My colleague, good friend and fellow blogger B2B sales lead expert Mac McIntosh and I are putting together an e-book on the top 10 silly B2B marketing mistakes — and we want you to be part of it!
Here’s how it works:
Use our special survey link to tell us what you think are the top 10 B2B marketing mistakes. These can be anything from PPC ad campaign no-nos and social media blunders to “old school” marketing snafus including trade shows, print ads, etc.
We’ll collect your lists for the next two weeks (submission deadline is February 12, 2010) and then collate the results to determine what you, our fellow B2B marketers, think are the top 10 B2B marketing mistakes that others are making.
Everyone who shares their list of mistakes will have their name listed in the e-book along with a live link to your blog, Website, or LinkedIn profile. (Just gives us the link you prefer to use.)
One question the survey addressed: “Products deemed important to know about in order to execute marketing strategies” — with all of the usual suspects listed: social media, blogs, video, e-newsletters, etc.
What I found interesting is that respondents decreased the importance of all of these tactics from 2009 (e-newsletters, for example, decreased from a whopping 61% to 38%!) with one exception: mobile content. Mobile content increased from 24% to 38%.
Pulizzi doesn’t define “mobile content” in his survey. Hence, my question is, with the advent of smart phones, especially the iPhone and now Google’s Android operating system, isn’t *all* content mobile?
I bought my iPhone in August 2009 after fierce resistance. All I wanted was a phone that did its job — namely, make and receive phone calls.
Now that I have the iPhone, I don’t know how I lived without it and that’s because my iPhone is not just a “phone.” I use it for almost everything *but* a phone:
E-book reader – Thanks to the iPhone Amazon Kindle app, I now read business books using my phone. I love it.
Blog reader — Using Google Reader, I read blogs while waiting in the carpool line or while standing in line at the grocery store.
E-commerce — I particularly like the Fandango app, which lets me order movie tickets.
Social media – With apps for LinkedIn and Twitter, I can keep up with my network and respond to people, too, whether I’m at home, the office, or out and about.
Calendar — I used to struggle with keeping track of events and tasks as my life was tied up in ACT!, a desktop CRM application. Now I use Google Calendar and Google Tasks — and all of the information I need is available at the push of a button. (I ditched ACT! six months ago. What a relief.)
Yellow pages — With the iPhone, I can go to a company or business Website and click on a phone number and the iPhone will automatically call it. It will also map directions. Yet, I can’t tell you how hard companies make finding this important information. Even worse, some company sites don’t show up in the Google search results on my phone — which means they lose my business. (It also means that if your business isn’t optimized for local search, you are hosed.)
Restaurant finder — Thanks to the Urban Spoon app, my son and I found a *real* Mexican food restaurant in Massachusetts. (I mean real, as in California standard real.) Like everyone else, we rated it five stars. We often use Urban Spoon to see what others think of restaurants we’ve seen around town, which means that positive online reviews have become critical to many businesses.
Flashlight — Ok, I admit it. I LOVE the Flashlight app! I often use my iPhone to light my way in dark places.
Suffice to say, smart phones like the iPhone are no longer just for making phone calls. It also means content is no longer consumed by people sitting in a chair in front a desktop computer. It’s consumed by people in bits and chunks while on the go.
You can spend a great deal of time and money creating content for mobile applications. Or, you can take that marketing budget and ensure the content you already have is accessible to people on the go.
If you own an iPhone or other smart phone, how has it changed your content viewing / consumption habits?
How do you generate awareness for your company when your industry is defined by two Goliaths — namely SAP and Oracle? That’s the question that confronted Infor, a company that develops and sells ERP and other software solutions designed specifically for mid-market companies.
With over 70,000 customers, Infor has a strong mid-market presence — with very low name recognition. (In fact, I had not heard of Infor until I first saw their ad in the Wall Street Journal.)
