Digital B2B Marketing

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

'Marketers are looking for a way to get attention, to get their message across and ultimately to get an advantage over their competitors. Marketing has become a bad word to many. As a marketer you may even cringe in certain settings when you are asked what you do. Unfortunately, you know the feelings toward marketing is sometimes justified. Even some of the best brands fall for the worst marketing tactics at times.

Rules 100

Rules Paid Search Agency Banners Barriers 100

Digital B2B Marketing

FEBRUARY 17, 2014

'“We will start with an awareness efforts for the four weeks. This will provide air cover and soften the market for our demand generation campaign.” Theory, benchmarks and the wisdom of the marketing crowd would indicate that you have a sound strategy. This approach is common in B2B marketing, particularly for mid-sized marketers. Unfortunately, when you dig into it, the strategy doesn’t hold water.

Advertisements 100

Advertisements Advertising Brand Identity Branding 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JANUARY 22, 2014

'What happens when you survey 50 media buyers? You learn that media buyers have put a bit of social lipstick on their buys but they still don’t understand the potential of social media, the importance of content, and so much more. About two weeks ago, two equity research analysts at Cowen & Co surveyed 50 ad buyers. 60% said Facebook delivers the best ROI, 25% picked LinkedIn and just 5% chose Twitter.

Paid Search Agency 100

Paid Search Agency Ads Advertising Agencies Ad Exchange 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JANUARY 20, 2014

'For all of the discussion of data in marketing, and Big Data in 2014, most B2B marketers are showing they are inept when it comes to actually using data to improve the majority of their marketing. Yes, B2B marketers are doing a few things well when it comes to using data: B2B marketers are increasingly adopting marketing automation and using past behavior to deliver more relevant content.

Reachforce 100

Reachforce B2B Marketing DemandBase Planning 100

Digital B2B Marketing

DECEMBER 3, 2013

'“Paid search is slowly failing B2B marketers.” I never expected to say that. For years paid search has been one of the most cost-effective media channels for B2B lead generation. But over the last year, I have seen or heard case after case of B2B marketers struggling to make paid search, and Google AdWords in particular, cost-effective.

Paid Content 100

Paid Content Search Marketing Paid Search Agency Budget Programs 100

Digital B2B Marketing

DECEMBER 2, 2013

'You are easily spending thousands on lead generation media programs each month. You have carefully chosen your partners, negotiated an effective cost per lead and are diligently measuring your results. But you are still leaving money on the table. You can increase the value you get by changing how you run each of your programs. From content to process to branding, here are five steps you can take to improve the results from your publisher lead generation programs. 1.

Lead Generation 100

Lead Generation Budget Programs Lead Scoring Lead Ranking 100

Digital B2B Marketing

NOVEMBER 21, 2013

'B2B marketers are undervaluing Twitter’s contribution to their business. That’s hard to believe at a time when many B2B marketers are glomming on to Twitter like it’s the last shiny object opportunity they will ever have (even turning to spamming ), but it’s true. It is happening because web analytics packages are dramatically underreporting traffic from Twitter.

Twitter 100

Twitter Marketing Analytics Tools Social Networks Social Media 100

Digital B2B Marketing

NOVEMBER 19, 2013

'Enterprise B2B marketers face a conundrum. Businesses needs to drive growth and lead generation is a key way the business expects marketing to contribute. However, sales cycles are long. It can take months, even years, before marketing is able to prove the value of lead generation efforts with revenue. And you can’t afford to wait that long to optimize your investment and show results.

Lead Generation 100

Lead Generation Sales Qualified Leads Lead Scoring Lead Ranking 100

Digital B2B Marketing

NOVEMBER 14, 2013

'You observe. You learn. You study. You make your plan. And your backup plan. And you move forward. There’s just one complication: everything else continues to change. Those changes will impact you. Your competitors went through a similar planning process. The economy rolls on, changing (or stagnating). People around you set their own plans into motion.

