Let’s get real: who talks like this? Certainly no executives we have met. It’s time [...]]]> News release quotes are often the most underutilized communications tool at a PR pro’s disposal. Wire services are flooded with quotes from executives saying how excited, grateful, honored and thrilled they are about a new partner, employee, award or product release.

Let’s get real: who talks like this? Certainly no executives we have met. It’s time we all took an objective look at the quotes we’ve written before claiming we aren’t guilty of this practice. When you consider the function of the quote in the release, you start to realize its significance–it is the voice of the executive, often the CEO.

Think about that – the voice of the CEO. Yes, the PR team is truly inserting words into the mouth of the most senior person of the organization. This is no small responsibility.

Quotes in releases have determined company policies, influenced political decisions and inspired strategic vision. Oppositely, quotes have cost people jobs, sent stock prices plummeting and driven customers to competitors.

These may be extreme cases, but the point remains: the quote is a far from trivial element and should be treated accordingly. Here are suggestions for crafting powerful quotes that get noticed.

Tip one
Write the way people speak. Quotes are meant to be the true voice of the person being cited. If you find yourself using a superlative or figure of speech that belongs only on an SAT test, you are most likely are not writing the way your executives speak.

Tip two
Use your quotes to add information – not reiterate statements already made. Powerful quotes that help further the story are more likely to be used by a reporter. Ensure your quotes add new or deeper information about the subject of the release.

Tip three
Incorporate your organization’s name into your quotes. When the release involves a customer or partner, it’s also appropriate to include their name in your quote. In this case, turnabout is fair play. Use the opportunity to say something substantial about the other organization – then create a quote from them that says something meaningful about you. This creates a testimonial that, once on record, can be pointed to again in the future.

Tip four
Avoid clichés like the plague. (See what I did there?) Use anecdotes, facts, figures and real-life experiences as content for your quotes. Think of a quote as a mini-speech set within a very short story.

While this is not an exhaustive list, incorporating these four tips will result in releases with the power to influence, engage and drive interest from both media and customers.

Mike Neumeier, APR is principal at Arketi Group, a public relations and digital marketing firm that helps business-to-business technology organizations accelerate growth through intelligent strategy, public relations, messaging, branding and demand generation. Consistently recognized by BtoB magazine as one of the nation’s “Top BtoB Agencies,” Arketi helps its clients use marketing to generate revenue. To view all company blogs visit here, and for more information call 404-929-0091 ext. 202.

Today’s metric-rich email, CRM and automation tools [...]]]> As BtoB marketers, we know what follows flies in the face of all that’s instinctive. But the time has come for all of us to confront a tough reality – some of our prospect relationships just aren’t working anymore. And it may be time to turn these prospects loose.

Today’s metric-rich email, CRM and automation tools have given us the ability to identify and profile prospects and track their reactions to our email and web marketing efforts in a way never before available. They have also helped identify the curse of today’s marketer – the passive opt-out. The individual who doesn’t formally opt-out of emails but never opens, clicks, responds or submits anything. And, unfortunately, our databases are full of them.

Breaking up is hard, but it may be time for us to say goodbye – before our prospects do.

Breaking Up Is Hard to Do
If you want an eye-opening experience, do a quick check of the prospects in your database that have taken any action over the past 12 months. We think you’ll be surprised at the low number. In our experience, it can range as low as 10% to 15% of the total.

So instead of continuing to try and entice the other 85% – the passive opt-outs – why not just purge them (or at least relegate them to a “low value” list) and target ongoing marketing at those who have at least expressed some interest? By focusing attention on the prospects who have taken action, we end up creating stronger, more targeted email messages and calls-to-action – as well as providing more reasons for prospects to remain engaged.

The statistics back this approach up. According to Marketing Sherpa, 77% of polled individuals consider any email they did not sign up to receive as spam. And none of us wants to be branded with that label.

