As I mainly work for B2B organizations in the ICT and [...]]]> Is the B2B (IT) services industry adapting to a changing buyer behavior and shifting investments in marketing tactics and tools? The answer is obviously yes. Digital, social, content, it’s all there. However, the reasons why and the integrations deserve a closer look.

As I mainly work for B2B organizations in the ICT and marketing (technology) industry, I like to keep an eye on what marketers and buyers in those industries think, how their spending changes and how they adapt to an evolving buyer journey.

Especially the ICT industry has always been leading the way in digital marketing and business (and I’m not saying that because I started my career in it). The reasons are obvious I guess.

One of the organizations I closely follow is the ITSMA (IT Services Marketing Association). It’s a paying membership community for marketing execs who market and sell B2B services and solutions. But as the name says, it’s mainly for IT companies.

The organization now and then releases some information publicly on the research it conducts. The number of participants in the ITSMA reports is always low but the profile of respondents is extremely “high”.

In its 2013 Budget Allocations and Trends Survey, the ITSMA provides some interesting data on the marketing tactics and technologies respondents are using more. The report also looked at the marketing budget plans of the B2B services marketers and found that nearly half of them plan to increase their budgets this year.

The shift towards digital in B2B: data

As could be expected, marketers are shifting investment in response to changing buying behavior to provide more adapted and relevant customer experience in an increasingly digital reality. A quick overview of those shifts.

In the overall marketing budget more money is flowing into:

• Demand generation and lead management.
• Brand and communications.
• Content development.
• Sales (channel) enablement and support.

From the marketing mix perspective there are shifts as well.

More budget is flowing into:

• Digital marketing.
• Direct marketing.
• Private events, seminars and conferences.

On the other hand, budget is flowing away from:

• Public trade shows.
• Sponsorships.
• Traditional advertising.

Some of these categories (such as digital marketing) are of course relatively broad. So, what kind of digital marketing techniques and tactics are we talking about?

According to the ITSMA the main ‘digital’ budgets are flowing into:

• The corporate website.
• Search engine optimization.
• Public online communities.
• Email and email newsletters.
• Online video.

The shift towards digital in B2B: analysis

Looks like a rather traditional picture? Well it isn’t really.

The role of content and integration

First of all, it’s clear that content (marketing) is playing a bigger role. You can see it in many shifts: increased attention for content development as such, more focus on demand generation and lead management (guess what you need for that), search engine optimization (increasingly about relevant content and social signals), the use of video, etc.

Also take into account that large B2B IT and services organizations often work with an entirely different customer and prospect base than consumer brands. First of all they often have a limited number of potential customers (one of the reasons why community marketing and sales channel enablement are more important here).

Secondly, they develop more personal (not just personalized but personal) relationships with prospects and their existing customer base (key account management or KAM is important for them).

The role of social and community

What about social? Trust me, it matters a lot. Look at companies such as Cisco, IBM, BT etc. However, it’s a bit different than in B2C as well. Relationship marketing and community, with a focus on being a trusted advisor and reliable source/partner, matter much fore to these businesses. Also look at the use of different social channels: chance is small that the CxO of a large organization will send a tweet to a provider of corporate technology solutions saying their support sucks. They use Twitter, to name just one, very often in entirely different ways.

Furthermore, in general they have a more integrated view on different tactics and techniques, another reason why I like working for them. Now and then I see posts appearing that B2B brands are starting to implement B2C tactics but I can assure you the opposite is more true.

Customer-centricity, a focus on the buyer’s journey, holistic approaches, integrated marketing technologies, etc. are known very well in many of these firms.Finally, notice there’s a strong link between KAM,community, social and trusted advisorship.

Marketing technology priorities showing the shift to customer-centric digital techniques

This picture becomes very clear if you look at the different marketing technologies respondents plan to increase investment in. While email marketing remains crucial for these – and other – businesses, the investments in marketing technology show a changed focus. It also indicates that marketing automation is becoming more important (and that of course has an impact on email marketing solutions spend).

