The B2B Lead

The Economy, Budgets and Mid-Funnel Opportunity - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #155

Cody Young — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 17:13:12 +0000

It’s the perfect storm – tough economic times … budget scrutiny … the Q4 numbers chase … budget planning for 2009. As Reachforce CEO Suaad Sait says, this Fall is a marketers ‘oh-crap’ moment when we start asking ourselves if there is enough fuel (or money to provide the fuel) in the lead generation engine to fulfill current year sales needs and fuel 2009 momentum.

Under old school marketing rules this storm would usually lead to 1 of 2 things … 1) slam on the breaks and try to hit NOP numbers by minimizing expense, or 2) a flurry of spray and pray direct marketing activities that seek elusive bluebirds against all odds. The big problem is that neither of these well worn paths does a very good job at motivating prospects who are in the middle of the funnel.

On this note, Josh Bernoff – Forrester’s Interactive Marketing expert – made a great point in his February 2, 2008 writing entitled “Strategies for Interactive Marketing in a Recession.” It’s more obvious to some than others, but most mid-funnel contacts are logically folks who are still in consideration mode or somehow on the fence about making a purchase. Mid-funnel contacts are not only abundant, they are literally bluebirds in waiting who just need to be earned.

Companies who opt to slam on the marketing brakes in an effort to save their way to success are essentially putting all of the pressure to motivate a purchase on their sales closers. This may work in certain instances, but it’s not very strategic, scalable or sustainable. Nor is motivating these people a matter of creating awareness with direct marketing. While consistent DM needs to be happening for sake of keeping the top of the funnel fed, it rarely has the sort of impact needed to push mid-funnel situations forward.

But social marketing applications like interactive webinars, e-communities, blogs and networking sites are an effective way to align B2B marketing’s work with the things that are most critical to driving mid-funnel situations to closure I.e. – establishing credibility, delivering proof points, deep-dive Q&A, earning “trusted partner” status and best of all – a structured, pragmatic way to capture, manage and execute against those issues/objections that most often create and add to mid-funnel traffic-jams.

In his easy to read, highly recommended article Bernoff points out three important social media attributes that help recession proof your marketing plan:

Well-designed social applications are effective. Social programs leverage the voice of the customer to get messages carried further than ad impressions. If your message resonates with consumers, their word-of-mouth is a more effective medium than any of the traditional media.
They’re cheap. Advertising campaigns often run into millions of dollars. But Facebook pages and blogs are two examples of social programs that you can start for next to nothing. Even more sophisticated programs like a full-blown customer community typically don’t cost more than $50,000 to $300,000 to get going.
They motivate consumers in the middle of the funnel. Social applications like discussion forums are better than advertising at helping people in the consideration phase when they’re on the fence about purchasing. In a recession, improving consideration will be more cost-effective than blasting awareness messages at resistant consumers.

Is a GoogleGrader on the Horizon? - Marketing WTF?

Pam O'Neal Mickelson — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 14:32:42 +0000

What’s your Google Rank? No, not your Google Page Rank, your personal Google Rank? That’s right, according to a story published by Business Week, Google has filed for a patent on technology for ranking the “influence” of people on social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace. Much like Google’s approach to ranking web sites, the algorithm would calculate your influence rating based on how many “friends” you have, how influential your friends are, how frequently you blog, etc. The article speculates that this breakthrough could finally make ads on social networks relevant and profitable.

Not sure about that. Sounds a bit too much like TwitterGrader to me and you all now know how much I like that product.

In This Economy, to Buy or Not to Buy That is the REAL Question - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #154

Guest Blogger — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 18:34:11 +0000

Written by Ryan Ohls, a Market Development Executive at ReachForce.

In this current economic crisis many businesses have a natural, knee-jerk tendency to “wait and see how everything plays out.” It seems that business spending is put on hold, which only exacerbates the overall problem.

We as marketers and sales people feel it the most. I’m sure we’ve all heard something like this in the past couple of weeks, “We’re going to ‘wait & see’ what this economy ‘does’ before we spend any kind of money on ‘that.’”

Yeah…and sometimes a deer in the headlights just “waits to see” what that car is going to do.

