Webinars. Once you’ve figured out what you have to say with your webinar or series of webinars, promotion is the biggest consideration. Any media organization that you team up with to promote your webinar will be able to provide you with the list of registrants. Assuming you have a good topic that people care about, this should represent a healthy list of prospects in a reasonably finite period of time.

 

But beware, there are many webinar pifalls to avoid.

 

Seminars. The next step up from webinars is face-to-face seminars. These are more risky because you need to fill a real live room. With webinars, none of your attendees knows if they are one of 50 or one of 5,000. But when you’re in a room together, it’s all transparent. So seminars pose a constant challenge to fill a room. If the topic of your seminar is “Ten Ways Product X Can Improve Your Business Process,” don’t expect much of a turnout. The seminar must be educational in nature. Advertise good content and deliver, and you’ll build a reputation for high quality events.

 

As with webinars, seminars provide qualified leads. But unlike webinars, you’re team is able to actually engage potential buyers face-to-face during networking time and Q&A. Seminars are much more powerful at building and promoting your brand to attendees than webinars. They also build greater interaction with your brand and more vested prospects.

Check back later this week for more of the 5 fastest ways to generate leads.

Government decision makers and the corporate C-suite alike tell us all the time that they read resources that help them and their teams be more effective. Examples of such resources include content-rich newsletters, bylined/contributed articles, case studies, blogs, analyst reports, and white papers. For all of your content-driven materials, ask yourself: how does this help the decision maker do his or her job?

 

The credibility valuable content builds is paramount for companies selling professional services and products to the government. But remember, this initiative won’t be successful if materials are simply sent off blindly to an overflowing inbox of an unwitting recipient. Rather, these resources will serve as door busters for your business develop teams. And they will serve as incentives to use at different points in the sales cycle.

 

If you don’t have one already, create a library of powerful, valuable materials for your business development team.

 

Want to learn more about B2G marketing? Join me at The ASBC’s 5^th Anniversary Conference and Gala April 23, 2009 in Vienna, VA. I’ll be presenting on “11 Essential Steps for Marketing to Government.”

 

Read more about how the ASBC conference will help you do business with the government.

 

And now, for the first 3 tips for securing the perfect marketing agency for you:

 

1. Commitment to delivery. Agencies sometimes lack structure. Everyone you talk with is going to tell you they hit their clients’ deadlines. To get to the real issue, ask their references about their track record in hitting deadlines.

 

2. Seeing the big picture. Your account manager should have a firm grasp of your business objectives. The agency methodology should be more about helping you reach your goals than creating award-winning pieces. They must understand how and why you want to impact your audience.

 

3. What’s the ROI? The agency needs to be able to demonstrate return on projects like yours. If you’re looking at web marketing, what’s the agency done and how has it impacted their clients? If they’re trying to sell you on direct marketing, what’s their track record? How have they measured past success and how will they do it for you? A formal measurement methodology in plain English is a huge plus.

 

Check back soon for the rest of the ten tips for selecting the perfect marketing agency.