We have been discussing the ongoing shift in power in information technology purchasing from seller to the buyer in this blog for some time now. In this new era, a potential IT buyer can fully educate themselves about a company’s technology offerings and formulate purchase consideration before ever speaking to a sales rep. Therefore, it is no longer the IT marketer’s job to generate demand, but to facilitate demand. Facilitating demand is making certain that you are providing potential buyers with all of the content and information that they need to educate themselves about what you have to offer. Which means your marketing efforts will go only as far as the content you can provide.

In order to ensure you keep up with IT buyer demand for information, you need to get the most out of every piece of content you produce. For example, if you create a webcast, transcribe it and turn it into a white paper. Or edit the audio portion and turn it into a podcast. Or take your broad white paper and create multiple versions targeted to industries you work with/sell into. Possibilities are endless. This approach will allow you to most effectively use multiple distribution channels to capitalize on prospect media format/information consumption preference and maximize interaction opportunities. Also, do not be afraid to offer content in different formats together. Recent campaigns we have run that promoted a webcast and podcast on the same subject together have seen very low duplication rates.