Industrial Marketing Today

JULY 7, 2011

Websites of most industrial distributors follow the same basic format – the focus is on their product line card. You will find little evidence of best practices in content marketing – relevant, valuable and compelling content for customers. In other words, the online content is very product-centric. Grainger, Inc.

Enterprise Management 60

Enterprise Management Effectiveness Content Marketing Marketing Management 60

Industrial Marketing Today

SEPTEMBER 21, 2011

I think Jeffrey Zeldman ( @zeldman ), the renowned web designer and blogger, summed up the problem best when he said, “Content precedes design. Make sure online datasheets include ratings, classifications, sizes, operating ranges and material options for all your industrial products.

Marketing Websites 60

Marketing Websites Wiki Content Buying Cycle 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JULY 25, 2011

That’s why I say more power to the manufacturer if it can successfully use a B2C marketing tactic to help its customers select the right industrial product(s) quickly and easily. Applications like online color selectors and parametric part number builders are very popular with architects, engineers and specifiers of industrial products.

Tactics 60

Tactics Online Marketing B2B Thought Leadership Merchandising 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JUNE 11, 2011

What if you could combine the best of both these marketing tactics? On-site search engine optimization (SEO) is much easier to do by adding new posts using long tail keywords and deep linking to specific product pages within your company’s site. A blog is considered the cornerstone of an effective inbound marketing strategy.

Marketing Websites 60

Marketing Websites Ad Building Long Tail Marketing Cross-Selling 60

Industrial Marketing Today

OCTOBER 1, 2012

There are some guidelines and best practices that most professional marketing consultants follow but that doesn’t mean the strategies are cookie cutter plans. It should help you shift the focus from writing about your products and services to how you help your customers solve their challenges.

Paid Search Agency 60

Paid Search Agency Marketing Strategy Marketing & Strategy Work Management 60

Industrial Marketing Today

DECEMBER 1, 2011

It also includes downloadable whitepapers, eBooks, product datasheets, application notes, technical articles, how-to and best practices guides, FAQs, videos, webinars, podcasts, presentation slides, blog posts and content for use in social media. Myth: Our customers are only interested in product specs and datasheets.

SIC 60

SIC Peer-to-peer Buying Cycle Copywriting 60

Industrial Marketing Today

APRIL 14, 2012

I owe a big debt of gratitude to the late, great Steve Jobs and his innovative products. I learned my business in the early years by doing production work for other ad agencies and printers around town. If you think Apple charges a premium for its iPhones and iPads today, think again. Wow, we have all come a long way since then!

Paid Search Agency 60

Paid Search Agency Work Management Marketing Management Companies 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JUNE 22, 2011

Visitors who sign up to download your white papers, eBooks and other free content definitely grow your list of contacts but calling them leads without taking the next step is premature at best if not a costly mistake. Sales knows best about demographics and marketing has insights into visitor engagement through web analytics.

Sales Qualified Leads 60

Sales Qualified Leads Lead Scoring Lead Ranking Top of Funnel 60

Industrial Marketing Today

NOVEMBER 28, 2010

Often these are related to the company’s applications, solutions and/or or product names. SEO best practices say that you should optimize one web page for one keyword and optimize as many pages of your website as possible for different but related keywords. Mistake #2: Attempting to optimize the Home page for all the keywords.

Optimization 60

Optimization SEO Marketing Websites Keywords 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JUNE 12, 2010

You are not alone, most business purchases, especially industrial products don’t lend themselves to a simple Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price (MSRP). This was second only to downloading product data sheets. Have you struggled to answer that question?

Sales Management 60

Sales Management Pricing Price Marketing Websites 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JANUARY 14, 2011

Nobody cares about your products and services (except you)” was the title of a blog post written by David Meerman Scott (Author of the wildly successful book The New Rules of Marketing & PR and his new book Real-Time Marketing & PR ) back in 2008. There is a big difference between knowing and doing.

Content Marketing 60

Content Marketing High Quality Lead Planning BtoB 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JULY 20, 2010

Fiberglass absorbed sound the best but wouldn’t be safe. The answer lies in shifting from traditional company product marketing to customer problem oriented marketing. We need to develop customer-centric solutions-based marketing content instead of product-centric features and benefits marketing collateral.

