As an established content marketing agency, Well Planned Web prides itself on its expertise in helping clients tell their stories and engage with their customers like never before. Now, with PathFactory’s cutting-edge content insight and activation platform, we are poised to provide an even more comprehensive and impactful experience for our clients.

The Power of Partnership

PathFactory’s platform has been transforming the way marketers understand and leverage content to drive meaningful customer engagement. By joining forces with PathFactory, Well Planned Web can offer clients a powerful combination of strategic content marketing services and advanced data-driven insights.

This partnership will enable our clients to:

1. Improve content engagement and consumption: With PathFactory’s platform, we can now provide our clients with unprecedented insight into how their audiences engage with their content. This valuable data will allow us to optimize content experiences and drive better results.
2. Personalize the customer journey: PathFactory’s AI-driven platform enables the delivery of personalized content experiences at scale. This means we can help our clients create a more relevant and engaging journey for their customers, ultimately driving increased conversions.
3. Measure content performance and ROI: With PathFactory’s robust analytics, clients can now gain a deeper understanding of the effectiveness of their content marketing efforts. This data-driven approach will help businesses make smarter decisions and fuel their growth.

What This Means for Our Clients

By partnering with PathFactory, Well Planned Web is taking our content marketing solutions to the next level. This collaboration will empower businesses to create more engaging and relevant content experiences, fueled by data-driven insights that drive real results.

Clients who engage with WPW and PathFactory will have access to:

• A comprehensive content marketing strategy, powered by the combined expertise of Well Planned Web and PathFactory
• In-depth content engagement analytics and insights to optimize their content experiences and drive conversions
• Personalized, AI-driven content recommendations to deliver the right content to the right audience at the right time

Join us on this journey, and experience the difference that the Well Planned Web and PathFactory partnership can make for your business. Contact us today to learn more about how our combined expertise can help you elevate your content marketing strategy and drive real results. Better yet, let’s set up a call to demonstrate the power of our partnership in real time.

The post WPW + PathFactory Join Forces to Revolutionize Your Customer Journey appeared first on Well Planned Web.

The statistic that we talked about was from this Gallup poll and it said that 85% of employees worldwide are not engaged or are actively disengaged in their job.

That’s a very grim-sounding statistic, right? These are pre-pandemic statistics from 2017. What about today? The trend is clear: American workers are quitting their jobs in record numbers.

Sure, there are plenty of engaging political discussions we could get into and political theories as to the why. But, as marketers, there is a far more important conversation we need to have.

During the pandemic, there was a lot of soul searching going on. Professionals started to second guess and think through their priorities. They engaged in training and learning new technical skills. Today, they’re looking at making decisions and moves based on these pivots they made last year.

There’s also new confidence about the future of available options and professionals feel security they didn’t necessarily have before the pandemic. In other words, there is safety and freedom if the new move doesn’t work out.

So, what about Marketers?

While I didn’t find any pre- vs. post-pandemic data for marketing jobs specifically, I did find some historical statistics that are staggering.

According to LinkedIn — the largest professional database out there — Marketing has the highest turnover rate than any other job function. In fact, the turnover rate for marketers is 50% higher than the average global turnover rate.

While the rest of the professional world is suddenly jumping from one ship to another, marketers have already been doing this for years.

Your first response may be that marketers are flaky or unable to commit.

Not necessarily.

There are many reasons marketers have a higher turnover rate than other professions.

First, let’s talk personality.

Marketers are usually more adventurous. They never seem to rest. They are unusually hungry for growth and are always looking ahead.

They also have a trait that we at WPW call an “Innate Curiosity.” The best marketers have this trait that includes a need for constant learning and soaking up of knowledge.

Are these personality traits bad?

Think about it. Imagine if someone you’re interviewing said they were adventurous, don’t rest on their laurels, are hungry for growth and have an innate curiosity. My guess is you’d be impressed and think they’d bring a refreshing change to your organization.

So aside from personality traits, why else are marketers constantly on the move?

Sit down. We need to talk.

The Unicorn in the Room

Marketing Unicorns are not real. Yet, they’re plaguing job descriptions and team expectations all over the place.

To keep myself honest, I went out to indeed.com and started a search for “Marketing Specialist.” Literally, the first listing that came up is a perfect example of what’s going on here.

So let’s look closely at the overall description of this position. first of all, they’re talking about leading, strengthening an online presence and developing a strategy. Do they want a specialist or is a leader? They often don’t go together at all. But rather than hire a leader and a specialist, they assume they can find both in a single person.

This “specialist” will design digital advertising campaigns, email marketing campaigns social media blog content, be the analyst, handle SEO, manage press outlets and industry associations… and by the way, it’s great if they could speak Spanish.

This is not a specialist. This is not even a generalist. This is a marketing unicorn.