Here’s what I don’t understand – if what you sell can grow your customers’ bottom line, then why wouldn’t they buy it? If they can’t afford what you offer “right now,” then how are they going to afford the additional cost - “right now” - of NOT having it?

I do believe that in an economic crisis it may be wise to lighten up spending on certain things if we can’t afford them (i.e. lavish parties, luxurious vacations, designer nose-hair clippers, doggy massages). However, as sales guy at ReachForce, we have a unique opportunity to show our prospects how we can contribute to helping them through this mess.

If what you sell saves time, saves money, or adds to top line revenue or productivity in some way – AND YOU CAN DEMONSTRATE IT – then not only do you have an opportunity, you have a responsibility to tell as many prospects as possible about it.

If you’re still with me, you’re probably reading along, looking for your tip on how to get action from the ‘wait and see’ crowd out there today. Well, here’s what I’m doing…

I’m direct about how what I sell drives revenue
I show real customer case studies that include customer results
I provide best practice information around how to act on ReachForce solutions

Search Engine Marketing - ReachForce Book Club

Leigh Anne Wallace — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 14:42:30 +0000

In this chapter, David covers the basics of search engine marketing without getting into the technical details. He makes the great point that if you follow the New Rules, you will already be practicing search engine marketing. It really is all about the content. (Some of you may scoff that inbound links are most important, but I contend that great content is what draws inbound links.)

David covers a few tips on SEM but I want to highlight his tips on landing pages:

Make the landing page copy short and the graphics simple.
Create the page with your company’s look, feel, and tone.
Write from the prospect’s point of view.
A landing page is communications, not advertising.
Provide a quote from a happy customer.
Make the landing page a self-contained unit.
Make the call to action clear and easy to respond to.
Use multiple calls to action.
Only ask for necessary information.
Don’t forget to follow up!

Landing pages are critical to direct buyers to your content. Well optimized landing pages can rank highly in organic search and produce high conversion rates.

That pretty much wraps it all up. Now that we have completed The New Rules of Marketing and PR, the title of the final chapter sums it up nicely, “Make it Happen.” David, himself, admits that he has not put into practice every idea presented in this book. The point is to find what works best for you and your organization, put it into action and start reaping the benefits. Best of luck!

What’s Up With So Many Boring Blogs? - Marketing WTF?

Pam O'Neal Mickelson — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 14:55:01 +0000

A recent Wall Street Journal article based on a Forrester Research review of 90 enterprise blogs describes most B2B blogs as “dull, drab, and don’t stimulate discussion.” A few highlights from the WSJ article:

74% rarely get comments
70% stuck to business or technical topics
56% simply regurgitated press releases or other already-public news
53% of B2B marketers say that blogging has marginal significance or is irrelevant to their strategies

I’ve written before about the success we had at NetQoS with www.networkperformancedaily.com. But what I’ve never talked about were the challenges we faced in the early stages of the blog’s development. At first, we struggled to make a network management blog interesting without the ability to rely on a technical thought leader. So, we took the unusual approach of hiring a full time blogger – a former journalist who could not only report on news but who could entertain and dig deep into stories. Something like an investigative reporter with a twisted sense of humor.

We positioned the blog as “anything and everything that affects network performance from the mundane to the bizzare” and published sometimes humorous, sometimes scandalous, and often educational content. We mixed in relevant company content and interviews with technologists on staff. The blog was an immediate success. One of the early stories our blogger broke netted inbound links/mentions from the Washington Post, Wired Magazine, etc. At its peak, the blog reached 10,000 monthly readers. The key to success was developing original, humorous content, fun videos, and digging deep into breaking news stories.

I am now the VP of Marketing for BreakingPoint and we just re-launched our blog/community. While we don’t have a full-time blogger, we are working with some of the more visible experts in the company including our CTO, Dennis Cox, and others experts in our BreakingPoint Labs research team including HD Moore to provide useful and entertaining posts and videos that are relevant to our target audience. We are just getting started but already have more than 350 subscribers and I’m looking forward to another blog success. One of the keys to driving readership is the use of Twitter and other social media sites to highlight new content on the site and attract new readers.

