One of the biggest challenges facing software developers and marketers of software products today is rising above the noise of millions of thousands of marketing messages about thousands of software products directed at companies. The rise of the web has changed the way certain software is marketed and distributed. But some things never change. Face-to-face communications remain a powerful medium.

Shipping costs have increased dramatically. The cost of printing is out of control. Hiring direct sales staff, while often necessary, creates major management headaches, not to mention high overhead.

User groups are still active

Enter the user group. User groups have been around for many years. If you have been involved with PC or Macintosh computers, you may be familiar with a number of small groups of computer users. What you may not realize is that many types of business-to-business software and many types of hardware have their own user group advocates. These user groups provide a useful forum for their members and are often sponsored by the providers. User group participation is often cheaper and more efficient than attending large trade shows. You can often demonstrate your products in more detail and learn more about your users than you can at the big trade shows.

User Groups Profitable Marketing for B2B Software Companies

For software companies, user groups offer one of the most cost-effective means of reaching highly qualified leads. Think about it. They are people who take the time to belong to a group that meets once a month or once a quarter. These people come together to learn and share what they know about their particular software product.

a true story

I was the first manager hired by a small software company in 1996. The other four managers were all founders of the company. As such, they had particular expertise in engineering, finance, and sales. The company’s entire marketing plan was to run an ad every two months in an industry magazine and attend two major trade shows a year. In addition, a quarterly direct mail piece was prepared and sent to an internal list of 80,000 prospects.

Sales had steadily increased to approximately $2.5 million a year. Unfortunately, the company’s products or database support tools are primarily aimed at programmers in a particular niche database. Our company had designed two new product versions for a much larger but much more competitive database system. The challenge was to open a new market in which none of the founders had experience.

He was well aware of the strong user group structure that had been built around this particular database technology. The user group had dozens of chapters in the US and Europe and gained strong support from the database vendor itself.

Answer the call

So when I got a call from the president of a small user group a thousand miles away, inviting me to attend as a vendor member, I jumped at the chance.

That first user group meeting was eye-opening. We had no placards, very little warranty, and a brand new product that was essentially untested in that market. Airfare is about $600. It cost us another $150 to rent a table with a plastic tablecloth. I went to that meeting alone, scared to death that it would be a complete failure. Before I left, the CEO told me that he thought I was crazy to spend the money, but it was my budget and if I wanted to spend it on a rinky dink user group show, so be it.

Learned lessons

I stuck a company t-shirt with our logo on the wall behind my stand, because we didn’t have a sign. I hardly knew the product. Although I knew the type of people who attended, having worked in the business for over ten years, I was not prepared for the familiarity that many of the prospects shared with other vendors, my competitors. It quickly became clear to me that there was a strong network of suppliers and prospects in this market. If we were to succeed, we would have to really hone our message.

When the first meeting ended, I fulfilled several tasks:

• I had contacted half a dozen vendors.
• I had met with each of the 150 members of the user group.
• I learned that you always have to carry a roll of masking tape and a black marker.

In eighteen months, after more than 50 user group meetings, I took pride in the fact that our participation in many user group meetings provided support and information to the kind people in our industry. I was also proud of the fact that in eighteen months our
income increased in that market from 0% to 34% of our total income. I have no doubt that this revenue, which in the second year amounted to a 500% increase in revenue over the first year, was directly attributable to the participation of our user group.

Find a group support your product. And don’t neglect the online communities that are springing up all over the web. Find and join those who cater specifically to your market and get involved today.