reinforce what they already know with an undeniably visible reality. Once you’ve done this, you then start in on how your MSP offers the right training and, voila, you’ve converted a potential prospect.
Securing Prospect Conversion Among Management
MSP marketing strategies that can demonstrate to prospective buyers how fundamentally valuable marketed services are in terms of numbers and tangible examples are marketing that’s more likely to convert such prospects. The truth is, they do need security. If they don’t get it now, they may find technology has moved to such a point that acquisition becomes more expensive than it would have been otherwise. The fallout from networks that aren’t properly secure is likewise a considerable selling point, as this is never cheap. So, use numbers and truth to sell management prospects and don’t forget to offer training!