Welcome back to the third and final installment (part one and part two) of The Future of Marketing series. I believe the greatest marketing challenge (and opportunity) for the future is mastering “channel strategy.” What’s channel strategy? It’s the strategic deployment of a marketing budget into media channels that will most effectively attract the largest number of customers.
Today’s marketing options can seem innumerable and the number of choices in the future will only increase. Marketers have to choose not only which channel to utilize, but how much to invest in each channel to achieve success. The diagram below shows an example of some of the choices available to attract customers today:
Looking at this diagram reminds me of playing darts. Darts may be a more effective method of allocating budgets because multi-channel measurement is still in its infancy. Even when we have data from all the individual channels, we still don’t know how the combined formula impacts the bottom line. It’s alchemy and it can blow up!
According to an InfoTrends study on Multi-Channel Communications Measurement and Benchmarking, multi-channel campaigns using email, customized landing pages and print yielded a 35% higher response rate than print-only campaigns.
Multi-channel campaigns are simply more effective. How can we know the efficiency of each individual channel and what the ratio of investment should be in each? Investment in one channel naturally takes money away from other channels so every decision either approaches or detracts from the optimal formula.
Currently there is no standard CPM to measure channel mix, although several companies have proprietary solutions that attempt to attribute cross-channel results. Companies like Alterian, Radian6, Nielsen Business Media and Mobilestorm are a few. These software solutions are a great step toward ROI transparency, and their sophistication will improve as time advances.
Most companies aren’t aware or can’t afford these software solutions so Marketers need a disciplined planning process with clear steps to help you increase your chance of success. To be clear, let’s revisit Jessica, our 25-year-old professional working in the year 2020. We’ll use a day in her life to explain how you might make better channel marketing decisions for your business.
Here’s how to evaluate the right channel strategy:
6:20 A.M. – After snoozing through one alarm, Jessica grabs her Cloud Acquisition Device (CAD) and drops it in the cradle in the bathroom where she’ll listen to news, weather and sports while she gets ready for work
Step 1. Segment your audience according to profitability. Understand the financial impact of adding X percent of new customers within each segment. Jessica is a high-end digital consumer who buys the maximum data plans to support her voracious information-access needs. Analyzing your customer segments will help you focus on the channels that will deliver the highest ROI. If you don’t fully understand your target segments, drop everything you’re doing and get this data. It will change everything you do. When I worked at Ameritech Cellular, we knew 15% of our customers delivered 80% of the company profit. While it was tempting to put the majority of our budget and resources into the retail consumer promotions (only 20% of the profits), that decision would have had terrible financial consequences. Instead, we invested in high-end business packages that sold our best customers more services, driving up EBIDA.
There are several businesses today that tier their content offerings, charging consumers for content that’s free of ads. Check out Pandora and Uber Twitter. We’ll see more of this as everyday, basic content changes as time progresses, so start organizing your product or service offerings now.
Step 2. Make sure your data supports threshold levels of investment based on your targets use of that channel before you add that particular channel into the mix. “Innovation” (otherwise known as cutting edge media with no proven performance) should be kept below 10% of the budget.
7:15 A.M. – Jessica grabs her CAD from her bedroom CAP and brings it into the kitchen where it wirelessly connects to the Cloud Acquisition Portal (CAP). Her mother calls her to remind her about her father’s upcoming birthday, and the CAD seamlessly transitions between news and the video chat session with her mother. Since all video is now web-enabled, Jessica will use the top online gift store to search a variety of gift options for her Dad. More about this when Jessica comes home tonight.
Each channel will be much more segmented, persuasive and effective. B2B channels will even be fully integrated with search engine optimization (SEO), video, email, promotions, ads (banner and PPC), mobile, print, direct, PoP and social. Support for this trend can be found in the study by EConsultancy.
7:45 A.M. – Jessica jumps into her electric car and drives to work. Electric cars, and all the cottage industries that support them, will grow exponentially in the next decade. Popularity will increase electric car market penetration to 50% by 2020.
9:30 A.M. – While doing research for a 10:00 A.M. client meeting, Jessica reads a news update regarding one of her supplier’s new contracts. She clicks on a link and receives an un-branded case study that can be used in any presentation. Packaging case studies for viral distribution, with links back to the source, will become a rich source of lead generation in the future.
Noon – On her lunch break, Jessica scrolls through mobile ads she’s cached for future use. She’s opted into certain ads so she can save money on the things she likes. The cache app allows her to save ads she wants to save and retrieve when she is near the store.
2:30 P.M. Throughout the day, Jessica receives alerts about a variety of information according to her pre-approved preferences. These alerts represent highly targeted opportunities to reach consumers.
5:30 P.M. - A good friend calls Jessica and invites her to a business association meet-up that night where business celebrities talk live and interact with attendees from far-off locations – using sophisticated streaming technology. Branding and social media opportunities abound.
8:00 P.M. - Once home, Jessica plugs in her CAD and selects from a list of high quality resources that will deliver relevant news, cases and data to her business account in the morning. This information will make her more informed and articulate when the discussions and debates occur throughout her business day. If content is King, Jessica will have a crown by noon.
The only way to ensure you’re maximizing your marketing investment, knowing that it isn’t perfect, is to measure every channel. Start with individual measurement tools and add software that integrates channel metrics. Analyze the data and you’ll find valuable insights that will grow your business – guaranteed. Too often we shrug our shoulders and believe its too complicated and there aren’t accurate resources to measure effectively. This attitude leads to complacency and sloth. It’s possible today to dramatically increase your marketing ROI. Get granular and you’ll make a mountain out of a molehill.
I hope you’ve been motivated by this series and make the effort to rise above the standards of this day to lead the future of marketing. I looked ten years into the future but I believe we don’t have to wait to achieve the kind of effectiveness that technology and strategy will surely bring. I’m excited about the future and can’t wait to see what YOU will contribute.
