Tim Fitzpatrick of Rialto Marketing

[00:00:02] Hello ladies and gentlemen, welcome to June 6th, 2024. And this is another edition of the MSP Initiative at MSP Talk.

[00:00:13] And for everybody that usually follows us, we're going to do some housekeeping right here in the beginning of this session.

[00:00:18] And then we'll get into the good stuff. So here we go.

[00:00:23] So, mspinitiative.com. If you don't know how to spell initiative, Google it. It'll give you the right spelling.

[00:00:29] Put MSP in front of it and .com at the end and you will get to this webpage.

[00:00:33] Here you will see sessions like this session right now is being very much recorded and we will distribute it on our podcatchers and YouTube page and the sessions tab of mspinitiative.com.

[00:00:45] Community Mines. We got one of these under about this year in Nashville and next one is coming up in Denver.

[00:00:51] So if you go to the Community Mines tab of mspinitiative.com, you will see we are holding another one in Denver, September 25th and 26th.

[00:00:59] Completely two day educational event for you, hopefully the MSP community.

[00:01:04] So this is a great opportunity. We have both workshops and panels and this is absolutely not a regular show with booths and trade show floor.

[00:01:12] This is all about learning, learning, learning and more learning.

[00:01:15] So if you're after learning actual things rather than being pitched a topic with a credit card swipe at the end of it, this event could be for you.

[00:01:24] So that being said, check it out. MSP Community Mines September 25th and 26th.

[00:01:29] But before we even get to Denver in September, you're going to get to Denver in June as in next week.

[00:01:38] Two block parties and these are pretty much what we're famous for.

[00:01:43] We have a block party coming up next week on June 10th in conjunction with our good friends at PAX 8 for the PAX 8 Beyond conference in Denver.

[00:01:52] So in the evening of June 10th between 830 and midnight, we are holding a community block party.

[00:01:57] And yes, we'll be shuttling people to and from the conference venue.

[00:02:00] And yes, we're going to have a great time because we have room to fit, I don't know, everybody and anybody at this event.

[00:02:06] So even if you're not going to PAX 8 Beyond, you happen to be in the greater Denver area and you're an MSP, join us because it costs you absolutely nothing to register.

[00:02:15] Please do so ahead of time. You'll see two registration links for MSPs and anyone that isn't an MSP.

[00:02:20] And thank you to all of our sponsoring vendors that are helping to put this together.

[00:02:24] It is not inexpensive, but it is definitely a good time.

[00:02:29] So check that out. And then not one, but two days after that, we are going to get right on over to the other side of the ocean and back to DattoCon.

[00:02:42] Say that, DattoCon Europe in Dublin.

[00:02:45] So on the evening of June 12th, we are transporting everyone to the absolutely amazing venue called the Camden.

[00:02:52] And we will be rolling till midnight again or until you can't stand.

[00:02:56] No, just kidding. Please always stand or sit, but stand comfortably.

[00:03:01] Same deal, two registration links. Anyone's an MSP and anyone that isn't.

[00:03:06] Again, thank you to our co-sponsoring vendors who are making this one happen.

[00:03:10] You know, it takes a community to make these happen. They are absolutely amazing and we hope to have an absolute blast.

[00:03:17] So those are the two community block parties.

[00:03:20] Denver first, June 10th, Dublin next, June 12th.

[00:03:24] We have some community offers which are just deals from companies around the industry that you may or may not take advantage of.

[00:03:29] And then we have our industry calendar, which as you can imagine this month is very, very busy.

[00:03:34] And we try and keep track of several things happening out in the MSP IT community sphere and keep you up to date on what those dates are just in case you feel like not being at home and surely not being at vacation and just using work travel as your excuse to vacation.

[00:03:49] And that is pretty honest, to be honest.

[00:03:53] That being said, that is all the housekeeping and you can file all of that at MSPNation.com and our YouTube page and our podcatcher and LinkedIn and Facebook and all the other good stuff.

[00:04:04] So there it all is for the second time ever we bring back today's guest on podcast Tim Fitzpatrick who I will let him introduce himself if you didn't catch him on the first one and then we'll get into all things marketing.

[00:04:20] Go for it Tim.

[00:04:22] Well, George thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here.

[00:04:25] So super quick about me. I am a marketing consultant advisor and outsourced our part time marketing executive.

[00:04:33] So what does that mean? What do I do? I help MSP's build or update and then manage their marketing engine so they can get where they want to go faster.

[00:04:41] So I do that by focusing on three areas of marketing strategy, planning and leadership.

[00:04:47] Got to have all three if you want your marketing engine cranking so that's where I live.

[00:04:52] Awesome. Wow. One thing is for sure.

[00:04:57] Marketing is I feel like almost a sour topic in MSP IT sandbox land.

[00:05:03] Nothing other than tens and thousands and probably even more dollars have been invested invested invested and I was just actually mentioning this to somebody in a different context but still around marketing and it's like hey listen.

[00:05:19] If somebody's if you bring in somebody else to tell your story likely the message that they create is not the message that you're trying to get out there for some reason there's always that disconnect or many cases are that disconnect so but I have to acknowledge the fact that a lot of people who get into this business and technology lands.

[00:05:39] I'm not going to say are the basement you know man cave, you know, you know kind of in the shadows kind of people but maybe not the outgoing extraverted type person and so there's a little bit of just uncomfortableness maybe and delivering the message and so hence we get to the word marketing.

[00:05:55] However, I'm going to challenge you on this one. Marketing is part of sales. Yes or no.

[00:06:03] I would say they're related.

[00:06:06] Okay, so marketing comes before sales right so to me the job of marketing is getting someone who has a need or a problem you can solve to know like and trust you.

[00:06:19] That's what marketing is all about to me. And so if marketing is doing its job.

[00:06:25] I don't necessarily see them as as part of each other I see them as complimentary and they go together.

[00:06:37] Okay, it's very difficult to have one without the other in some way shape or form.

[00:06:45] Okay, so let me tell I think about it. No, no, no.

[00:06:48] That's why I'm challenging you because I've run into many many how many times have you run in, you know we're all linked in, you know, manager of sales and marketing director sales and marketing VP of sales and marketing.