Looking for great tips on how to make your blog a success? Try The Secret to Writing a Successful and Outstanding Blog by Liz Strauss, one of the most influential relational blogger on the Internet.

Would also love to hear from the rest of you on techniques for finding your blog “voice.”

Social Networking and Marketing – Are you up for the virtual challenge? - ReachForce Book Club

Amy Hawthorne — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 14:17:08 +0000

This week’s focus on The B2B Lead seems to be social networking, not sure if we planned that or if it’s sheer coincidence. Laura, Leigh Anne and I have been busy these past weeks building out our LinkedIn Profiles and making sure we are answering any of the LinkedIn Answers questions out there that apply to what we do on a daily basis. So this chapter (19) is right on time for us. Here’s a few new things we’re planning on doing or checking out in the coming weeks…

Squidoo – Do you squidoo? We don’t currently but we will be looking into it very soon. If anyone is currently using Squidoo, we’d love to hear what you think? Does it drive the right kinds of traffic?
Max Pipeline – like Helga in the Volkswagen example – will be out there exploring the B2B Lead Generation world and will be sharing his findings right here on The B2B Lead. Check him out on FaceBook and be sure to check back here for his updates.
LinkedIn Groups – oh the possibilities here…

As you can see, we’re jumping in the social networking world with both feet. If you’re just getting started or considering a social plan, here’s a few other tips David recommends to get the most out of your social networking sites:

Target a specific audience – think niche market/long tail here
Be a thought leader – provide valuable and useful information, remember this is not where you do company promotions
Be authentic and transparent – just be yourself please
Create lots of links – links “makes the web what it is”
Encourage people to interact with you
Participate – you can’t just put it out there and hope they’ll come, you have to engage with others in your space.
Experiment – if what you’re doing isn’t working, try something new – there’s definitely enough choices out there.

What are you doing? What have you learned? Please share as this is a new world for most of us. Making the leap can be scary but the benefits are there if you’re willing to work for them, right?

Implement Lasting Plans to Align Marketing and Sales Today - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #153

Suaad Sait — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 13:57:25 +0000

With economic times the way they are today, it is more important than ever that Marketing and Sales teams be aligned. Together you must decide and figure out what activities make the most impact to the top line of the business. Focus on all types of initiatives
1.    To retain, cross-sell and up sell current customers
2.    New customer acquisition programs
3.    Channel partner marketing opportunities

We recently rolled out an ebook, 10 Tips for Marketing and Sales Alignment, with our partner Marketo. These 10 tips are just a few ideas on how Marketing and Sales can play on the same team to generate qualified leads and drive revenue.

Here’s a few more tips to think about as you are building out your Q4 Marketing and Sales plans.

1. Marketing and Sales teams should have shared goals

Bookings and new customer wins are jointly owned by marketing and sales, and marketing bonuses are directly tied to the joint success.
Revenue alignment and continued success programs for current customers ensure happier customers. And we all know it’s more expensive to find a new customer than it is to keep your current ones happy.
Shared goals means shared success - when sales wins, marketing wins…and when marketing wins, sales wins … and overall the business WINS!

2. Do Reality Based Planning

Use TRUE funnel conversion metrics to set marketing lead generation targets.
Understand and plan based on sales team behavior - how many leads can they work at time, how many calls does it take each sales team member to identify a hot or qualified lead, etc.

3. Don’t forget those stuck in the funnel

Deals get stuck in the middle stages of the funnel. Let marketing help by trying to engage with the prospect through best practice content offers, event invites, or new media outlets.

4. Don’t forget them when the deal is done

Engage in current customer marketing programs. Use a newsletter, blog or customer community to stay front of mind for cross-selling, up-selling and renewal opportunities.
Case studies and references are powerful sales tools, but marketing needs help with the set up and creation of these.

5. Communicate, Communicate, Communicate

Share what’s working and what’s not – closed loop marketing is essential here
Marketing should be involved in new sales rep training
Celebrate WINS together

Organizations talk a lot about aligning their marketing and sales teams but many never put plans into action. By implementing the five steps above and adhering to the plan, Marketing and Sales teams can align for shared success.

I welcome your thoughts and feedback (successes and other tips you want to share).