The main areas of marketing technology spend according to the ITSMA (in decreasing order of importance):

• Lead nurturing and management solutions (marketing automation,…).
• Social media monitoring and measurement (reputation but also “what’s happening” for content production purposes and competitor tracking).
• Web analytics and optimization solutions.
• Content management and delivery, a rather vast range of content marketing software platforms.
• Campaign management.
• Customer and/or contact management.
• Marketing performance management (are you ready for marketing ROI?).
• Email marketing.

More data below.

Why content variety matters

Marketing is an activity that requires at least an idea of what we want to achieve, how we want to achieve it and how will we check if we achieve it. With an expensive word: a “strategy”. Strategies, plans etc. are important although the results are in the hard work, execution [...]]]>

Why content variety matters

Marketing is an activity that requires at least an idea of what we want to achieve, how we want to achieve it and how will we check if we achieve it. With an expensive word: a “strategy”. Strategies, plans etc. are important although the results are in the hard work, execution and what we see ‘in real life’ instead of what we think in board rooms. While a content marketing strategy looks at the strategic part of content marketing in the overall marketing process, a content strategy looks at the different steps regarding content planning, mapping, execution, etc.

In this sense, a content strategy involves various components. In most cases several of them come back but here are some common questions to answer or tasks to fulfill in a content strategy.

Dissecting the content strategy

Obviously it always starts with the usual suspects as covered in defining a content marketing strategy: setting up your goals (over time: long-term, short-term, etc.), knowing your buyer personas and/or target audiences, making an inventory, mapping, planning, defining metrics, etc.

Let’s detail the content strategy a bit more with a quick list of things to do.

• Analyzing what content is needed to fulfill different business goals across the customer journey or for branding purposes (often overlapping, each touchpoint has a branding dimension as well).
• Making an inventory of existing content and other resources or pieces of information that can be turned into content.
• Setting up the proper content planning, collaboration and scheduling processes.
• Developing a narrative that takes into account the brand’s promise and unique value proposition. Link the brand with the business goal and customer intent through content. Establish the tone of voice, style (guide), etc.
• Automating specific marketing processes, often triggered, using the right content at the right time on the right place.
• Planning a content strategy for different channels. OK, channels are never the priority but, on the other hand, each channel has specific characteristics, technical aspects, usage patterns, etc. Twitter is not Google is not email is not LinkedIn is not a webinar or a trade show.
• Making sure the content gets found by and shared with the different buyer personas and target audiences.
• Defining content-specific metrics and KPIs you will need to see if the overall marketing/business goals as defined in the content marketing strategy and ideally for your marketing ROI
• Creating, sourcing, aggregating, curating, optimizing content: or just getting it done using the tactics that work best.
• Defining a proper mix that fits the goals and the customer journey, regarding formats, channels, etc.
• Providing the content in different formats, each with their specific calls-to-action, depending on individual stages. Offer a variety of content types and formats. Not for the sake of it but because different segments and personas have different needs. Furthermore, if you can avoid message fatigue, several touchpoints are good, certainly also from a brand perspective. There is nothing wrong with repetition, variety, choice and multiple formats. As long as it’s relevant.
• Mapping content to pain points, questions and buying cycle. Elaborating on the buyer personas from a content strategy perspective. Look at the buyer journey but also the sales cycle (and, as opposed to popular belief, both are not aligned or the same).
• Planning campaigns in the overall marketing strategy whereby various content marketing tactics can be combined.
• Defining governance, content flows, managing content assets, storing ideas and data, etc.
• Training the people that will be invvolved in the planning, execution and follow-up.
• Closing the loop between your mrketing and sales, which involves content as well.
• Looking at less typical content needs, e.g. for customer service.
• Analyzing: competitors, markets, what customers/prospects want and say, the marketing place, a baseline analysis, etc.
• Testing, optimizing, testing, optimizing, testing, optimizing,…
• Etc.

What a content strategy is not

There are many elements in a content strategy and this list is certainly not exhaustive, it’s rather a summary of elements that comes to mind. Note that, as far as I’m concerned, some elements, for instance regarding buyer personas really belong to what I call the content marketing strategy.

Let’s look at what a content strategy should not be.