[00:07:00] Why sales and marketing, the same person. Oh, other than small businesses right and everybody wears a lot of hats I get that but um one likely leads to the other right like you know like, can you plan one without the other is there supposed to be a disconnect,

[00:07:16] I don't know I think there's got to be, you know, I don't know I'm a backwards waterfall guy right it's like hey, I need to accomplish this goal as a company this month this quarter this year.

[00:07:27] And if this is what I'm trying to get to everything that comes now backwards from it's supposed to lead me to my goal right. Yeah. So if marketing supposed to help generate opportunities and opportunities lead to proposals and proposals or quotes lead to my, my goal financially

[00:07:43] like, you know, there's a there's an interconnect right. Yeah, yeah. I look I'm biased but I think you, it's very difficult to have one without the other. What I see a lot of MSP's in the MSP community, sales and and direct sales outreach is super common

[00:08:04] it seems to be really ingrained in the industry so it's, it's not uncommon for me to talk to MSP's that are not doing a lot of marketing that have had a sales effort for a long long time.

[00:08:19] I think your sales efforts are significantly more difficult without having marketing on the front end of it. Okay, so like if you know, are we talking about, you know, outbound efforts versus inbound and not trying to get super classroom here but like, you know, if I'm a sales rep, or if I'm somebody helping in the ability to generate, you know, like, you know, out that you're making phone calls, I'm sending emails, I'm sending postcards.

[00:08:48] I'm maybe getting in front of people literally in person, whether that's in an event or at a mixer at a happy hour or who knows I'm walking down the street and I happen to run into somebody that needs technology services, or maybe I'm going real old school.

[00:09:04] I used to do this and maybe in my younger days when I was selling candy and Boy Scouts land it's like, hey, yeah door to door popcorn and candy sales right so like, you know, that's what is that what we were referring to and like, in terms of, you know, the direction of traffic here.

[00:09:20] Yeah, I yes. I think if all you are doing is just making outbound dials. And there's not anything else on the front end from a marketing standpoint.

[00:09:31] It is going to be much more challenging.

[00:09:34] Okay. So, I run into the convert this conversation rather often, other than the I spend a lot of money with some effort and just didn't result back to the what are reasonable return on investment, you know, metrics for my marketing span.

[00:09:56] You know, we can talk for a long time about, hey, based on the size of your organization, this is how much money you should allocate towards marketing. Maybe we'll get that second, but let's say I've made that, you know, calculation I've decided to spend the money.

[00:10:08] Now the next step of that, and we'll go back to step one in a second is, well like what should I reasonably expect back based on my spend so for every dollar, should I expect $3 back like I don't know you like what what is that for you.

[00:10:23] Yeah, I think it depends on who you talk to and what the act what the marketing activity is.

[00:10:30] But as a general rule of thumb. I look at three to 10 x.

[00:10:35] Oh, okay, so three to $10 I'm going to get three to $10 back. Yeah, now here's the, here's the reality George.

[00:10:45] If you're putting in a dollar, and you're getting too back are you gonna freaking care.

[00:10:50] As long as I'm getting something in addition to my initial investment.

[00:10:55] Right.

[00:10:56] Really happy but yeah, I think I think the opposite happens a lot though I spend the dollar does hero back. It does.

[00:11:03] Especially in the beginning. Here's where most MSPs I talked to are thinking far too short term with marketing. Okay. And I think that is where there's a big, there's a disconnect. Right and it's not necessarily, you know anybody's anybody in particular fault right but, and frankly it's probably marketers fault because there are a lot of marketers that over promise and under deliver.

[00:11:28] Right. Hey, we're gonna, we're gonna get you the top page Google in 30 days. Really, like, the you, nobody can control that.

[00:11:38] So, to promise that is ridiculous.

[00:11:42] But when people hear that, and then they start to believe it, and then it doesn't happen right goes back to what you touched on at the start right it sours us on it.

[00:11:51] And it's unfortunate that that happens. But the reality is marketing is not a short term one and done thing. Yeah, if you want to be successful with it, you've got to think long term.

[00:12:03] And it needs to be something that you do consistently over time.

[00:12:07] You know, now that's not to say that there aren't the key. That's it. In my opinion, that's, that's actually a very key word like we walk away at the end of this and say what did you get away from it like the word consistency.

[00:12:18] I don't care if you're in the sales, you know or Legion prospecting marketing role.

[00:12:23] The inconsistency is what breaks almost all of that, my like in my experience.

[00:12:29] Hey, you know you met with someone. Did you follow up with them now inconsistency hey you started a campaign.

[00:12:36] But did you what was the second third fourth step of that hey, you know like this old school sales methodology it's like, have somebody on a call.

[00:12:44] And don't end that conversation with, well okay just let me know. At the end of that conversation should be what's the next step. What do we go from here right like what can we set the next call like what do you need to do when should when should we make the next

[00:12:57] interaction point and like don't let go of that until the next part set right. Yeah.

[00:13:04] Even though that's not a new theme that still applies on the marketing side now. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely.

[00:13:12] You've got a too many people give up before they've given it the opportunity to actually work.

[00:13:20] Right, and then it's like oh well I tried that it didn't work.

[00:13:24] Well, how long did you do it, you know what happened.

[00:13:28] We have to think at it from a long term perspective, because the reality is marketing is all about testing, like a lot of things you do from a marketing standpoint are not going to work.

[00:13:39] That's okay.

[00:13:40] Right, but it's if you don't put things out there and test them you're never going to learn and you're never going to figure out what's going to work for you.

[00:13:48] So this is like baseball right like if you're if you're hitting the bat ball 30% of the time.

[00:13:53] Yes.

[00:13:54] Really well.

[00:13:55] Yeah, exactly. Right. You can't, you can't put something out there and expect everything that you do from a marketing standpoint to work that's totally unrealistic.

[00:14:05] And it's never going to happen. The bat even the best marketers fail all the time.

[00:14:11] But when they fail, they learn and they iterate. And that helps them figure out what's going to work and when you figure out what works, it makes all the stuff you invested in that didn't work.

[00:14:24] Worth worth it. That's part of the process.

[00:14:26] That's what a lot of marketers won't won't say right. Yeah.

[00:14:32] But that's the reality of marketing right is it is a constant process of testing, measuring and learning. And then you wash rinse repeat.

[00:14:42] Okay.

[00:14:44] Free network assessment.

[00:14:48] I mean, I think, I mean I see a couple hundred MSP websites a month.

[00:14:55] And then near on every single one of them. That's their that's their pitch. I mean,

[00:15:00] That's their next step is a free network assessment.

