According to Forrester’s Social Technographics Ladder only about 24% of people using social are “Creators”. Social media marketing conversationalists creators Forrester joiners lurkers social graph social media spectatorsThese are the people who blog, publish content such as video or audio they’ve created. One rung down on the ladder we find the “Conversationalists” who update social site status and tweet. By far the two largest groups are more about consuming than they are about creating content. MORE >>

T his week, leading sales enablement professionals met to share issues, best practices and success stories at the Forrester Sales Enablement Forum. Forrester analysts like Scott Santucci presented the latest research on selling effectiveness, and there were three important findings that I think will have profound implications on your sales / marketing strategies for 2013: 80% - that’s the percentage of marketing leads, on average, which fail to advance through the sales process. Status-Quo Bias Sales Enablement Forrester Pisello Alinean Value Selling Outcome-Based Selling MORE >>

Forrester’s latest research “ B2B Sales and Marketing Alignment Starts with the Customer ” confirms the dysfunctional and damaging gap that still exists between sales and marketing in the vast majority of B2B organisations. According to Forrester’s survey, the top 3 excuses for failing to achieve alignment were given as: “Marketing thinks long-term, sales thinks short-term”. Forrester and SiriusDecisions aren’t the only organisations to highlight the need for alignment – it’s been a consistent theme in the research by CSO Insights and many others. Bob Apollo. MORE >>

Jeff Ernst, Principal Analyst, Forrester Research. B2B marketers are doing a poor job with demand- and lead-generation programs, according to a new study from Forrester Research. B2B Demand Generation | Companies are struggling with demand generation today. From BtoB Magazine Marketers Lagging in Demand Generation. “I find it sad how badly most companies are doing in B2B demand generation today. Instead of complaining about the poor economy, if more invested in quality demand generation programs, they’d put up vastly better results.&# Cambridge, Mass.— MORE >>

Forrester Research has recently released a study, “ Benchmark Your Interactive Marketing Maturity “, that aims to give you some metrics to figure out whether you are putting your money on the right marketing tactics. According to Forrester, you should take a look at the following: Annual interactive marketing budget : this involves branching out from the pure email marketing tactic and looking at mobile, tablets, and the like. It’s worth trying out: Forrester Benchmarking Tool. Five Benchmarks. Comparing Your Numbers. ” don’t despair. MORE >>