And I kind of like the view of Arketi Group on that. I quote: “In today’s attention-challenged, ultra-segmented and over-marketed BtoB environment, the traditional approach of developing a few white papers, case studies and data sheets and blasting them out to a list of all suspects, prospects and customers, hoping to achieve the “nirvana” of a high download rate are over – for good”.

Right, blasting is pushing and broadcasting, attention-challenged means you have to get the attention in another way and over-marketed means, well, that you have to be very good in engaging your customers through content. And when I hear the word engaging (driving to action and persuading/converting, really), I think ‘ personalization’, ‘cross-channel’, ‘data driven’, ‘triggered’, ‘ event driven’ and ‘customer-centric’, certainly in a lead management sense.

So, what does Arketi Group think is a good content strategy? A few years ago, the company launched something called “3D Content Mapping”. It’s not really a model to define a content strategy but rather a summary of three parameters to take into account for customer-centric content mapping (and planning). Consider it as some extra food for thought before diving deeper into the different aspects of a (B2B) content strategy in our blog posts.

Effective content and the different content types in the funnel

Three dimensions to consider in a B2B content strategy

Segmentation

You know what segmentation is. In general, it means that your content should appeal to prospects/customers in function of their profile, behavior, journey, personas, etc. You probably think “I am doing that” but instead of targeting people in function of demographics or job functions take it further: industry, expressed needs and challenges, past behavior, triggers, digital signals, cross-channel customer data, whatever. But, most importantly: look at the pain points, questions and concerns of your prospects.

The buying cycle/sales cycle

Let me quote the people of Arketi Group: “Today’s prospects are much more in control of the information flow, relying on trusted online resources and solution providers’ websites far more often than sales reps to identify solutions, evaluate options and develop short lists for further consideration. The role of today’s BtoB marketers in this new environment is to offer the right content, matched to the individual prospect’s level of interest”. That’s using customized content for lead nurturing, in function of your customer’s offline and digital footprints and where he is in the buying cycle.

Content type

As Arketi Group says “keep the message fresh”. But also make sure you use several content options, regarding format, channel and trigger (push, pull). Every prospect has his own preferences and in a cross-channel lead nurturing approach, meeting those should be the most obvious thing on earth. The type of content really depends on different elements in the above mentioned other two dimensions: pain points, behavior, personas, stages in the sales cycle, you name it. Arketi further developed the model over the last few years and I think it’s a nice way to look at it, certainly in B2B.

Content marketing is about offering the content to your prospects in function of their needs, desires, reading preferences etc. And, certainly in B2B, about the customer life cycle. In the end, that is customer-centricity and thus, by definition, cross-channel and multi-channel (or let’s just say channel-agnostic). Check out the video below for more on the 3-D content mapping model.

We can say it a million ways but some folks just aren’t going to get it.  Or at least not yet.

With the tools out there, the connections that can be made and the audience’s diminishing tolerance for being shouted [...]]]> The world has changed.  Things are different.  This is the new normal.  This ain’t your grandaddy’s marketing.

We can say it a million ways but some folks just aren’t going to get it.  Or at least not yet.

With the tools out there, the connections that can be made and the audience’s diminishing tolerance for being shouted at — there are many things we need to do differently.  Including finding a job.

Check out this slideshare (PPT) presentation that Lorenzo Galbiati sent me as he embarks on a job hunt.  ( if you want to chat about career possibilities)

Imagine you need to hire someone.  You get a standard paper resume and this PPT.  You can only interview one candidate — who would you choose?

We need to re-think everything and there are plenty of sacred cows that need to be done away with.  If someone ever says to you — this is how it has to be done or this is the standard — ask more questions, think beyond the “usual” and remember that the world has changed.

The last thing you want to demonstrate is that you haven’t been keeping up.

Can’t see the PPT?  Click here to view over at www.slideshare.net

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One problem that many companies may face, is the difficulty of getting good PR performance in social media; all brands want to experience a certain degree and volume [...]]]>

One problem that many companies may face, is the difficulty of getting good PR performance in social media; all brands want to experience a certain degree and volume of good social media mentions such as retweets, repins, Facebook shared, Linkedin share; but not all of them know how to get a lot of social media mentions for their brand.

