Joomla agency owners have an uphill battle to climb.
With Joomla being such a widely used CMS, there are plenty of developers and service providers competing to build and maintain sites for the diverse companies utilizing Joomla.
If you're unsure how to differentiate your company to stand out, read on to learn some tried and true techniques to position your Joomla agency.
Pull a Zoolander
The most critical step a Joomla agency takes in the positioning process happens to be the first. Before you can go about telling the world who you are, you've got to figure it out.
Just like Derek Zoolander, you're going to need to answer the eternal question:
Unlike Derek, you won't need to take part in an assassination scheme and lose your friends in a freak gasoline fight accident to figure it out.
Rather, the process of identifying your agency's positioning should be an intentional and structured process that involves the entire team.
Whether you're a one man shop or a team of 20, block off an afternoon to bring everyone together (even if it's just on Skype). Identify your company's core values, key strengths, and (this one's important) areas of weakness or services you're not equipped to provide.
In order to project your image and expertise out, you've got to have it clearly identified and embraced internally first. These concepts should be totally unique to your organization, and the entire team should be able to buy into them.
Hint: it should be about more than being really, really, ridiculously good looking.
Don't be a physician. Be a brain surgeon.
Once you know what your agency does well, you want to focus your energy in that area.
Some agencies do great with bigger clients, some teams do best with small jobs where they can get creative with the details.
Your sweet spot might be about the industry, it might be about the budget, it might even be about the components and extensions that will be used. Whatever it is that you're great at, don't be afraid to stay there.
I heard a great metaphor once about agency specialization. Someone asked me, would I rather be a physician or a brain surgeon?
For your agency, the answer should be brain surgeon. You'll see less "patients", but you'll make more money. Why?
Because you don't do everything under the sun. You do one thing, and you do it really well. People don't think of a pool of agencies when they need that specific thing - they think of you, the expert.
Just keep that ego in check, OK Doctor?
Go ahead and get emotional
Once you know what your agency is about, and what you specialize in, it's time to put some feeling behind those concepts.
It's simply not enough to market your team as an agency that builds Joomla websites. To really capture attention, you need to tell a story and solicit emotions around that narrative.
Take a look at your company's website, and look for ways to make the experience warmer, inviting, and engaging on a personal level. This might mean sharing the story of how your agency began, detailing why your core values are important and how they're reflected in your work, or featuring stories about your team.
Social media is another great place to build your agency's identity and "feel", where people can get exposed to different dimensions of your company on a regular basis.
The more feelings you can get a person to experience as they learn about you, the deeper you're ingraining your brand in their psyche.
Don't talk about it, be about it
It's one thing to tell a really great, really emotional story on your agency's website. It's another to drive it home with proof.
Positioning is somewhat of an intangible idea, but leveraging proof to back it up solidifies the concept.
Proof is best demonstrated through creative case studies, testimonials from happy clients, community involvement, and two-sided dialogue on social media. Look for ways like these to show the world that your agency doesn't just talk about it's ideals and expertise, it truly walks the talk.
Give things away for free
That's right. I want you to package up really incredible work that takes a lot of time and energy, and I want you to give it away for free.
No, I'm not secretly trying to bankrupt your business. When you start reaping the benefits that come from providing value to your community, you'll understand why.
See, no matter how great and unique your agency is, there's likely at least one other company out there doing something nearly identical. So when it comes down to decision time, how will a client choose one over the other?
To answer that question, we need to dial it all the way back to the begining of the decision making process. When someone decides they want a website build (or updated), they start researching providers who specialize in their area.
Inevitably, they'll find some agencies with great websites and some not so great. If they're lucky, they'll find an agency out there that provides great content that helps them learn more about their own needs.
This agency is the one that's publishing tutorial blog posts, that's creating awesomely helpful eBooks, that's putting information out there without demanding something in return.
Agencies that master this art gain multidimensional benefits: they become more visible within their industry (via the sharing of their content) and they are positioned as authoratative and helpful from the very first step of the buyer's journey.
A word to the wise: don't confuse free with low quality. Any content you put into the Joomla world will innevitably be critiqued and shared, so invest in creating something exceptional that reflects well on your agency.
As a Joomla agency owner, I hope this list is helpful as you begin the process of positioning your agency against the diverse pool of competition. I hope you're pleasantly surprised to find that the more you hone in on a specialized area, and the more you dig into the specifics of your company's identity, the higher quality leads and clients you'll encounter!