About The B2Bblogger: Dan co-founded the Chicago public relations and search engine optimization firm, Vivid Ascent, to change the definition of integrated marketing. By placing Internet behavior at the center of how people buy, public relations, advertising, website design and social media become much more powerful.
Prior to Vivid Ascent Dan was the Global Director of Advertising for Accenture. He spent the first twelve years of his career at J. Walter Thompson and was President of the International Advertising Association (IAA) Chicago Chapter for five years. You can read more from Dan at Vivid Ascent’s PR, social media and SEO blog or follow him on Twitter @danielmobrien.
How do B2B marketers tackle the question of marketing campaign value? Do we make strategic decisions based on real, actionable data?
With the firehose of data that is available to marketers now-a-days, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to find the information that truly matters. And this is especially true for B2B with their typically complex, drawn out sales cycles.
In our latest episode of #B2Bchat, we dug into questions surrounding metrics. Here is a summary of the questions and comments, compiled:
Q. Which components of your digital marketing campaigns are delivering the best results? E.g. Search, Email, Display Advertising, Social Media?
Search (PPC and SEO). These are most effective when in used in conjunction with great landing pages.
Email
Mediums are secondary, success depends on the contextual relevance of the message.
Q. Why do campaign budgets get cut? Poor performance or lack of tracking?
Both: poor performance due to lack of clear objectives. and lack of tracking because no analysis properly done during campaign
Most of the time the problem is poorly defined goals and metrics
Budget cuts can also come due to lack of well defined baselines.
Lack of commitment to the campaign. Unreasonable expectations of sales impact.
On social media budgets: Shyness with social media due to it being unproven, thus high risk. Execs are holding back.
Measuring metrics a science, but knowing how to explain them can sometimes be an art. e.g. convincing your boss to keep budget.
Q. What is your biggest pet peeve when it comes to marketing reports?
First Dashboard reports need to be customized (management level) and meet biz needs…focus on actionable metrics!
A lot of people over-do it with reports. Too much data and too complex = danger of focusing on wrong metrics.
Q. How do you assess the value of a digital marketing campaign? Where do you start?
Have specific goals and objectives
Start with the dollar value of new sales and work backwards
Measure the number of sales-ready leads and wins
A good marketing dashboard is fundamental
Q. What metrics (Key Performance Indicators) do you track? Which matter most?
“Actionable” metrics, data which will allow us to make better decisions and take action
PDF downloads, newsletter subscriptions, sales leads, e-commerce transactions
Word art of transcript from April 29 #B2Bchat – Measuring the Value of Digital Marketing (courtesy of Wordle.net)
About the B2Bblogger: Andrew Spoeth is an independent marketing consultant who specializes in B2B demand generation. He most recently worked as the marketing director at Enquiro, one of North America’s leading search marketing agencies. You’ll also find Andrew speaking at industry events, co-moderating the weekly #B2Bchat series on Twitter, and blogging at MarketingFinger.com. You can follow him on Twitter at@andrewspoeth.
Attribution… measurement… return on advertising spend… cost per lead… These are buzz words that marketing executives love. And they are ones that also keep them up at night.
How do B2B marketers tackle the question of marketing campaign value? Do we make strategic decisions based on real, actionable data? With the firehose of data that is available to marketers now-a-days, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to find the information that truly matters. And this is especially true for B2B with their typically complex, drawn out sales cycles.
In our next #B2Bchat session, we’ll open up the discussion on measuring the value of digital marketing. Here are some of the questions we’ve collected:
How do you assess the value of a digital marketing campaign? Where do you start?
What metrics (Key Performance Indicators) do you track? Which matter most?
Which components of your digital marketing campaigns are delivering the best results? E.g. Search, Email, Display Advertising, Social Media?
Which attribution model(s) do you use? First click? Last click? Blended model?
Who is responsible for collecting the data? Agency? Internal staff?
Why do campaign budgets get cut? Poor performance or lack of tracking?
Do you use a reporting dashboard? If so, how often do you revisit the dashboard?
What is your biggest pet peeve when it comes to marketing reports?
How has your company’s internal reporting evolved over the past two years?
Join us for this week’s #B2Bchat on Measuring the Value of Digital Marketing, Thursday, April 29 at 8pm Eastern (5pm Pacific). Follow @B2B_chat for updates.
About the B2Bblogger: Andrew Spoeth is an independent marketing consultant who specializes in B2B demand generation. He most recently worked as the marketing director at Enquiro, one of North America’s leading search marketing agencies. You’ll also find Andrew speaking at industry events, co-moderating the weekly #B2Bchat series on Twitter, and blogging at MarketingFinger.com. You can follow him on Twitter at@andrewspoeth.
Milestones are great time to stop, look back, and reflect. With the publishing of this article, we’ve surpassed the 100 post milestone (faster than I expected). So that’s a good thing. Speaking of good things, so are you – for being a reader and willing to share your time with me and B2Bbloggers. We are extremely thankful.
From the start on Oct 28th, 2009, the mission of B2Bbloggers has been to shape the future of B2B marketing. Our approach on the web site is to provide you a combination of original content from fellow B2B marketers and aggregated content from over 1,500 B2B marketing blogs (submit your B2B marketing blog).
Using our Twitter account – @B2Bbloggers – we are constantly tweeting links to helpful, useful articles to again make it easy for you to find the information you need to be more successful. Every tweeted article is hand picked and has to pass our filter: “Will this make the job of a B2B marketer easier?” and “Will a B2B marketer learn how to better market their company?”
We are just getting started, we are especially appreciative to each of you that have become our loyal readers, retweeters, and advocates. We look forward to our continued relationship, and as always you are welcome to share your voice and thoughts on the future of b2b marketing by writing for B2Bbloggers. Enjoy the list, it is a summary of learnings, happenings, musings, and some favorite blogs, posts, and eBooks that I’ve discovered over the past 100 posts.