This listing also stated that this position would make $600 a week. So…ummm… yea… a cheap unicorn, at that.

Now, I’ve had people argue with me on this. Saying, “I know marketing unicorns, they’re amazing,” or, “I was a marketing unicorn back in the day.”

Okay… if you were a marketing unicorn, how long did you stick with that? How long is the marketing unicorn that you know now going to stick around? Not to mention, is that unicorn producing results? Are they happy, healthy, and thriving in a well-balanced role with work/life balance? Important questions.

Ways to Get Past the Unicorn Syndrome

First, look at the marketing skill sets that you need on your team. Figure out the exact mix of what your company needs and your strategy demands.

Next, look carefully at how you distribute this list across your team.

Finally…and most importantly… ask yourself the following:

Does this do right by the Customer, the Company and the Employee?

If your answer is no…you don’t necessarily have to hire a bunch of new employees with tremendous overhead.

You can supplement with an agency partner. The right agency partner will complement your existing team that exists today, provide relief after large attrition, or help you to regain or reset strategic focus.

Marketers Seeking a Change: It Starts With You

If you’re a marketer who’s feeling cringy as you read this and realize just how much you need a change — it starts with you.

To fight that unicorn syndrome and to achieve greater job satisfaction, you need to take charge of your career, your purpose, and your future.

Where to Start

Start by taking a professional inventory. For a full explanation of this, watch this video.

By doing this, you’ll:

• Document what you love to do (and what you don’t love to do so much)
• Understand your “why.”
• Create a vision for what’s next in your career

When you find purpose, you find confidence. And when you have confidence, you have better conversations with your manager, assess open positions with a sharper eye and take charge with a newfound motivation.

Open a document or a blank sheet of paper…

Divide it into three columns.

The LOVE Column

Your love column includes what enjoy most and most importantly why you enjoy those things.

The HATE Column

Yes, I’m using the “H” word here. We all have things that we literally hate to do in our jobs every day. It doesn’t mean that we’ll never have to do them, but it’s good to jot them down.

The EXPLORE Column

What piques your interest? What haven’t you done yet or only had a small taste of?

For more on this process, watch this time-linked clip: Taking Charge with a Professional Inventory.

Will things change?

The nature of marketers may not change, but will this turnover statistic follow us forever? We, as an industry can do better. We need to nurture our best talent and determine what’s best for the customer, for the company, and for the employee.

So what are your thoughts on this? Is this something that you would like a workshop on?

Talking about the unicorn in the room isn’t enough. We need to do something about it.

The post Marketing Jobs and Longevity: We Can Do Better appeared first on Well Planned Web.

Create (the right) content. Build a following. Find radical success.

Sounds easy enough. A lot of folks talk the talk. But most businesses do the opposite. They have a product or service that they want to talk a lot about, and decide to go create a mountain of content that THEY think is valuable.

My favorite quote so far:

Brilliant and true.

Another concept Joe goes into is something called the “Content Tilt .” This is perhaps the most critical section of this book.

Who should read this book?

ENTREPRENEURS: this will speak to your soul. Joe speaks your language. He’s the godfather of content marketing, but he is an absolute entrepreneur at heart as well. A successful one at that.

STARTUPS: No matter how mature your startup is, content should be at the core of what you do, so start while your company is young. This should be something that’s the fabric of your being. Don’t think that you need to wait to get big to make content part of your strategy. In fact, it’s just the opposite. Embrace your inner David with content and you’ll defeat Goliaths (and then some).

SMALL BUSINESS LEADERS: If you’re struggling… putting content first can absolutely be the #1 thing that turns you around.

MEDIUM-SIZED BUSINESS LEADERS: If you’re ready to grow exponentially, following the Content Inc. model could launch you into the stratosphere — IF you have the fortitude.

ENTERPRISE BUSINESSES: If you have the authority to affect the marketing plan and affect how content is created and how the content strategy is formed within your organization, refresh yourself with this book. It will really help you reinvigorate your program. Even if you feel like all cylinders are firing, Content Inc. will reignite your passion for content. Or help you find it all together. A phrase I like to use with our enterprise business is “you’ve got to be nimble, you’ve got to be quick.” I believe Joe encourages that nimble and quick attitude with Content Inc.

CONTENT CREATORS: Content has been king. That has been a phrase that we’ve all heard over the years, but it doesn’t mean that it’s viable in terms of building a business. This book changes that and speaks to that. Go learn how to monetize what you love.

Joe has also launched a site, a movement, an organization called thetilt.com. Can’t wait to follow The Tilt and learn more as things develop.

The post Content Inc. – 2nd Edition. My thoughts… (and I have many). appeared first on Well Planned Web.

So why aren’t sales teams swooning over each new shiny content publication? Is it off the mark? Is it unusable? Is it just not enough?
The answer: All of the above.