Planning 100

Planning Course Twitter Studies 100

Digital B2B Marketing

NOVEMBER 12, 2013

'Need leads? It will cost you. Between $35 and $65 per registration according to statistics recently published by Madison Logic. And that is if you are just targeting a broad function, like “marketing” or “technology.” Do you want a specific industry? Level of seniority? Geography? The more targeting you need, the more expensive those leads become.

Lead Generation 100

Lead Generation Generation Leads Lead 100

Digital B2B Marketing

NOVEMBER 7, 2013

'Collecting followers is so last decade. It is easy to make arguments against simply trying to build up your following count and the tactics that are often used: Purchased followers aren’t real. Fake follower sites can reportedly tell if you followers are real or fakes and fakes are a sign that you have been buying followers. Mass following is frowned on by Twitter and if carefully managed, your follower ratio eventually makes you look like a spammer.

Twitter 100

Twitter Reachforce Demand Generation Agencies B2B Marketing 100

Digital B2B Marketing

NOVEMBER 5, 2013

'The biggest problem in B2B content marketing is that it requires content. Somehow, this most obvious of truths has become the thorn in the side of B2B marketing (and the inspiration for 1,000s of pieces of content). So what if you could be a content marketer without actually creating content? Hallelujah! All your problems are solved! Enter curation, the glittering solution for today’s content marketers.

Curation 100

Curation Content Differentiation Twitter 100

Digital B2B Marketing

OCTOBER 29, 2013

'If you torture the data long enough, it will confess to anything. One of the challenges with relying on research, particularly research companies use in their own marketing, is that the statistics used have been tortured. When you see a sales pitch full of statistics, how do you differentiate the real story from the spin? Short of dismissing all of the data presented (a good idea, but not realistic for most of us), these five methods will be a good starting point. 1.

Statistics 100

Statistics Banner Ads Stats Sample 100

Digital B2B Marketing

OCTOBER 15, 2013

'Forrester recently released a report pointing out the failure of most content marketers to plan for adequate content distribution. And they’re right. Marketers are slaving over content today, but almost no one sees that content. Optimizing your content for search and distributing it through your own social and email channels is just the starting place.

Paid Content 100

Paid Content Distribution Advertising Agencies B2B Marketing 100

Digital B2B Marketing

OCTOBER 1, 2013

'We like to measure ourselves against something. We want to know that we are doing good work. Is my my email click rate good? Is my search conversion rate where it should be? Is my brand lift above average? Ummm, but what are you comparing yourself too? A number in some book or website, based on the results of businesses nothing like yours? Stop. Now.

Advertising Benchmark 100

Advertising Benchmark Click Rate Sample Statistics 100

Digital B2B Marketing

SEPTEMBER 24, 2013

'Google just made two major announcements. Long-term, these could change the face of online marketing and advertising for almost every company. But before we look at how they are related, two background points are key. 1. When it comes to online advertising revenue, no one is bigger than Google. Not even Facebook comes close. 2. Online advertising companies that use big data in advertising are today’s market darlings.

Advertising Agencies 100

Advertising Agencies Advertisements Advertising Mobile Advertising 100

Digital B2B Marketing

SEPTEMBER 19, 2013

'Native advertising, and more specifically native content publishing, is hot. Nearly every major publisher already has a program or is working on one. It shouldn’t be a surprise, as marketers increasingly turn to content, publishers need to offer solutions to promote and distribute that content. For B2B marketers, the Forbes BrandVoice program is one of the original and most established programs.

Advertisements 100

Advertisements Advertising Research Distribution 100

Digital B2B Marketing

AUGUST 13, 2013

'Are you ready to be an agile marketer? Are you ready to respond to a reality that is changing, in unexpected ways, around you? I’ve had a recent (and continuing) personal lesson in agility. We just sold our house. It wasn’t on the market, and frankly, we didn’t think it would close. In short, we were not ready. Now, we need a place to live.

Planning 100

Planning Marketing & Strategy Marketing Network Marketing 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JULY 31, 2013

'According to Nielson , smartphone users spend 87% of their time with apps, and just 13% of time with the mobile web. Last quarter, 41% of Facebook’s revenue came from their mobile user base. What are you waiting for, you need a mobile app. Right now. STOP. You are asking the wrong question. As marketers, collectively, our perspective on mobile apps versus mobile web has had the wrong focus.