[00:15:03] I feel like that's their all like that's their offer. That's how they think they're going to get in the door. Hey, let me come give you a free look. Does that work? You see that where I mean?

[00:15:15] Well, I mean, it could. I mean, again, to me, everything with them from marketing starts with your your target market who are you serving? You know, who are your ideal clients within that market? And when you understand that, that helps dictate everything that you're going to do down the line.

[00:15:36] Fair. So, you know, if

[00:15:39] I feel like most MSP's aren't vertically targeted, like they're generally and they kind of just go.

[00:15:48] Hey, I don't care what industry you're in. Like, I'll work with anyone and then like it's too vague for my who am I targeted?

[00:15:56] I agree 100%. I think the simplest way for MSP's to really hone in their marketing efforts is to focus on specific verticals. It's not the only way, but it is the simplest way, in my opinion, to hone in on your market and to start differentiating because a lot of MSP's struggle to differentiate themselves.

[00:16:21] Yeah. And when you struggle to differentiate, you look the same. And when you look the same, what are people going to default to? Price. Exactly. They default the price and nobody I mean, it sucks, dude. Nobody wants to compete on price.

[00:16:36] When you hone in on a specific vertical, you become a specialist, you can speak their language.

[00:16:43] And frankly, over time, you're going to be able to charge more because you're specialist. Right? Who makes more? Your general practitioner or the freaking harder brain surgeon? Right?

[00:16:53] Brain surgeon. Yeah, way more.

[00:16:55] Less cases, more money.

[00:16:57] Yeah. So to me, I think there's a lot of additional benefits outside of just your marketing in honing in on a specific vertical, right? Because you can narrow down your tech stack offering, right? Your implementing and onboarding becomes more efficient.

[00:17:15] And it's easier to service long term. I think you can be a lot more profitable if you do that.

[00:17:20] So you deal with a lot of MSP's, right? From a marketing perspective, right? That's what you do. You're a consultant.

[00:17:28] Yeah.

[00:17:30] Where do you see the concentration in verticals?

[00:17:34] It's all over the place. But I would say it tends to fall more into professional services. Right? So accountants, attorneys, those types of folks.

[00:17:50] But really, when I start with the client and we're looking at, hey, do you have opportunities to focus on a specific vertical? What we look at is your existing client base. Who are you working with now?

[00:18:07] And I feel like single digits across every category. Yeah.

[00:18:11] Well, and it could be right. And sometimes this is not like you go through this process and it's not black or white. There's gray often. And we need to make decisions based on that. Right?

[00:18:25] But I think you want to sit there and look at your existing client base and go, look, who do you love working with? Who's profitable? And who are you getting great results for?

[00:18:36] Those are very good questions.

[00:18:39] Yeah. If you can work with those types of clients day in, day out, you're happier, your team's happier, your clients are happy. Right? You're going to retain them longer. You're going to get referrals.

[00:18:50] So let's look at that base of existing clients and then start to go, okay, they check all three of these boxes. What do they look like? Right? Are there commonalities that are coming to the surface here?

[00:19:04] And oftentimes, like I'm just going through this with the client right now. And they're like, yeah, well, you know, we've got a handful of architectural clients. Right?

[00:19:16] I did it with another MSP a month ago and they're like, yeah, we've got a handful of attorneys that we work with.

[00:19:23] And, you know, I was like, well, do you love working with them? Well, I don't know. I can't say I've worked with enough of them to say that yet. Okay.

[00:19:37] Are they profitable and do they pay their bills?

[00:19:39] Yeah. Right. So, you know, it's not always cut and dry. But we got to make some decisions. It's like, okay, well, you've got some attorney clients you've worked with. You've had them for a while.

[00:19:53] Would you feel comfortable focusing some of your efforts marketing wise and direct them specifically to this market? Yes, I would. Okay, cool.

[00:20:04] Now let's make sense. Let's interview them. Let's get some input so that we really start to understand. I like that. What's happening with them?

[00:20:13] You know, what do they love about working with you? What problems have you solved for them? Why do they continue to work with you? Right.

[00:20:21] And it's that information. That information can drive a lot of decisions, but it goes, you touched on messaging in the beginning. When we hear in our clients words, what it's like to work with us and how they describe us.

[00:20:35] We get a lot of really good information from them in their own words and that can help dictate what our message should be.

[00:20:43] Aha, right. So like your customer becomes your message. Yes, right. I'll give you a perfect example of this and this is not an MSP example, but this about five or six years ago was working with a residential siting contractor.

[00:21:00] Okay, and I would say contractors are messaging wise are probably not all that much different than MSPs. I mean you go to a lot of contractor websites and they're talking about, hey, we're the number one provider in this area or highest quality products.

[00:21:16] And I was like, man, that's table stakes. Like people expect that. Yeah, it's not a differentiator.

[00:21:23] And one of the things we did with this client was we started looking at their Google reviews. You know, they had over 100 reviews. Okay. And we started reading through their reviews.

[00:21:34] And there was a woman there who said the thing I loved about these guys is they treated my house like it was their own.

[00:21:40] That's the freaking message, right? They don't they expect the siding to be the best siding. Frankly, a lot of siding contractors are selling the same stuff. Right. I'm a James Hardy dealer and I'm a James Hardy dealer. We're all doing the same stuff.

[00:21:58] So that doesn't differentiate. But dang, when they say I'm going to they're going to treat my house like it's their own all of a sudden, you know, you imagine they're going to clean up after the job. When they walk in my house, they're putting booties on.

[00:22:15] You know, I'm not going to find you know, like my roof had to be replaced a while ago. You know how long I found roofing nails everywhere in my yard? Like, I got kids, you're walking around a bare feet. I mean, like it's that kind of stuff.

[00:22:32] That's what you want when you when you have a contractor, they're going to do the job to the nth degree and every detail is going to be where it needs to be because it's like my house is their own. That's the message. Right. And so that becomes a differentiator.

[00:22:49] It's those types of things that we're looking for when we start to interview clients and we hear in their own words what the experience of working with us is like. But that helps drive once we've interviewed them, we can start to craft our message.

[00:23:05] And then we can also here's another reason why I like focusing on verticals. And again, it's not the only way, but it becomes much simpler. If I'm going to focus on attorneys or accountants or architects or whoever it may be.