The painful truth is that only one-third of the content that salespeople actually need comes from marketing.

What’s worse is that sales teams still feel forced to create too much of the content they need on their own. We’re not talking rewrites or variations of existing content here, folks — we’re talking content “from scratch.” Yikes. (Source: CSO Insights)

With any complex sale, a salesperson is still critical to navigating the specific questions, concerns, circumstances, negotiations and buying committees that surface during the process. Yet many salespeople are left to fend for themselves when it comes to these mission-critical communications.

The term “sales enablement” has been thrown around a lot in recent years. But, get past the fancy buzzphrase and you’ll see that this is where the content not only starts helping the customer — but supercharging salespeople, as well.

This is the content that joins customers and salespeople for those conversations that build a bond. This content facilitates a deep understanding between customers and salespeople.

Sales-enablement content includes:

• ROI calculators
• competitive battle cards
• presentations
• SOW sidebars, enhancements, clout-columns
• vision into life after the sale (such as implementation or onboarding)
• demos
• details about pilot programs
• emails (yes, even a single email)
• dialogue-driven examples, best practices and

You may be thinking, “Wait a second…if most prospects avoid salespeople like the plague, why on earth would we spend time creating content that helps in conversations that are clearly dwindling away?”

Turns out we’ve had that part completely wrong.

Today, buyers want salespeople to:

• actively research and understand their business
• respect their time
• focus on the long-term view of success (beyond the sale)
• radically change their vision
• understand the buying committee
• improve their expertise

The course-correction is simple. Arm your salespeople with more content they need to meet the expectations above. (Pssst: no offense content purists — that may mean pausing the production of that fancy new infographic you’ve been perfecting.)

But to do this, you’ll likely need to slow down in order to speed up.

Too many marketing and sales teams are “making do” with incredibly weak audience personas that just plain suck.

Yup, I refuse to be polite about this any longer.

Time and time again, we speak to marketing and sales teams who have one-page personas that kinda-sorta outline a few demographics and assumptions. These weak personas — often produced by big-name agencies are worthless and wasteful. Yes, the clients just hope for the best and cross their fingers that it makes a difference. It’s a disgrace. There I said it.

Together, sales and marketing teams need to take a stand and demand high-quality immersive audience profiles that impact both customer-facing and sales enablement content.
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Unsure whether your audience documentation is of any value? Here’s one way to find out — do you use it?

No seriously…do you pull it out every week to reference its action plans, its requirements and the powerful “lens” it provides before embarking on any new plan for content?

If not, you’ve likely got an expensive deliverable that will only cost you more in wasted time in 2020.

Scrap it. Divorce it. Help your executives see the light. Then, partner with a team that won’t rest until an immersive audience profile is launched and put into action.

Customers are fed-up with salespeople who start the conversation with “So, tell me about yourself,” or “I see you came to our website.” These are worthless exchanges that could be bypassed with a simple LinkedIn Search and some basic research. What customers really want is to feel like salespeople understand their business from the get-go. They want to dive into the meat of the matter — now.

A smart sales-enablement content strategy includes conversation starters ranging from meaningful questions that can be asked on LinkedIn — all the way to the conversation starters that may kick off a first phone call. Such starters will include details that reflect an understanding of the buyer’s industry, circumstance or detailed need.

Let’s look at Rob, the CIO at the Behemoth Healthcare Consortium who struggles with document security across 2,000 hospitals.

Weak Conversation Starter:
“Rob, tell me about Behemoth Healthcare. What’s your biggest challenge?”

Better Conversation Starter:
“I see you have over 2,000 locations at Behemoth. What kind of documents seem to slip through the security cracks most today?”

Best Conversation Starter:
“So, when Physicians enter prescription information, how is it routed to the patient today? As the owner of security, what part in this process makes you cringe most?”

Better Conversation starters meet expectations. The Best Conversation starters exceed them.

In WPW’s sales-enablement strategy docs, we affectionately calls these “Deal Breakers and Door-slammers.”

Think about the most common “push back” topics that are at the heart of every sales conversation. Your salespeople know these all too well. But have you ever discussed them in detail? Together, you can tackle these doozies — one door-slam at a time. The best objection-handling content shows that the salesperson is listening — and isn’t mindlessly dancing around the elephants in the room.

For 2020, schedule a workshop with your best salespeople and ask them point-blank about the questions or statements they dread the most. Look at this through the lens of your new audience profile. Then, get creative.

Let’s look at an example using our favorite CIO, Rob, once again…

Objection-Handling for CIOs like Rob:

Sales would be so much easier if decision-makers could just make the purchase in a vacuum. The reality is that 6.4 buyers are involved in making a decision over a period of 5 months or longer.

Bottom line: Salespeople no longer have to convince the contact they know. They must instead arm him/her with everything needed to make their case in-house.

