Question

Topic: Branding

Target Sales Blog To Niche Or Mass Market?

Posted by Anonymous on11/16/2007 at 10:57 AM ET 250 Points
I'm going to launch a blog that I posted about on here earlier. It was originally geared toward engineers that are put in a sales position with little-to-no training.

At any rate, I was planning to offer about 10 white papers in addition to the typical blog postings. As I've been writing the papers, I realize that they would appeal to more than engineers. Any salesperson involved in complex sales should benefit from them.

And in fact the central theory behind the white papers is strong and cohesive enough to be a brand in itself - that's the dilemma - to brand it as an engineering sales training site using a specific sales philosophy, or as a general sales training site with the sales philosophy as the brand.

So my question to you is do you think it would be better to focus on the niche engineering group (who I'm convinced don't have a high rate of reading blogs) and teach them to use the philosophy or dilute the 'brand' and try to appeal to anyone and everyone involved in complex technical sales by making the sales philosophy the brand rather than helping engineers sell as the brand.

Tough to explain - think of it as should the web site be something like helpingengineerssell.com (using my sales philosophy) or mysalesphilosophy.com and make the philosophy the brand.

It's having an impact right now on my branding package strategy. Everything from the name to logo to writing style. I'm really struggling with it.

Thanks much for the time!
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RESPONSES

  • Posted bySteveByrneMarketingon11/16/2007 at 1:01 PM Accepted
    I wouldn't target a mass market (doesn't even sound right). I would target a niche of the engineer segment to start. Focus as much as possible and be successful with the first niche. It's a huge challenge for anyone in the crowded world of such information.

    Once successful, pick an adjacent niche and so on.

    Who knows, the process could lead to a substantial chunk of the "mass market".

    best of luck,

    Steve
  • Posted bymgoodmanon11/16/2007 at 10:23 PM Accepted
    Target. The narrower the better.

    But more important than that, what's your objective? Why are you doing this? How will you know if you're successful? What's the context for your question?

    Said another way, WHY are you launching this blog?
  • Posted byJay Hamilton-Rothon11/17/2007 at 6:39 AM Accepted
    Specialize in the niche. You'll be able to target your prospects easier, talk to them in their language, and charge more for your specific knowledge. As you get more clients, you'll naturally get referrals into other niches, which will help you learn their language and needs, and you can adapt your program to them (and so on).
  • Posted byHans De Keulenaeron11/18/2007 at 7:00 AM Accepted
    Interesting blog project. I'd like to hear more about it at some stage.

    But to answer your question, I do not think you could just target engineers with this blog, even if you wanted to. The target audience is in the message, and your white papers will act as 'heat seeking missiles' finding professionals seeking to make the bridge between technology and markets.
    https://www.leonardo-energy.org/planning/?p=137

    A lot of your readers will be engineers, but other professions active in industrial marketing may be equally interested.

    利基是更广泛的比工程师,但不是general public. It appears that you're targeting business marketeers, or content marketeers, i.e. professionals who build marketing campaigns around content.

    The challenge is that content marketeers are specialists in their subject, but lousy writers. On the other hand, professional copywriters unfamiliar with a subject matter produce equally poor results.

    Looking forward to hearing more about your project.
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