Is your company selling to the government, seeking procurements, team members, employees and partners for new acquisitions, contracts, IDIQ schedules and task orders?
KME.digital’s team includes significant government marketing, digital engagement and consulting advisory expertise, offering the following guidance for approaching PPC keywords (among other digital marketing topics in this industry).
You won’t find this combination of expertise (combined technical, marketing and government consulting), engagement and value anywhere else in Virginia. We’ve written about B2G SEO before – it continues to be a growing need.
Government IT contracting, integration and advisory services – whether for-profit or not – is very competitive, particularly for common, generic service categories (and keywords) like cybersecurity, cloud, digital services, analytics, agile, telecommunications, IT modernization and IT services management (ITSM).
Unique qualifications, strengths, pricing and value of a company’s offerings aren’t easily demonstrated online in public, due to things like:
- Acquisition & contract restrictions;
- intellectual property protection;
- government agency policies;
- non-disclosure agreements; and
- public trust or security protections.
Differentiating messages can be very competitive and stand out using online digital engagement (i.e. content marketing, social media, digital publishing), SEO and pay-per-click (PPC), for things like:
- Unique, targeted solutions, publications, R&D
- Branded products or services
- Validated (with data, preferably by a 3rd-party) outcomes, results
- Validated, certified skills, training
- New points-of-view on emerging technologies & trends (like SDN/NFV for telecommunications)
- Membership or leadership in communities
- Team, group or organization membership
- Events, presentations
- Approved (for release) use cases, successes
- Employee expertise, certifications, company support
- Schedules, contract vehicles
- Leadership engagement, presence
- Specific mission, social or environmental cause support (and nonprofit status)
PPC use by the government contracting community (on any platform, from LinkedIn to Adwords) is not as pervasive or well-executed as it could be, particularly outside of the largest consulting and services firms – though the costs to test and use can be minimal (given use of certified PPC professionals). Likewise, landing page and digital engagement (UX/CX) design and engagement is very under-utilized – particularly for small to mid-sized firms.
Keywords across these digital marketing channels should be consistent, and coordinated, though tailored to the channel and audience. They may be coordinated with vendors or partners, particularly for exclusive teaming or investment partnership scenarios.
Keywords specifically for PPC campaigns (i.e. Google Adwords, LinkedIn Ads) will be “longer-tailed”, plus are very focused in terms of audience and timing – driven mainly by acquisition and spending cycles, government mission events and vendor technology announcements. Audience targets include:
- Existing (incumbent) program staff and partners (government and contractors)
- Investors and stakeholders (internal to government and outside)
Potential partners or innovation team mates (particularly BD/Capture teams, & Solution Architects) - Potential and current (for retention and to encourage corporate social support) employees
- Communities of Interest (Relating to the service offering or procurement topics)
- Contracting community (Government CORs/COTRs/PMs/Advisors)
- Local, political constituents (for region, location or platform-specific support)
This information is only a partial list of considerations focused on PPC for government systems integrators, contractors, vendors and partners. This guidance also underpins the myriad of other SEO, Digital Marketing & Customer Engagement strategies to be considered by organizations selling to the government, and among themselves.
Contact KME.digital’s expert, unique and highly-experienced government integrator marketing and outreach staff today, for an in-person consultation and path forward.