ROI Calculators

Think these invaluable calculators don’t qualify as content? Think again. There’s nothing more compelling to a prospect than numbers they can take to their superior about savings of dollars, headaches, overhead or time. Don’t assume these calculators need to be fancy or code-intensive. Remember, this is a sales enablement tool. Even MS Excel spreadsheets can do the job, so long as the savings are clear.

Competitive Comparisons

As much as we can’t let the competition drive our marketing strategy — they’re part of a salesperson’s reality. And, prospects will want to know how you stack up. Whether you create side-by-side comparison lists or full-blown battle cards — the important thing is to inject confidence and authority into every discussion about the competition.

Battle cards are often the best route to ensure every sales player — from the most junior to the most seasoned — understands how you measure up. And, don’t shy away from your weaknesses. Often times, openly explaining how you intend to address any weaknesses builds trust.

Perhaps the most impactful conversations in the sales process include consulting on the solution, stoking a new vision and creating momentum beyond the sale, itself. Some of these may already exist in your current content library. If so, I can almost guarantee only a fraction of your salespeople know they exist.

Review your content through the sales team’s eyes — or better yet, partner with your sales team to review what content would be most helpful at what stage of their conversation. Then, see if you need to shorten, modify or edit the existing content to fit within the expected conversations.

Finally, map the content to the stages in the buying journey and the sales conversation. Tools like Uberflip, WittyParrot and countless others make it easy for marketing and sales teams to create content that’s both customer-facing and sales-enabling.

Make 2020 the year of clarity and continuity between your two teams. Even the smallest shift towards a sales enablement content strategy can lead to more effective sales conversations. Need a strategic content partner who gets both sides of the content equation? Drop us a line and we’ll help design and execute a program that strikes the balance between maximizing leads and enhancing sales.

The post Why Most B2B Content is Failing The Sales Team appeared first on Well Planned Web.

In fact, the lines between sales, marketing and content are blurrier than ever.

Here’s why…

Leads Don’t Equal Sales

Yup. You read that right.

In complex B2B sales cycles, the decision can involve multiple people at various levels in an organization. Yes, there’s usually one guy tasked with researching solutions. Yes, he’s a lead. But, to assume he’s ready to buy five minutes after downloading your latest whitepaper…well…good luck with that.

With a complex sale, playing the leads-quantity game is pointless—you won’t win.

For marketers, it’s easy to obsess about lead generation, especially when it’s the primary KPI by which they’re judged. But, obsessing about having buckets and buckets of leads can cost you long-term conversion.

Today, marketers must join sales in obsessing over what conversation needs to be had over time (a.k.a. Lead Nurturing) and how to expand that dialogue to the entire group of decision makers.

The Funnel is Flawed

The traditional sales funnel has been an important part of inbound sales and marketing. But, after seven years, we’ve learned that the funnel is flawed and needs to be flipped. Why? For starters, the traditional funnel depends on a boatloads of leads (see above).

Flipping the funnel aligns with how sales works — aiming to close the sale, not piling on unqualified leads.

You (and Your Content) Must Be Present to Win

These days, content no longer supports the sale — it is the sale.

According to Forrester, customers only contact an actual human after they’re 70 to 90 percent “sold” by the information-rich content they find on their own. It drives home how important it is to provide mission-critical content as buyers research — rather than create content because it’s “on the list.”

Even though customers today have less time to consume content, they demand more than ever before. In fact, B2B customers say they’re using content to research their decisions 75 percent more than they were just LAST YEAR. (Yup. Last year.)

Your content must be part of the customer’s research process because research is part of the sale.

Customer, Take the Wheel 

Marketers think they have the wheel. Sales thinks they’re driving the process. The reality is…they’re both wrong.

In the 2016 Demand Gen Content Preferences Survey Report, it was revealed that an astonishing 95 percent of respondents said they are open to accepting vendor content as trustworthy. This is a huge opportunity, people!

But, customers still want to be in control of the decision-making process. Give them content that gives them the wheel. Then, let go. But, let’s be clear. Hyper-relevant content can be delivered by marketing OR sales. Both teams own handing over the wheel. If you provide truly relevant content, your customers will drive around your neighborhood for a while before they come right back to your house, confident and ready to talk. That’s what matters.

Closing the Deal Means Closing the Gap

The days of Marketing and Sales departments operating in distinctly separate worlds are gone. If both teams don’t work together to nurture sales, you can flip the funnel a million times and get nowhere.

Take it from any successful sales person: leads are not numbers, they’re people. That’s why, instead of merely collecting phone numbers like it’s Saturday night, we need to become obsessed with nurturing the relationships we already have.