Thoughts On Blogging
It’s fun. And hard work.
If you enjoy writing, it is a lot easier (luckily I do).
It’s changed publishing. We are all publishers now. (You have to take the good with the bad of that statement).
It’s more strategic than you first think. At minimum you need goals, well conceived buyer personas, and an editorial plan.
The written article is truly just 50% of the job. Copy editing, proofreading, optimizing, finding/creating images, and adding it to the blog platform make up the rest.
Eric Fletcher (coming soon) CMO McGlinchey Stafford PLLC
Musings
Content Marketing and Inbound Marketing work. Period. In a post back in November, I asked if these terms were synonyms and the leaders of the charge Joe Pulizzi, David Meerman Scott, and Brian Halligan all weighed in. I prefer (and use) the term Content Marketing more so than Inbound Marketing for the reason that (in my view) content marketing takes into account all the channels your content can (and should) be used in to attract, nurture, and engage people.
To all the people who are saying, “Why do I need an iPad?” Were your parents the people asking, “Why do I need a microwave?” While you are probably right, you don’t need an iPad right now, in my view this next generation of computing devices will see 50% of us having some form of iPad, HP Slate, Microsoft Courier, or Google Tablet within the next 3-5 years (if the price comes down typical to Moore’s Law that percentage may even be higher).
Can someone explain to me how working with a writer to draft blog posts (i.e. Ghost Writing) is any different than having a PR agency write a press release (or any other form of marketing content)? I just don’t understand how on one hand you can preach the benefits of content marketing and then on the other hand (knowing the labor involved) say that to be successful you have to do it yourself.If you give me authenticity/transparency/trust argument, does that mean PR agencies haven’t been that way in the past when writing press releases for clients? I really just struggle with understanding the argument. A good partner will go to whatever lengths necessary to understand your business and ensure your communications are honest, transparent, and authentic. Wouldn’t they?
This year will not be the year the content marketing and inbound marketing “cross the chasm“. We will see big leaps forward, but the vast majority remain skeptics. For lots of reasons (generational, time, fear, risk aversion), it is just extremely difficult to get some people to consider the benefits. We’ve all heard, “Twitter, you’re kidding me right?” We have to all remind ourselves on occasion that just because we live, eat, and breathe this stuff, we are still largely ahead of the curve.That said, comfort can be found in the fact that this same phenomena was just experienced 10-15 years ago, “What’s the internet and why would I need a website?” Internet marketing crossed the chasm and so will content marketing … just not this year.
In less than two years, B2B marketers will wonder what they ever did without Marketing Automation software (and also be thanking the universe for not to have sort leads in spreadsheets). Here is a comprehensive list of marketing automation systems available today.
Google rushed Buzz out. It did them more harm than good. In hindsight it seems rather clear now that they should have followed their normal go to market strategy of: Labs, Beta, Production.
The Books I’ve Read (not affiliate links)
I love to read – it is how I learn. Here are the books I made it through in the last six months. We also started the #B2Bbookclub twitter interview series. Once weekly, but now monthly, I am in the midst of working with Bob Gilbreath (Marketing With Meaning) and Jeffrey Hayzlett (The Mirror Test) to schedule the next dates.
I have twice missed the send of the B2Bbloggers newsletter. I’ve justified this by believing that if I can not add enough value, it is better to say nothing, than waste your time.Hopefully that rings right to you.
I haven’t been controversial enough. I’ve had some controversial thoughts, but lacked the guts to spit ‘em out and publish them here. Let’s see if that changes in the coming months.
The layout of the sidebar is long overdue for the addition of categories, an archive, and popular posts. Unfortunately, it keeps getting bumped down the priority list. (At least my failing is not have a priority list, right?)
What a great idea this was by Ksenia Coffman. Just a little over a month ago, she reached out to Kent Huffman and I and suggested we start #B2Bchat. Within a couple of days, we had our first chat and right after that Andrew Spoeth joined us as a fourth moderator. Each week we post the questions and the transcripts. Join us in the coming weeks and read the transcripts of the first couple.
That’s a wrap for our 101st post. As I mentioned earlier, we are sincerely appreciative of the time you spend here, please keep coming back. I would love to hear your thoughts and ideas for future of the site, so share them in the comments and we’ll consider putting your ideas into practice. Next milestone post will be at 250. Would love to get there by the end of 2010. Wanna help us? The platform is open. (One final thought on blogging, creating a post with 100 points takes about twice as long as you initially think.)
Like many marketers I am hard-wired to look for emerging trends. I’ve read about or observed key trends affecting B2B marketers, and more about trade show trends, but I’ve yet to read anything that summarizes how current B2B trends affect trade show marketers.
Why look for the overlap between B2B marketing and trade show trends? Because trade shows represent the single largest marketing expenditure for B2B marketers. For some companies, trade shows are central to their B2B marketing.
So here are seven B2B marketing trends, and some ideas on how trade show marketers can take advantage of them:
1. Economic recovery: With US GDP growth of 5.7% in the 4th quarter of 2009 (the fastest rate in six years), B2B marketers are getting off their heels and onto their toes, as prolonged uncertainty gradually shifts towards resurging ambition. Marketers don’t just want to conserve cash; they want to make an impact.
“The extreme cost-cutting of the past has led to a big rebound in corporate profits, so businesses will start to compete for market share, said Frank Chow, chief economist for Trade Show Executive magazine. To look like a leader at trade shows, B2B marketers are getting new graphics to promote their more ambitious marketing messages, or finally replacing the entire worn-out trade show display they had been holding onto. But they are cautiously spending even in their ambition, choosing lighter weight portable and modular exhibits, and renting exhibits more often than before the downturn.