5 Tips for Promoting Your Business Page on Facebook - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #152

Guest Blogger — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 14:48:12 +0000

Written by Ellie Mirman, blogger at the HubSpot Internet Marketing Blog and Inbound Marketer at Internet Marketing company HubSpot.

So you’ve got a Facebook Business Page… Now what? Building a Business Page is one of the best ways to increase your presence and engage more potential customers on Facebook, but it’s more than just clicking “Create Page”. As you venture out into the social media world, here are a few tips to help you promote your Page and reach more of the 100 million Facebook users.

Create a Facebook Business Page worth becoming a fan of.

To quote David Meerman Scott, nobody cares about your products and services (except you). People care about how you can help them solve their problems. To extend that thought to Facebook, don’t use your Facebook Page to talk about your products all the time. People aren’t interested. Instead, create some interesting, useful content that people want to receive. This could be blog posts, whitepapers, or simply discussions.

Take advantage of the viral nature of Facebook.

Facebook provides great opportunities for viral marketing. Facebook creates a “News Feed” of your friends’ activities on Facebook, like posting photos, changing statuses, or becoming fans of a Page. What this means is that every time someone interacts with your Page in some way, that action is published across all of their friends’ News Feeds, giving you exposure to that person’s entire network. The best way to take advantage of this is to engage your users and give them more opportunities to interact with your Page, for example, by fostering discussions, inviting them to events, allowing them to post links. Leveraging the power of the News Feed is a critical part of establishing your presence on Facebook and building a fan base for spreading your messages.

Don’t forget to draw on your network.

All promotion does not need to take place within Facebook. Feel free to email your opt-in e-mail list, blog about your Page, and post a link to your Page on your company website. The best people to help you build up your fan base for your Business Page on Facebook are those people already subscribed to your blog or engaged with you in some way.

Optimize your Page for Facebook – and public – search.

Another way to get found and build your fan base is through Facebook’s search. Facebook – like all other search engines (Facebook was noted the most used people search engine) – has an undisclosed algorithm that ranks search results in a way that aims to return relevant and useful results to the searcher. The best think you can do to show up higher in these search results is to build a large following of your existing fans, because entities with a larger network tend to show up higher in search results. Also note that Facebook Business Pages are public and indexable by search engines. This potentially gives you exposure to those searching in broader search engines like Google. To make the most of this, start lots of engaging discussion threads on your Page, so that if someone is searching in Google on that very topic, they can stumble upon your Facebook Page and discussion thread.

Get an extra push with Facebook Ads.

If you want to give your Business Page an extra push at the beginning, you can also buy some advertising slots. Note that Facebook ads are much less effective than the viral marketing options on Facebook, and the click through rate for Facebook ads is notoriously low. Facebook advertisements show up on the sidebar as users browse through their friends’ profiles, groups, and so on. When you set up your ad, be sure to include “social ads” – these draw on a users’ network to see who in their network has already engaged with your Page and shows, for example, “Jim Smith is a fan of Company ABC” next to your ad, potentially improving your click through rate. Also, make sure that you give viewers a relevant reason to click on your ad by inviting them to connect with industry peers or offering a free whitepaper, for example. Also in this vein, note that you can target your ads by age, gender, interests, geography, and other factors, to reach users who may be more interested in your Business Page.

Bonus Tip: Measure your results.

Once you’ve built up your Facebook Page it’s good to measure what you’re actually getting out of your social media program. Some metrics you may want to measure are: number of fans, page views, and unique users. Facebook’s “Insights” provide some of these metrics, including demographic data. You’ll also want to track actions beyond your Facebook Page, namely, website traffic, leads, and sales that come from Facebook. Hopefully some of these tips will help you get your Facebook Business Page off the ground and build it into a valuable channel for reaching your potential customers.

All this said, social media, including Facebook, is by no means static. It is constantly changing and we, as marketers, are constantly learning the right way to leverage these channels for marketing. If you want to see what we at HubSpot have done, you can become a fan of our Page at http://facebook.hubspot.com. And, if you’re looking to network with other marketers on Facebook, you may be interested in the Facebook Pro Marketers group, a group for marketers passionate about marketing. Perhaps there we can continue discussing ideas for marketing on Facebook.