We need to become obsessed with the sales relationships we already have.
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The number one rule of sales hasn’t changed: Relationships still rule. Which means marketers need to look long and hard at their priorities. Are we playing a short-sighted game of numbers? Or, are we partnering with sales for the long-term goal of winning the customer’s trust, heart and loyalty. Meanwhile, sales teams need to look long and hard at their content. Are they missing opportunities to provide the customer with content that puts them in charge? What else do customers keep asking? They’ll ask again. So, let’s get a content plan in place.

Smart marketers and sales teams will have the humility and guts to change their course. Some will see it as “giving in.” We see it as a challenge to innovate, inspire and engage like never before.

The post Why the Line Between Marketing & Sales Gets Blurrier Every Year appeared first on Well Planned Web.

The goal, in the end, has been to:

1. Bring in loads of leads at the top of the funnel with relevant content [AWARE]
2. Dig though the pile of leads. Decide who’s qualified. Deliver content that helps them understand a business problem or challenge the status quo [INTERESTED]
3. Nurture even fewer promising leads. Deliver content that deepens their understanding of possible solutions [EXPLORE]
4. Zero in on the hottest lead in the pack. Arm him/her with information to justify their chosen solution [JUSTIFY]

Some people call it “inbound” marketing, others call it lead-generation marketing. We call it “no longer the only way.”

Why The Traditional Funnel is Flawed

Like so many marketing and sales approaches, the traditional sales funnel is focused on one thing: quantity, quantity, quantity. It’s a numbers game and relies on “spray and pray” content and delivery. With simple transaction-based or B2C sales, that approach may work. But when selling a complex, high-cost product or service, it just doesn’t. We raised the flag and refocused on nurturing a while ago and even pushed back on select clients that were obsessed with the numbers. The issue: no regard for how likely that pile of leads was to convert.

Is it any surprise that 79% of marketing leads never convert into sales? Or that only 1% of those leads convert to revenue. (Marketing Sherpa)

Marketers must let go of the notion that ROI = quantity of leads. Sure, volume looks good on paper and in weekly reports. But once marketing proudly hands those leads off to sales, what happens? 50% of marketing generated leads are not followed up by Sales (MillerPierce). That handoff from marketing to sales continues to fail with the numbers-based approach.

Marketing claims Sales doesn’t follow up. Sales claims that the Marketing leads stink. Sadly, both claims are often true.

Changing the Focus

Which would you rather have:

A) 5,000 “questionable” leads clogging up your sales team’s time

OR

B) 5 high-quality leads that are ready for personalized follow-up

If we’re talking large-sized engagements, contracts or accounts, that second option should look pretty attractive right about now.

Flipping the Funnel

Starting with the end in mind, the flipped-funnel approach:

1. Identifies and Defines the Accounts that the Sales team already knows they want.
2. Engages Contacts within those accounts using highly relevant content. That content will be passed along and Expand its reach to additional contacts within the account.
3. Nurtures those contacts on a hyper-tailored scale. Content equips the sales person to Consult and Solve on a level that’s personalized, meaningful and real. Gone is the noise of broad-brush content.
4. Gets contacts within an account talking — ultimately Selling your product to each other. Call them advocates, fans or friends. Regardless, they’re making your case within their walls.

Account-Based Marketing isn’t a new concept — it’s just a new way to look at the Marketing, Content and Sales relationship. In the end, all tactics are designed to convert — not to pile on names or mull through unqualified leads.

Double-Edged Benefit

We’ve been using this flipped funnel for several years now with clients focused on growing their existing customers. But, today, we join other Funnel Flippers in the exciting revelation that this approach makes sense for bringing on new customers, as well.

Content: Still at the Core

Traditional or flipped, both funnels require relevant content that’s mapped directly to the buyer’s needs, hot buttons and decision points. The difference with the Account-Based approach is that the content can be distilled to a hyper-relevant level — speaking to a specific account list. The result? Hyper-relevant content delivers hyper-qualified leads.

Ready to Make the Flip?

Does your funnel feel full but fruitless? Maybe it’s time to look hard at your target accounts and structure your content strategy around your sales team’s dream accounts.

Contact us today and let’s look at what makes the most sense for your team.

Relevance wins. Opportunities arise. Sales ensue.

The post Why We’re Flipping the Funnel appeared first on Well Planned Web.

Relationships Are Back

It may sound clichéd, but the old saying is still true: People buy from people. To make the sale, the concept has to go both ways. In today’s automated, database-centric marketing world, it can be easy to forget that we’re SELLING to people, as well. We’re talking to living, breathing humans, here. (I know…radical, huh?)

In addition to living and breathing, the humans you are selling to are also savvy, busy, and wary of being put on email marketing lists. Today’s audiences are easier than ever to lose because they’re easier than ever to reach. They need to feel the connection.

