IT solution provider sales teams are often frustrated by their pipelines. They may scramble for a month or two, trying to keep up with high demand … and then it all goes quiet. For months, there seems like little to do except work through old leads and make a few seemingly futile cold calls. Even if the numbers look good at the end of the year, the process that gets you there can be pretty frustrating.

It’s possible to smooth out the pipeline a bit – and generate more sales at the same time. All it takes is a bit of marketing planning.

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When you kick off your marketing efforts, you’re thinking strictly about the return on investment. You want to know that every dollar you spend on marketing will lead to several dollars in sales. Yet, when you’re meeting with prospects about their technology needs, too often, the conversation turns to ROI’s three-letter cousin: TCO.

With solutions such as virtualization, storage management and network security, it’s easy to build the cost containment case. And frankly, it’s a good one. Cutting expenses is something that resonates with most IT leaders (e.g., IT directors and CIOs). Yet, it leaves an opportunity on the table – not just for them to implement a better solution but to raise their profiles within their organizations.

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There are two ways to look at MDF: a “tool” for schmoozing prospects or an investment in the future of your company. I may seem a bit biased in how I positioned this, but it’s for a good reason. The difference really is that vast. Yet, despite the chasm between entertainment and strategic investment, a lot of IT solution providers still don’t use their MDF as effectively as they could.

It’s natural to see why IT solution provider sales reps would gravitate toward entertainment. Obviously, it’s fun for them, too, but this isn’t the full reason. Rather, it puts the rep in his comfort zone. Sales professionals are comfortable dealing with people in relaxing environments. It’s easy to form a personal connection and cultivate a relationship that can last a while.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t always work that way.

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You just passed through the doors of your clients building, and you have momentum. You’ve just finished a great appointment, and while there isn’t an immediate purchase in the works, you know it will be coming six months down the road.

So, what do you do until then?

Six months can be a long time, and there’s always the risk that a competitor will work his way into your opportunity. Or, the prospect could forget about you and wind up looking for a different IT solution provider. It’s easy to see how this deal could slip through your fingers. You need a way to keep this contact engaged until the time to buy arrives.

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What marketing functions are you outsourcing?

The latest data from MarketingSherpa suggests that many companies are planning to outsource more of their marketing functions. Even with much of marketing’s capabilities remaining in-house, the advantages of outsourcing — for scale or capabilities — are starting to be noticed.

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To say the IT industry is flooded with event-like marketing activities is an understatement. Yet, I can’t remember a single case where a marketing or sales professional from an IT manufacturer or solution provider told me that these events were critical to business growth. They keep doing it anyway, though, and the leads just aren’t following.

So, why does the IT sector still use all these events for marketing? That’s easy: it’s what they’ve always done. For some companies, there’s a shortage of marketing resources and experience, which makes it hard to do anything that hasn’t been done before. For others, it’s a way to spend MDF, which often becomes an end in itself.

The problem isn’t with marketing events: they can be very effective. Rather, IT solution providers need to figure out how to turn them into lead generation activities. Here are three ways you can make your IT marketing events more compelling (and productive):

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Are you looking at e-mail open rates as a success metric? Well, it’s time to get past that. While this measure does provide some indication of interest in your newsletter, it still doesn’t get the recipient into the sales cycle … and that’s what matters most! Of course, there is still some value to open rate, as it helps gauge interest in your message, but it’s only a first step, and you need to track the entire set of results.

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Long sales cycles are frustrating not only because it delays revenue but because they also introduce the risk that you won’t. The longer it takes to bring a prospect from the mouth of the funnel to a closed deal, the greater the likelihood is that you either won’t finalize the relationship or that it will come in at a much lower amount than you expected.

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For so many IT solutions, TCO is the easiest selling point: it isn’t hard to show a company how it can save some money. When you focus on the cost argument too much, though, you miss a golden opportunity to sell based on ROI, too. Every TCO play has an ROI component, and getting there requires no mental gymnastics.

It’s all about moving resources around … prudently.

Let’s assume your solution can cut TCO for a particular platform by 50 percent in dollars and two full-time employee equivalents. That’s a savings — great! Now, your client needs to know what to do with the “leftover” resources. Raise the issue of redeploying both the cash and the bodies to initiatives that will advance the company in the marketplace. The cost savings becomes fuel for a growth engine.

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Do you spend sales appointments talking about yesterday’s news? That’s what everyone else is doing! Make your company stand out: help your clients understand what’s on the horizon. Get them set for the future, and you’ll deliver a far better ROI case — for them and for you.

The cost and return benefits associated with conventional IT solutions are inherently constrained. They are known quantities, innovation that has become standard. To provide outsized value, you need to introduce your client’s to what hasn’t become widely adopted yet, and implement technology that will keep them ahead of the game.

How does this work?

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