2. Change in the sales cycle. Until about 10 years ago, when a B2B buyer needed product information, they had to ask potential vendors’ sales people. That put the sales people in control of the sales cycle. But now, buyers know they are in control, because they have so much product info instantly available just by searching Google. The recent downturn gave any actual buyers even more clout. Buyers can wait later and later until they contact the sales rep.
This places even greater value on trade shows, as when a prospect meets you at the show, they’ve already learned about your products on the internet, and want to check out your people. Plus, at a show you finally get face-to-face access to the buyer that your salesperson is having a harder time getting an appointment with.
3. Marketing Automation: With B2B salespeople losing access to their prospects in favor of the Internet, marketing automation software such as Eloqua, Marketo, Genius, Manticore, and Silverpop has gained popularity as a means to keep tabs on and develop top prospects.
For trade show marketers, if your company introduces a marketing automation platform, you will need to learn how to record leads at show so they seamlessly enter into the marketing automation program. Even better, be able to tap into the lead scoring system at a show, so when a top prospect enters your booth, you can identify their value, and take appropriate action, such as introducing them to a top company officer, or bring them to a conference room for a longer discussion. Also consider how lead nurturing drip campaigns can include your pre-show invitations and post-show follow up messages.
4. Growth Internationally: United States companies that want to grow are looking more at exports to achieve that growth. Recently President Obama even set a goal of doubling U.S. exports over the next five years. No wonder — according to the World Bank, GDP in developing countries is expected to grow 5.2 percent in 2010 and 5.8 percent in 2011, while GDP in the USA is only expected to grow about half that.
U.S. manufacturers looking to increase exports can get an easier start by exhibiting at international trade shows, either on their own, or within a U.S. pavilion at the foreign show. Even if they don’t exhibit abroad, U.S. exhibitors can get started or expand exports by paying more attention to international visitors in their booths.
5. Greater Sales and Marketing Integration. The economic downturn put even greater emphasis on the need for marketing to better drive sales. There just isn’t any more leeway for lost revenue and profits from friction and miscommunication between sales and marketing. Marketing must provide the sales force with tools for every step of the sales cycle, and deliver leads that sales values and will follow-up on. They become one team with a common goal. Companies that embrace this partnership are more likely to succeed.
There is no greater example of this than at trade shows, where sales and marketing literally work side-by-side. In the booth, marketing people have to act more like sales people, and sales people have to be willing to help generate leads for outside their territory. That teamwork at trade shows builds stronger relationships between sales and marketing.
6. Social Media: Social media growth has been one of the most high-profile trends affecting business marketers. More and more B2B marketers have learned to take advantage of social media sites like Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Facebook to extend their brand reach, communicate with customers, build communities, and generate sales leads.
Those same social media tools are becoming more useful to trade show marketers. Whether it’s posting on YouTube a video interview with a client in their exhibit, or sending a tweet during show hours to announce a drawing in their booth, business marketers will more fully integrate their pre-show, at-show, and post-show promotions with their company’s social media programs. Also consider that your popular company blogger may now be a good draw in your trade show booth and that your bloggers could get similar treatment as your industry press as an attendee
7. Increased Use of Mobile: As more and more people carry their computer in their pocket, growth in mobile marketing is expected to grow 43% in 2010 according to Forrester Research, much faster than established B2B marketing mediums. While some marketers are starting by ensuring their websites and blogs view well on mobile devices, others are taking advantage of the location-aware nature of mobile devices to create greater relevance and interactivity in their marketing.
For trade show marketers, mobile devices mean that trade show attendees don’t have to lug a laptop around the show to receive and act on their Twitter and email at-show promotions. Some trade shows are using apps that replace, even surpass the printed show book, with a scheduler, venue city info, and more. Also, new lead management systems are now available that can be run on mobile devices rather than show-specific systems. And audience polling apps can be used on mobile devices for greater interactivity, be it in their booth or at conference seminar sessions.
Marketers who exhibit at trade shows control a huge portion of B2B marketing budgets. While other marketing areas appear to be undergoing more rapid change, trade show marketers are also affected and need to remain aware of how to adjust and adapt to these trends.
Do you have other ideas on how trade show marketers can adapt to these 7 B2B marketing trends? Or have you noticed other B2B marketing trends you feel are more important to them? Please share your insights in the comment box below.
About The B2Bblogger:: Michael Thimmesch is Skyline Exhibits‘ Director of Lead Generation and Industry Relations, with over 20 years of Marketing and Trade Show Marketing experience.
It’s easy to be impressed by new smart phones, touch screen displays and other technologies that seem to appear out of nowhere. But there’s always evidence right in front of us that reveals what our lives might be like in the future if we only pay attention. These changes have, and will have profound effects on marketing.
Individually they can be viewed as breakthroughs, but they complicate marketer’s ability to achieve ROI. Why? Innovations don’t integrate well with established technologies.
We’ve all professed our sophisticated integration, but the reality is we live in a disaggregated and inefficient marketing world. Lack of integration isn’t all our faults. As a culture, we suffer from a lack of platform integration. Despite the fact that consumers overlap their media, various media platforms aren’t connected, especially in a manner that would allow measurement. But that will all change.
In this three-part series I will investigate the future of marketing from the customer experience (today’s post), the marketer and then the implications on channel mix today and for the future.
So let’s take a peek into what our business and social lives might be like in ten years from the customer’s perspective. I’ll paint a picture of our future in an attempt to encourage you, and possibly give you ideas that will help us all realize this future sooner. I won’t predict flying cars and surrogate beings, but rather, a more probable future based on research and technology trends from today.
Lets look at our world ten years from now, in April 2020, through the eyes of Jessica (the most popular baby girl’s name in the U.S. in 1995).