[00:23:20] Once I know who I'm going to focus on, I've created my message. Marketing is all about targeting, right? We want to fish where the fish are. We don't want to cast a line out in them, you know, a net in the middle of the ocean hoping we're going to catch something. Right.

[00:23:37] We want to catch the right fish. It becomes much simpler to create a list of where they are when you're narrowed by vertical. I call it an ideal client GPS. But when we look to create an ideal client GPS, going back to your example earlier, oh, I work with small businesses that have, you know, 50 to 80 seats and they're in this area. Okay, great. Where are they?

[00:24:05] Where do they congregate? It's too broad to create a really narrow, strong list. But when you say I work with accountants, all of a sudden I can start to ask myself, okay, what associations do they belong to? What conferences, you know, events do they go to? Are there influencers in the space that they might follow? Are there people who are going to be involved in the business?

[00:24:34] Are they people? Are there podcasts they listen to? YouTube channels they follow? Email lists, you know, they belong to publications. They read. All of a sudden you go where they go. Exactly. You create a list and you've now have a targeted list. Are you going to go everywhere that you put on that list? No, you can't.

[00:24:57] But now you've got a targeted list and you can say, okay, for the next three months, we're going to test these two things or these three things and start getting active in these areas. But at least you know, when you're there, you're fishing where the fish are. You're not going to a networking event hoping that somebody that might fit your ideal client type is going to be there.

[00:25:22] Yeah, you know that, hey, I'm going to the local accounting association monthly meeting. Who's going to be there? Accountants and guess what? Guess who else is going to be there? Potential strategic partners, right? Because there's going to be other vendor partners or suppliers that are going to be part of the association as well. So you're going to meet other people that serve accountants there. But we got to be targeted, right? And that's one way that we're going to be there.

[00:25:52] And that helps you be really targeted with your marketing efforts.

[00:25:55] You know, I mean, by the way, I love what you just walked through right there. Because by the way, it makes a lot of sense. And I think, you know, just like technologies, like, you know, mysterious to the people who need technology people, you know, or like, hey, I'm not a mechanic, right? I can change a car battery if you put a gun to my head. But at the end of the day, like, I couldn't tell you one sensor versus this manifold versus what like, right? Don't ask me. Um, money. Let's go back to that conversation, right? Like,

[00:26:27] you know, like, you go back to especially the guys who started, you know, cyclical, right? Like somebody internal IT. Yeah, they get laid off there, whatever they said, you know, start an MSP, right? They're like, hey, I'm working based on my knowledge. And you finally hit critical mastery, like, I don't want to work 80 hours a week. And like, do I have enough money to actually hire the next person, etc. Right? But when it comes to marketing, marketing is like this magical hat, right? Does you know, pull the bunny out or not?

[00:26:57] You know, to a lot of people. And so there's a little bit of a harder road to get people to decide, yes, I'm willing to do it. And how much money am I willing to put into it? Right? Anything? Let me let me give you a better analogy. Marketing to many people in this industry is like gambling. Yep. You go to the casino and you may win and you may lose but like for me, and I'm not a gambling, you know, I make wagers all the time, usually ones I know I'm going to win.

[00:27:27] But I'm not a casino guy. But like, yeah, for the people that are, I've, you know, and I know many they're like, hey, if you're going to do this, right, you get hit Vegas and make it a thing or wherever your casinos are going with a number, right? Like, what is that? Like, what is the number that you can lose and not, you know, worry about paying your bills kind of thing, right?

[00:27:45] Yeah, like, so I think about that when we come to this topic all the time. And I'm like, well, number one, like, is your business profitable? Do you know your math? And how much money do you have, like, above and beyond like paying your bills? Right? So like, to me, I start there. But I think one of the missing components, and I want to get your opinion on this, is there is so much, like, truckloads full of vendor dollars available that go absolutely untouched every time.

[00:28:15] Yeah. Yeah. Like, and by the way, a lot of the low hanging fruit, like smaller dollar amounts, two, three, four, $5,000 type things, right? There's not a lot from a requirement standpoint to get access to that dollar amount from your vendor. Like effectively, you just didn't ask. And if you did ask the bare minimum things they're requiring you to do, which is like track your results and provide a plan, is like not going to be a big deal.

[00:28:45] And that's not hard, right? So I'm just curious from your perspective how often you're able to help use that as an avenue to kind of make it work.

[00:28:55] Yeah, so you're talking about getting vendor MDF funds. Yeah, I totally agree with you. It is often overlooked.

[00:29:07] And it's there, right? So to me, if you're as an MSP, if you're like, man, I don't have the funds to invest in marketing.

[00:29:17] That's the first place I would be reaching out is to my vendors.

[00:29:22] Right? To say, hey, we were looking at, you know, increasing our marketing efforts.

[00:29:31] What kind of support do you guys have as a vendor? I was actually having this conversation with a Microsoft consultant about a month or two ago.

[00:29:45] This guy specializes in helping MSPs and other IT consultants navigate the Microsoft partner ecosystem, right?

[00:29:55] It's huge. It's all over the place. It's confusing, but he's like, man, there's a lot of MDF co-op marketing funds that are available there that people just are leaving on the table, like you said.

[00:30:09] And so he helps people with that. That is one of the first places I would look for marketing funds.

[00:30:17] But you also touched on something that I think is really important, you know, because the most common question with marketing budgets, people go, what does it need to be?

[00:30:26] And it's a frickin loaded question. Right. So if I had to answer it in general, I would say five to 10% of your revenue.

[00:30:36] Or gross. Revenue. Gross revenue.

[00:30:41] But that depends on a lot of things. It depends on like, where are you as a company? Right. Are you more established? Are you just starting and you and or are you looking to grow significantly?

[00:30:55] That's going to impact how much you should be investing in your marketing. The other thing, you know, what are your goals? And how profitable are you? Right.

[00:31:03] The more profitable you are, the more funds you're going to have to reinvest back into the company.

[00:31:09] But if, man, if you're not profitable, like it's going to be really difficult to invest in marketing.

[00:31:16] Personally, I think if you're not profitable enough, you need to figure out why and get that addressed first and foremost and then come back on it.

[00:31:25] But all of those things are going to impact what you need to invest in marketing.

[00:31:31] You know, I'll give you an example. I had a conversation with the prospect. This is probably a month ago.

[00:31:37] You know, an MSP that is is.

