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Today's superintendents, cabinet members, and principals are stuck between a rock and a hard place. On one hand, their communities expect them to choose the latest technology to improve teaching and learning— as long as it doesn't cost too much. On the other hand, they are bombarded by hype-filled messages from an explosively growing number of providers competing for their attention and business. So what should ed tech companies— specifically their sales and marketing teams— do to make district leaders' life less stressful? How can you earn trust from these district leaders while building strong, lasting relationships from scratch?

One extremely successful approach starts with adopting an inbound marketing philosophy, which is based on the premise of becoming a partner, not just a provider, by meeting your buyers where they are rather than asking them to meet you where you are. Traditional marketing depends on the premise that no matter where buyers are in their journey to purchase, your offer is so attractive that it will disrupt their plan and prompt them to act on your timeline.

We ask our product developers to create beautiful, engaging solutions designed to meet learners where they are, to personalize students' experiences based on where they are in their learning journey. I pose the question to all of us in marketing: Why are we not taking that same approach with our prospects? Why are we not tailoring the content we offer for our buyers, creating an experience that is customized to their role and their unique challenges as well as where they are in the buyer's journey?

Just as you would never (well, almost never) propose on the first date, pushing for a sale too early in your relationship with prospects will more than likely push them away. It takes time (and data) to learn who your buyers are, where they are, what their needs are, and how you can most successfully nurture them through the sales funnel to realize maximum ROI.

So how can you learn about your buyers before you have even met them? First, start with your existing customers: Can you identify common pain points or reasons that brought them to you? Are there commonalities among roles within a school or district? Or is it demographics within a district that bring them to you?

While these questions are nothing new, this is where all of your inbound marketing—and trust-building—begins. By having a thorough understanding of who your buyers are, you can anticipate what their challenges will be and offer up dynamic content to attract them to you. What better way to build trust than by providing useful, timely information to those that need it?

Put yourself in your buyers' shoes and imagine the questions they would have at each stage of the buyer's journey, from awareness to consideration to decision. By creating helpful and relevant content that addresses their challenges at all stages of this journey, all of us serving the education marketplace can help decision makers do their jobs better and therefore earn their trust. (And the PO!)

So you've worked hard to create thoughtful and targeted articles, blog posts, webinars, social media posts, original research, ebooks, photos, slideshows, checklists, white papers, videos, and similar resources. How do you make sure that your potential customers can actually find this content?

Again, meet your buyer where they are! This will take time, analysis of data, and some trial and error to figure out. It can be as simple as using A/B testing or varying when you send a tweet to get a sense of what is working best and why. Promote your work on social media, by all means, but don't underestimate the power of strategic email campaigns to help you build a better understanding of what your buyers need and how to move them through the sales funnel.

I am making an assumption that we are all familiar with the term "marketing automation." It's a set of powerful tools that we as marketers can use to automate our efforts but also to inform all future efforts and truly identify ROI on our efforts. During a recent call, a client shared that he had signed a new customer as a result of a recent campaign; we traced that buyer's steps to purchase and discovered that this new customer had originally found the company through a tweet. Sure, this individual spent time reading various blog posts, attended a thought leadership webinar, and downloaded a few pieces of high-value content, But the connection began with a tweet. 140 characters. Whether you are using a platform like Pardot or Hubspot or cobbling a number of systems together, you understand the power that lies within the data we can collect, learn from, and act on.

As potential buyers navigate around your website, you are constantly learning about them and providing content appropriate to where they are in their respective journeys to purchase. Are they in the awareness stage, maybe subscribing to your blog, or potentially in the consideration stage, signing up for a trial or downloading a case study? Or are they ready to engage with sales? Whatever the answer, having the right content that these folks can find allows you to communicate with them where they are and efficiently nurture them to a sales-ready lead.

A good friend of mine, an administrator at a fairly large urban district, made a profound statement in a recent conversation: "My decision to buy does not align with your end of fiscal year. No matter how great a deal you are offering, if timing isn't right, you won't get a sale." He isn't alone in his sentiments.

Throughout this process of building awareness and fostering trust, recognize that most people are more concerned with the challenges they face than the name of the company that will alleviate them. So don't focus on pounding your branding into the heads of prospects that are in the first two stages of the buyer's journey. Show them you understand their problems and can offer solutions, and they will soon learn and praise your name!

So how do you build trust with education decision makers? Not by offering them discounts. Not by spamming their inbox with the same message over and over again. You build trust with ed tech leaders by educating them.