She is a 25-year-old professional woman, and this is a perspective on what her typical workday might be like:
6:00 A.M. – Jessica’s Cloud Acquisition Device (CAD) wakes her up with her favorite songs or sounds. The Cad is cradled on her nightstand in one of many Cloud Acquisition Ports (CAP) located throughout her apartment. Jessica voice-enables the 10-minute snooze and drifts back to sleep.
6:10 A.M. – The sweet sounds of encouragement wake her up again, and after 15 seconds shifts to a voice-calendar reminder of her day’s schedule. Jessica’s cloud is tailored to her life, with calendar, personal and work database, music, television programs, movies, internet, social networks and more – all contextually delivered and selected to improve her efficiency and happiness.
6:20 A.M. - Jessica grabs her CAD and plugs it into the port next to her bathroom sink where it displays world and local news, financial market activity and weather on a video screen. Jessica catches up on news while she gets ready for her day.
TV’s will become intelligent video portals for streaming content: http://bit.ly/dAfSzw
7:15 A.M. – Jessica grabs her CAD from her bedroom CAP and brings it into the kitchen where it wirelessly connects to the CAP. Her mother calls her to remind her about her father’s upcoming birthday, and the CAD seamlessly transitions between news and the video chat session with her mother. After the call, Jessica voice-enables her calendar and adds her father’s birthday and a reminder to shop for his gift when she gets home tonight. The CAD is charged wirelessly, eliminating the need for cords.
7:45 A.M. – Jessica attaches her non-invasive, audio/microphone button behind her ear (over the external acoustic meatus bone which transmits sound without ear damage). Then she is out the door and into her electric car. Her CAD delivers music and podcasts to her ear button, which is legal while driving because it doesn’t block external noise. Her CAD still seamlessly integrates with her car’s audio and navigation device, and verbal commands direct her music, traffic reports synched to her destination, news, internet search or phone call options while also providing audio navigation (if necessary).
8:10 – As Jessica parks in her building, her CAD synchs with her monthly parking status (paid) to open the gate.
8:15 A.M. - As she enters her office building, the international coffee chain using location-based services reminds her that she has 12 credits left. This is the only audio advertising reminder she has enabled Monday-Friday. Once in her office, Jessica plugs her CAD into the CAP, which recognizes her location and delivers her business desktop through a CAP screen. She removes her ear button because the audio and microphone wireless systems in her office are highly focused and efficient.
9:30 A.M. – While doing research for a 10:00 A.M. client meeting, Jessica discovers the most recent and relevant contextual data available for her client’s products. Her options are organized by news articles, research, business strategies, trademarks and legal issues, competitive products, pricing and customer insight. Search results are no longer organized by “video, images, blogs, books and discussions” because these options exist within each result. Each option is organized chronologically, with search variable control.
Noon – Anticipating a lunch break at 12:30, Jessica voice-enables her food option network and chooses a Thai salad from the salad restaurant around the corner from her building. The salad is purchased with her CAD-enabled, password protected bank account, and the salad is ready to be picked up at 12:30. She dons her ear button and leaves the office.
At the restaurant, Jessica grabs an impromptu candy bar at the counter and pays by swiping her CAD. All of a sudden Jessica remembers she needs a birthday card for a co-worker, but doesn’t know where a card shop is located near her building. She voice- enables a search for “birthday card shop” and audio directions for a pedestrian are delivered. Once the card is purchased using her CAD, Jessica returns to the office to work while she eats her salad (some things never change). All her social networks are integrated into a single user interface allowing her to stay in touch during her day without spending too much time on it.
2:30 P.M. - A client meeting begins and Jessica uses her CAD as the lead device for the team. It plugs into the CAP in a conference room and establishes audio and videoconference connections to eight locations via the invites in the calendar. Jessica selects the presentation from her CAD and seamlessly controls the screen that everyone sees during the meeting. Data reduction technologies have transformed our ability to share large files over pipes that have not expanded as much as they have in other countries. All CAP’s have file reduction filters that reduce the density of data to enhance speed.
The conference is recorded and notes are logged for future access and work flow.
5:30 P.M. - A good friend calls Jessica and invites her to a social meet-up that night where live auditions are being broadcast for a popular reality TV show. Live video venues stream concerts, theatre, church, government proceedings, legal disputes and parades, with screens and sound closely replicating the feel of being there. This becomes a more affordable and accessible means of attending “live” events. They agree to meet at 6:30.
6:30 P.M. - Jessica uses her CAD to buy admission and dinner while at the event.
8:00 P.M. - Once home, Jessica plugs in her CAD and settles down at the portable screen on her coffee table. Reclining on the couch, she enables her online persona, which accesses her profile that was previously created and saved, including likes and dislikes for every category relevant to her. Her search results offer a plethora of gift ideas for her father, easily purchased and delivered without any concerns about identity theft or creeps hacking her real identity.
11 P.M. - Once in bed, Jessica voice-enables her alarm and reads from her wireless reader, which drifts to sleep-mode after Jessica.
I hope you’ve enjoyed this peek into our collective future and it’s given you some inspiration for innovation. Don’t settle on expected marketing. Know your target, research the options and create a marketing plan that will engage and inspire. Let me know what you think.
In my next post, I’ll report about Jessica’s world from the marketer’s perspective. What will these technology innovations mean for us as we try to sculpt the most effective marketing plans? Until then, enjoy the moment.
About The B2Bblogger: Dan co-founded the Chicago public relations and search engine optimization firm, Vivid Ascent, to change the definition of integrated marketing. By placing Internet behavior at the center of how people buy, public relations, advertising, website design and social media become much more powerful.
Prior to Vivid Ascent Dan was the Global Director of Advertising for Accenture. He spent the first twelve years of his career at J. Walter Thompson and was President of the International Advertising Association (IAA) Chicago Chapter for five years. You can read more from Dan at Vivid Ascent’s PR, social media and SEO blog or follow him on Twitter @danielmobrien.