[00:31:41] They've grown to they were like four and a half, five million dollars in a local market. So they did a really good job of saturating their local market.

[00:31:53] They want to expand into another market.

[00:31:57] They're spending like less than half a percent of top line revenue on marketing. And I was like, wow. So I just want to be clear, right?

[00:32:05] Like on a million dollars in gross, you're saying 50 to 100 thousand dollars. Yep.

[00:32:10] So on a five million dollar business. OK, like you're talking closer to four or five hundred thousand dollars. Yeah.

[00:32:19] And like, especially if like you're in one city, let's say I'm outside of Philadelphia and now I want to move into North Jersey outside of New York City, which is its own little bubble before you even get into the ridiculousness of New York City.

[00:32:32] Right. Like that's probably an animal. Like you're going into a whole different world. Yeah. Yeah, you are.

[00:32:39] And you got to if you're look, you can expand into other markets without marketing.

[00:32:44] It's just it's going to be a hell of a lot more challenging and it's probably going to take a hell of a lot more time. Right.

[00:32:50] But to me, when you look at like if I look at a five million dollar MSP and you're not even spending fifty thousand dollars a year on marketing, like.

[00:33:03] That's you just because you were able to grow to a certain point by doing things a certain way doesn't necessarily mean that it was the best way to do it. Right.

[00:33:14] And frankly, this particular MSP was in a market where there just wasn't there wasn't a significant amount of competition and the competition that was there was not very good.

[00:33:28] Right. You know, would they have been able to get there if they were in a more competitive market or in a market where there were much larger competitors in the space that were coming in probably would have been a lot more challenging.

[00:33:43] You know, so again, it just goes back to I think being realistic with what you're doing with marketing and you know, frankly, look, if.

[00:33:51] If you think it doesn't work and you know, you don't want to invest the money, then don't like I mean, that's up to you. It's your business.

[00:33:58] It's no different than an MSP convincing a prospect that they need technology services. That's the same conversation to a large degree. Like.

[00:34:09] Let me go another direction with you real quick. Like, yeah.

[00:34:16] Some of the traditional marketing avenues, maybe with a twist still work in 2024 like let me talk to you like billboards digital radio like I love I love listening sports radio all the time.

[00:34:32] Then you got AdWords across all the play, you know, like, you know, and LinkedIn and Facebook and I sometimes think some of the other platforms aren't business focused like I don't know how many people are buying services from tick tock ads or Instagram ads or Snapchat ads.

[00:34:52] Right. But like LinkedIn, I mean, business people are going there right like that's a good chance.

[00:34:58] So while that's a little bit new though, that's not brand spanking new right like these ads been around since the 2000s. Right. So like so let me recap billboards magazine ads TV radio at at online ad spends.

[00:35:14] Does any of that make sense for the 5 million 2 million million or less at MSP?

[00:35:23] If it's targeted.

[00:35:27] Right, so let's take let's take a look at the billboard.

[00:35:34] I think that's too broad.

[00:35:36] Okay, right.

[00:35:38] Going back to what I touched on before, like, I think it makes the most sense to go targeted by vertical right if you're targeting more broadly.

[00:35:49] Yeah, maybe somebody's going to drive by and see the billboard and I you know but I just, I don't know I think there are much better places to spend.

[00:35:58] You know, you touched on magazines. But hey, if it's a magazine that my deal clients are reading. Absolutely. Right. Not the airline magazine but the association magazine. No, no right like if it's targeted and your ideal audience is reading it.

[00:36:14] Absolutely do it.

[00:36:16] And, and here's the other thing too. With things like rent.

[00:36:23] You can track that.

[00:36:25] Right, you can you can have, you know a QR code there or you can have a specific number that they're calling, you know there's call tracking software out there.

[00:36:34] There's you can have a specific URL to track. Hey, we advertise in this publication.

[00:36:41] What happened. Did we get any responses did any of those responses, turn into clients. So, you know, I, if you whatever you're going to test determine how are we going to measure this.

[00:36:55] And whether it's effective or not. Okay, so, so there's a lot of people in your chair, who have come into this space and said, well your average cost per lead should be or your average cost per client should be.

[00:37:10] Are those metrics that makes it matter to you even follow any of that.

[00:37:17] I think that you want to have an idea of how much those things are costing you right.

[00:37:24] But you also have to have additional numbers if that's going to mean anything to you, right.

[00:37:30] If you say well my cost per lead is $500.

[00:37:35] Right or $1,000 whatever it is, or cost per client and whatever the number is.

[00:37:41] Okay, that's great.

[00:37:44] You can't determine whether that makes sense for you, unless you know other numbers. Right. The most important number there is what's the lifetime value of a client for you.

[00:37:55] Okay, so how, so when you're consulting and you're told where you're about to work with someone.

[00:38:03] Do you help them get to that calculation.

[00:38:06] Yes.

[00:38:08] Right, and when you want to get that calculation number that you see what your.

[00:38:13] Can't, it's all over. Right. But here's what I'll say though for MSP, it tends to be high.

[00:38:21] Right because people tend to stay. Yeah right there. They're with you longer, and they're larger, larger dollar amounts that they're paying recurring every month.

[00:38:32] But we can't look at the top line revenue when you're looking at the.

[00:38:36] What I want to know is what's the, what the gross profit is per client each month. And then how long do you retain them on average, that's going to give you a more accurate number for what the lifetime value of a client is.

[00:38:52] Once you know what that is.

[00:38:55] And then you can start to look back and go okay, our cost to acquire a client is x.

[00:39:02] Is that freaking profitable.

[00:39:06] Right, but without the lifetime value of a client the other number who cares what the other numbers are that you don't have enough data to determine whether it means anything.

[00:39:15] So, it's interesting when you go to this exercise, maybe you go to an average but I mean their entire companies have popped up to help people understand what their profitability is on a customer by customer basis and like, like all businesses right you take some

[00:39:30] customers on earlier on probably weren't the best fit but you needed to pay the bills and then like over time you like got smarter and you're like, this isn't the right company that we want this one.

[00:39:39] And then you start to like, like a good portion of your customers are profitable and then there's like another portion of customers are like in the middle and then there's the other guys who are like, man I really need to stop dealing with these guys because I'm losing.