However, getting a lot of social media mentions for your brand, can be also easy if we know how.

By trial and error, I have come out with these 7 effective ways to increase your social media mentions.

1. Humor Plays a Part

People love to share funny and entertaining jokes, pictures and videos with their family and friends on social media. Companies who know how to integrate humor into their social media strategies, will always be ahead of others who are not humorous.

Sometimes, it is also advisable not to ‘over use’ humor as it might backfire at times. Moreover, also try to avoid sensitive topics related to sex, race, religious and politics.

2. Organize Your Content

Organize your content in a way that speaks strongly about what your brand is all about. Make your content speak around a brand theme and write about topics that are interesting to your consumers. If your business is about organic food then all your pictures, links and videos on social media should be all about organic food or any topics related to healthy eating lifestyle.

3. Be Different

Take the car business for example, there are many distributors selling the same car brand. So, how special is one distributor to another? What is the thing that will make consumers want to buy from your company instead of other car distributors? Why is your brand different from the rest?  What is your unique selling proposition? (USP).

Instead of just being a car distributor of the same car brand, you can differentiate your brand by being a niche expert in your industry; for example, a family car specialist. You can also use a different kind of branding and marketing approach to make your brand different as well.

4. Ask Questions

Ask questions in order to lead people to give their comments on your social media pages. In this way, you can make your posts interactive. One example that I did in my own Facebook page, is that I combined two brand related images side by side in one, posted it on my Facebook page and then ask the audience to give their comments on which image do they like.

It does not matter which image does my audience like, your ultimate goal is to encourage your audience on social media, to interact and talk about your brand. And that is it!

5. Picture me perfect!

There is an old saying, “a picture tells a thousand words.” This is so true even in today’s social media age. From my experience, we can see that people on social media responded more towards visual stuffs such as images and videos rather than just words and links. To add on to that, you also make sure your visuals are relevant to your brand.

6. Target the right group of consumers

At the initial stage of every social media PR campaign, make sure to target the right group of consumers. Some campaigns have failed badly because they do not have a good start.

Contests and giveaways are some common types of social media promotion techniques that will likely give your brand the wrong group of consumers or “fair weather fans” who do not really care about your brand at all. (for they only love your prize and giveaways.)

Hence, aim for quality targeting on the right demographic of people that will likely love your brand. And by targeting the right group of consumers, your social media mentions will naturally increase as a result.

7. Time Your Brand with the Season

Time your brand with the latest happening news and events in your country. Timely articles and content will usually get a lot of read than articles that are less timely. This is because they look more updated, and “personal” to your audience. You can also post brand related content that blends well with the seasons and the holidays.

In this way, it will give other people the impression that your brand is always different and keeping up with the trends.

In summary

Increasing the social media mentions for your brand is easy, all you need is to have an unique brand approach; and also posting good quality content, pictures and videos that are both interactive and relevant to your consumers.

As you may know, I travel quite a bit. I’m a big believer in maximizing my travel by being a loyal brand consumer…which gains me status, points and makes my travel life easier and [...]]]> Marketing is getting the details right.  And its always the simple things that companies mess up.  Lt me give you an example.

As you may know, I travel quite a bit. I’m a big believer in maximizing my travel by being a loyal brand consumer…which gains me status, points and makes my travel life easier and more convenient. I try to only fly United and whenever I can, I stay in a Marriott hotel.

That affords me sort of an insider’s view of both of these businesses but still interacting with them as one of their frequent consumers.

We’ve talked before about the value of seeing your business through your consumer’s eyes and I had an ah ha moment while staying in Nashville this past week.

Because I stay in a lot of hotels, I notice card keys. I’m fascinating at how different hotels use those card keys as marketing tools. Some sell it as advertising space to the local pizza joint while others use it as a brand platform, putting a beautiful visual on the card. I equate the quality of the hotel to the beauty of the card. When I stay at a Comfort Inn or Fairfield Inn — I get pizza coupons. When I stay at a Westin — their cards are a work of art they’re so beautiful.

