Search engines have been around for a long time. Google, for example, traces its roots back to 1996.
But it’s only been during the past few years that search engines, in combination with social media and mobile devices, have truly become a disruptive force that’s reshaping how enterprise IT buyers research and make decisions on colocation data center services.
Some CEOs of data center companies totally understand this. Others are in search engine denial.
How does your CEO know that? When was the last time your buyer personas were updated?
His answer, being the denier that he is, is, of course, “because I said so.”
Your CEO is espousing what’s known as the HIPPO – the highest-paid person’s opinion.
Is your leadership at your colocation data center in denial about what’s changed in the buyer’s journey? Is your CEO burying his head in the sand?
When you look at a basic keyword research tool, you can see how many times a month a specific keyword phrase is searched for, in a given country.
This example shows that the two-word keyword phrase “data center” has been searched 8,100 times in the past month.
For many people reading or watching this example, your website may not necessarily have the search engine authority with Google to target a broad, two-word search term.
Typically, you’d go after something a little bit longer, a little more specific, and have a better chance of working up to a two-word keyword phrase like “data center.”
But there’s an enormous demand out there with people searching for these kinds of terms.
And remember, if you don’t get found in those first 10 results, if you don’t make it to page one, either organically or on a paid basis…
If you can’t crush your important search terms, it doesn’t even pay to show up.
Getting found by strangers, before that 83% point in the buyer’s journey, the moment of truth is critical to competing in today’s colocation data center market.
The way to do so is by investing in creating at-scale helpful, original, remarkable content.
This is what’s going to lead to true differentiation – which is a major challenge and frustration among sales teams, business development managers, and marketing executives in the colo data center space.
There’s a big struggle to differentiate. It’s not a matter of you saying that you’re differentiated.
Your buyer personas and ideal clients you’re going after must perceive that and agree that you’re differentiated.
It’s like shopping for a car, and the car salesperson says, “Trust me, I’m honest.”
Come on. You’re not the one who gets to decide whether you’re differentiated.
It’s the marketplace. It’s your ideal buyers that you’re going after that make that decision.
So the question is: Is your company on board? Or is it living in 2005? Let us know in the Comments box below.
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