[00:39:52] Like, so like that, I feel like there's never like unless you know you know when that doesn't happen. Let's say somebody exited this old, and then they started again, and they know now in part and you know, opportunity to point out they're like nope we're only going to

[00:40:09] deal with this situation with this clientele under these circumstances and they know going in that's what they want. Yeah, but they learned already right so like that's a little bit different.

[00:40:20] But that's another reason why focusing on and really honing in on who your ideal clients are is important. That's another benefit of that is those numbers become much more consistent and predictable.

[00:40:33] Yeah, yeah. Right, and that's how you can then when you know the numbers. That's how you can then start to determine like, are we getting a return on our investment for what we're doing with our marketing.

[00:40:47] Right, but until you understand the numbers you're not going to know what the return on investment is.

[00:40:52] I, I'm probably not gonna tell you anything surprising here but if I had to guess, Tim's probably running into a lot of people that do not have these numbers figured out.

[00:41:03] Correct.

[00:41:05] Right. But it's not like a finance guru in the beginning of this operation right to figure out what the actual thing is. Yeah, and it's too George it's also like just marketing is just information.

[00:41:16] Information overload. Right, there's so many different channels, so many different tactics are so many different people saying hey you need to do this or you need to do that.

[00:41:25] I think it's really important to just take a step back and keep it simple.

[00:41:31] Like we, it is so easy to over complicate things in our business, not just marketing. But when we over complicate things like that is that gets in the way of getting results.

[00:41:44] When we keep things simple becomes much easier to implement and execute on it.

[00:41:50] And most of the time it becomes much more effective.

[00:41:55] Feel like these are opposing forces though technology is complicated by its nature, like, it's not meant to be simple work, it's meant to, I mean, I guess it can be made simple but like, you know, the Apple type approach right but like, yeah.

[00:42:14] It's inherently a complicated story to begin with, and it's trying to solve for complicated problems.

[00:42:21] Yeah, but so let me give you an example from the marketing standpoint. Okay.

[00:42:27] People are out there talking like hey you need to set up a funnel.

[00:42:31] You need to have somebody ops in here for this free thing. And then, you know, they go down this path will the tools that are out there. I mean they get pretty sophisticated. Right.

[00:42:45] Like you can say, hey somebody ops in for this, this free widget.

[00:42:50] If they open five emails out of the next 10, then I want them to go down this path.

[00:42:59] And if they don't open any then I want them to go down this path.

[00:43:03] And if the wind is blowing five miles to the east, they go down this path right.

[00:43:09] That is an example of making things overly complex. Okay, just because you can make things complex doesn't mean that it's the best thing to do because the reality is when you start to go to that level of complexity.

[00:43:23] It becomes really hard to troubleshoot where things are breaking down.

[00:43:29] And it becomes really hard to implement and execute on it.

[00:43:35] That's the best right so best funnels are the simplest, they don't have to be 1015 steps.

[00:43:44] Okay, so we need to boil it down so from the text and look, I'm not a tech person. Right, so I can't speak to it on the MSP side but think about the tools that you guys are implementing and executing.

[00:43:56] I mean there are a lot of different features that you guys can use but you know the reality is like, are all of those features really important.

[00:44:09] Yeah, you know, so it's, you know, looking like do we really need this for to do this, or can we keep this simple and still have it be very very effective.

[00:44:22] I challenge most people that keeping things as simple as possible is still going to make things extremely effective.

[00:44:31] That's fair. And to be honest with you, you're kind of, you know, I think you are an uphill battle because technology people are usually right you know they go down the rabbit hole they get stuck in the weeds whatever analogy want to use

[00:44:44] right like you get into like very minute details and it's like dude, like let me bring you back to reality here right like we're getting too far down an area that we're wasting time on and it happens all the time and to the point where, you know, it's like paralysis by analysis kind of thing.

[00:45:01] You know, come on, let's get the job done like let's stop stop getting hung up here. Yeah. Well, look, here's another example.

[00:45:11] We started talking about target market and your messaging, right. The, the fundamentals, the principles of marketing.

[00:45:21] They don't change. It doesn't change in anything. Right, the fundamentals of your big football fan, right, you like the Eagles.

[00:45:30] The fundamentals of a quarterback dropping back and throwing a pass the fundamentals of doing that well, are the same they don't change.

[00:45:38] Same with marketing right. So when I talk about keeping things simple. It's about focusing on the fundamentals that don't change first and foremost, because that lays the foundation for you to be successful.

[00:45:51] Most of what most MSP's do is they jump right to the tactics. Oh, I need to have a website. I need to be on Facebook or I need to be on LinkedIn without actually having the fundamentals in place.

[00:46:05] And when I talk about strategy, when I talk about strategy with marketing, what I'm really looking at are the fundamentals of marketing.

[00:46:14] That's the fuel, right. That's the fuel for the marketing vehicles you choose. So if you just say, hey, I got to have a website. Awesome. That's a marketing vehicle. But if you have no fuel for that vehicle, it's not going to work.

[00:46:26] Yeah, no, that's what most people are doing is they're jumping into vehicles, but they have no fuel there. And they're like, why is this not working? I use the analogy, right. It's because the person next to them is doing it right.

[00:46:38] Like, you know, the guy across the town is doing it. The guy I met at the event's doing it. The guy in my peer group's doing it. And like if they're doing it and they're successful, then if I just replicate what they're doing, maybe I'll be successful too.

[00:46:49] Like this is no different than when somebody comes in and was like, hey, like this happens in MSP land all the time. It's like, you mind give me a copy of your contract? And then they just try to like, this isn't one of these things where you just cross the names out, guy.

[00:47:04] You should consult with someone because the way that you do business may be completely different than the way I do business. And like, that makes a difference. But I like this happens all the time. So like, the other problem is, to your point, right, the guy who they look across the town with may already have the pieces you're talking about planned, right?

[00:47:25] They've right that the foundation and they're two, three, four steps like down the line. And like the person, you know, is ear oxing the idea has none of that. They're just saying, hey, if they do it, I'm going to do it. I'll get what I got to lose. Right?

[00:47:40] Yeah, and you got to be careful. You don't want to copy people, right? It's okay to model things model frameworks and things that have been proven to work. But yeah, you it's a perfectly valid point, right? Is everybody's at slightly different places. And just because that worked for them doesn't necessarily mean that if you just take it and copy it, it's going to work for you.