The Hidden Cost
In the pre-email days (remember those?) we would regularly purge lists to avoid spending the $3+ cost to send something to someone of marginal value. But along came email and the cost-per-contact dropped dramatically. So it became easier to take the “batch and blast” approach. Recent studies, however, confirm that this is seldom effective. The best way to convert a prospect to an opportunity is, not surprisingly, to start with a motivated prospect. And finding the motivated prospect begins by segmenting existing lists and databases.

To those who argue “but what about that one individual that I might miss if I purge or don’t stay in closer contact?” we suggest that spending time ensuring all campaigns are relevant to everyone, cripples the effectiveness of the marketing efforts directed to the smaller but critically important segment of motivated prospects. We are all increasingly concerned about falling responses, increased spam complaints and poor overall conversion rates. So maybe it’s time for us to say goodbye – before our prospects do.

Mike Neumeier, APR is principal at Arketi Group, a public relations and digital marketing firm that helps business-to-business technology organizations accelerate growth through intelligent strategy, public relations, messaging, branding and demand generation. Consistently recognized by BtoB magazine as one of the nation’s “Top BtoB Agencies,” Arketi helps its clients use marketing to generate revenue. To view all company blogs visit here, and for more information call 404-929-0091 ext. 202.

Shooting Stars Companies Rises and Falls in an Instance

‘Shooting star’ companies are what I defined as brand new, short lived and ‘Big Time’ companies which invested heavily on marketing [...]]]>

Shooting Stars Companies Rises and Falls in an Instance

‘Shooting star’ companies are what I defined as brand new, short lived and ‘Big Time’ companies which invested heavily on marketing and advertising campaigns without a clear direction of where the company heading in the long term. These companies usually focus on getting quick profits.

Shooting Companies Always Invest Heavily in Massive ‘Air Bus’ Liked Advertising

Just like a shooting star, it shines the brightest among the other stars in the dark skies but only for a short while before it descends into nothing. Some of the signs of shooting star companies are, overnight massive branding and advertising campaigns in all kinds of online or print medias, sudden rush to get IPO within less than 3 years of business operations, where company’s business model is easily ‘copied’ by competitors with heavy advertising budgets with months.

It will be too ‘dangerous’ for a marketer to work for a shooting star company as it will be like venturing into the unknown without a clear vision of the future. Here are 3 reasons why.

Too Much Short Term Strategies

Shooting Star Companies are Usually ‘Short Sighted’ in their Marketing Strategies

Shooting star companies spend too much time and money on short term advertising campaigns. They tend to be over focus and overly dependent on massive advertisements for their business survival. Such dependent on mass advertising will not work for the business survival in the long run. This is because the cost per acquisition of a customer may be very high due to its heavy investment  on massive interrupting advertising. It seems that the company wants to become famous quickly without building its foundation well. A strong foundation is not just include getting the advertising or sales right but also all the other little things that makes up the whole business. Such little things are its employment policies, HR structure, customer support team, customer service team and so on. Hence, focus on both short term and long term strategies for the business can make it become a brand in the long run eventually.

Consumer Trust Lacking

It Takes Time to Win the Hearts of the Customers. So, be Patient.

Consumer trust on a brand new product or a brand is not built overnight; it needs time for people to learn and to appreciate it after a period of using it. Therefore, massive advertising campaigns only raise awareness of the product or the brand in the minds of the consumers; consumers are perhaps curious to find and try out the product and brand and see if it benefits them or not that’s all. It is only after a series of awareness and satisfied transactions, then the consumer can trust the particular brand or product.

When most shooting companies focus on getting large amount of sales in the short run, they might fail on getting things right especially when during the after-sales. Customers who have tried their products and services may not be unhappy about it. These companies may not have a support team to do damage control and handling consumer complaints. Hence bad word of mouth marketing will spread, making cost per acquisition of a consumer much higher in the long run.

