

Ask HN: If my market is agencies (ad, mktg, etc.) how do I reach them? - marcamillion

It's kinda easy to reach a 'small circle' of developers and designers that are influencers here on HN.<p>Also, on Forrst, I can reach designers.<p>But if I wanted to reach agencies - marketing, advertising, any agency that hires designers and does design work - how would I reach them in a cheap/free way ?<p>I am creating a startup targeted to them, so would love a scalable way to reach them online.<p>Thanks.<p>P.S. I know they read Ad Age and those sorts of publications, but what are the more lower-level outlets that I can reach them? Popular blogs that they read, etc?
======
byoung2
My company (an ad network) just had a booth at AdTech (<http://www.ad-
tech.com/>) in New York. I think admission for the public is free, so that
could be a great way to reach them all in one place. There are upcoming dates
in cities around the world over the next year.

~~~
marcamillion
I am not based in the US, and I am creating a web app - so I don't think trade
shows are the most cost effective way to reach them.

What blogs do you guys read, what email lists do you subscribe to? Where do
you get your news? Who are the thought leaders in your industry?

If I wanted to target you, how would I do that?

Thanks.

~~~
byoung2
There are AdTech dates in Australia, UK, India, Singapore, and China coming
up. You'd be surprised how much of the ad industry is driven by in-person
meetings and handshakes, even for online advertising. Note that AdTech is a
trade show specifically for digital marketing, and our company signed several
hundred thousand dollars worth of deals there.

As far as how to reach people at my company, all of the developers (like me)
are the ones reading HN and blogs, but the ones who sign our paychecks and
make deals worth hundreds of thousands of dollars spend their time at trade
shows. When they came back from AdTech they hired half a dozen more people to
handle the increased business.

------
stephenou
You can definitely try the 37signals method. Teach your customers. If your
material quality is good enough, they will come to you, for free, everyday.

If you don't have an expertise yourself on marketing/advertising/writing, you
can always reach out to them personally via emails. Or you can even find out
their social media presence and see what they are talking about.

------
gallerytungsten
What does your product do? There are many different kinds of advertising
agencies.

Do you have any agencies using it yet? What do they tell you?

~~~
marcamillion
My product is <http://www.compversions.com>

No agencies using it yet, but looking for a few to start off with little by
little. So if you know any that you can recommend, I would appreciate it :)

~~~
gallerytungsten
This is antithetical to the way that most designers work. Ideally, you
understand the brief and produce one (and only one) design that expresses the
brief. Producing multiple versions from the jump is a game for chumps.

------
noodle
> I know they read Ad Age and those sorts of publications, but what are the
> more lower-level outlets that I can reach them? Popular blogs that they
> read, etc?

if you don't know the answer to that yourself (if there is one), you don't
really know your niche that well.

outside of straight up cold calling, though, this is the type of thing i'd be
going after. blogs and such, to try and find some low-hanging but valuable
fruit.

~~~
marcamillion
You are right. I don't know my niche that well, that's why I am trying to
learn.

I worked in an agency for a few years - on the web development side - and
never took much interest in finding out what the designers were attuned to.

However, now I regret that and am trying to learn.

All I am doing is simply trying to solve a problem that I had while I was
there, that I am sure many others will likely have too.