[00:48:04] And I think that's another challenge to within the marketing space, not just in the MSP space, but marketing as a whole is, you know, everybody's like, hey, we've already got all the templates and the tools that you need. And they think, oh, great, I can just put my name and logo on this. And away I go. That's not how it works. Yeah.

[00:48:27] And that's the problem is people just they think it's an easy button. And it's like, cool, I can get all these templates and all the stuff that I'm gonna need. And I just put myself on their grid, this is gonna be great, it's gonna work. And then it doesn't work. And they're like, why? Well, because you got to make this your own, you got to look at your particular situation. Who you're targeting what your goals are and adapt these things for you, you can take the base. And you know, the framework and the model and the methodology that works. And then you can take the base and you can take the

[00:48:57] model and adapt it to your own. But you got to make that your own, you can't just stick your logo on it and send it out. It doesn't work.

[00:49:05] Well, but hold on for every back to the go back to vendors, right? Everyone's like, oh, here's the brochure. Put your logo on it. Here's this, put your logo on it. Here's the template, put your but that's all. Honestly, that's all I see out there.

[00:49:20] But it doesn't work. So, you know, it's like, I'm George, we could go down a whole nother conversation about like, vendor provided sales and marketing materials for MSP is like, nobody buys from you because it goes back to my earlier example of the James Hardy, you know, siding contractor, they're all buying James Hardy, right? But you know, for the most part, I mean, okay, so you do Google, you do Microsoft.

[00:49:41] contractor, they're all buying James Hardy, right? But you know,

[00:49:45] for the most part, I mean, okay, so you do Google, you do

[00:49:48] Microsoft, you would take your pick. They're not buying from

[00:49:53] you because you sell that stuff. They're buying from you

[00:49:56] because of what you do. And the results and the outcomes

[00:50:00] that you help them get. So when you get a flyer from a

[00:50:04] vendor, pitching their stuff, that's talking tech, and you

[00:50:09] give it to a client who's at a level two when it comes to tech,

[00:50:14] it's foreign, right? It's like it's a foreign language. I

[00:50:18] don't get it. So to me, most of the vast majority of those

[00:50:23] materials are a complete and utter waste of time. They don't

[00:50:27] do anything.

[00:50:29] That's my second take. I mean, there's a lot of

[00:50:30] takeaways in this session is actually pretty good. But

[00:50:33] that's one of my takeaways from this session. That like,

[00:50:36] you can go to every portal and download every document, slap

[00:50:40] every logo you want. But sounds like it don't work.

[00:50:45] That's not think about how your clients buy and why they

[00:50:47] buy from you.

[00:50:51] I don't know about you. I mean, I've never talked to an

[00:50:53] MSP who was like, Oh, I got this client because I sell

[00:50:57] this particular vendor.

[00:50:59] But some of the household name like Microsoft, Apple,

[00:51:02] Google, right? No, these brands, right? There's some

[00:51:07] cache to that. No, I mean,

[00:51:09] I think there's some, I think there's some credibility and

[00:51:14] brand transfer there. But again, like the vast majority

[00:51:18] of MSPs could stick those logos on their website,

[00:51:22] right? So we're all doing it. It's not a differentiator

[00:51:26] anymore. Right. And so it's the when somebody works with

[00:51:32] an MSP, they're buying the outcome, right? They're buying

[00:51:35] the solution to that business problem. They're buying into

[00:51:40] how you solve that problem, right? Like, what's the process

[00:51:43] you take people through, to get from where they are to where

[00:51:47] they want to be, right? They're buying you, they're

[00:51:49] not necessarily buying the stuff behind the scenes.

[00:51:56] Sure, sure. Right.

[00:51:58] I mean, there might be a couple of brands that are

[00:52:00] important. Like if you were to go do that exercise you

[00:52:03] did where you talk to the customer, and you just said,

[00:52:06] hey, here's a list of thing of companies, technologies,

[00:52:10] circling one that you recognize, I'm sure there's two,

[00:52:13] three-ish, four, you know, that they're like, oh, yeah,

[00:52:16] I know this. And I know that. And I mean, like,

[00:52:18] yeah, you went through that exercise, I'm sure some of

[00:52:20] those might bubble up. But to your point, then what?

[00:52:23] Like, what's the next part of that? You know, just

[00:52:26] putting the vendor logo doesn't actually mean. I'm

[00:52:30] like, okay, what does that mean? Right? Like, yeah,

[00:52:33] registered as a partner. Yeah. Yeah. So I get what

[00:52:39] you're saying. I know. So like, some of this is just

[00:52:43] working from real data so that you can then decide what

[00:52:48] to do next. And I think what I gathered from this

[00:52:52] session was, hey, if you're just shooting by the hip,

[00:52:55] and there isn't a plan, and you're not you don't really

[00:52:57] have the information to measure, and even understand

[00:53:01] what the results of that measurement even mean. Like

[00:53:03] you're like, hey, you know, we talked about, hey,

[00:53:05] these metrics are great, but without other data,

[00:53:08] what does that actually do for you? Like, it doesn't

[00:53:10] mean anything. So like I know, if anything at the

[00:53:15] MSP really needs to when it sounds like when they

[00:53:17] look at marketing, almost need to look back in the

[00:53:20] mirror, right? When they go to a prospect and say,

[00:53:22] hey, based on what you said, and me looking at

[00:53:25] what you're doing, you need this, this and this. How

[00:53:28] do you justify that? It's the same very similar

[00:53:30] track to what as a business trying to grow or get

[00:53:36] more clientele or even just increase business from

[00:53:39] existing clientele, you need to do this. Well,

[00:53:42] like it's a very similar track.

[00:53:45] It is. It's very similar. Right. One of the

[00:53:49] things I say is hope is not a marketing strategy.

[00:53:52] Yeah, that's a great

[00:53:53] like we can't, we gotta have a plan. We gotta have

[00:53:56] a strategy in place and then we gotta execute on

[00:54:00] it and we're gonna learn from that. Right. But

[00:54:02] you like a lot of MSP is a very data driven

[00:54:06] people. Oh, yeah. Right. But when we but they

[00:54:10] struggle on the marketing side to to track the

[00:54:13] right data so that you can make because when

[00:54:15] you have the right data, you can make strong

[00:54:17] decision. Yeah. Right. As to what you need to do

[00:54:21] with marketing, we just need to boil down to what

[00:54:24] are the important metrics and then we need to

[00:54:27] track them. And from there, we're gonna be able

[00:54:29] to make good decisions about what's working,

[00:54:32] what's not, what course corrections do we need

[00:54:34] to make moving forward? Yeah, no, I 100% I'm

[00:54:39] tracking what you're saying. And quite

[00:54:40] frankly, I've said it a couple of times in

[00:54:42] this session, I say it again. This conversation

[00:54:46] is very like just like mysterious to many

[00:54:50] people in this, you know, vertical right MSP it

[00:54:53] services land, they're just like they don't.