Putting the focus back on relationships in your B2B marketing may sound daunting — but can actually come naturally with the right planning and processes. In fact, today’s CRM and Marketing Automation technologies (when used properly) allow us to move away from faceless, broadcast campaigns to individualized, personalized events. You can have conversations, nurture the relationship and sell – and continue to sell.

It’s All In the Delivery: Be A Smart Sender

Think of delivering an email as if you were delivering a birthday gift to someone’s door.

Let’s say you have a friend who loves to cook. You want to give her that set of gourmet kitchen knives she’s been hinting about for months. If the knife set arrives by mail from the trusted manufacturer with a card from you, she’ll love it and thank you. If you send a clown to her doorstep to deliver the knives? You’ll give her nightmares on her birthday. Right gift, right time – wrong sender. Nobody wants a relationship with a clown bearing knives.

What Happens When We Fail to Prioritize People in the Process?

Many sales and marketing teams get complacent with what works, and blow off new and better ways of handling leads within their organizations. When the same thing works, they do the same thing over and over, discounting newer, more nuanced and nurturing approaches.

The result? Sloppy contact management leads to sloppy relationship management – and sacrifices potential sales.

Consider the following examples:

Example 1: Improper Assignments

Think about it. You could send the right content TO the right person at the right time — but if it’s FROM the wrong person it’s not going to be received well.

This is especially brutal when it comes to nurture campaigns. If a prospect feels a connection with anyone in your company — you should treat that as gold. If they know Joe from a trade show, but suddenly get nurture emails from some guy named Brian (or a clown bearing knives) they’ll feel the instant disconnect that comes with rejection.

Solution: Prioritize a process for properly assigning prospects in your CRM system. This will help you set up campaigns in your Marketing Automation System that will enhance communications from your sales team, instead of creating confusion and disconnect.

Example 2: Cold Hand-Offs

Sometimes the need to reassign leads is inevitable. Let’s say your leadership team has been speaking at a myriad of events. Prospects feel a quick relationship — connecting your company with their charisma. When your team tries to hand them off to a sales or account team, the prospect may feel they are not being valued or given the best attention. Their feelings get a little hurt.

Solution: Develop a process for follow-up communication that addresses the event where the lead was generated, as well as the need for the hand-off. The more personal the message, the better. Otherwise, those warm leads from an event or presentation will go cold fast.

Example 3: Incomplete Connections on LinkedIn

The power of LinkedIn for B2Bs is undeniable.

Are there any existing relationships you can leverage? Who shares similar groups? Which connections make sense for your Director, VP or Executive Levels? Are introductions and connections to sales reps in order?

Once again, WHO reaches out from your organization is as important as the connection itself.

Solution: When looking at companies and individuals with who you want to connect, consider WHO in your organization would be the ideal person to reach out first. Use LinkedIn to develop everyone’s networks — not just a select few.

A note about the C-Suite on LinkedIn: If your executive team is building connections on LinkedIn with key accounts, do they know how to follow up? Would an introduction to a sales rep be a more reliable next step? Execs who only “dabble” in LinkedIn can short-circuit your connection strategy. Be sure they have support from an admin or a marketing team to close the loop.

Example 4: Limited Reach & Credibility

So, you’re distributing some fantastic content on LinkedIn. Unfortunately, all of that meaty content is shared by one person on your marketing team. That killer content never reaches the right audience — meaning it never sees the light of day.

Solution: Develop a plan for multiple people in your organization to share content. Help these people build their connections so the content they share is seen by the right people.

Other Takeaways

Because B2B Business Is Personal

While each example above is slightly different, they all show the importance of taking the relationship into account when making sure you are sending out the right content, to the right person, at the right time. This is true with B2C sales, but when it comes to B2B sales, it’s everything.

• When planning content, consider who is the best person to be the author
• When distributing content, consider who is the best person to share it
• When making connections, consider who is the best person to develop the relationship
• When thinking about how prospects or clients might respond, consider who will be the best person to follow up

Ready to Make a Return to Relationships?

Let us look at your organization, learn about your buyers and develop content and delivery strategies that put people first.

We’ll help determine:

• Who you should be building relationships with at your key accounts
• Who on your team should be building those relationships
• What content will “lock eyes” with those contacts to help nurture and support the relationship
• What behavior and responses to monitor to determine actionable versus cold leads
• How best to follow up, listen and further nurture your relationships over time

The post How the FROM Line Can Make or Break Your Content appeared first on Well Planned Web.

But, the fact remains: LinkedIn is still the top dog in the B2B Marketing and Sales arena. Why? It’s simple: LinkedIn has the power to turn a distant business contact into a warm lead. And, for the record, warm leads are four times more likely to convert.

Yet, as powerful as this business network is, 70% of sales professionals don’t have the training to harness the power of LinkedIn. Yikes!

Bottom Line: LinkedIn is an easy network to ignore. It’s not as sexy, gimmicky or even as visually appealing as some of the spotlight-stealers out there. But, if you’re serious about lead nurturing, LinkedIn is the network you can’t ignore. 

