Ask five non-finance folks what private equity (PE) firms do, and you’ll get six different answers. Maybe more. Some think PE firms just buy and sell companies. Others think they’re basically banks. But oversimplifying a PE’s scope of services is like saying a mechanic just changes brakes.
In reality, a PE firm is like an innovative, highly skilled mechanic — and engineer — but instead of improving F1 cars, moto GP bikes, or space shuttles, they take businesses into the stratosphere. This is especially true post-acquisition. Whether through operational improvements, market expansion, or strategic partnerships, a PE firm finds ways to tweak the nuts, bolts, chassis, and anything else to boost earning power and efficiency.
Unfortunately, the knowledge gap engulfing the value-added value of PE firms is cavernous. But content marketing can bridge the gap, shedding precious light on everything your firm can do for clients.
The Role of Content Marketing in Private Equity Value Creation
For PE firms, content marketing is the most straightforward way to demonstrate the value of your services. Using strategic storytelling, you inspire potential clients to envision how your firm improves their trajectory.
How Content Marketing Elevates Private Equity Firms
If you’re like many people, you discovered your favorite mechanic through trial and error — after driving by their shop dozens of times. That’s because your mechanic, despite being a master at their craft, likely lacked marketing that showcased their skills and knowledge.
To stay ahead of the competition, you can use content marketing to ensure internet passersby know what makes you better than the rest. Otherwise, companies needing your unique skillset may just roll on to another firm.
For instance, your growth strategies may involve more than simply expanding a company’s marketing approach. You go the extra mile, using your engineering team to design or improve new products.
Some PE firms, like other companies in the financial industry, use advanced ERP software equipped with AI to identify ways to boost efficiency. Or maybe your team is simply really good at their job, and their analytical skills and intuition have delivered one win after the next.
The only way to make your skills and resources part of your client’s success stories is by flexing them using content marketing.
Why Private Equity Firms Need to Showcase Their Growth Strategies
The PE market is rife with blanket claims with little to no evidence. “Our team joins our interests with our clients to stimulate growth.” That’s nice, thanks. But how? And can you prove it?
On the other hand, you can deliver compelling examples by outlining your growth strategies instead of high-level chest pounding that lacks specificity. In this way, you communicate your value prop, build trust with portfolio companies, and position your firm as a strategic partner that’s in it for the long haul.
The key is to focus on specific areas where your firm creates value. Here are some you can use to build the core of your content marketing strategy.
Key Areas of Value Creation to Highlight in Content
Even though the improvements you bring to the table are unique, here are a few that many winning PE firms offer.
Operational Improvements
You’ve probably seen a few balance sheets that screamed operational inefficiency. Maybe a company was paying triple what they should to domestic workers when they could outsource to a nearshore firm.
It’s common for unhealthy debt to gnaw away at solvency over time. A relatively straightforward debt restructuring move can improve a company’s prospects.
Regardless of the situation, you’ve delivered operations improvements countless times, and your content strategy needs to put your wins front and center. Here’s how to do it:
- Use case studies to touch prospects with the stories of previous clients.
- Describe your processes. This makes the path to success more tangible for potential clients.
- Get into detail about operational improvements that have become the bread and butter of your firm — time and again, you’ve used a few effective strategies to improve performance.
Market Expansion and Strategic Growth
The wins you score for portfolio companies should be put front and center. For instance, a portfolio company has a compelling offering but needs to scale it up to boost profitability. Your firm designs a plan that enables scaling without inflating overhead, and stronger financial performance follows. You may have dozens of similar anecdotes.
There’s no need to wait until a face-to-face meeting to tell these stories. Your content can do it for you.
For instance, you can outline, step by step, how your firm executes a geographic expansion strategy. Using a mix of written and visual content, you clarify how you bring companies more business to other regions.
As another example, the process of product diversification may seem daunting and complicated. But you can describe how your firm diversifies a company’s products by factoring in design, target market pain points, cost management, and other considerations.
Strategic Initiatives and Innovation
Like an excellent mechanic, a PE firm can find ways to not just fix problems but improve a company’s production speed, financial power, and market agility. Driving innovation and strategic growth often involves digital transformation, mergers and acquisitions (M&A), and software or hardware advancements.
One of the most effective ways of letting clients know how you leverage these to produce results is through thought leadership content. This is where you lift the hood a little, just enough to show how you use innovative strategy to boost performance.
For instance, your thought leadership content can describe how digital transformations enable automation, greater efficiency, lower tech overhead, and more.
By telling this story, you create a space for potential clients to muse, “Hey, that’s exactly what we need.”
Giving clients these Aha! Moments is pretty straightforward if you pull the right tools from your content toolbox.
Content Types That Showcase Private Equity Growth Strategies
You have several options for making your value-add vivid for clients.
Case Studies and Success Stories
Case studies are the perfect vehicle for giving prospects detail-rich stories that resonate. Nothing delivers like a real-world example when you have to show and prove your prowess. To create effective case studies, you can use these best practices:
- Use a challenge-solution-tangible benefits structure. This is easy to follow and skimmable.
