🦈Do the marketing sharks know how much work it has taken you to get this far? The time, the struggle, the sleepless nights?
And yet they want thousands of 💰
Here is what many Shop owners perceive from Marketing firms
◼ Just trust us (really? No mention of building a relationship first?)
◼ We get results (Like I have time to check all your references)
◼ You can’t make money if you don’t spend money (Actually, it’s the exact reverse)
◼ Is your SEO on point? (You mean I have to spend more time on the internet?)
◼ Commission-based payment plan? HAHAH, No way! (Why isn’t this possible?)
🤔 A major question that seems to be on the top of the Shop owner’s mind is:
“How can I pay a marketing firm, when I don’t have the cash for it now?”
Under these assumptions, you are SOL! 💩
AZ-TEK Engineering hears these things from many Shop owners across the country. To try and understand the pain points, it has been helpful to list the common challenges small Shops face.
Here are some common things we hear from small to medium sized shops (not all things apply to every shop)
The “We Wants”
◼ We want more prototype work
◼ We want new customers
◼ We want more work from our current customers
◼ We want consistent work
◼ If only we had a couple nice production jobs
◼We want to be paid on time
◼ We want understanding customers we trust
◼We want to be sent work instead of competing in the RFQ rat race
The “We Donts”
◼ We do not mess with *fill in your material of choice (Stainless steel is a popular “No-Go”)
◼ We only do mill work
◼ We only turn
◼ We only grind
◼We don’t to fixtures
◼We don’t make anything without supplied drawings
◼ We don’t make anything without supplied models
◼ We don’t design
◼ We don’t reverse engineer
◼ We don’t hold anything less than +/- 0.005in
Here is what we are hearing from customers looking to send work out
The entrepreneur
◼ I have money and ideas, I need help designing
◼ I have hand sketches – just need to get stuff made
◼ I have CAD, just need help refining
◼ I have old parts that need to be modified and reverse engineered
The Company
◼ We have fixtures that need to be designed and made
◼ We have old legacy drawings that need to be remodeled
◼ We have miscellaneous work that isn’t getting done
🤷♂️ So, what’s the point?
We are attempting to sum up the major wants and challenges from both Shop (those doing the work) and Company perspectives (those creating and sending the work).
1) Shops: Need to diversify
We know, this is nothing new! The basic premise here is that machine shops will achieve an increased business level once they identify the new industries they can offer services to. The requirement here is to think differently on how they serve their new customer. In many cases, it could require creating new services to offer.
But how can this be done without a large financial investment in marketing?
🐴 Enter the “Trojan Horse” technique
The idea here is to package an interesting service to your target audience even though you yourself may not be considered an “expert” in it. Here, you are asking your new customer to take a chance on your new service ultimately leading to increased hours your spindles are running – and that’s the sound of money! 🤑
Keep in mind: The whole goal is to keep making chips! Whatever it takes! 🍟
2) Companies: Need to offload risk (due to resource constraints)
We are seeing engineering resource constraints across the board. Companies have a lot of small to medium size projects, but no one to do it. There are many potential design and engineering projects that could produce work for many shops, but they are under resourced and not being focused on. We have seen shops benefit from coming to these customer’s aid. Companies are willing to take a chance on shops that can help in these areas because they are offering to sharing the risk.
What does this all boil down to?
❗One of the most significant leads we have seen👇
This seems to be a leading question from those that create and send out work:
“Can this Shop provide design, modeling and drafting services?”
So why don’t companies creating the work just outsource the design/engineering projects to engineering firms or the like?
◼ Its more expensive than you think
◼ It takes longer
◼ Return on investment is not well understood or even visible
◼ Middleman syndrome: Logistical delays from the outsourced company back to the customer then eventually to the machine shop
🍞 Think of the Bread-Crumb method
There are many companies out there sitting at the dinner table of industry. Thousands upon thousands of tiny breadcrumbs fall to the floor and no one is cleaning them up!
Breadcrumbs = 💸
Who will clean them up?
That’s you!
💹 Here are some new business growth results AZ-TEK Engineering has created for Machine Shops
◼ Continual die cast business from large food manufacturer – Achieved through design services for tooling and complexes surface modeling services
◼ Production Sheetmetal product lines – Achieved through stamping die design services
◼ Existing product servicing – Achieved through fixture and drill press design services
◼ Legacy hydraulic components – Achieved through quick turn modeling services
◼ Prototyping – Achieved through offering entrepreneurs quick turn design services
Most of the work listed above has brought continual work. The results above are a relationship-based model where trust is created through new services. 🤝
The key ingredient here is TRUST. AZ-TEK engineering specializes in trust building through shared risk.
🙄 Is this just a shameless marketing plug for AZ-TEK Engineering?
Well, Yes…but not in the typical way. 😏
The key difference is we partner with you with no up-front cost.
◼ There are no Fees.
◼ There is not marketing payment plan
◼ The shared risk model means its a time-proven trust building relationship
◼ We are in it for the long hull
We have been helping all types of shops with this. We have a love for the machinist and the small biasness person. We want to see succeed with you!
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