Mobile Marketing 100

Mobile Marketing Banner Ads Paid Search Agency Banners 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JULY 25, 2013

'Today’s marketing simply wouldn’t exist without marketing technology. From marketing automation to demand side platforms to content management systems, technology puts the right message in front of the right person at the right time. Or at least that’s how it is supposed to happen. You no longer create your marketing communications.

Eloqua 100

Eloqua Auto Responder Banners Marketo 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JULY 23, 2013

'What is a good ROI on marketing? If you can increase net income by 50 cents for every dollar spent on marketing, that’s good, right? The more you spend, the more money you make. But what if you learned your primary competitor was getting $1.50 in income for every dollar spent on marketing? 3x the return you are getting on marketing! All of a sudden your marketing looks pretty ineffective!

ROI 100

ROI Advertising Agencies Telemarketing Planning 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JULY 17, 2013

'Over time, your role in marketing begins to permeate every part of your life. You adopt behavior, language or perspective that is completely natural to you, but doesn’t make sense to anyone around you. Just maybe, that means it is time to take a break. If more than a handful of these describe you, it is time to get to know, again, what the world beyond your marketing bubble is like.

Planning 100

Planning Banner Ads Banners Ad Exchange 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JULY 11, 2013

'When the success of your business is less important than the success of your marketing, something is seriously wrong. Yet this is exactly how most B2B marketers approach lead generation today! You don’t care about the number of leads your sales team has. Instead you care about the number of marketing sourced leads. We all know B2B marketing measurement is imperfect, yet we momentarily suspend all reservations in order to judge our effectiveness based on results attributed to our efforts i

Lead Generation 100

Lead Generation Lead Scoring Lead Ranking Generation 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JULY 9, 2013

'Have you ever clicked on a promising headline and then been horribly disappointed by the results? Have you then been amazed at the number of social media shares you continue to see of that same thing post? I know I have. Those writers have discovered the foolproof formula for creating killer content with minimal effort or original thought. Content that consistently delivers results (shares and visits, not people that actually care, that’s not worth the trouble to measure anyways) for your

Content 100

Content Rules Guidelines Social Media 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JULY 1, 2013

'Have you felt like social advertising just wasn’t right for your B2B marketing? If so, LinkedIn’s new Sponsored Updates may just change your mind. This looks like the most compelling social advertising offering yet for B2B marketers. Up until now, advertising on LinkedIn was just advertising. With great targeting options, LinkedIn was compelling, but advertising opportunities didn’t fit the increasingly social framework of LinkedIn.

Cost Per Click 100

Cost Per Click Linkedin Advertisements Advertising 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JUNE 26, 2013

'Despite the capabilities of modern marketing automation platforms, many B2B marketers still approach nurture with a short term mindset. Your primary goal is to increase engagement, raise lead scores and pass a more active “lead” to sales as quickly as possible. The result is often a series of short term “nurture” programs combined with campaign blasts sent sporadically to a huge list of inactive contacts.

Buyer's Journey 100

Buyer's Journey Sales Qualified Leads Blast Campaigns Marketing Automation Services 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JUNE 20, 2013

'I was sitting in a conference hall and everyone around me had a smartphone, tablet (often with a keyboard) or laptop out. The title on a sponsors flyer on the table caught my attention. I really did want to look them up at the break and learn more. But when I looked closer, my only option was a QR code. To use it, I needed to set my laptop aside, pull out my phone, scan the URL, and then use a tiny screen.

Paid Search Agency 100

Paid Search Agency Lead Gen Mobile Marketing Barriers 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JUNE 18, 2013

'There are easy ways to create good content, right? No. Sorry. Creating good content is hard. And it’s getting harder. If you take the content shortcuts that are recommended by so many self-labeled content marketing experts, you will be sorely disappointed in the long run. Here are five common bits of advice you shouldn’t follow. Easy Content Myth 1: Just Post Your Slides On SlideShare!