- Be strategic about how you portray your firm. Does your target clientele want a superhero that swoops in and saves the day? Or would they prefer someone who acts more like a compassionate partner or a kind guide?
- Highlight the measurable outcomes resulting from your efforts. It’s all about the delta. Feel free to showcase multiple percentages, dollar amounts, and efficiency metrics.
Thought Leadership and Industry Insights
A thought leader is an intellectual scout who forges ahead of the crowd, reports their findings, and inspires followers. You probably engage in thought leadership daily as you solve business problems. By presenting those ideas and the strategy that powers them in your content, you put your thought leadership to work.
However, your inspiration options aren’t limited to innovative problem-solving. Using white papers, blog posts, and industry reports as part of your content calendar, you can also:
- Provide insights into trends. From new tech to cutting-edge methodologies, there’s always something rising on the PE horizon that your clients need to know about.
- Break down market shifts. By dissecting market changes and explaining the ‘why’ behind them, you comfort those who find them unsettling and highlight opportunities for those looking to parlay them into an advantage.
- Outline strategic growth opportunities. You become a partner in their success by giving your clientele ideas for growing their businesses. They may reward you with their business.
Video and Visual Content
Video and visual content are ripe with brand-strengthening potential because they allow you to explain things more in-depth, put a face on your organization, and use visual aids to better explain your unique value add.
Here are some questions you can ask to spark the kinds of video and visual content ideas that lead to conversions:
- What kinds of insights can our leadership offer that prospects may find intriguing? You can use these as the foundations for interesting interviews.
- What elements of our firm’s story could inspire confidence in prospects? Depicting these in videos makes your organization seem more human and can earn the trust of interested leads.
- What’s the most unique facet of our firm’s growth strategy? An infographic depicting your approach can distinguish you from the competition.
Videos and infographics are also ideal venues for explaining complicated concepts. For instance, you may understand how you quantify the effects of diversifying a struggling company’s product selection. But does your target audience? Using a video, you can describe the metrics you use, how and why you measure them, and their impact on performance.
Building Credibility and Trust Through Content Marketing
Consistent content marketing builds trust with potential investors, partners, and portfolio companies because it shows them how you do what you do and why it works. While black box solutions are intriguing for their mystery, they don’t help you connect personally with your audience.
Communicating your long-term value creation should be foundational to your content strategy. Circling back to the mechanic metaphor, some adjustments may yield tangible efficiency benefits — but only after a few months. Similarly, some benefits may take a while to yield value with a PE firm.
For example, restructuring debt, digital transformations, and implementing agile development principles often provide minimal benefits in the short term. Your clientele will want to know why, so explaining the numbers and strategy behind the approach with a straightforward content plan is best.
Tailoring Content to Different Audiences
As a PE firm that has to decide what to say to each stakeholder, you may feel like an F1 mechanic about to speak in a company-wide meeting. The investors need to understand X, the drivers must understand Y, and the pit crew must comprehend Z. If you succeed, everyone is on board with your decisions.
The only way to talk to each group is to tailor your content to meet their needs. If you try to do the opposite — create content that speaks to everyone — you’re guaranteed to miss the mark with at least one or two groups.
For example, company managers need to understand how their workers can execute their ideas without revamping their entire workflow. Investors need to see returns within a certain time frame, and those in the C-suite want to see the long-term impact on operational efficiency. Your content should address these topics one at a time.
You also have to consider each type of business stakeholder. To illustrate, portfolio companies want targeted problem-solving techniques outlined in simple terms. And you need industry partners to buy into your decision-making process and managerial strategies.
The good news is that by focusing on each message, one by one, you can get everyone on board and ready to do business.
Measuring the Success of Content Marketing in Private Equity
Creating awesome content is only the start, and if you can’t quantify its effectiveness, it may not be amazing at all. To measure the success of your content marketing strategy, you can use webpage analytics to:
- Track engagement rates across your new content. Compare that with older content and look for trends.
- Keep track of the number of inbound inquiries your content produces
- As your content produces leads, track which articles, images, or videos inspired the most interest.
In the long run, a combination of thought leadership, clear breakdowns of company strategy, and detailed case studies inspires confidence in your audience — and more business. And ultimately, that’s the holy grail of all metrics.
Use Content Marketing to Demonstrate Your Firm’s Value
Content marketing is the ideal solution for PE firms to showcase their value because it puts you in control of the messaging you deliver to your audience. Using a mix of case studies, thought leadership, and visual content, you demonstrate how you bring value from multiple angles.
As you clarify how you deliver operational excellence and market expansion, you build confidence in your skillset. You make it easier for investors to get in the passenger seat and portfolio companies to hand over the steering wheel.
If you’re ready to rev up your content marketing and inspire trust in your firm’s value add, connect with a content strategist today.
