91ÊÓƵ

Melissa Crosman is the marketing manager and an associate at Interface Engineering. She is preparing to step up as the 2011-2012 president of the Oregon chapter of the Society for Marketing Professional Services, and last week she attended a national SMPS conference. She recently spoke with the 91ÊÓƵ about current trends and new challenges in marketing professional services.

91ÊÓƵ: What is the biggest challenge that is facing marketing and business development efforts today?

Melissa Crosman: In today’s market, distinction is a big issue. It’s a very competitive market, and there’s not much work, so sticking out in the crowd with your services and with your staff is a challenge. Marketers have to look at how to take that message and communicate it to your clients.

91ÊÓƵ: How do you approach finding what distinguishes your firm?

Crosman: At the national SMPS conference last week in Chicago they talked a lot about branding. I think there’s a deeper understanding in our industry these days about what brand means. Your brand is not your logo. It’s not colors. It’s your people. We are a people business in professional services. We are marketing services of our staff members, and the entire client experience is critical. The client service is your brand.

91ÊÓƵ: How do you decide what jobs to look for?

Crosman: I think there has to be an alignment between your brand and the work you’re doing. It’s important. From the marketing standpoint, the expectation is that the services that you’re marketing have to connect with what your staff and your firm is actually producing. There can’t be a disconnect. Knowing your strengths and matching those strengths to the client’s needs, you’re going to get the most success.

91ÊÓƵ: What can make a firm’s marketing strategy successful in these times?

Crosman: I think one of the common themes is the integration of marketing into multiple levels of the business. The successful firms are realizing that marketing needs to be involved in business strategy, in staff performance. There needs to be a strong collaboration with marketing, between owners, principal group, staff members, clients. It’s not just working on a proposal. Today, the marketer’s role is expanding and there’s a lot more opportunity for us to make an impact in the whole life of a project and the client relationship.

91ÊÓƵ: Why is the client relationship so much more important now?

Crosman: I think it’s a matter of going back to basics. Right now people are focused on the client, what the client needs and whether we meet those needs. The survey process that firms are doing in a variety of ways is to get at that.

Are we providing the service that they were expecting? Because it’s the return clients that will help us succeed as firms. It’s not necessarily new work, but it’s keeping those relationships alive with clients that we’re working with now.

91ÊÓƵ: What does the expanded role of a marketer look like?

Crosman: The emphasis from this conference about “Building Business” was on how the marketing profession can increase their role in the process. Traditionally, marketers were involved only up to a certain point – until the proposal was turned in – and then we moved onto the next proposal. But I think the firms that are thriving are involving their marketers in multiple levels of the project. And that’s exciting. I think there’s a lot of energy right now in SMPS because leadership roles for marketers are increasing.

If marketers are engaged with staff, they are able to stay more involved with the project and the client. Making sure there’s a connection between what we’ve marketed and what the client is receiving is important.

91ÊÓƵ: Are there particular strategies that can be used to get marketers more involved in the client experience?

Crosman: Something we’re seeing a lot more of is client surveys – in fact that’s something we’re talking about here at Interface – as a part of how we encourage client connections throughout the life of the project. We need more communication with the clients so that we can communicate with the entire team about the process and notify the team of any issues before they get to be big ones.

91ÊÓƵ: Can new social media and networking tools also be part of the equation?

Crosman: Use of social media is evolving in our industry. It’s a tool, and I think a lot of firms are still figuring out how it can fit into their overall marketing plan. You have to look at the return on investment, especially right now.

What we’re seeing a lot of success with social networking is with public relations. And I think, on that level, marketers are really able to get integrated into the project as well as the client relationship through that method, by partnering with clients and building owners about their project and expressing that through social media outlets. There’s a lot of success for that. And some firms are doing it very well.

You have to involve the client if you use social networking strategies. If your goals align with your client’s goals, that’s when you’re going to see the biggest bang for the buck.

91ÊÓƵ: You’re about to take the reins of SMPS Oregon. What can people look forward to this year?

Crosman: A big focus for our board this year is helping support and prepare our marketers to become leaders in their companies and help them take advantage of the opportunities that are there now and learn how to create opportunities in their own firms.

SMPS Oregon continues to grow – our membership is up, even in the last two years. And SMPS national as a whole is doing well. In past recessions we’ve seen our numbers dip, but this time around we’ve actually stayed pretty steady and I think that speaks to the value that marketers bring to their firms right now.

91ÊÓƵ: What message would you give to firm principals about how they should use their marketing staff?

Crosman: Collaboration is a big buzzword for our industry right now. I think collaborating internal is even more important. I would encourage principals and project managers to look to their marketers as a resource, not just at the selling point but through the life cycle of the project and the client relationship.