The post Reality Check: The Power of LinkedIn for B2B Marketers [Infographic] appeared first on Well Planned Web.

The Hype Cycle

Content Marketing has followed the Gartner Hype Cycle to a “T.” The Peak of Inflated Expectations included a flood of marketers looking to become the ultimate content-generating machines — pumping out as much content as possible. After all, during the hype, one could point to exploding editorial calendars, busy blogs and never-ending lists of ideas — all to get a collective hype-driven “hurray” from their superiors. Those same marketers were hoping their slew of content would skyrocket Google rankings.

Moving Into Productivity & Value

Fortunately, as we emerge from the peak, we’re now entering an era of Content Marketing Productivity. In short, Content Marketing will no longer be hailed for simply existing in a marketing plan — now it will be measured by its ability to “lock eyes” with B2B prospects as they research and make their decision.

Now, for the Numbers…

Proof: Quality Trumps Quantity

In a recent survey, B2B buyers
said that the vendor they chose:

• Delivered content that had a significant impact on their buying decision (68%)

• Delivered a better mix of content appropriate for each stage of the purchasing process (61%)

• Provided higher quality content than other vendors (66%)

• Produced content that was more conducive to building a business case for the purchase (63%)

At the same time, respondents did not agree or disagree that their winning vendor produced more content during the purchasing process — a sign that the amount of distributed content isn’t as relevant as the quality.

Source: DemandGen: 2014 B2B Buyer Behavior Survey (Twitter: @DG_Report)

As for SEO and Google rankings? Well, Google spoke volumes about quality over quantity with its Penguin and Panda updates — continuing its firm move towards serving up quality search results for its visitors.

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Proof: Results Can’t Be Rushed

During the Peak of Inflated Expectations, many companies expected that waving the “magic content wand” would force prospects to make their decisions faster — generating a flood of instant sales.

In fact, 40% of survey respondents say they waited longer than last year to initiate contact with B2B vendors.

Why? Perhaps because more than two thirds (68%) of respondents agreed that the number of content sources used to research and evaluate purchases has increased over the past year.

The Bottom Line: As with consumers, B2B buyers now have more information at their fingertips than ever before. They want to measure, learn and form an argument (make a case to their boss) before ever engaging with a vendor’s salesperson. It seems it’s more dire than ever for B2B players to play their part in meeting prospects with quality content.

One could argue that content has actually extended the decision cycle — but has made prospects more confident and satisfied along the way.

What it All Means

The evidence is clear that content marketing is becoming a standard for lead generation, lead nurturing and increased visibility online. But, now that the hype cycle is shifting, it’s important for you and your team to conduct a “gut check” of your content marketing motives.

Keep the following “must-do’s” in mind ahead of diving into any content marketing effort:

1. Immerse Yourself In Your Audience

This doesn’t mean know their demographics or your typical target company size. You must dig deep into each decision maker, what makes them tick and what keeps them up at night.
A word of warning: Don’t settle for superficial or half-hearted audience exploration or documentation. Exhaustive and detailed profiling of your audiences holds everyone accountable through every stage of the content marketing cycle — VPs, writers, strategists, distributors, designers…you name it. Every editorial and marketing decision should map back to your audience pain points and needs. Period.

2. Examine Your Buyer’s Journey

Do you truly understand every stage of research, questions and stumbling blocks that the buyer faces? The content you create to generate awareness will be very different than the content you deliver to help the buyers justify the purchase to their boss.

How about after they become a customer? Are you generating meaningful content to retain their business or to get referrals?

3. Commit to Creating “Mission Critical” Content

Diving into Content Marketing without a solid goal of locking eyes with your customer is like proposing marriage before you’ve ever dated.

Recognize the difference between “good” content ideas and “Mission Critical” content — the content that’s bound to put you on the short list.

4. Drop the “Machine” Mentality.

Dedicate budget and resources to quality content — not to a mindless machine that pumps out content for content sake.

5. Listen. Measure. Pay Attention.

The post Why the “Mad Dash” to Content is Coming to an End appeared first on Well Planned Web.

There’s a growing epidemic among corporate content marketers and content producers. It’s a lack of a sharing. I’m not talking about lack of collaboration or not playing “nicey nice” in the sandbox. It’s about letting content die a slow, painful, pointless death after hitting that ever-loving “Publish” button.

Prospects actually WANT to see your (useful) content.

It’s probably no shock to you that there is a LOT of content out there. A daily avalanche, in fact. But that doesn’t mean you can’t compete for your prospects’ attention. In fact, it’s imperative that you do.

Mind you, this is different than the old days where you poured more dollars into advertising than the other guy. Today, it’s a matter of pouring on more *helpful* and *relevant* content. Help your prospect and they’ll take notice. Promise.