A couple of weeks ago, I identified three recurring b2b marketing trends and I shared them with you in this post, Three B2B Marketing Trends (To Avoid). Today, I introduce you to something you are more than likely already intimately familiar with, I am calling it, The B2B Marketers Dilemma. Here it is.
Am I right? Pretty close I bet. Quite frankly, if you are a B2B marketer, I think you have the most difficult job in the organization right now. You are likely championing your company’s B2B social media marketing efforts, while at the same time thinking the best approach would be for the entire organization to be asking itself, “how do we become a social business?” Not just, “how do we set up a Facebook Fan page?” If the former were the case, you could spend your time in a more meaningful way than convincing everyone a negative comment on a blog won’t kill you.
The reality is though, you are having to fight that fight, and to me that is just one of the reasons why your job as a B2B marketer is so challenging. But moving beyond those discussions, your most important work is in solving this dilemma for your organization. It’s vital to your success not only as a company, but also as a B2B social media and content marketing professional.
So how do you do it? Here are a few suggestions to get you started.
Reassess all your spending from a buyer persona perspective versus “target audience” – When you have well developed buyer personas for the people involved in your buying process (notice I am not saying sales cycle), you know them intimately. You know their online habits, their daily struggles, their education level and much more. Once you get this close to your buyers, you find an entirely different point of view to assess where and how you are spending your marketing and advertising budgets to reach them.
Evaluate the structure and roles of your marketing department – When marketing is changing as rapidly and radically as it is today, new thinking in required. Now, I’m not talking about “new thinking” in the sense that you need to come up with some new breakthrough, magical formula. I simply mean looking at the old way of doing things with a 2010 mindset. Apply critical thinking and develop better methods to serve your needs now and in the future. This covers not only evaluating the skill sets of the people working for you, but also their job descriptions and operational responsibilities. Build your department to support ongoing content creation.
Talent matters, it’s time to evaluate yours – Gone are the days when you leave someone on your team, “because they have been with the company for so long,” or whatever other reason you may be making for an under performer. In the new world of B2B social media and content marketing, each and every person on your team needs to contribute, every day. If they have the talent, but not the skills, invest in training and help them grow professionally.
Outsource – I’ve long been a proponent of outsourcing because of its ability to allow an organization to stay focused on its core competency. The same benefits hold true for B2B social media and content marketing. So whether it be outsourcing the creation of a video, white paper, or hiring a writer or editor for your blog, these are sound business decisions and one you should consider if you are understaffed.
There you have it, a few suggestions to get you started solving the B2B marketers dilemma. Ultimately though, what lies ahead in solving this dilemma is transformation, renewal, and hard work (lots of it). But don’t let that prevent you from pressing on. Rome wasn’t built in a day, nor will your b2b social media and content marketing strategy and execution.
Kindly share some of your ideas in the comments on how we can help each other solve The B2B Marketers Dilemma.
From various conversations with others in my profession, I am starting to realize that very little is understood about the role of web analytics in the context of this brave new world of b2b marketing automation. In this article is an explanation of how to think about these tools and the types of questions they can answer for your business.
Let’s start with the definitions as it is important to put each of these terms into context:
Marketing automation tool – a marketing database (think Salesforce, but for marketing). You place marketing leads here first until they are ready to be passed into your business CRM and to a sales representative.
With the help of compelling content delivered via email & your website, you can help educate prospects in this database about your solution as you progressively glean more information about who they are and what solution would benefit them the most.
In order to easily collect the activity information of your prospects at this phase, the automation tool also has a web tracking component that saves a person’s web activity from a particular campaign into a field in the marketing database.
Web analytics – a tool that tracks visitor activity at an aggregate level; also helps build traffic trending over time, etc. on your web properties. You typically get very high level data and no IP information with a service like Google Analytics, but you can drill down to the individual with services such as Webtrends and Omniture.
Fillingthe Marketing & Sales Funnel
Implementing a marketing automation tool helps ease some of the work hours a marketing department spends manually gathering information and setting up workflows. With that freed time, the team has more resources to dedicate to generating demand for the business.
Demand Generation activities – events, PR, contributed articles, speaking engagements, advertising, SEO, social media – will feed the marketing database with contacts that can be nurtured, qualified, and then passed to Sales based on rules that marketing & sales establish together.
Creating a Lean & Mean Demand Generation Machine
Peter Young from Webtrends (@webtrendspeter, LinkedIn profile) has a very neat metaphor for describing the difference between web analytics and marketing automation:
“Marketing automation is like looking through the windshield of your car.Analytics is like looking into the rear-view mirror – both are critical to a positive driving experience.”
Another useful way to think about the power of web analytics is in the context of the Sales & Marketing Funnel. Web analytics reports and dashboard help marketers optimize web properties in order to bring visitors into the Marketing & Sales Funnel. Path analysis, web behavior tracking, landing page optimization, etc. all fall into this part of the experience. When you make changes to your web properties you can also check against historical data and make decisions based on those baselines.
The key at this step is to fine-tune the web properties to drive conversions (in many cases, this would be obtaining vistors’ email address for future email marketing).
Down the Rabbit Hole: Passing from Top of Funnel into the Marketing & Sales Funnel
As soon as someone identifies themselves, they immediately get placed in the marketing database, where further web activity, qualification (lead scoring), segmentation, and education (lead nurturing) takes place. From this point on, you may want to segment out the web traffic of these warm prospects visiting your site and use content marketing to drive thought leadership and educational messages to them.
Beyond the Horizon: Messaging To Your Customer
The other, sometimes overlooked, aspect is that this marketing database of contacts will keep track of a prospect’s behavior on your web properties into their transition as a customer. Additional segmentation on your customer population can help drive customer retention and programs that target your base. You can use marketing automation to learn, indirectly or directly, more about your customers’ needs.