Creativity 60

Creativity B2B Marketing Lead Ranking Lead Scoring 60

Industrial Marketing Today

NOVEMBER 14, 2010

Setting aside emotions, the key takeaway is and I’m quoting Pragmatic Marketing here, “Ideally, you should use architecture to free yourself from the technical and refocus on how the product solves problems for buyers. Or as Adele would say, “Got a great product? Now that’s a[n] architecture I can believe! Get over it.&#

Advertising Agencies 60

Advertising Agencies Paid Search Agency Work Management CMO 60

Industrial Marketing Today

MARCH 23, 2012

Even the best marketing efforts are for naught if the website is not optimized (in terms of performance and design) to communicate the “offer” and trigger a “response.”. Your industrial website must be a true reflection of your company, its products and services. Pick their brains for what they know and are hearing from your customers.

Marketing Websites 60

Marketing Websites Marketing Budget Creation Budget Programs Marketing Proposals 60

Industrial Marketing Today

MARCH 1, 2011

Most of the lead nurturing best practices guides and articles that I’ve read are from a marketing perspective. Salespeople mail out marketing brochures and product datasheets in an effort to maintain a relationship. Plenty has been written about the importance of lead nurturing in B2B and industrial marketing.

Lead Nurturing 60

Lead Nurturing Cold Calling Leads Lead 60

Industrial Marketing Today

AUGUST 20, 2010

For example, segment your products and services by application and/or industry. Give them hardcore specifications typically found in product spec sheets. The first thing an engineer wants to know is do your products, parts and components meet his/her design specifications and standards?

Web 2.0 60

Web 2.0 Planning Buying Cycle Lead Scoring 60

Industrial Marketing Today

OCTOBER 2, 2010

Email strategy: Milwaukee Tool worked with email service provider (ESP) ExactTarget in developing an aggressive email campaign containing links to product videos. webinars website design White Paper Marketing whitepapers YouTube Marketing Matters Marketing Matters is our monthly e-newsletter on best practices in industrial and B2B marketing.

Email Marketing 60

Email Marketing Planning Web 2.0 BtoB 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JULY 14, 2010

In his post, Manifesto For The Content Curator: The Next Big Social Media Job Of The Future, he defines a content curator as “someone who continually finds, groups, organizes and shares the best and most relevant content on a specific issue online.” Rohit may be the first person to have coined the term “content curator.”

Curation 60

Curation RSS Web 2.0 Content Marketing 60

Industrial Marketing Today

SEPTEMBER 3, 2010

She defines it as “Contagious content must educate them [prospects and customers] about what they need to know, apply your company’s unique expertise in addition to your product and prove you walk your talk through the sharing of evidence. Are your company, products and services visible in various online channels used across the stages?

Buying Cycle 60

Buying Cycle Buy Marketing Budget Web 2.0 60

Industrial Marketing Today

MAY 18, 2010

Here are the top ten business clichés from Seth’s list: Win-win situation Thinking outside of the box Giving 110% Best Practices Synergy Paradigm Shift At the end of the day,… Low-hanging fruit Going forward Push the envelope I couldn’t tell how old this lens was but the original ten has grown to 384 as of the date of this post. . –

B2B Marketing 60

B2B Marketing Web 2.0 Planning Demand Generation Agencies 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JULY 9, 2010

Let’s get one thing straight from the get go, if you are in a declining market with low demand for your products and services, no amount of automation will help you generate new leads. As with any Process, the best way to design one is to follow the path of Continuous Process Improvements: Think, Plan, Do, Measure and Repeat.

Marketing Automation Services 60

Marketing Automation Services Lead Ranking Marketing Qualified Leads Marketing Automation 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JUNE 3, 2010

Learn to connect the dots – many times product managers and engineers have very deep knowledge about their products and the problems they can solve. Be a ruthless editor – business owners and product developers are passionate about their offerings. This will also lower the client’s fear of “you just don’t get it.”

Marketing Websites 60

Marketing Websites Web 2.0 Work Management Buying Cycle 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JUNE 29, 2010

That’s a shame and here’s why — among the top ten in Interbrand’s Best Global Brands 2009 , IBM was listed at #2, Microsoft, GE and Intel at number 3, 4 and 9 respectively. Too often, marketers create new educational content based on internal triggers, such as a new product launch or the adoption of a new marketing strategy.

Relevance 60

Relevance B2B Marketing Web 2.0 Brand Identity 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JUNE 8, 2010

You are well aware of the fact that the Internet has completely and permanently changed the way industrial buyers purchase technical products and services. Let’s say your business offers a software product designed to help business owners efficiently allocate revenue to related expenses to ultimately reduce costs.

Buying Cycle 60

Buying Cycle Buy Work Management Marketing Management 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JUNE 15, 2010

Success story #2: Developer of software suite for the upstream oil & gas industry The client’s old corporate website was designed by us to put a sharper focus on their target audience of reservoir and production engineers, operations personnel and upper management in oil and gas production companies.

