Chris Koch

OCTOBER 7, 2011

They hold back because they know that they need the full support, commitment, and participation of the business in social media. The business case doesn’t exist for social media; but it does for idea marketing. We need a lead management process to act as a place to bring people from social media. 30% said yes.

Social Media 100

Social Media B2B Thought Leadership Media Peer-to-peer 100

Chris Koch

SEPTEMBER 24, 2010

From what I can tell, the internet didn’t disrupt the basic model for the sales enablement process; it just moved much of it online. Who should own the process? Don’t worry, I’m not going to say, “and then everything changed,” because it didn’t. Salespeople remained dependent on marketers for information. Tweet This Post.

Peer-to-peer 100

Peer-to-peer Wiki Marketing Management Internet Marketing 100

Chris Koch

MAY 15, 2012

As buyers do more searching, they are stretching the buying process earlier and earlier, to the point where they may not have a specific product or service in mind when they search. They are looking for inspiration and guidance on the business problems they face. What does online search have to do with selling?

FAQ 100

FAQ Custom Publishing B2B Sales Work Management 100

Chris Koch

OCTOBER 6, 2009

One of the great trends were seeing at ITSMA is increased automation of the lead process. But this trend has an unintended side effect: it exposes our content development processes (or lack thereof). That metric is going to be critically important as we automate the lead process because nurturing is marketing’s special sauce.

B2B Thought Leadership 100

B2B Thought Leadership Planning Thought Leadership Paid Search Agency 100

Chris Koch

OCTOBER 6, 2009

One of the great trends were seeing at ITSMA is increased automation of the lead process. But this trend has an unintended side effect: it exposes our content development processes (or lack thereof). That metric is going to be critically important as we automate the lead process because nurturing is marketing’s special sauce.

Planning 100

Planning B2B Thought Leadership Paid Search Agency Thought Leadership 100

Chris Koch

MARCH 18, 2011

I’m not saying that you should stop measuring consumption; but it’s clear that those kinds of metrics don’t give business people the answers they’re looking for when they ask about the value of marketing. One great way to connect ideas to offerings is to create a business theme—think IBM’s Smarter Planet or Cognizant’s Future of Work.

Work Management 100

Work Management Thought Leadership Marketing Management Paper 100

Chris Koch

JULY 31, 2009

Both marketing and sales should work together to reduce CPOD because that’s what really matters in terms of marketing’s contribution to the business. It’s time to measure sales and marketing together in that process. Marketing and sales are both part of the same process: raising revenue. Create a unified lead process.

B2B Thought Leadership 100

B2B Thought Leadership Paid Search Agency Work Management B2B Sales 100

Chris Koch

JULY 31, 2009

Both marketing and sales should work together to reduce CPOD because that’s what really matters in terms of marketing’s contribution to the business. It’s time to measure sales and marketing together in that process. Marketing and sales are both part of the same process: raising revenue. Create a unified lead process.

B2B Thought Leadership 100

B2B Thought Leadership Paid Search Agency Work Management B2B Sales 100

Chris Koch

JANUARY 15, 2010

Assuming CIOs would be willing to accept the pay cut, and smart and determined as they are, I’m certain that few have the talent for or interest in the publishing process. Today, more salespeople are able to have business and strategy discussions with customers and take the time to listen to their needs. What am I paying for?

Social Media 100

Social Media Work Management Marketing Management Marketing Automation Services 100

Chris Koch

JANUARY 8, 2010

Not in our businesses, though. Companies that made commodity products would tell me with straight faces that even their financial processes were unique—GAAP be damned—and that they needed to customize their software to fit “our ways of doing things.” Every buyer wants to learn at all stages of the buying process.

Social Media 100

Social Media B2B Thought Leadership Thought Leadership Media 100

Chris Koch

NOVEMBER 5, 2010

The process is incredibly expensive and inefficient. The process of getting subject matter experts placed in publications or other third-party content channels is awful for everyone involved. The entire process was focused on trying to use me and my publication for corporate messaging—as though that’s what my readers wanted.

PR 100

PR Press Paid Search Agency Lead Ranking 100

Chris Koch

AUGUST 7, 2009

When I covered CIOs for 13 years at CIO Magazine, I found that it was very difficult to generalize about the profession, beyond a handful of universal problems such as alignment with the business and the complexities and the voracious needs of the IT infrastructure. Business Strategist. And that has big implications for marketers.

