Why You Need a Tech Matchmaker
As an IT leader, you’re constantly bombarded with sales calls and emails from various tech vendors. These calls are to inform you of a problem with your operations that can only be solved by using their innovative and bleeding edge product or service. Here’s the issue: You probably don’t really have the issue that their persuasive sales staff are working so tirelessly to convince you is hindering your business.
The truth is, there is a consistent trend in the tech world of vendors pushing to tailor your business to fit their systems. There is an insistence that you need to be using a particular tool, even if it isn’t a good fit for fixing the issues you want to address within your business. The reality is that these vendors are ultimately concerned about their bottom line, and they do not necessarily care who they are actually selling to.
There must be a better way for IT leaders to be introduced to services that are beneficial to them, as opposed to the approach of trying to shoe-horn in a system that simply is not a good match. This is where we look to provide a service to ease the stressful and time-consuming process of finding the right tech solutions.
The Traditional Lead Generation Approach
Even a useful and well-engineered tool is only helpful for the job that it was designed to perform.
In a pinch, a pair of needle nose pliers may technically work for removing a bolt, but a wrench or socket is clearly the best tool for the job. A company who manufactures pliers understands this and doesn’t try to market their service for bolt removal. And why would they? That would be silly and ignores their actual target market for their product while simultaneously selling the consumer on a product that is not going to help perform their job.
Why, then, should tech vendors try to push the tool they are selling on you when the issue it is meant to solve is not the issue for which you need a solution? The short answer: they shouldn’t.
However, this mentality is, sadly, the more traditional approach taken by most tech lead generation companies. The focus lies solely in the technology that they want to sell, and if you’re in the business of IT you’re a prime target for their shotgun approach to lead generation. The aim is to make their solution fit your business, when the reality is that the systems you put in place should be tailored to fit your unique needs. No two businesses require the same stack of technology to function most efficiently.
This type of approach is essentially what can be defined as demand creation. Rather than discovering a true lead based on a business’s needs and pain points, the lead is instead being created out of thin air. The practice of demand creation can at times be good for the tech vendor’s sales, but it is not buyer focused.
The demand creation approach can often be counterproductive for the vendor too, as they waste time and resources trying to push their product on a customer it clearly does not fit. Sure, they may see a few sales, but IT decision-makers are smart, and they will generally understand when a product isn’t a fit for them regardless of the skill level of the sales person. This makes these sales calls a waste of time for both the vendor and the customer.
As cliché as it sounds, time is money, and wasting your valuable time is a sunk cost that cannot be recovered.
The Launchpad Tech Matchmaker Approach
The difficulty for an IT leader is the sheer number of technology products available. Cloud solutions, data center solutions, security software, telephony systems, and many other product categories have so many brands and products to choose from. You don’t have the time or manpower to sift through the sea of options for every solution that you need. This would take away time from performing the critical tasks required to keep your operation running.
The Launchpad believes that an IT partner should have a partner who has their best interests at heart. A skilled and experienced tech matchmaker will help to align the needs of the business with technology solutions that best fit. No more sales calls pushing products that won’t help your business run more effectively. Instead, The Launchpad takes on all the heavy lifting for you in looking at the needs of your business and supplying expert recommendations on the tech partners that will serve you best.
We don’t try to sell you on a particular solution simply because it is popular or because of a financial incentive on our part. We ensure that when we recommend a technology product or service to you, it is because it fits precisely with your business. In other words, we want to make sure that you are using the right tool for the job at hand.
The difference between us and the other guys is very simple: We listen. The most important phase of our system is the discovery phase, in which we speak with you to figure out your actual needs. We will work to discover what problems you need to solve, what your current systems look like, and what results you are aiming to achieve. We then work to connect you with just the right vendors to solve each of your pain points, based on the information that you have provided us.
We don’t make assumptions; we ask questions. Then we listen to the answers.
This should be the obvious first step in any lead generation process. Unfortunately, that has not been the norm in the industry. The shotgun approach to lead generation has become the default, where more pinpoint accuracy is always what will match you with the best technology. This is what helps your bottom line and keeps your processes running like a well-oiled machine.
Customer Satisfaction
The Launchpad has helped many leaders in the IT industry discover the best solutions for all their business needs. We help to streamline the decision-making process, saving you time and money in the process. Our customers immediately see the effects of our method of connecting them with the perfect technology vendors for their operation.
“I receive a ton of calls from technology vendors about everything under the sun, most which has no benefit to my business. The Launchpad was different, starting out by explaining what they did and asking what areas I wanted/needed help with. The Launchpad saved me time and effort in sorting through the myriad of providers to put me in touch with exactly what I would benefit from implementing. After a couple of short phone calls, we have narrowed down to the two vendors to provide technology complete with pricing and provide implementation. I have truly enjoyed the thoroughness and professionalism of The Launchpad.” -Jeff C., CEO
Kind words like this from our loyal customers are why we do what we do. It would be easy to simply provide your contact information to every vendor in our rolodex and allow them to call you to make their sales pitch. This is how many lead generation firms operate, and it does not make for a positive customer experience.
What we strive for is to be a partner in solving your problems in regards to the technology you use. If you come away happy with the partners and solutions we’ve helped to provide, we will have done our job.
Final Thoughts
We believe that your business has its own unique set of needs. We also believe that there is a demand for every great technology service. What we do not believe in, however, is the idea of forcefully creating a demand that does not already exist for a technology solution. The aim should be to match IT leaders with services that meet their needs, rather than attempting to foster a demand within your operation for a particular tech solution that we are trying to sell.
With The Launchpad as your tech matchmaker, you will be provided with optimal solutions to help run your operations efficiently without having to sift through the sea of unnecessary tech sales pitches.
