How an Experienced Industrial Copywriter Helps You go to Market
What’s special about industrial copywriting?
Typically, industrial, business-to-business copy must reach out and grab three different audiences: distributors, manufacturers’ representatives, and end-users.
Do you need better industrial distributors?
The goal of industrial copywriting when talking to distributors is, first and foremost, to get them to carry your line. Inertia is a huge challenge with distributors. Sometimes the most effective strategy is to generate enough end-user demand ("marketing pull") so the distributor simply must look into carrying your line.
Once they sign on, you need distributor education programs to help your reps. Since distributors can carry thousands of products, it’s best to leave nothing to chance and to provide a lot of easy-to-use marketing materials that help them understand and promote your industrial products. I have extensive experience in distributor communications.
Marketing and manufacturers' reps
Your communications program for manufacturers' representatives (reps) should be closely tied into your distributor program, if you sell through distribution. Many big-ticket industrial systems are sold by reps alone. In either case, it’s critical that reps are kept up-to-date on product developments and that they understand (and appreciate) the company’s on-going investments in marketing campaigns targeting end-users.
Manufacturers’ reps are an excellent source of marketplace feedback for the industrial copywriter. (I gain much more industry insight by talking to three good reps for two hours than when I walk an industry trade show for two days. Feedback from rep council meetings — when your best reps are brainstorming with you — is especially useful.)
Marketing to industrial end-users
The industrial copywriter needs to telegraph to the end-user how the client’s product will make them work better, faster, and more efficiently. And the copywriter has to do more than just “break through the clutter” — the copy needs to have a “hook” that latches onto the end-users’ imaginations and makes them think differently, in an instant, about their problems.
Then the industrial copywriter needs to aid the specifier in making the business case to their management decision-makers.
Direct marketing of industrial products
With direct marketing, it's even more important that the industrial copywriter understand the products' markets, since the client does not rely on intermediaries — that is, distributors or reps. Specifically, the copywriter needs to understand the prospect's job and responsibilities.
What are her industry’s pain points? What keeps the prospect up at night? What lingo does she use to describe those pain points?
Then, the copywriter needs to work with the client to determine the best way to position the products so they become tangible, real-world solutions in the specifiers' minds. And finally, a powerful and appropriate Call To Action is devised.
Industrial Distribution: Handle With Care
Clients typically go to great lengths to please their industrial distribution channels. (Often, they have no choice, since their products may not lend themselves to direct sales due to logistics or other limiting factors.)
There are numerous “sensitive” areas between distributors and manufacturers that must be handled with care. I understand and honor these distribution sensitivities.
Take a few moments to contact me to see what suggestions I might have to improve your industrial distribution channel communications.
. . . so, then, what is Technical Copywriting?