Planning 100

Planning Segmentation Work Management Gartner 100

Chris Koch

AUGUST 7, 2009

When I covered CIOs for 13 years at CIO Magazine, I found that it was very difficult to generalize about the profession, beyond a handful of universal problems such as alignment with the business and the complexities and the voracious needs of the IT infrastructure. Business Strategist. And that has big implications for marketers.

Planning 100

Planning Segmentation Work Management Gartner 100

Chris Koch

OCTOBER 22, 2010

And that is a huge change in the buying process. ITSMA’s annual survey of IT buyers found that this year, for the first time, a majority of buyers in the US—and 75% when you include other countries—are using social media in the purchasing process—especially the younger ones. Buyers are removing salespeople from the buying process.

Lead Management 100

Lead Management Marketing Management Automation Marketing Automation Services 100

Chris Koch

MAY 14, 2010

We’re seeing companies use social media to bring customers into the product and service development processes to collaborate on new ideas and improvements. That means that marketers need to integrate social media with the larger marketing and business strategies. Our subject matter experts (SMEs) are talking to customers.

Organic Leads 100

Organic Leads Social Media Social Marketing Organization 100

Chris Koch

JANUARY 29, 2010

Just as the web has gutted the business model of publishing it has also reduced the price of marketing content. It has also changed the scope of our content process, as Jon Miller points out here. Thinking about a pricing model for content also helps us target our content to the specific segments of the buying process.

Lead Ranking 100

Lead Ranking Lead Scoring B2B Thought Leadership Mobile Advertising 100

Chris Koch

JANUARY 29, 2010

Just as the web has gutted the business model of publishing it has also reduced the price of marketing content. It has also changed the scope of our content process, as Jon Miller points out here. Thinking about a pricing model for content also helps us target our content to the specific segments of the buying process.

Lead Ranking 100

Lead Ranking Lead Scoring B2B Thought Leadership Mobile Advertising 100

Chris Koch

SEPTEMBER 11, 2009

Of course, devising those incentives, putting them in place, and driving the cultural change necessary to make them stick is a maddeningly complex process that helps keep consultants and academics in business. Information. This is the one that’s actually within marketers’ control.

Marketing Automation Services 100

Marketing Automation Services B2B Sales Consulting Marketing Automation 100

Chris Koch

APRIL 10, 2009

Thought leadership marketing is based on the academic research publishing model, in which academics created journals built around a peer review process. The most famous business incarnation of this model is the Harvard Business Review, which began publishing in 1922. Why did companies start focusing on it?

Thought Leadership 100

Thought Leadership B2B Thought Leadership Peer-to-peer Work Management 100

Chris Koch

JANUARY 21, 2011

At ITSMA , we’ve been busy preparing for our annual State of the Marketing Profession briefing next Tuesday. What this means for marketers is that social media have increased buyers’ expectations for intimacy at all stages of the buying process. We have built intimacy into the later stages of the buying process.

Social Media 100

Social Media Budget Programs Paper Stats 100

Chris Koch

MARCH 26, 2010

If you’re in tune with your SMEs, then what interests you should interest them (at least from a business perspective—no need to go nuts and take up golf). It will improve the quality of their posts and it will also help you keep them focused on the issues that matter most to your business. Get ideas from customers. Tweet This Post.

B2B Thought Leadership 100

B2B Thought Leadership RSS Enterprise Management Thought Leadership 100

Chris Koch

SEPTEMBER 11, 2009

Of course, devising those incentives, putting them in place, and driving the cultural change necessary to make them stick is a maddeningly complex process that helps keep consultants and academics in business. Information. This is the one that’s actually within marketers’ control. Tweet This Post.

Marketing Automation Services 100

Marketing Automation Services Consulting B2B Sales Paid Search Agency 100

Chris Koch

JULY 10, 2009

In the epiphany stage of the buying process, we should be offering people great information, not turning them off by trying to sleaze information out of them when they’re nowhere near being ready to buy. If prospects downloaded it, we can assume they were checking if their building or business is within Level 3’s fiber network.

Web 2.0 100

Web 2.0 B2B Thought Leadership Ideal Customer Profiles Thought Leadership 100

Chris Koch

DECEMBER 10, 2012

For customers in this realm, I think utility has long meant access to their peers and to expert advice during the purchasing and post-sales processes. I am concerned about the B2B side of things, though, for complex technology solutions in particular.

Peer-to-peer 100

Peer-to-peer B2B Social Media Mobile Marketing 100

Chris Koch

FEBRUARY 11, 2011

Most companies do not yet have closed-loop lead management processes supported by systems, for example. We need to use analytics to quantify and manage how fast we move prospects through the buying process and to increase loyalty and trust after they’ve bought from us. So we need some important systems installed in the short-term.

