Do you sound like a Hot Dog Marketing client?

When Hot Dog Marketing first got started, we were a small business marketing agency that worked with pretty much any business that wanted to hire us. Over the years, our team’s capabilities evolved, and we started to focus in on our strengths. In the last year, our focus pivoted strongly to work with expert service providers and tech companies. We realized that our best work, our best client relationships, and our value lies with our experience in understanding service-based businesses.

Our client-base is 80% business-to-business and 20% business-to-consumer. Whether it’s a SaaS company, a high-end hair salon, or a professional employer organization, the following traits are common among our clients, and we understand how to work with them.

You Want to Appear Low-Risk – a Safe Choice

The higher the ticket for the service, the more important it is to be perceived as the safe, reliable choice. Not only do you get to command a higher dollar for the services you provide, but that safe and reliable choice is what attracts consumers and business-to-business buyers.

To be the safe, low-risk choice, you have to have a great reputation, but more than anything you need brand equity. Brand equity is the value of having your brand come top-of-mind when you think about a service or need. When you have brand equity, you are the safer choice because your customers see you as the main choice or the most popular choice.

A client once said, “No IT guy got fired for choosing Microsoft Outlook for email service for their company.” Even if that IT guy thought there was a better solution for email, the safer choice is to go with something that has earned brand equity. Even if Microsoft Outlook crashed for a day and brought business operations to a halt, that IT guy’s job is safe.

You want your brand to be perceived as that low-risk and safe.

You Understand What Your Time is Worth and Don’t Want to Waste It

There are several tactical marketing needs your company needs to address on a daily, weekly and monthly basis. As a service provider, you have a very clear idea of what your time is worth so when you look at these tactical to-dos, it’s difficult to justify having an expert in your business take over these needs.

Yes, there is a time in a company’s growth when having an internal marketing team makes sense, but for many businesses, even when there is a full-time marketing department, it still doesn’t make sense to have them learn branding, web development and SEO strategy when those are one-time or fractional needs.

You Need Your Marketing to Be Focused Around Your Expertise

Because you’re the best at what you do in your niche, you want to be able to charge your premium rate. In order to get to those more profitable rates, you have to find the right clients. In order to attract that “right client,” you have to be properly positioned in your niche.

Proper brand positioning is what leads to industry expertise, brand equity and increasing your brand reputation. You need a clear understanding of your customer’s buyer’s journey, triggers to purchase, and know what issues your customers are facing. Once you have a clear map, strong brand messaging and a professional visual brand presentation that is consistent and persistent throughout your marketing is what will get you to your goal.

You Understand What Good Service Looks Like

Since our clients are also service providers, they’re often seeking a relationship with a marketing agency that matches with the service culture they’ve created for their clients. Expert service providers are schooled in the art of creating raving fans and appreciate the same effort when they’re in the client-seat.

On the other hand, you’re easily put off by a company that doesn’t try at the relationship. Because you know that there needs to be proactive communication and a foundation of trust to get the work done, you’ll be easily annoyed if you’re not receiving that from your agency. You’re seeking an expert to help you so you can be the expert to others. Experts have to step-up, make the right suggestions and map a path to success. That’s what you do for your customers. That’s what you want for your agency relationship.

At the end of the day, you’re seeking growth.

Company Growth is Your End-Goal but You’re Looking for the RIGHT Customers to Get There.

We’re looking forward to growing our current relationships and excited to start new ones. If you feel like you related to these traits, then you’re probably our next Hot Dog Marketing client. Our Texas Digital Marketing Agency will help you reach your growth goals.