Whenever I check into a Marriott, I get a card that looks like this. The word elite indicates that I am a member of their Marriott Rewards program and have achieved their highest status level — platinum. As you can see, the card is pretty bland but it clearly is the platinum color…to signify my member rank.

Seems sort of dull, doesn’t it? It hardly says high end hotel to me. But this hotel is Gaylord‘s Grand Opry — a very high end hotel. By accident, they made me a “regular” key card too.

Look at how beautiful it is. (I was in their Magnolia wing) But Marriott assumes that the bland but “prestigious” card is what their most frequent customers would prefer.

I have often thought — “I wonder why Marriott has such ugly key cards compared to other higher end hotel chains” Turns out — they don’t. They just give the ugly cards to their best customers.

Here’s my ah ha moment — how often do we assume that we know what our best customers want? I’m sure Marriott thinks they’re stroking my ego by giving me the special platinum key card. But I assumed everyone got the ugly cards and I didn’t even notice that it was geared towards their elite members.

In my daughter’s college town, there are no Marriott properties so I just stay at either a Comfort Inn or something like that. Even their keys are more interesting than Marriott’s and every time I check in I think, “why can’t Marriott do better keys than these guys?”

Now I know. They do. They just don’t give them to their most frequent customers.

Is this a big deal? Absolutely not. But — that’s what marketing is. It’s the details. Most businesses get the big stuff right so how you differentiate yourself is in how well you handle the details. In my opinion, Marriott missed the boat on this one. Later this week I’ll show you a hotel that didn’t miss a single opportunity to build and highlight their brand.

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Many companies • Build brands by launching strategic initiatives that define their brand strategy. • Organize brand portfolios • Develop identity standards that include core key communication messages and visual elements. Afterwards, the [...]]]> With the increasing number of places that your stakeholders can interact online and offline today, it’s more important than ever for you to develop cutting-edge brand strategies that deliver results.

Many companies
• Build brands by launching strategic initiatives that define their brand strategy.
• Organize brand portfolios
• Develop identity standards that include core key communication messages and visual elements.
Afterwards, the company typically launches a brand-building plan.

While these branding components show encouraging signs of enhancing the business’s image, the most important part of branding – being your brand – remains tenuous.

Brand-Building Strategy

Branding is about building relationships with stakeholders that transcend your products and services.

Your brand is basically shorthand for what your company is all about. With all the volume of competing messages and images, you need to have something that strikes a chord with your customers in a simple, concise way. Your brand creates a belief about what your company delivers to them.

The purpose of branding is to articulate your brand’s promise – your promise to customers and others. It is a way to differentiate your company, products and services from competitors, and to provide it with a personality that is both unique and appealing to your stakeholders. It is a multifaceted, multilayered process and discipline. It’s much more than your logo, corporate colors, marketing slogans and icons.

The benefit –
Well-focused and consistent attention to branding is the most effective way to compete, to rise above the noise and become a factor in your industry.

The importance –
Branding has taken on a greater significance as companies now see their brands as assets – as valuable and as tangible as factories and patents. It’s the cornerstone upon which brand equity is built.

The challenge –
Managing your identity so it is an accurate reflection of your company is an ongoing process. Brand management has sound disciplines that make significant differences to how well a brand is protected and presented. It means focusing on the big picture – the brand’s essence, mapping out competitors in your brand’s category, and identifying new obstacles or opportunities to ensure building your brand’s value. Brand management is the ultimate protector of profit margins. It’s about living your brand.

Your brand strategy should include –

Identify the brand – All the distinctive elements associated with your products and services must be identified. Why customers care or should care about what it is you offer and what makes it different from your competitors. This is the identity that you are creating for your customers.

Build the brand – After the distinctive elements are identified, it must be framed in succinct messages that people can understand and relate to. This will reinforce your brand.

Promote the brand – What good is a message if no one hears it? Your company must make a strong pledge to consistently market its products or services, and, over time, to solidify its identity in customers’ minds.

Developing and Reinforcing Your Brand

Your message is chosen; marketing, advertising and public relations activities are actively promoting it. However, your entire organization must be living it. There must be a direct connection between your brand and the customer’s experience – when he / she walks in your door, talks to your sales team and purchases your product or service.