Although SAP and Oracle have been moving into the mid-market with their own offerings, the market has been very poorly served. Designed for the biggest companies, “Big ERP” — as Infor calls it — was retrofitted for the mid-market, and in the process, has created a great deal of frustration.
“According to market research by analysts such as Forrester, people know of Oracle and SAP, and then you drop way down and a bunch of companies get mentioned, including ours,” says Dave Alampi, Infor’s VP of Marketing Strategy and Services.
“We wanted to move the needle on unaided awareness and preference and wanted people to think ‘Infor’ when they considered a business software solution. We wanted to take the big guys to task and create a campaign that would touch a nerve and connect what people were thinking about the market.”
Here’s how Infor set out to achieve these objectives.
Step #1: Develop a message and test it.
Infor’s Cambridge, Massachusetts agency PJA Marketing + Advertising, developed the campaign, which features the “Big ERP” characters who represent the frustrations mid-market companies have with regard to Big ERP software.
“We gave these characters personality,” says Mike O’Toole, President of PJA. “Our creative staff gave them a fun voice — and this voice worked naturally with the social media elements of the campaign. Infor began testing the “Big ERP” concept message to determine if it resonated with customers and prospects — which it did, in virtually every geography tested.”
Step #2: Get C-suite buy-in.
When asked if they had push back with regard to using social media and the Big ERP characters for the campaign, Alampi and O’Toole both said the top brass at Infor believed the campaign was the right thing to do.
One lesson marketers can learn is that it pays to have marketing strategy that’s based on business objectives and real world research — which is especially helpful when you have a new CMO come in when you’re in the middle of creating the campaign.
“We reviewed our goals with Robert Humphrey, our new CMO,” reports Alampi, “as well as the thinking behind the campaign, the details and media strategy, and our research and test results. He became a strong advocate very quickly.”
Adds O’Toole, “Infor isn’t opposed to social media nor do they believe in doing it just because ‘everybody’ else is. To back up our recommendation for social media integration, we used data from IDG Connect which showed that close to 80% of decision makers in the software adoption process use information from social media channels. We were able to prove that prospects and customers in Infor’s industry use social media to make purchasing decisions.”
Step #3: Create external and internal campaign components.
In addition, Infor ran an internal contest for employees on who could develop the best video or submit the funniest photos. To generate excitement, the company created full-sized cut-outs of the Big ERP characters, mouse pads, etc.
“We had lots of employee engagement,” says Alampi, “and over 40 submissions, including three videos, from individuals and groups around the world. Our employees really understand the frustration in the market and are very excited about this campaign.”
Once the campaign went live, Infor and PJA began engaging market influencers by following editors and analysts who write about ERP. “We commented on their Tweets and blog posts and after awhile, they started commenting back. We have over 300 followers now for our Big ERP Twitter feed — and while that sounds like a small number, these are highly influential people,” says O’Toole.
Step #4: Measure results.
Because the goal of the campaign was to raise brand awareness, Infor will be looking at its market awareness every six months and retesting to see how far they’ve moved the needle. The team is also looking at the impact on its sales pipeline and the number of hand raises due to the campaign microsite and traffic to the Infor site plus the 29 country sites.
And, the company will be tracking RFPs and RFIs to see if these numbers increase as well as the impact of social media on the broader conversation. The team is using Radian6 to look at naturally occurring conversation around ERP and the mid-market within the blogosphere, list serves, and social networks.
“We want to know,” says O’Toole, “how much of this conversation includes Infor and how we can increase natural mentions within conversations.”
When asked what other large companies like Infor can learn from the campaign, Alampi said, “You have to follow through. Our CEO, Jim Schaper, wanted to be bold and make a bold statement. As a marketer, you hear this often but once the C-suite sees what ‘bold’ looks like, ideas get watered down or campaigns canceled altogether.”