About the B2Bblogger: Rodica Buzescu (@rodica) is a marketing manager at Amazon Web Services. She enjoys combining interdisciplinary knowledge and various agency & B2B experience in digital marketing to solve larger marketing challenges. Rodica sometimes blogs on various marketing, management, and bigger strategy ideas at http://morphingthrough.blogspot.com.
For the past several months, I have followed @JeffreyHayzlett on Twitter. Some days reading every tweet to get a sense of life as a CMO for a global B2B/B2C brand, other times just checking in to see where in the world Jeffrey may be. If you follow Jeffrey, you’ll get first hand experience of the future as a Chief Marketing Officer. Whether it be on a trip back to South Dakota or in Spain (as he is at the time of this writing), he is constantly engaging, educating, exciting, and evangelizing the Kodak brand. Jeffrey Hayzlett is a new media CMO and as you’ll learn in this exclusive interview, a smart marketer.
This interview itself is also a symbol of the rapid state of evolution we are experiencing in communications and media. Jeffrey and I met via Twitter with a simple follow, follow back, direct message and the rest you’ll read below as Jeffrey shares his thoughts on marketing, the recession, social media, and the changing nature of B2B marketing. Enjoy!
Jeremy: What brands do you admire? Why?
Jeffrey: There are a number of brands I admire from a personal perspective based on the connections that I make with them as an enthusiast of their products and the connections that the brands make with me as a customer. They’re brands that represent a promise delivered. I love brands like Cabela’s for their attention to the customer, the way they deliver great customer experiences, and the activities they promote.
I also admire more familiar brands, like Coca-Cola and Apple—people know who they are because the brands know who they are. They’ve delivered affinity and become iconic.
Also, living in upstate New York, I’ve come to really appreciate the Wegmans supermarket chain, and Fresh Direct, an online grocer out of New York – they’ve done exceptional jobs in enhancing their bonds with customers.
Jeremy: Read any good business books lately?
Jeffrey: I’m a prolific reader. I read multiple books every week, and usually am reading multiple books at one time. I just read “Betrayal,” by Andrew Kirtzman, about the Bernie Madoff scandal. I was struck by how long he was able to keep the fraud going because people wanted so much to believe the good things they thought were happening.
Jeremy: You are an early adopter of social media. How’d that happen? What made you notice?
Jeffrey: I started using social media almost immediately after it was introduced as a means to keep in touch with family and friends. From a business standpoint, I was fascinated by the opportunities that social media makes possible to reach many of Kodak’s customers at the same time, which is how marketing has traditionally worked—through a medium that reaches people in a personalized way, which is what marketing today and in the future is all about. And, maybe even more important, not just reach customers but make a connection between them and the Kodak brand. We have people throughout the company who are actively using social media to achieve what we call “Kodak’s 4 E’s: Engage, Educate, Excite and Evangelize.”
Jeremy: One of the things I have been saying is that 2009 was about survival and 2010 is about renewal…would you agree?
Jeffrey: 2009 might not have been quite that dire but it certainly changed forever the dynamics of the markets and industries that practically every company operates in. Companies need to recognize that many things aren’t going to return to the way they were before the recession. That’s true for Kodak and certainly true for our B2B customers in the commercial print market. As advertising budgets were reduced, print certainly took a hit. This reduction in print spend accelerated a trend that had already started of printers rethinking their business model to focus on offering more integrated marketing services beyond putting ink on paper. I see the new world in which we all live as a positive opportunity for companies to move in different directions, offer new products and capabilities, and create the business they really want to be in.
Jeremy: What are the core areas of renewal for Kodak in 2010?
Jeffrey: As a digital company, we like to think of renewal as a continuing process. For example, we have to move faster than ever in the ways we innovate and communicate. In 2010, we’ll focus a lot of our B2B efforts around helping commercial print service providers renew their businesses and become marketing services providers through our digital technologies. At the forefront of that effort, we’re launching the KODAK PROSPER Printers featuring Kodak Stream technology, a groundbreaking inkjet printing technology that will take print to previously unattainable levels.
As I mentioned already, marketing today is all about reaching people on a 1:1 basis. With customers in full control of how, when and where you can engage them, marketers need to use a full digital communications mix that is relevant, timely and personal. What we’re doing with Stream is, for the first time, putting print on a level of scale, personalization and interactivity that is comparable to online media. By offering this digital print capability, print service providers can help marketers achieve what’s most important to them—an integrated digital campaign that delivers strong return on marketing investment.
Jeremy: What are some of the biggest challenges/opportunities you foresee for marketers/corporations as the economy (hopefully) rebounds in 2010?
Jeffrey: Given the cautious environment that companies will operate in this year, the challenge for marketers is reaching purchasers and influencers in a way that will convince them to spend with you. As part of achieving that goal, marketers need to figure out the right mix of media, events and other tools to reach customers on a personal level. The big opportunity for marketers lies in rethinking the value that their products, technologies and services bring to customers. In almost all cases, it should come down to answering this question: Does our marketing clearly communicate what our products deliver to help customers grow their businesses?
Jeremy: Kodak’s social initiatives seem to be much larger than “social media” – what I mean by that is that it seems Kodak is becoming a social business … not just Tweeting. Am I right?
Jeffrey: Absolutely. Social media fits into our overall strategy of connecting with customers on a personal level. For many people, their daily routines include participating on Twitter and Facebook. We want Kodak to be there with them. I’m challenging our team everyday to come up with new ways to engage with customers and facilitate conversations. On the consumer side of our business, we recently held a contest through Twitter for people to name our new high-definition pocket video camera, the new KODAK PLAYSPORT. Whenever we participate in a major trade show — on the commercial or consumer side of the business — we include a “K-Zone.” K-Zones are a great way to share topics that are important to our audiences — trends, issues, applications, and success stories. It’s not talking about us. It’s talking about what we can learn from the experiences of others. Those sessions are broadcast live over the Internet and videos of the discussions posted online. It’s all about bringing people together around shared interests and reaching them in way that’s meaningful and memorable.