You must have a brand promise. You can’t expect your employees or customers to remember a long list of adjectives that describes everything the company does. A brand promise that lists everything that your company does results in being nothing to anyone.

Branding requires executive team involvement, supported by your branding agency to help you align your image and identity. You need to define the essence of your brand. What is the company passionate about? Pick one. Align your business units with that passion. Too many companies don’t express a passion. If there is a brand promise, business divisions are not in alignment with it; some are a bunch of disconnected divisions, each with their own agenda.

Honing in on your brand promise requires some serious introspection and discussion. It should not be what you do. It’s how you do it. How you want your customers to feel when interacting with your company.

What you do will change over time. How you do it should not. Your brand promise creates a trust factor that should remain the same. The benefit of a branded customer experience is enhanced customer loyalty.

As your company grows and adds new products, a strong brand position and promise gives you a pathway to follow. It’ll help you prioritize new initiatives based on your brand promise. It’ll guide you to research and development (R&D) of new products and services that are relevant to the company’s passion.

Be Your Brand

Once your brand promise has been identified, you need to energize and inspire your employees to change their behaviors to live your brand and deliver on your brand’s promise. You need to motivate and empower employees to become your brand ambassadors at all levels of your company. It must start at the top and trickle down to all employees.

Your brand strategy must be merged with company culture. You need to establish a strong sense of purpose and shared sense of direction. If you do, your employees will actively engage your unique brand promise every day. Then, and only then, will your customer preference and experience accurately reflect your brand’s values.

I suppose many people make the [...]]]>

It seem intuitive to us that if we’re heading to a trade show as an exhibitor we should be thoughtful about how to maximize that time and dollar investment. Yet somehow, when we’re attending a show or conference as an attendee, we don’t seem to give it the same consideration.

I suppose many people make the assumption that if you go to a conference and learn something – it’s time and money well spent. That’s certainly a good start, but if you’re smart about it, you can get so much more out of your trip.

Location, location, location: Assuming the conference is not in your home town – take advantage of the change of venue. Is there a prospect you’ve been romancing from a distance that happens to be located within a reasonable distance from the event location? If so, fly in a day early or fly out late and schedule a face to face.

Create a hit list: Usually the conference will publish a list of attendees ahead of time, to entice others to join in. If they don’t publish a list – do a Twitter search to see who is talking about the event. Once you’ve seen the list or at least a partial list – identify three to five people you absolutely want to meet and connect with.

Seek them out (not in a creepy stalker way) and be ready to engage them in a conversation. Your goal – to get to know them well enough that you can reach out to them after the show and stay connected.

Be a connector: Make it your goal to help one new person a day. That help might be introducing them to someone you know, it could be sharing a resource or as simple as inviting them to join you for lunch.

For many people, being at a conference (especially if you’re alone) feels very isolated and even the most gregarious person can get a little shy. But if you’re the one being helpful, that’s takes a lot of the discomfort away.

High five the presenters: No matter how often someone speaks at a conference, it’s still a bit of a nerve-wracking experience. Even if they’re a superstar in their field, they still will appreciate a “way to go” or “I learned a lot from you.” Want it to be even more sticky? Tweet the “atta boy” to them and then follow up with a question. Odds are, you just added someone cool to your network!

Pace yourself: Most conferences over-pack their events with speakers, socials, minglings and exhibit hall time. They want you to know that you’re getting your money’s worth. But no human being can go at that pace for several days in a row. Identify the two events each day that are “must see” and a couple more that are “would like to do’s.” Don’t let the schedule over schedule you.

Schedule an extra day at the end: I know it sounds ridiculous. You’ve already been out of the office for several days. Why add an extra one? If you don’t do your conference follow up (write blog posts, shoot off some emails, enter the business cards into your database with your notes, make some follow up calls and appointments) before you get caught up in the hustle and bustle of your regular work life – odds are, it will never get done.

If you aren’t going to set yourself up for success and all you want is to learn something new – save your money and watch a webinar or two. But if you really want to make the most of your investment – grab a couple of these tips and hit the ground running.

Originally Posted on Drew’s Marketing Minute.