“Schaper wanted a bold campaign with a sense of humor,” continues Alampi, “and this gave PJA the freedom to develop ‘Big ERP.’ It’s different, it’s getting people’s attention, and people are responding to it. The campaign, which has yet to be launched in Europe and Asia Pacific, is already paying off. In fact, we’ve even received a couple of leads via Twitter, which was completely unexpected!”
Leigh Anne Reynolds, in her ReachForce blog post, “Set Your Content Free for More Clickthroughs” writes:
I will be the first to admit that I have been very skeptical about “setting my content free” (not using forms in front of eBooks and whitepapers.) I feel like if my job is lead generation then I have to capture those downloading.
She goes on to state that after much consideration, she decided to follow David Meerman Scott’s advice and make her e-book, 101 B2B Online Marketing Tips, registration free.
Although she didn’t do a strict A/B split test, she did see a 1600% increase in downloads. Yep! “Be free, content, be free!”
Today, online marketing is vital to any integrated marketing program. With so many new avenues for reaching prospective buyers, B2B Marketers have to think outside of the box to stand out in the crowd. From significant improvements in marketing program metrics to greater efficiencies in your sales funnel, employing new online marketing tactics can create immediate benefits, if done right.
In Volume 1 of this e-book, you’ll find the first 30 online marketing tips from The B2B Lead, including information on the basics of SEO, optimizing your video for the web, boosting your blog using twitter, how to measure your online successes and much more.
The print ad at the right, which ran in today’s Wall Street Journal, caught my eye due to its use of color and the “Boss Tweed”-like graphic.
And, I love the headline. “Don’t Know What Big ERP’s Complicated Technology Can Do For You? Don’t Worry, Neither Does Big ERP.” Ha!
I also like that the ad comes with a targeted URL that relates to the ad copy: DownWithBigERP.com.
When you click on the URL, you get taken to a landing page filled with “we, we, we” jargon. Love it! The landing page then burns away to Infor’s site — the company offering alternative CRM/ERP software.
Of course, I immediately looked for the Twitter icon so that I could follow them, and there it was, right at the top of the page. (Screen name is @infor. I’m now following the company.)
You often hear that social media isn’t for B2B or that traditional marketing methods no longer work. Infor is a great example of how to drive leads to a microsite through an engaging print ad, and then keep them on your site with engaging content. And, if you’re not quite ready to work with Infor, you can follow them on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.
RainToday, one of the top online sites that help companies sell their professional services, complied a list of the best online marketing and sales resources of the decade.
Whether you sell only services or products and services, check out their great list of sales and marketing Websites and blogs.
In addition to being listed as one of the best resources by RainToday, this blog also made the Junta42 Top 42 Content Marketing Blogs for the first time (#37).
The Junta42 list, which is compiled by Joe Pulizzi, author of Get Content, Get Customers (next on my to-read list), highlights the best bloggers on the Web discussing content marketing.
Thank you RainToday and Joe for the honors. I am thrilled!
In a recent Wall Street Journal article, Brigantine Advisors analyst Colin Gillis is quoted as saying, “LinkedIn is not really a community as much as a collection of names. [LinkedIn is] definitely in danger of losing the business-networking market.”
The article goes on to say that people spend more time on other social networking / social media sites than they do on LinkedIn — and that LinkedIn wants users to participate on its site more often.
Dear Adam Nash and the Powers that Be at LinkedIn, here are some tips for you to help you meet that objective.
1. Don’t become a Facebook wannabe.
Despite its astounding growth, Facebook isn’t for everyone. I listen to many people who admit they don’t have a Facebook account or that they have one but use it only for personal reasons — versus using it for business.
LinkedIn serves a real purpose — it’s a business networking site. Don’t lose sight of that objective. You do fill a real need in the marketplace.
2. Build more unlocked gates in your wall.
In the same way that you allow people to post public profiles with “vanity” URLs, also allow Group leaders to develop vanity URLs for their Groups. This way they can then promote their Groups on Twitter, blogs, e-newsletters, etc.