How to Create a Facebook Page for Your Company - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #151

Laura Koether — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 17:58:08 +0000

Wikipedia’s definition of Facebook - a social networking site where users can join networks organized by city, workplace, school, and region to connect and interact with other people. People can also add friends and send them messages, and update their personal profile to notify friends about themselves.

I got on Facebook when I was in college (when only college students could be members), and used it to keep up with hometown friends, keep up with other students I had met, join groups that I cared about, send messages to friends and post fun pictures and wall posts reminiscing from the weekend before. Now that I am out of college and working, I still use Facebook to keep up with friends (maybe a few less pictures and groups), but I also use it now for networking and more business purposes. My personal and professional life are definitely colliding!

Facebook has made itself easier for professionals to use with groups, discussions and ads, but I think the best thing you can do for your business on Facebook is Facebook Pages. Facebook Pages help to build a business presence and engage with customers, co-workers, partners and fans on Facebook. Users can express their support by adding themselves as a fan, writing on your wall, uploading photos, and joining other fans in discussion groups. You can send updates to your fans regularly — or just with special news or offers. Add applications to your Page and engage your users with videos, reviews, flash content, and more. More importantly, it is free and easy!

To get started:

You need to be a member on Facebook
Go to facebook.com/business/?pages (or go the bottom of the page and click “advertising”)
Click “create a Facebook Page” and follow the directions
Upload a picture (best to use your logo for this)
Fill in company information
Take it from there…add photos, discussions, notes, video, etc. (you should see all the categories to edit right there on the page or if not click “edit page”)
Click “more applications” if you would like to browse what other applications are out there (like RSS Feeds) - you can look or type in the search box
Publish the Page (in red lettering at the top of the page)
Ask co-workers and customers to become fans and start getting the word out

Now you know how to get started with a Facebook Page, how do you manage it? We over here at ReachForce just put up our own page, and are still working to get the word out. Luckily, our friend Ellie Mirman from HubSpot has some experience. Look for a post from her soon on how to manage your page and get fans. HubSpot already has 797 fans!

Podcasting and Video Made, Well, as Easy as Possible - ReachForce Book Club

Laura Koether — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 15:57:21 +0000

Podcasting and video can be very scary to use…buying new equipment and software, and then learning how to use it all. The procedure might be a little more difficult than just writing text, but the outcome of engaging your audience is worth it. And if that doesn’t sell you, then what David has to say about it will. It sold me!

“The potential to deliver information to buyers in new and surprising ways is greater when you use a new medium. And while your competition is still trying to figure out ‘that blogging thing,’ you can leverage your existing blog into the new worlds of audio and video and leave the competition way behind.”

Who doesn’t like to watch a short video (mostly if it is funny) while reading a blog post? I won’t speak for everyone, but I am willing to bet the majority does. And it might seem scary at first, but putting a podcast or short video together really is not all that hard. Luckily, David has some tips for us to use as well:

For Podcasting

Show preparation -gather ideas and create a script
Recording when you are near your computer -use a microphone that delivers audio into your computer (need software here)
Mobile recording gear - is required if you are going to be moving around interviewing people at different places
Phone interviews - require a digital recording switch device that connects to your telephone
Editing your audio files - optional
Postproduction editing - sometimes includes running a noise-reduction program and sound compression
Tagging the audio -adding text-based information about the audio to make it easier for people to find
Hosting and distribution - so people can easily obtain your podcasts
Promotion - you must provide links to your show
A companion blog - to discuss the content of each show, and will also help to be indexed by search engines

For Video

Posting to video-sharing sites - like YouTube, just shoot and upload
Developing an online video channel - usually used with a unique URL
Attempting stealth insertions to YouTube - dangerous, YouTube will find inauthentic video
Vlogging - “video blogging” by embedding a video into a blog post
Vodcasting - a podcast with video tied to a syndication component
Inviting your customer communities to submit video - to help generate viral marketing interest

Our friends over at HubSpot recently posted a really funny video about imbound vs. outbound marketing that was a real success. They told us it only took an afternoon to come up with idea, write it, shoot it an edit it. See…worth it!