Technology is boardroom news these days. Engaging with IT directors is critical for every vendor. They are an audience full of contradictions. And they, frankly, haven’t time to read half the information you’d like them to. Add the fear that IT directors speak a different language to the rest of us, and they can be seen as an audience who are, to put it mildly, hard to reach.
To help you hit the right buttons, here are some useful insights and tips from our planning department to help successfully get inside the head of an IT director.
A pen portrait from our own research indicates the following: 90 per cent of IT directors are male, and usually 40-55. They’re time-poor, with frequent overseas travel; three out of four of them often work weekends and most are married, with kids. Most (not all) have IT backgrounds. They consume paper-centric media.
They are strategic, ‘bigger picture’ thinkers who are accountable to the board and work with the CFO to define budgets. Straight-talking and very risk-averse, they’re analytical and sceptical (borderline cynical). They earn £75,000+. They like beer and wine, drive Mercs more than BMWs, and prefer rugby and cricket to football.
Now let’s build on that profile by applying some marketing rigour to our thought processes.
Remember your basic marketing principles uncover some meaningful insight about your audience, map your product/solution to this insight and deliver your message in an engaging and relevant way. These are forward-looking people whose job is to chart a route for their business through an ever-changing IT landscape. Marketing efforts should be focused on campaigns with depth of content rather than quick and varied activities. Tip: avoid disparate ‘product’ campaigns and seek more connected engagement.
Faced with so many choices, IT directors tend to err on the side of caution. In many cases they act like sheep and move en masse to tried and tested products that offer less chance of disruption. If you have a new technology, you need to isolate those who buck this trend and have a track record for championing new products. Think about ways to help them minimise risk, trial products or mentor with existing clients. Peer-to-peer marketing is hugely powerful. Tip: sell evolution, not revolution.
The IT director might be the big cheese but there is a very important group of influencers who can steer his thinking. Of real note are his immediate board level peers, especially the finance director, and the IT manager who often has a better understanding/knowledge of which technologies are most suitable. Tip: think about the decision-making unit not just the decision-maker.
IT directors are human beings. Their title doesn’t mean they aren’t susceptible to more emotional marketing. Whilst your message is important, it’s not the only thing! When you and your competition are saying the same things in the same way you cancel each other out. So view yourself as being in the entertainment business, competing for people’s time by using brand and creativity as vital weapons. Tip: do something surprising.
Most IT directors are bored senseless by every tech vendor using the same old, same old mechanics. Be more inventive in how you engage with the IT director. What’s your approach to gatekeepers? This could take you out of the realms of business media and into other areas of brand stand-out. You could even think about excluding the IT director: sometimes their overload can make them a blocker to adoption. Tip: challenge conventions.
Focus on enhancing your behavioural and psychographic information so that you can employ personalised marketing tactics to drive home your message. Advances in digital printing and orchestrated marketing can give your product real stand-out. Tip: get personal.
The Internet is a great place to conduct secondary research on IT directors. Websites, weblogs and analyst reports can all give you a head start in understanding the issues that affect these individuals. However, don’t get lazy! There’s a new trend in immersion planning whereby client and agencies are literally walking in the shoes of their target audience. Tip: get your agency planner to spend a week with an IT director who matches your specific profile. The insights they gather should lead to original and fresh creative ideas.