I have had many situations where I want to get people to my Group for a terrific discussion, but have to post a URL that is open to Group members only. Non-Group members should be able to read discussions and if they want to post, they then must become members.
3. Promote Groups based on high-value activity, not number of members.
Based on the feedback I hear from my own Group members, many Group owners don’t take an active role in moderating discussions or removing spam posts. Many Groups have thousands of members but little in the way of real high-value discussion activity.
Instead of promoting Groups based on sheer numbers of members (which really means nothing), promote those Groups whose owners and members actively participate. Perhaps you could feature ten well-moderated Groups every week — and those Groups who have been featured could receive a special badge.
4. Give Group Owners a special badge.
You let LinkedIn members promote their various Group affiliations on their profile pages, but you don’t give any method for Group Owners to display that they’re in charge of a Group. Help Group Owners better promote their Groups with a special badge that they can add to their LinkedIn profile page, Twitter page, and blog / Website.
And while I’m on the subject of Groups, add an Events tab to the Group function. That way people can feature the events relevant to their specific Group.
5. Use video to show LinkedIn newbies how to better use LinkedIn.
When I recommend to my clients who don’t use LinkedIn that they use the platform for business purposes (outside of job hunting), they usually ask why. Unfortunately, LinkedIn has a reputation of being that place where you “post your resume.” Of course, nothing is further from the truth.
One way you can get around this is by posting video of real LinkedIn members who are using the platform to network and conduct business. You could also post video of how to set up an effective profile — again, using real members.
6. Ask people how they’re using LinkedIn, make it easier for them to do more of it — and then promote the hell out of it.
At the last presentation I gave, I learned that many people use LinkedIn’s TripIt feature to let their network know when and where they’re traveling. Apparently, TripIt makes it easier to book appointments with people in their network. I did not know this and found it fascinating.
And, while mucking about in LinkedIn just this week, I realized that people can follow the book list I’m building. Amazing.
LinkedIn, you definitely need to better communicate the features you’re offering people. For example, I just read on your blog that the iPhone App 3.0 was just released.
However, the link to your blog is located at the footer of your Website. If you’re going to announce news this way, perhaps your blog should be more prominent?
I find your platform to be quite robust but sometimes have no clue why you offer certain things — i.e. how does the whole “following” thing work? I still have not figured that one out.
7. Allow business owners to edit their Company profiles.
Like many companies, I have a Company profile but I have no way of correcting erroneous information. Because you rely on bots to fill out Corporate profiles, mine shows that I have six employees — five more than who actually work at my one-person company.
Perhaps you could offer a “validation” notice the way Twitter does for high-profile Twitter users.
LinkedIn, I am one of your more dedicated users. Due to being a Group leader, I spend about 10 – 15 minutes on the site almost every day. I post status updates, the books I’m reading, and I check out what others in my network are doing. I moderate my Group and work to keep discussions going.
I’m also forever promoting your platform in my blog, to my clients, and in articles I write for other blogs. Quite frankly, I love LinkedIn, but I do think you could do things better to help people like me use your platform more effectively.
I really have no interest in LinkedIn becoming a Facebook wannabe, and if you polled your members, you would most likely find that many people agree with me. If someone wants the Facebook experience, they’ll join Facebook.
You have an awesome platform, so I hope you’ll take these suggestions — and others you’ve received — and continue to offer features that benefit your users.
B2B sales lead expert Mac McIntosh recently interviewed me for his Sales Lead Insights blog. He asked lots of great questions, a few of which were cut due to the length. One of these questions was:
“You mentioned more companies are asking you about social media marketing. Is it something B2B marketers need to pay attention to? Why? And what should B2B marketers be doing about it right now?”
This is a question I’m frequently asked by B2B marketers and small business owners. Many people mistakenly believe social media is for consumer companies — or for their teenage kids!