Jeremy: What advice do you have for your fellow CMOs getting ready to walk in your shoes?
Jeffrey: First, get ready to do a lot of listening. Whenever I start a new project or initiative, I make sure I’ve gotten as much input and understanding from everyone involved. Many people talk about the importance of listening but I’m not sure everyone really does it well. Second, think ahead. Everything you’ve heard about how quickly the world changes in every sense of the word is true. You have to anticipate what’s next before your competition. Third, create momentum. Big ideas and routine tactics need to work together to raise visibility and awareness that builds to actions and results. If something doesn’t contribute to that momentum, don’t do it. Finally, and most important, do everything FAST. FAST is a core set of operating principles that drive everything we do at Kodak: Focus, Accountability, Simplicity and Trust.
Jeremy: Of course the main concern on a CMO’s mind relative to anything “social” is ROI and measurement of success or failure. What are the key performance indicators that Kodak uses to measure and monitor the success of your social media initiatives?
Jeffrey: When we look at the Kodak 4 E’s of social media (Engage, Educate, Excite and Evangelize), we look at the first one, Engage, as the way to begin the process of achieving success with social media and as the way to measure our success. We can Tweet and post all day but if we haven’t engaged anyone, we haven’t been successful. So, engagement is the new ROI. We look at quantitative data via measurement tools like Radian6 to analyze the extent and type of engagement we’ve achieved with our constituents. Another way to answer the question is to think about ROI as meaning something else—what is your Risk of Ignoring?
Jeremy: Name the three top social networking sites you are using and your goal for each one of them?
Jeffrey: Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. The goal for each is the same: to engage in meaningful dialogue with customers and influencers in a way that supports the Kodak brand and helps support sales.
Jeremy: What changes do you see coming in B2B marketing? How are you preparing Kodak for them?
Jeffrey: B2B marketing will continue to be all about reaching the customer on their terms, in a highly personalized way, by using a wide range of touch points. We have to think about 360, integrated campaigns that provide customers with instant access to information when they want to receive it. No one medium alone can do the trick. Online, social, print and other media need to be in the mix. Some campaigns may use all media together, others will use several components. It depends on who you’re trying to reach and what you want to say. Trade shows, conferences, sporting events and other venues for reaching customers through speaking engagements and sponsors also need to be factored in. Again, it’s all about the 360 approach to marketing.
Jeremy: What does 2010 hold for Kodak from a B2B perspective? What are your top three initiatives? And how are you aligning your marketing to achieve them?
Jeffrey: We’ll focus more than ever on showing customers how Kodak can help them grow their businesses. We need to show customers that we understand their businesses, their challenges, their opportunities better than any other company. We need to show that because of that understanding, we can talk about the right applications and capabilities they need to offer to help their customers be successful. Then, we need to show them we have the right products and technologies to deliver those applications and capabilities. We’ll achieve all of that by continuous, personalized 360 customer communication and engagement.
Jeremy: What is the biggest challenge you are facing in B2B?
Jeffrey: Our number one marketing objective in 2010 is to get closer to customers. Everything we do needs to help make our relationships with customers more meaningful. We’ll do that through relevant, continuous engagement. To do that, we need to get all the moving parts within our organization working together. Because sales, marketing, and operations all engage with customers, we need to make sure those groups are aligned. By working together and sharing information we’ll have the type of customer engagement that will help us win.
There is something truly amazing about right now. We are living through an experience that is undeniably unlike anything we have ever seen before. A little more than 24 hours ago, a earthquake rattled Haiti. [updated: earthquake occured at approxiamately 5:00 PM EST].
About 23 hours ago (around 12:30 AM 1-13-2010 EST), @RedCross posted this tweet:
Then about 16 hours later…this tweet was posted.
And another nine hours, this tweet …
That’s quite powerful. Over $800,000 in sixteen hours. Nearly $3million dollars in 36 hours.
While this is not an illustration of how to use social media in B2B marketing, it is a demonstration of the state of communication and how Twitter is impacting our lives in every way at every moment.
There is no doubt. Social media will play a role in the future of your business. The question is only a matter of how soon will you get there.
I just added $10 more dollars to the cause, have you sent your text?
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Hi, I'm @jeremyvictor, the founder of Make Good Media and Editor In Chief of B2Bbloggers.com.
B2Bbloggers.com is an online magazine for B2B marketers. Our goal is to engage, educate, and make it easier for B2B marketers to find the information they care about to do their jobs successfully.
As a publisher and new media marketing agency, Make Good Media advises businesses how to integrate social media and content marketing with traditional marketing tactics to attract, nurture, engage, and convert customers in the brave new B2B world of the social, mobile web. How can we help you Make Good Media?
Looking at this diagram reminds me of playing darts. Darts may be a more effective method of allocating budgets because multi-channel measurement is still in its infancy. Even when we have data from all the individual channels, we still don’t know how the combined formula impacts the bottom line. It’s alchemy and it can blow up!
Here’s how to evaluate the right channel strategy:
About The B2Bblogger: Dan co-founded the Chicago public relations and search engine optimization firm, Vivid Ascent, to change the definition of integrated marketing. By placing Internet behavior at the center of how people buy, public relations, advertising, website design and social media become much more powerful.
About the B2Bblogger: Andrew Spoeth is an independent marketing consultant who specializes in B2B demand generation. He most recently worked as the marketing director at Enquiro, one of North America’s leading search marketing agencies. You’ll also find Andrew speaking at industry events, co-moderating the weekly #B2Bchat series on Twitter, and blogging at 
About The B2Bblogger:: Michael Thimmesch is 
About the B2Bblogger: Rodica Buzescu (
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