Analytics 100

Analytics Paid Search Agency Marketing Management Loyalty 100

Chris Koch

JUNE 25, 2009

Social media disrupts marketing structures and processes. Hierarchical structures and linear processes work fine because everything has a timeline and a beginning, middle, and end (launch). Social media is a social—not a business—phenomenon. Marketing and business are joined at the hip.

Social Media 100

Social Media Paid Search Agency Social Marketing B2B Marketing 100

Chris Koch

APRIL 2, 2010

Those two things are built into the process. Tags: Blogging Customer Relationships Social Media B2B marketing Business LinkedIn marketing Subject matter expert Technology Thought Leadership Twitter. (Hey, it was the best thing we came up with at the meeting, so why wouldn’t customers like it, too!?). Related articles by Zemanta.

B2B Thought Leadership 100

B2B Thought Leadership B2B Marketing Marketing Budget Thought Leadership 100

Chris Koch

OCTOBER 30, 2009

We found that usage of social media among IT and business buyers of technology rose 50% over last year and finally pushed to majority status—55% said they use social media as part of the technology buying process in 2009 versus just 37% in 2008. Sounds like a business case for investment to me.

Social Media 100

Social Media Peer-to-peer Enterprise Management Media 100

Chris Koch

MAY 21, 2010

Facebook has built its business model around gathering as much personal information about us as possible. There’s would be joy in Twitterville this week if it didn’t seem that the founders of Twitter have none of the ego and contempt for competitors that most businesses seem to have. (Of What do you think? Tweet This Post.

Privacy 100

Privacy B2B Marketing Lead Ranking B2B 100

Chris Koch

MAY 20, 2011

Marketers need to facilitate a process for internal development of ideas and for external feedback. Marketers need to help create that culture in the company by facilitating the idea process. Create an idea network as the basis for social media. When ideas are an expectation, social media participation is easier.

Social Media 100

Social Media B2B Thought Leadership Media Thought Leadership 100

Chris Koch

NOVEMBER 7, 2012

I agree (journalism’s future will be determined by its ability to create a business model that pays better than the current one: giving away content for free and charging way too little for ads), but I think he missed the more important disruptive power that platforms like BrandVoice really do have: to disintermediate traditional marketing.

Disintermediation 100

Disintermediation B2B Marketing Marketing Management Paid Search Agency 100

Chris Koch

SEPTEMBER 17, 2010

Most CIOs wouldn’t mind being green, but their businesses evaluate them on cost and efficiency. We’re building the publishing engines in our marketing groups, but I think we’re leaving this larger issue of themes and marketing by association out of the process. What do you think? Tweet This Post.

Thought Leadership 100

Thought Leadership B2B Thought Leadership Advertising Agencies Paid Search Agency 100

Chris Koch

MARCH 25, 2011

This process is usually facilitated by marketing. Can you start to see that by creating these idea development processes, it becomes much easier for companies to engage in social media conversations that will impress customers and influencers? The winning ideas are implemented. Make it competitive. Make it visible. What do you think?

Social Media 100

Social Media Organization Peer-to-peer SME 100

Chris Koch

MARCH 12, 2010

Rooted in Michael Porter’s timeless work in business strategy, Treacy and Wiersema took it a step further with their three “value disciplines.”. There has been no revolution—no breakthrough in process or practice to raise all boats. The theory is that every company competes in three disciplines: Customer intimacy. Tweet This Post.

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Thought Leadership Work Management 100

Chris Koch

SEPTEMBER 25, 2009

One client summed it up by saying that there are two points of resistance in the process of bringing new things to market. The first comes at the beginning of the process—the “why” battle—where everyone takes pot shots at the new idea. That’s why the research process needs to be iterative. Talk to the right people first.

Research 100

Research Service Product Paid Search Agency 100

Chris Koch

SEPTEMBER 25, 2009

One client summed it up by saying that there are two points of resistance in the process of bringing new things to market. The first comes at the beginning of the process—the “why” battle—where everyone takes pot shots at the new idea. That’s why the research process needs to be iterative. Talk to the right people first.

Research 100

Research Service Product Paid Search Agency 100

Chris Koch

DECEMBER 18, 2009

Social media seems better suited to B2C, with its larger scale and simpler buying process. B2B customers tend to be high on the executive ladder and are usually reluctant to discuss their business strategies in public forums. With good reason. Developing these new skills and ways of thinking takes time. What do you think?

Social Media 100

Social Media Peer-to-peer Social Marketing B2B Marketing 100