I know it can be hard to wrap your head around social media, so I give the following simple strategies for B2B marketers and business owners who want to want to get their feet wet. 1. Claim your company name on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.
By this I mean, even if you don’t use Twitter, open a profile under your company name so that someone doesn’t hijack it.
If you’re a one-person business or the CEO of a small business, claim your name on the main social media platforms (i.e. LinkedIn and Facebook) and claim your Google profile as well.
2. Join a LinkedIn Group and participate regularly.
Since starting my own B2B Social Media LinkedIn Group, I have come to really appreciate the Group within LinkedIn. I’ve met people ranging from Ben Hanna (@B2BOnlineMktg) at Business.com and Steve Woods (@stevewoods) at Eloqua to all kinds of consultants and corporate marketers.
It’s been a wonderful experience and a very easy way to keep my ear on the ground of social media marketing as it relates to B2B.
I recommend that B2B marketers or business owners join one or two Groups where your customers hang out (this is key) and then answer and/or post discussion questions. It helps if you find a Group that is well moderated (for example, I do not tolerate spam posts on my Group and I try to keep the conversations moving).
3. Read blogs and leave comments.
Business owners frequently ask me if they need a blog. Actually, you don’t need a blog to take advantage of the blogosphere. Instead of starting a blog, read other people’s blogs and leave insightful comments that add to the discussion – and when you do, be sure your comment includes your real name and website URL.
When your comment goes “live,” your name is now a clickable link – which people do click on. How do I know this? When people subscribe to my newsletter, I ask how they found me. Fifty percent of my new subscribers find me via comments I leave on other people’s blogs.
In fact, I got a speaking gig from an association manager who found me via a comment I left on a blog. She followed it back to my blog, then my Website and then started following me on Twitter. A few months down the road, she hired me. That’s how social media works.
Be sure to read my interview on Mac’s blog as well as the interviews he’s done with a number of B2B marketers. I especially like the one with B2B Marketing By Phone Expert Michael Brown.
My top ten posts include social media, which I expected, since it’s a hot topic (post anything about social media on Twitter and it’s bound to get retweeted multiple times). But I was more interested to see that one of the top five posts wasn’t a post at all, but a category: Free B2B E-books.
E-books are becoming more popular — which is one reason I started my new E-Book Central where I’ll be posting the new B2B marketing e-books and reports released each week.
Of the 70 posts I wrote in 2009, here are the top posts covering B2B Marketing and Social Media.
2. What Should be Included In a MarCom Manager’s Job Description? — I’ve noticed for a while now that this has been one of my top posts. In it I discuss why companies need to revamp their marcom job descriptions, which typically call for people who know how to juggle projects and write well — versus being held accountable for a whole lot more, including working with sales.
3. Category: Free B2B E-Books — Here you’ll find B2B marketing e-books written by myself and other marketers.
(Hint: When an organization asks if you can address a certain topic, say “Yes.” That’s how I fell into social media.)
9. Why Facebook is Like Attending a BBQ at Your Boss’ House — I had been using the BBQ analogy for months while giving presentations and finally wrote a blog post. This is my favorite blog post of the year because I love the comments people left.
I hear this phrase frequently: “Our Website is our brochure.” As a B2B marketer who helps companies get new business through an effective Web presence, it drives me insane.
Why? A Website and a brochure are two completely different animals. –> A brochure is static — Once it’s printed or saved as a PDF, it doesn’t change.
–> A brochure presents information in a linear fashion — You read it left to right, top to bottom and page to page.
–> A brochure’s content usually is limited — Typically brochures contain information about products, services and the company itself.
–> A brochure’s shelf-life is limited — Often, a brochure is out of date the moment the ink has dried.
A Website, on the other hand is dynamic, allowing you to update information as needed.
A Website allows you to incorporate all kinds of elements — text, images, video and sound — to help you better communicate your message AND make offers designed to generate leads, subscriptions to e-newsletters, requests for demos and attendance at webinars and in-person events.