CMS Development 60

CMS Development Marketing Websites Work Management Web 2.0 60

Industrial Marketing Today

MAY 26, 2010

But not easy to execute because there usually is a disconnect between what your prospect wants to hear and what you want to say about your company and its products and services. Sounds simple, right? In short, this is good, practical and actionable stuff and not some marketing theory.

Buying Cycle 60

Buying Cycle Buy Web 2.0 Allocation 60

Industrial Marketing Today

NOVEMBER 16, 2009

Of course, you don’t have to copy word for word any of the examples from above, you are the only one who can decide which approach works best for your product, service or list. You’ll receive your first issue immediately even if it is 2:00AM on a weekend.

Email Marketing 60

Email Marketing Web 2.0 Planning Opt-in 60

Industrial Marketing Today

MAY 11, 2010

IMO, content is still the king in B2B lead generation, sales and marketing need to agree on a unified lead definition and figure out how best to use relevant content in driving sales. .&# Wait a minute, isn’t that what Content or Inbound marketing is all about? This white paper aims to change that perception of them.

Sales Cycle 60

Sales Cycle Lead Ranking Marketing Qualified Leads B2B Sales 60

Industrial Marketing Today

APRIL 22, 2010

Because it is the mega-distributors that dictate terms and reduce the value of the manufacture’s innovations into commodity products. webinars website design White Paper Marketing whitepapers YouTube Marketing Matters Marketing Matters is our monthly e-newsletter on best practices in industrial and B2B marketing.

Distribution 60

Distribution Web 2.0 Lead Ranking Privacy Policies 60

Industrial Marketing Today

AUGUST 24, 2009

Don’t be afraid to tear apart your initial outline if you think it will improve the product. webinars website design White Paper Marketing whitepapers YouTube Marketing Matters Marketing Matters is our monthly e-newsletter on best practices in industrial and B2B marketing. I realize the above 5Rs may seem a bit daunting at first.

Web 2.0 60

Web 2.0 Copywriting Content Buying Cycle 60

Industrial Marketing Today

MAY 3, 2010

Are you pre-selling a product or service? Write about what matters to your readers: You are passionate about your company and want to write everything about its products and services. Make a plan: Even before you start writing content and posting, you need to have a clear set of goals. What do you want the post to do for your company?

Business Blogging 60

Business Blogging Web 2.0 Long Tail Marketing Business 60

Industrial Marketing Today

AUGUST 3, 2010

However, it is not so simple to measure customer engagement in situations with long sales cycles that’s commonplace with manufacturers, sellers of technical products and B2B consultative solution providers. For an eCommerce site that is easy, it is typically the value of transaction per visit.

B2B 60

B2B Marketing Analytics Tools Web 2.0 Buying Cycle 60

Industrial Marketing Today

SEPTEMBER 27, 2010

Steve Woods said it best when he wrote in his blog post , “As the emphasis on face-to-face interaction as a way to build trust decreases in lieu of other ways of building trust, the need to be “in the field” also decreases.” If nothing else, it makes the mobile sales force much much more productive.

Social Media 60

Social Media Social Marketing Media Planning 60

Industrial Marketing Today

OCTOBER 26, 2009

That’s why your Home page may not always be the best entry point. Use a free tool like Google’s Keyword Tool to find search terms and long-tail keywords that people are using to search for information related to your products and services. That level of pre-qualifying is best left for the lead scoring stage.

Traffic 60

Traffic Lead Scoring Lead Ranking Top of Funnel 60

Industrial Marketing Today

MARCH 11, 2011

The plant engineer/maintenance manager – the end-user, his biggest WIFM is “Will your product make my job more difficult?” Your reengineered content provides: An online product configurator for finding the right flowmeter quickly and easily using the parameters given to him by the process design engineer.

Relevance 60

Relevance Terms and Conditions Buying Cycle Content 60

Industrial Marketing Today

JULY 1, 2010

Buyers of technical products and services do look to vendors for providing relevant information for solving their problems. Even though B2B customers consider product features and price very important, what they are really looking for is a remarkable sales experience.

Marketing Automation Services 60

Marketing Automation Services Web 2.0 B2B Lead Ranking 60

Industrial Marketing Today

NOVEMBER 1, 2010

Indium Corporation is a developer, manufacturer, and supplier of specialty alloys, solder products and solder paste. times increase in registration of community members; double-digit growth in paid subscriptions for their SaaS product RapidResponse and a BtoB Social Media Awards 2010 winner. Exhibit #2: Indium Corporation Blogs.

Business Blogging 60

Business Blogging Enterprise Management Paid Search Agency ROI 60