No Product Uniqueness

Create an Unique Brand or Market Where Competitors Found it Difficult to be ‘Copycat’ for it

If the uniqueness of the company is anything but its massive advertising budget only, then it actually means that it does not have any product uniqueness at all. This is because any company, so long it has a huge advertising budget, can become a competitor to the shooting star company anytime. Anyone can just duplicate its business model so long they have the money. Hence unless the particular shooting star company can come up with a new strategy to make its product different from the rest and  make something that is not easy to be copied; then it can retain its market share for a relatively longer period of time and eventually marketers can help to make such product a lasting brand in the economy.

Be Sharp Enough to See the Signs of a Shooting Star Company in Your Competitive Market

In summary, open up your eyes and be sharp in spotting signs of a shooting star company appearing; and with that in mind, by understanding the know-how of a shooting star company, you will also know how to deal with such company should they suddenly appear as a competitor in your market.

A few weeks ago I spoke at SES New York about mobile PPC and SEO. I touched briefly on mobile [...]]]> Note from Drew:  Every once in awhile I like to open up the blog to a guest with a depth of expertise that I think you’ll benefit from.  Here’s Jason Well’s take on landing pages.

A few weeks ago I spoke at SES New York about mobile PPC and SEO. I touched briefly on mobile landing pages.

After the presentation one of the attendees walked up to me and said, “thanks for covering mobile landing pages, but most people still need help on their standard landing pages.”

He was right.

Especially in the B2B world, ‘regular’ landing pages are still critical.

While keeping in mind that no landing page is perfect, there are a few simple (and not so simple) rules to creating wicked awesome landing pages.

1. Goal – When you create a landing page what is your goal? Do you want people to download a White Paper, schedule a demo, or call you on the phone? This goal should be clearly defined and obvious to the visitor at-a-glance. Everything on that landing page should work to accomplish that goal.
2. Headline – The headline of your landing page needs to be short and precise. That is all.
3. Brief Copy –There is a rule that journalists use that marketers should also apply. The rule is this: use the fewest words necessary to get your point across.
4. Call-to-Action – What do you want a visitor to do on your landing page? (Remember our discussion about goals above). This call-to-action should be crystal clear. (Think blatant, obvious and simple).
5. Options – You don’t want to necessarily mandate that your visitors fill out a form. Give them options. Place your phone number in prominent locations on the landing page so they can call you, if they prefer.
6. Fields – The other day I visited a landing page that stunk. It was terrible. Why? Because they wanted me to fill out 16 information fields! 16! Now, there is no perfect number for form fields. But one thing iscertain: 16 is way too many.
7. Testing – You should A/B test every element of your landing pages. Place phone numbers in difference locations. Change and tweak specific form fields. Change copy and headlines. Test and refine. (Everyone knows they should do this, but most people don’t).
8. ‘Retreat’ Offers – If someone doesn’t want to sign up for a demo on your landing page, for example, give them the option to download a White Paper when they leave.
9. Metrics – Most marketers know what percentage of visitors to their landing pages are converting. (i.e. how many people are filling out a form to download a product or see a demo). But does your conversion rate include people who called you as a results of your landing page? Does your conversion rate count those people who +1 you after visiting your landing page? Including those ‘other metrics’ in your conversion rate will give you a more complete picture of how effective your landing page actually is.

Bio: J ason Wells is the CEO of ContactPoint. Their new product, LogMyCalls, represents the next generation of intelligent call tracking and marketing automation. Prior, Jason served as the Senior Vice President of Sony Pictures, where he led the creation and international expansion of Sony’s international mobile business line from London.

Jason holds an MBA from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.

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In today’s information-rich environment, buyers are in control of [...]]]> Public relations and marketing, no matter how good, cannot make a buyer buy. This is especially true in a BtoB environment, where purchasing decisions are often made by committee, impulse buys are rare, and emotions – though not irrelevant – play a secondary role to rational considerations.