PLUS a Website provides the kind of information usually found in a brochure — that is, information about your products or services and company.
Most important, Website content isn’t linear — a key difference between Websites and brochures and one many small business owners and/or marketers just do not “get.”
Due to search engines and links found on other Websites, site visitors start their perusal of a Website where a searched term or phrase was found, or where an inbound link led to — rather than the home page. (Read that sentence again.)
And, Website visitors follow navigation, text links or buttons on a page to get where they want to go, rather than following a page left to right, top to bottom and page to page like a brochure.
In short, prospects and customers interact with a Website in ways they cannot with a brochure.
So what can you do to ensure your Website isn’t a static online brochure that does nothing for you?
1. Optimize it for search.
I got a call one day from a small business owner. In the last two years he had gone from being a thriving business to barely making enough to buy groceries.
He lacked a Website but argued he didn’t need one as all of his business came via word of mouth. I told him to type his key search phrase into Google and tell me what came up.
Silence.
“You still there?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m looking at a page that lists all of my competitors. I guess that’s where all my business went.”
To remain in business, you must, must, must optimize your site for search engines so that your prospects can find it when searching. Period.
2. Develop content on a regular basis.
The “online brochure” mindset carries over to how small business owners view the site — basically, they develop the site, get it online, and then forget about it.
To get traffic to your site — and to better sell your services / expertise / products — you must create new content on a regular basis.
Most people groan when I say this. The expense! The time! But we sell widgets!
Here is a simple plan for developing fresh content on a regular basis:
–> Publish a monthly e-newsletter and archive each issue on your site (do not archive it on the site of your email service provider — this defeats the purpose).
–> Develop three white papers, reports, or e-books (or combo thereof) – Consider a “top mistakes” e-book. Survey your newsletter readership and generate some kind of industry report. Analyze the different options available to those in your industry regarding software, hardware, etc., and present an unbiased report.
Once you have your content ready, develop dedicated optimized landing pages for each piece so that people can easily find the content and download it.
–> Write three case studies — Case studies deliver a double marketing punch: they let you show prospective customers how your company can solve their challenges PLUS you get to add three new pages of optimized *high value* content to your site. (For other reasons why case studies work well, read this interview Forbes did of me about B2B case studies.)
Follow this plan and at the end of the year, you’ll have 18 pages of new Web content. You’ll also see a corresponding increase in traffic as people begin linking to your content, writing about it, and downloading it. Your pipeline will begin to fill as those searching online for your products and services find your content, click over to your site and then call and email you.
3. Market the hell out of your site.
When I recommended to a small business owner that it wasn’t enough that she build a site, she had to market it, too, she looked at me with a puzzled expression. “What do you mean?” she asked.
Posting comments on blogs
Getting involved in social media
Creating content others link to and write about
Developing offers people download
Hosting online events such as Webinars
Developing online profiles at places like LinkedIn or Google
Writing articles for online publications
Furiously taking notes, the small business owner said, “Wow! No one ever told me this before. Thank you!”
Now you can see why I go crazy when small business owners tell me their Website is their “online brochure.” It most definitely is not!
Dianna: Michele, Thank you again. You were such a big help; I could not have done it without you! And likewise, I’m glad we got to know each other better. Rachel (and Stephen, too) —...
Dianna Huff: Ed, Wow, thank you so much! I have to give Michele all the credit for the “Why I’m Different” page. I would have never written something like it — she helped...
Michele Linn: Dianna, Thank you for the warm shout out. You did a fantastic job with the site, and I’m thrilled to have been able to help. You have SUCH great ideas and credentials, so the...
Ed Gandia: Dianna, I absolutely LOVE the new site — the design, usability, content AND your new messaging. It’s so clear and relevant. Your “Why I’m Different” page is...
Rachel Cunliffe: Yay, awesome! So happy to have you fully over on Wordpress
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