I was recently interviewed for a TechTarget article on the challenges associated with transitioning to cloud backup services. I found it to be an interesting endeavor since it seemed to me that neither the author, nor I, knew where the interview would lead. I was asked by our Cloud Backup and Recovery software vendor, Asigra Inc., to participate in the interview. The interview lasted under an hour and we quickly zeroed in on the key subject of marketing cloud-based data protection services. This subject was top of mind since it had been occupying a bulk of my time. Our company, Echopath, LLC, to which I am a co-founder and president, was right in the middle of a corporate name, logo, and website make-over. During a marketing assessment conducted late in 2012, it was discovered that we were sending a lot of mixed marketing signals to prospective cloud-backup and recovery clients.
What started as a journey to develop a more streamlined web presence ended up being an evolution in our approach to how we run our business. We had previously discounted many of the benefits of marketing and brand management. Chalking up a lack of marketing presence to being “a technology company that was great at what we did,” just wouldn’t allow us to meet the goals we had set. We quickly recognized that we need to make a major investment in marketing our company’s data protection services properly.
The article touches on this along with similar themes from other cloud-backup service providers. I hope you enjoy it.
One thing that was discussed in the interview, but didn’t fully make the editing cut was the subject of the partnerships we’ve made. It was briefly touched on in one of my quotes, but I can’t stress enough how being an “engaged” Asigra partner has helped make echopath a better data backup and recovery service provider. Great partnerships are built on relationships where each party challenges one another to achieve higher goals. Technology comes easy to echopath, but by developing the business, marketing and sales portions of our organization we will ensure that we are around to continue serving the client’s we protect for a very long time.