In today’s information-rich environment, buyers are in control of the sales process – so understanding what makes them tick is essential. However, as BtoB communicators, it seems we’ve lost sight of this critical point. It’s understandable. In recent years, we’ve been bombarded with the mandate to drive ever more leads through email marketing, overwhelmed by the social media du jour, and enthralled by the promise of marketing automation.

Simply put, we took our eyes off the ball. We know effective marketing starts and ends with the buyer. We always knew it – we just forgot it temporarily. It’s time to reorient ourselves, and our organizations. It’s time to stop selling and start listening to the buyer. It’s time to embrace buyer-driven communication.

This is a way of thinking that places buyers and their needs at the center of all communication priorities. Understanding what buyers care about, how they make their decisions, and how they want to receive information, makes PR and marketing about them, not about us.

Buying-cycle changes brought about by the Internet and social engagement are forcing BtoB marketers and PR professionals to retrench and place the buyer at the center of our world. And for most marketers, resources continue to be constrained, and our teams are being asked to do even more with even less – so focusing on what’s important is essential.

If the program, strategy or tactic does not clearly impact the buying decision of a customer or prospect, then it’s not relevant, and not deserving of execution. But, for a given tactic, how do you determine its relevance to the buyer? Well, one way is to ask them. If the last time your marketing team interviewed customers was when Mosaic was a popular web browser, you need to get out more! With buyer information and opinion in hand, you can then develop buyer personas to help the communication team understand buyer motivation, and drive decisions that respond to their needs, desires and concerns.

While the Stop Selling. Start Listening. approach certainly can use “big data,” behavior-based marketing, and deep customer and prospect segmentation, it doesn’t have to be that daunting. For example one can simply start by:

• Interviewing 10-15 customers
• Regularly joining sales for a day of calling on prospects, or
• Spending a few hours in your contact center listening to incoming customer calls.

The more you bring prospects and customers into your PR and marketing efforts, the more success you’re going to experience. Testing messages and marketing campaign concepts with buyers, approaching PR from the buyers’ view, and ensuring your website speaks to buyers’ needs – not your greatness – all deliver big results.

PR and marketing professionals win by initiating conversations with customers – would-be and current – then using that intelligence to craft campaigns and communications that speak to buyers in their terms, answer their questions, and meet their specific information needs. Remember, now is the time to stop selling and start listening.

Want to join the movement? Visit www.arketi.com/stopselling and join in the discussion.

Mike Neumeier, APR is principal at Arketi Group, a public relations and digital marketing firm that helps business-to-business technology organizations accelerate growth through intelligent strategy, public relations, messaging, branding and demand generation. Consistently recognized by BtoB magazine as one of the nation’s “Top BtoB Agencies,” Arketi helps its clients use marketing to generate revenue. To view all company blogs visit here, and for more information call 404-929-0091 ext. 202.

In the most straightforward terms, the risk is that letting high-value prospects progress that far without [...]]]> Companies providing complex, high-investment solutions are facing a significant risk management issue in light of Sirius Decisions and others finding that B2B buyers are self-educating and moving through as much as 70% of the sales funnel before connecting with sales.

In the most straightforward terms, the risk is that letting high-value prospects progress that far without proactive engagement—and instead relying too heavily on inbound marketing and marketing automation to find, nurture, and convert them—can result in losing deals to the competition.

For me, risk management has always been about assessing business exposure and taking proactive steps to improve a situation rather than remaining reactive when there is downside potential.

I was curious about a more formal definition of risk management and found this on Wikipedia:

“Risk management is the identification, assessment, and prioritization of risks (defined in ISO 31000 as the effect of uncertainty on objectives, whether positive or negative) followed by coordinated and economical application of resources to minimize, monitor, and control the probability and/or impact of unfortunate events or to maximize the realization of opportunities.”

In the context of this discussion, there are four areas where overreliance on inbound marketing and marketing automation puts the “realization of opportunities” (i.e., SQLs and closed deals) at risk.