As Jay Baer noted in his recent keynote at Content Marketing World, buyers simply demand more content these days than ever before when making a decision: “In 2010, shoppers needed 5.3 sources of information before making a purchase decision. In 2011, just one year later, shoppers needed 10.4 sources before making a purchase decision.”

And we’re not just talking consumers here. B2B buyers are even thirstier for decision-making resources.

“B2B customers contact a sales rep only after 70% of the purchase decision has been made.”

Bottom Line: Useful content is the best pre-sales entity you’ll ever add to your team.

So, if helpful content goes unwritten, it’s a shame. But, if it exists and goes unseen — well, that’s just an outright crime. 

Optimize for searching AND sharing.

Even before Google made its game-changing announcement that it will encrypt all search activity, many B2B marketers were taking the easy route of just matching content to keyword data. That “scientific” approach to getting content seen cuts its potential short — big time.

Yes, prospects will go to Google at some point during their search (usually to start). But, as with most complex B2B decision paths, they’ll eventually start to dig deep — and look well beyond the keywords.

They’ll delve into the bowels of your site. They’ll want examples, case studies and solutions they can identify with. They’ll have nagging questions that take them to specialized forums or LinkedIn groups. They’ll pay attention to online chatter among peers. And, they’ll absolutely abhor any sales talk as they try to weed through what’s best for their company or department.

Bottom line: If your publishing strategy starts with a few clicks and ends with a few pushes to the networks, you’re missing an enormous part of the picture.

Share, share, not alike.

Okay, so if you can’t just push content to a bunch of predefined LinkedIn groups, a few forums and some networks, what should you do?

To truly lock eyes with your customers, you must create an exhaustive sharing plan for every piece of content.

Let’s allow that to sink in…

Not just a sharing plan designed for the audience …but for each and every piece of content.

Why? Because the intent of each piece of content maps to completely different conversations.

Let’s take for example, Carl…

Carl is the lead developer at a healthcare chain tasked with updating the chain’s automated phone system. Carl is not a Customer Care guy. Not even close.

1. Carl has to start the ball rolling — but feels “blinded” by his ignorance. His overworked Customer Care counterpart doesn’t know where to start either. After all, this is a technical decision, right?
2. Carl starts scouring the web, learns a bit about the “big picture” of automated systems. He then becomes overwhelmed by the “it depends” answer he keeps getting.
3. Carl decides to start asking around. He heads to his favorite IT forums, Developer boards and LinkedIn Groups.
4. Carl poses the question, “We’re looking to switch from our 1985 Acme Voice Systems to a more updated system. Does anyone have advice or ideas on where to start?”

Eureka! This would be a superb time to respond with your publication: 10 Things You Must Know Before Choosing Your Customer Service Automation, right?

Note that word: respond.

But alas, your team posted the publication on a little corner of your website. And two of your salespeople (who Carl doesn’t know) posted to their LinkedIn status updates one day. Oh…and a link is on your company’s Facebook page.

Create a plan that’s flexible, not finite.

Creating a Distribution Plan is more than we can cover in this single post. However, here are some highlights… 

• First, note the obvious paths for each piece of content. You’re probably already doing these.
• Next, review your specific forums, LinkedIn groups, Twitter hashtags, Facebook pages, etc. If you know these groups well, you’ll likely know what topics will spark their interest, discussion or even disagreement.
• Seek out threads that are relevant to your content. Start with noting keywords. No, these aren’t the keywords as we think of them today. You’ll use these on the networks to search for relevant discussions that you can jump into. This way, you’re not creating an entirely new thread each time. Building off someone else’s is often a better, more prospect-centric option.
• Note “tickler” questions for each group. Instead of just posting your content for all to “admire,” ask some very pointed, real, all-about-them questions. You may decide to post your tickler ahead of your content to gage interest or get a conversation flowing
• Ask for feedback. Care about the answers. Be willing to be wrong …or at least challenged. Don’t defend your content or point of view too much.
• Propose new ideas for new content based on what you hear in your groups. Yup. You have to listen.
• Follow up on responses to your content or tickler questions. This may sound like a “duh” but too many distribution plans fail to account for this.
• Alert your sales team, fellow marketers, content creators and other stakeholders when questions, ideas and quandaries arise. Most of all, make sure your internal teams are the first to see new content!
• Start all over. Yes. The best content finds new opportunities, audiences and threads every day. Unless the content is highly time-sensitive, make sure you continue to search for relevant places to contribute and distribute.

The Hard Truth

If you’re thinking, “Distribution sounds like a lot of work.” Yup. You’re right.

In fact (take note Marketing Leaders), you should allocate as much time to distributing your content as you do to creating it. That means having content strategists who not only obsess about useful content, but getting that content seen…over and over again. 

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