Wednesday, August 30, 2006

Death of the salesman?

We were not surprised by the findings of a recent market research report that engineers are turning to the Internet as their preferred source for product specifications. According to market research carried out this summer in the GlobalSpec Annual Engineering Trends Survey, 90% of respondents involved with purchasing of technical products or services have used the Internet to obtain product specifications, with 56% rating specifications as ‘the most valuable information when searching for products or services’.

This serves to confirm Technical Marketing's view that the Internet is now a vital part of any integrated marketing campaign and highlights our four main areas of service – ‘marketing consultancy’, ‘internet marketing’, ‘press & public relations’ and ‘technical writing, documentation and publication’. We have used web database techniques to enable our clients to rapidly publish and update product specifications and news online – two of the top items engineers and buyers are looking for – and with full search facilities for visitors to quickly identify products and services they want.

The survey also records that 45% now spend more than 6 hours a week on the Internet for work purposes, meanwhile the use of printed trade magazines and attendance at trade shows continues to decline - 18% reported a decrease in use of printed magazines and 51% did not attend any trade shows. The top four reasons for using the Internet were found to be – ‘to find components and suppliers’, ‘obtain product specifications’, ‘research’ and ‘news’.

When it comes to contacting suppliers 42% opt for the web as their preferred medium, 36% for e-mail and 21% telephone and just 1% preferring a sales rep visit!

Monday, August 28, 2006

Is print in decline?

Two sides of the online v print argument this week. On the one hand we are preparing final text for a client’s regular newsletter, on the other, a letter arrived from Process Engineering magazine headed ‘Important Changes’. The important changes it would appear are a less frequent publication, now once every two months and the introduction of a fortnightly e-mail news. The letter goes on to emphasise the benefits that will see ‘an increase in the amount of quality editorial coverage’ and the ability to ‘deliver more timely news via web and e-mail and concentrate on providing greater analysis and application content in the magazine.’ This reflects an approach to news delivery that we have been impressing on our clients for some years – e-mail, RSS, and online news for urgent communication and print for more in-depth coverage – in short to provide an interesting read and add retention value to the publication. In conversation some months ago and in another industry, one company president confided over a cup of coffee, that by the time the monthly industry journal arrived he felt he had already read most of the content. Of course there is another big issue driving this change and that is the economics of the traditional trade press. Not only is news slow to appear, but advertising revenues have been under pressure for years … but that’s another debate. This is the tenth anniversary of our client’s newsletter and from the beginning this was not really about news, but about application stories and helpful technical advice. The use of stories and third party endorsement to demonstrate how customer problems have been solved has been the source directly of a number of new projects and also helped build the company a reputation as being knowledgeable in their industry - especially as they now compete with importers of low cost product from China. It is just one factor in building a differentiated position. So we feel there is a continuing role for the print, providing the content is right. To understand more visit Technical Marketing's web site .

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Is RSS about to take off as a marketing tool?

From the Technical editor of Pro-Talk this week comes a series of e-mails on the topic of RSS - a subject about which he enthuses. He sees RSS as the third arm of the Internet alongside e-mail and web sites. At Technical Marketing Ltd we have been offering RSS to our clients for at least 2 years now – maybe longer. We agree it is a great facility, but has not really taken off. It gets round the blanket blocking of e-mails by over enthusiastic IT departments that in some cases seem to filter most everything out, not just ‘subscribed for’ e-mail news, but individual e-mails too! And with RSS appearing in browsers such as Safari and reportedly eventually from Microsoft Explorer it will also become more widely used. To find out more about how RSS can work for you, check out the Virtual News Office .

Marketing in the engineering work space

A phone call from a client in the engineering sector this morning raised an interesting topic that, if a true reflection of the industry suggests a major sea change for British manufacturing. We have become used to the political views that Britain has long since ceased to be a serious manufacturing nation and after first Japan, then the so-called tiger economies of the Far East, now China is the workshop of the world. We have also read that British university students have been opting for the softer options and rejecting the engineering and science disciplines as we progress towards a nation of hairdressers and finger nail artists. So how does this affect our client? In two ways. Because so much manufacture is now off shore his sales are increasingly for prototypes or laboratory research projects and not volumes for manufacture embodiment. Secondly the ‘engineers’ he is selling to, are now less well informed. Result – more sales effort to sell less product. One of the ways we have been able to help our client is to create informative material in the form of White Papers and Guides that can be downloaded from the web site and help fill the knowledge gap. To find out more about White Papers and guides take a look at Technical Marketing's web site.