Executive work styles and late adopters

Many C-level decision makers have not yet embraced—and may never—the role of self-education via social media. In a recent blog I shared the account of a chief executive of a large utility who finally responded positively on the 42^nd touch and later signed off on a $1 billion deal for one of our customers. His was not a self-educating work style, and there was no way he was going to search blogs or websites to download white papers. He responded to a proven outbound lead generation methodology driven by an experienced prospect development professional.

Complex internal buying landscapes

Outbound marketing and its emphasis on personal, direct and regular contact with prospects assures correct assessment of decision maker roles and influence early on. Evaluation and buying dynamics are constantly in flux, and a personal relationship generated and maintained with outbound efforts provides immediate response to shifting prospect landscapes. Selling tactics can be immediately tailored to reinforce the laser-like relevance of a solution.

Early-stage to late-stage market coverage

Many agree that inbound marketing and marketing automation work best when time is not an issue. That is, it takes time to develop content, promote it, and get prospects to find it and engage with it. But overreliance on this inbound “get found and convert” strategy doesn’t address “very early” and “very late” stages.

A primary advantage of a proactive outbound approach lies in the way a company can reach out early to connect with a qualified decision maker and begin to build a business relationship. This activity not only helps the prospect clarify challenges and solutions—it also establishes the company as a trusted thought leader in a way that ideally leads the prospect to view the company as a preferred vendor as the buying process evolves.

And because inbound marketing generates contacts and supports self-education over a period of time, it’s easy to miss opportunities that could be deep in the current pipeline. We consistently find 5% of the market in an active buying stage and narrowing the list of competitive solutions. Many times, we’ve interrupted these scenarios to secure wins for our clients. I might also point out that betting too heavily on inbound marketing providing 100% market coverage is a risk not worth taking.

High-investment offers

Inbound marketing works very effectively with solutions at lower price points. An example might be a $10,000 piece of hardware. Technical specifications are to the point, and the buying process may include ordering online or rep engagement with a single contact in a purchasing group. But a proven outbound approach is needed when selling a six- or seven-digit enterprise solution with a long sales cycle to a multi-disciplined executive group.

To put this another way, imagine you’re sitting in front of your demand generation dashboard and reflecting on your marketing strategy. On the screen there are four horizontal scrollbars, and you’ve moved four sliders all the way to the right to indicate…

• Selling to C-level and senior executives
• Complex buying landscape and long sales cycle
• Need to assure 100% market coverage right now
• High-investment offering

In situations like this, sales and marketing executives should check the definition of risk management above and reflect on the right “application of resources to maximize the realization of opportunities.”

The return on complex sales is too high to risk the identification, care and feeding of potential high-value opportunities on overreliance on inbound marketing and marketing automation.

With the complex sale, it remains critical to ground core strategies in a proactive outbound prospect development process proven to be effective in uncovering, nurturing and delivering sales qualified leads.

Take a look at this chart — it’s pretty telling. (This chart is part of the 2012 edition of The SoDA Report, from the Society of Digital Agencies.   More on the SoDa Report here.)

As you can see, when marketing [...]]]> Wondering where people are expending their efforts (and money) when it comes to digital marketing?

Take a look at this chart — it’s pretty telling. (This chart is part of the 2012 edition of The SoDA Report, from the Society of Digital Agencies.   More on the SoDa Report here.)

As you can see, when marketing decision makers were asked (in the where they were going to focus their attention, in terms of earned and owned media — they had some very definite opinions, with Word of Mouth and Blogger Outreach topping the charts.

Those surveyed said that they were continuing to shift their spending from traditional, expensive tactics toward digital—especially earned media —though it’s rarely a one-to-one exchange. According to the SoDA Report, a dollar or euro lost from TV and print budgets becomes 20 cents of digital.

While only 22% of client marketers are forecasting increases in traditional media spends in 2012, 50% projected an increase in paid digital media and two thirds say they expect to increase earned digital media efforts this year.

How do their answers align with what you’re doing at your place?

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