Content 100

Content Opinions Video Marketing Advertising Agencies 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JUNE 12, 2013

'Congratulations, you are a B2B content marketer. You have created a great industry blog and library of premium content. You promote your content through search, social, emails, newsletters, even banners. You are seeing strong traffic, engagement with your blog content and a steady increase in registrations for your premium content. There’s just one little problem: the leads are crap.

Lead Scoring 100

Lead Scoring Lead Ranking Buyer's Journey Leads 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JUNE 6, 2013

'Joe Fernandez of Klout recently said Klout’s goal is to help every person maximize their individual influence. It is no secret, as a marketer you want to influence purchases. You use advertising, content marketing, PR, and the influencer programs Klout wants to sell, to change perceptions and purchasing behavior. But what would happen if Klout achieved this goal and every person became more influential?

PR 100

PR Network Marketing Social Media Act-On 100

Digital B2B Marketing

JUNE 4, 2013

'You need to generate leads, right? If you are a B2B marketer, particularly one focused on making a complex sale in a large enterprise, the answer is almost certainly a resounding yes. The B2B lead generation landscape has changed tremendously in the last decade. Today, B2B lead generation relies heavily on digital marketing and this list reflects that switch.

Paid Content 100

Paid Content Lead Generation Tactics Paid Search Agency 100

Digital B2B Marketing

APRIL 30, 2013

'“Overall, a 30% increase in positive Tweets is four times more effective in driving sales than a 30% increase in existing above-the-line advertising.” That is an impressive statistic, quoted directly from a Twitter infographic and attributed to a study by Deloitte. With the inclusion of a big name audit and consulting firm doing a study of 100 different game releases, it has all of the marks of credibility.

Twitter 100

Twitter Research Word of Mouth Correlation 100

Digital B2B Marketing

APRIL 25, 2013

'It’s true. When people share too much, we tune them out. We only half-listen, or we just walk away. In social media, we do the same thing. We skim over the update from the chatterboxes , not giving them the same attention as updates from others we see less frequently in our stream. Here is the problem: As an individual building your own personal brand or as a marketer, you have taken the advice to share other people’s content to heart.

RSS 100

RSS Social Media Twitter Traffic 100

Digital B2B Marketing

APRIL 23, 2013

'Picture an old town. There is a town square, a general store, a watering hole or two in the town center and homes scattered beyond. People know each other. More than that, they rely on each other. They gather together in large groups in the town center and in small groups in outlying homes. Now a new family moves to town. They build a specialty store at one end of main street with an apartment above.

Communities 100

Communities Ad Building Twitter Trends 100

Digital B2B Marketing

APRIL 17, 2013

'Advertising is dead (again). The latest killers are the social media and content marketing stars. Not so fast. Marketing is a spectrum. At one end might be the experience someone has using your product or service as you intended. At the other might be a tiny mobile banner or a transit bench on a side street. Advertising isn’t dead. Comparing different parts of the marketing spectrum is like comparing visible light to X-rays; “better” is entirely dependent on your purpose.

Advertisements 100

Advertisements Advertising Mobile Advertising Webcast 100

Digital B2B Marketing

APRIL 11, 2013

'B2B content marketers are hiding behind false excuses for their content marketing challenges. According to Curata’s survey, now nearly a year old, B2B content marketers’ biggest challenges are limited budget (27%), limited staff (25%) and creating enough new content (21%). ( source ). In the Content Marketing Institute’s 2013 benchmarks (released in October 2012, in addition to content they mastered time travel), the top challenges are producing enough content (64%), producing

B2B Marketing 100

B2B Marketing Content Marketing B2B Paid Search Agency 100

Digital B2B Marketing

APRIL 9, 2013

'Banner ads work. Banner ads don’t work. Banner ads are just wallpaper. It doesn’t matter what your opinion is of banner ads, someone out there has a study that will agree with your position. However, as online publishers develop new “higher impact” online ads, recently published results should serve as a warning to both publishers and advertisers:: Don’t allow ads to come between your audience and the content they are looking for.

Ads 100

Ads Banner Ads Banners Effectiveness 100