[00:54:55] There's like a disconnect for some reason

[00:54:57] between this and like what they're doing.

[00:54:59] But in reality, there's a heavy overlap.

[00:55:02] But they need to spend the time to get the

[00:55:05] right information in place in order to actually

[00:55:09] do it correctly. And like I would be, I'm

[00:55:13] not surprised now that we've gone, you

[00:55:15] know, so second time talking, but I would

[00:55:18] think a lot of the people that you're

[00:55:19] trying to get it get to are very surprised

[00:55:21] the beginning part of your job is helping

[00:55:24] them really understand their math,

[00:55:28] their math and who are they really

[00:55:32] targeting? Right? Who do they want to

[00:55:34] target versus who they're targeting now

[00:55:38] and how they're doing it?

[00:55:40] Maths a big part of that. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:55:42] That's your point. Like back to the

[00:55:44] you know, the analogy, right? It's like,

[00:55:47] well, if this is the thing that I want

[00:55:49] the most because it is most profitable

[00:55:51] and least problematic. But I'm dealing

[00:55:55] with everybody like back to well, how

[00:55:58] do I narrow down to the people that

[00:56:00] actually are good clients versus just a

[00:56:02] client? Yeah. And math's a big part of

[00:56:06] that, because if those clients are

[00:56:07] profitable and pay their bills on time

[00:56:09] and you're spending less labor costs in

[00:56:11] order to support them trifecta.

[00:56:16] Unfortunately, a lot of people don't

[00:56:18] have these answers. Like they haven't

[00:56:20] spent the time to get to what you're

[00:56:22] talking about here. So yeah, it sounds

[00:56:25] like there's a lot of there's a little

[00:56:26] bit of legwork involved, right? And

[00:56:29] frankly, it's not just MSP, any

[00:56:32] business, right? Like, yeah, the

[00:56:33] problems for, you know, they're

[00:56:35] deciding contractor as it is for the

[00:56:37] MSP. So yeah, yeah.

[00:56:39] Yeah, it's not. This stuff is not

[00:56:41] easy, right? It takes work. But it

[00:56:44] can be simple, right? We we can all

[00:56:47] understand this. We just need to take

[00:56:50] the time to go through the process.

[00:56:55] But if we don't go through the

[00:56:56] process, then we're you know,

[00:56:58] you never move stuck in the same

[00:57:00] place. No, yeah.

[00:57:02] Then this was awesome. And I think

[00:57:04] you have a really great gift at

[00:57:09] taking a complex theme and like

[00:57:10] saying, Hey, it doesn't have to be

[00:57:12] complicated. Keep it simple. I know

[00:57:14] that that's not the first time

[00:57:15] everybody's heard this right. But

[00:57:16] like, executing that is different

[00:57:19] than just saying, Hey, you know,

[00:57:22] it's like, yeah, I hear what

[00:57:23] you're saying. But doesn't exactly

[00:57:26] work that way. One, because you've

[00:57:27] wrote you're making it complicated,

[00:57:29] doesn't that? Right? So I noticed

[00:57:32] that coming out of this call them,

[00:57:33] how do people find more information

[00:57:35] about you, your program, your

[00:57:38] methodology, maybe they want to

[00:57:39] get all that good stuff.

[00:57:41] So to all two places, our website,

[00:57:45] Rialto marketing.com, it's R I a

[00:57:47] LTO marketing.com. I am on

[00:57:51] LinkedIn. So if you search me up

[00:57:52] there, I'd be happy to connect

[00:57:53] with you there as well. The other

[00:57:54] thing I'll make available to your

[00:57:56] audience to George's at revenue

[00:57:58] roadblock scorecard.com. So

[00:58:01] revenue roadblocks scorecard.com,

[00:58:03] we we help clients remove nine

[00:58:05] revenue roadblocks with

[00:58:06] marketing. If you want to know

[00:58:08] which of the nine are slowing

[00:58:09] down your growth, that's where you

[00:58:11] can do it takes less than five

[00:58:12] minutes.

[00:58:13] That's cool. I might check that

[00:58:15] out myself. Put my put my like

[00:58:18] checkboxes in there.

[00:58:19] There you go. That's it.

[00:58:20] Awesome. Guys, this session was

[00:58:22] recorded and we had a earlier

[00:58:25] session with Tim, you should go

[00:58:26] check both of those out. I

[00:58:28] mean, part of selecting the

[00:58:31] right person regardless of

[00:58:32] whatever it is, is like, are

[00:58:33] you comfortable? And do you feel

[00:58:35] like they're giving you the

[00:58:36] right information? I mean, I

[00:58:38] tell you what I like what Tim had

[00:58:39] to say today. I would hope that

[00:58:41] most people who are deaf or

[00:58:43] frustrated even have tried and

[00:58:46] tried and like just haven't

[00:58:48] gotten anywhere. Try something

[00:58:50] different. Let's get a

[00:58:52] different result. Maybe why

[00:58:54] not? Guys, you'll find the

[00:58:57] session recorded, it will be

[00:58:58] online, posted on all the

[00:59:00] usual places and YouTube and

[00:59:02] podcatchers and our website

[00:59:03] MSP initiative that come under

[00:59:04] sessions. We are one more

[00:59:06] session away from out and

[00:59:08] about in the world with block

[00:59:09] parties and conferences and all

[00:59:11] sorts of good stuff. So if we

[00:59:12] don't see you in person, follow

[00:59:14] us because we're going to be

[00:59:16] posting all the shenanigans

[00:59:17] online. So at least you'll

[00:59:18] have a little bit of FOMO and

[00:59:20] eventually we're going to see

[00:59:21] Tim in person somewhere

[00:59:22] somehow. Watch it happen. But

[00:59:25] thank you for tuning in and

[00:59:27] Tim thanks for jumping on

[00:59:28] here again today and we'll

[00:59:29] catch everybody on the next

[00:59:31] one. Thanks guys.