The Local Government Marketers’ Guide to Unlock the American Rescue Plan

ARP Means Revisiting 3 Key Elements of Your Local Government Marketing Plan.

As a local government marketer, reshaping your marketing strategies and tactics to account for the American Rescue Plan (ARP)– which became law in March 2021– should be at the top of your to-do list.

The ARP injects $130B (Source: US Treasury) in direct aid to large and small counties, cities, and other local governments across the country. It is meant to be far-reaching and broad in scope to help governments respond to the pandemic in the way that makes the most sense for them.

This $130B impacts the plans of every local government marketer in 3 key ways:

Messaging. A sudden influx of ARP money changes what is on the minds of your targeted decision makers.
Product Positioning. Your target accounts probably have more money to spend on products or services like yours without realizing it.
Reaching the Right Decision Makers. Your target accounts may make ARP spending decisions quickly, which puts an even bigger premium on reaching the right decision makers now.

PRO TIPS

Adjust your messaging and content accordingly
Clearly demonstrate how your solution is an eligible use of ARP funding
Target by roles, not titles

Read on to learn more about how to make these ARP-driven changes.

1. Adjust Your Messaging

ARP will provide economic relief and opportunities for thousands of counties and localities across the country. Even the smallest towns and villages will benefit from ARP. For example, Beatrice, AL (population: 221) will receive approximately $5,000 from ARP (Source: US House Oversight Committee). The graph below shows just how widespread and pervasive this funding will be.

Demonstrate you understand what is top of mind for your targeted decision makers to unlock more qualified leads with local governments.

How do you incorporate messaging about ARP in your marketing content that’s meaningful to your targets?

Acknowledge ARP. They’re thinking about it, so explain how your product or service is well-positioned to be paid for with ARP funding (more on this in #2 below).

Answer the burning questions. ARP is an exceptionally large and complex piece of legislation, making it difficult for local government officials to get answers to the questions they care most about. You can provide answers in your content to ARP-related questions like:
- What can the funds be used for?
- For how long are the funds available?
- How much ARP funding will my government receive?

2. Clarify Your Positioning

ARP funds can be used broadly by local governments to respond to the public health or economic impacts of COVID-19, including but not limited to the examples below:

This means your product or service is likely eligible for purchase using ARP funding. Don’t wait or hope for your target decision makers to connect the dots. If your product or service legitimately fits within the eligible uses of ARP funding, make that abundantly clear in your positioning.

If your product or service legitimately fits within the eligible uses of ARP funding, make that abundantly clear in your positioning.

3. Confirm Your Targets are Decision Makers

Your marketing efforts must focus on the right decision makers– the officials with power to purchase (or influence the purchasing of) your product or service. While this is always the case, the cost of poor execution in the coming months has increased significantly in light of local government officials’ ARP spending decisions.

By using TITLES to identify decision makers, you’re reaching out to a lot of the wrong people. Which means you’re missing out on a lot of ARP-related opportunities.

If you’re using TITLES to identify decision makers, you’re missing out on a lot of ARP-related opportunities.

The most effective local government marketers use role-based targeting, aiming to connect with local government officials based on their responsibilities, not titles. Why? Because titles are an unreliable indicator of responsibilities.

Role-based targeting increases the value of every outreach, leading to more and faster qualified leads and sales. For example:

A local government’s top elected official is likely a major decision maker or influencer on ARP spending decisions. But if you used the title “mayor” to reach the “top elected official” of your target accounts, you’d reach less than 50% of those top elected officials! This is because for more than half of cities, townships, and counties, “mayor” is not the title of the top elected official.

Conclusion

In response to the coronavirus crisis, cities and counties across the nation are changing the way they operate, provide services, and interact with citizens. And with the passage of the American Rescue Plan, they have $130B in new funding to facilitate those efforts.

Local government marketers should adjust their plans in 3 key ways to take this new funding into account:

Incorporate ARP-related messaging into your content because it’s top of mind for your target decision makers
Clarify the positioning of your product or service to clearly present your solution as an eligible use of ARP funding
Use role-based (vs title-driven) targeting to ensure your chance to compete for all the relevant upcoming ARP-related opportunities

Making these adjustments to your local government marketing strategies will help make the most of the opportunities driven by the American Rescue Plan!

DID YOU KNOW?

Reaching the right decision maker is critical to succeed in marketing to local government. When you align your marketing outreach to the correct decision maker, you increase your chance of success including more frequent and meaningful discussions, more qualified leads, more sales, and longer-lasting partnerships.

Power Almanac’s database of contact information for local government decision makers is organized around roles (not titles) to ensure you can reach the right decision maker. Experiment for yourself with role-based targeting by downloading 100 free leads of local government decision makers now. It takes less than five minutes to choose any 100 records. No credit card required.