Chris Koch

FEBRUARY 24, 2010

I’ve been working with my colleagues at ITSMA on another survey on social media for B2B marketers that I hope you’ll take by going here. As we put together the questions, we struggled with the issue of social media strategy. Social media is no silver bullet.

Social Media 100

Social Media Marketing Strategy Marketing & Strategy B2B Thought Leadership 100

Chris Koch

DECEMBER 30, 2009

Who says B2B marketers are lagging in social media? Of the top ten posts on my blog this year, only one did not involve social media. I think the social media phenomenon is the most exciting and important thing to hit communications in my lifetime. The four components of social media management.

Social Media 100

Social Media B2B Thought Leadership Social Marketing B2B Marketing 100

Chris Koch

JUNE 18, 2012

Social media is biased toward English. One of the best aspects of social media is the opportunity to put ideas to the community and gather feedback. Fighting The Good Fight In Social Media (pr.typepad.com). Why do we assume that anyone can channel passion into his or her writing? Related articles.

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Communities Transparency 100

Chris Koch

MAY 14, 2010

Social media creates the need for marketing to lead within the organization. At least that’s the conclusion we reached at ITSMA recently when we did our social media survey (there’s a free summary if you’re interested). We mean that within the organization the leadership of social media is falling to marketing.

Organic Leads 100

Organic Leads Social Media Social Marketing Organization 100

Chris Koch

JANUARY 15, 2010

We needed to hear from marketers who were out there day-to-day listening to CIOs’ problems and aspirations. Back then what marketers had to say was all about their offerings. Marketers and salespeople didn’t have to do much coaxing to get CIOs to buy, so why get complicated? But mostly we were. And why not? And why not?

Social Media 100

Social Media Work Management Marketing Management Marketing Automation Services 100

Chris Koch

MARCH 19, 2010

I’d like to create a guide for how to use social media in B2B that does not involve talking about the specific tools—as least not in the top line. I think it’s important to try to do this if we’re going to get social media integrated with the rest of marketing. Here they are: Monitor. Gather research.

Social Media 100

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

Chris Koch

NOVEMBER 24, 2009

One of the cornerstones of a social media strategy is having a clear set of corporate social media guidelines or policies. The best documents don’t just tell employees what not to do; they also tell them what they should be doing to further the marketing goals of the company. This [Choose. Blog, Space.]

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Guidelines B2B 100

Chris Koch

AUGUST 23, 2011

One writer claims that the attraction of G+ is the opportunity to start over in social networking. The argument is essentially that we’ve screwed up everything in Facebook and G+ is our social media morning after pill. There are only two types of content in social media. Short or long. Twitter killed them all.

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Social Networks B2B Thought Leadership 100

Chris Koch

AUGUST 23, 2011

One writer claims that the attraction of G+ is the opportunity to start over in social networking. The argument is essentially that we’ve screwed up everything in Facebook and G+ is our social media morning after pill. There are only two types of content in social media. Short or long. Twitter killed them all.

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Social Networks B2B Thought Leadership 100

Chris Koch

MARCH 25, 2011

I confirmed something I’ve been hearing in my research on idea marketing over the past month: idea marketing requires a deep commitment not just from marketing but from the entire organization. This process is usually facilitated by marketing. Eric Wittlake makes this point in a blog post this week and I heartily agree.

Social Media 100

Social Media Organization Peer-to-peer SME 100

Chris Koch

MAY 20, 2011

Many marketers involved in social media management tell me that they struggle to get their subject matter experts engaged in social media. Create an idea network as the basis for social media. Marketers need to facilitate a process for internal development of ideas and for external feedback.

Social Media 100

Social Media B2B Thought Leadership Media Thought Leadership 100

Chris Koch

OCTOBER 14, 2011

I’ve also done research asking B2B marketers how they engage and how they educate their employees and SMEs to engage. Here’s my list of what seem like the right things to do on Twitter so that I feel like I’m being a good member of the B2B marketing guild —i.e., I’ve rolled all that up into an approach that I doubt constantly.

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Twitter Social Networks 100

Chris Koch

OCTOBER 14, 2011

I’ve also done research asking B2B marketers how they engage and how they educate their employees and SMEs to engage. Here’s my list of what seem like the right things to do on Twitter so that I feel like I’m being a good member of the B2B marketing guild —i.e., I’ve rolled all that up into an approach that I doubt constantly.

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Twitter Social Networks 100

Chris Koch

MARCH 12, 2010

Social media is raising the bar on customer intimacy. Though it has become a generic term, customer intimacy was first coined by Michael Treacy and Fred Wiersema who worked at CSC/Index back in the 90s when I was a thought leadership marketer there. Social media is making that fact plain. Intimacy through content.

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Thought Leadership Work Management 100

Chris Koch

OCTOBER 12, 2009

We’ve all heard a lot of debate lately about whether social media is an evolution or a revolution. Look at it this way and social media inevitably becomes evolution, as social media researcher Josh Chasin convincingly argues here. How does social media fill that void?

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Paid Search Agency Viral Marketing 100

Chris Koch

FEBRUARY 12, 2010

Social media experts often chide marketers about control. The experts say that in the new era of social media, marketers need to stop delivering tightly-scripted, one-way messages and start engaging in uncontrolled, transparent conversations with customers and prospects wherever those conversations happen.

Social Media 100

Social Media Forrester Media Transparency 100

Chris Koch

JUNE 25, 2010

expresses shock that he turned out to be an extrovert on the Myers-Briggs personality test and wonders if you need to be an extrovert to be in social media. Reading these got me thinking that we probably need to rethink the concepts of introversion and extroversion in social media marketing. Hell yeah! (I

Social Media 100

Social Media Peer-to-peer Media Wikipedia 100

Chris Koch

JUNE 26, 2009

In my last post, I hope I convinced you why you should establish a personal presence in social media even if your company hasn’t done so yet. That was the why of social media. I’m going to attempt to explain it by humbly offering my own initiation into social media as a guide.

Social Media 100

Social Media Social Marketing B2B Marketing Personalization 100

Chris Koch

APRIL 8, 2011

I was thrilled to run a social media workshop this week with a large B2B technology and services provider (and ITSMA member). The great thing about the experience was that this company is already doing social media. This company has established a highly visible presence in social media—indeed, it has won an award for it.

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Paid Search Agency PR 100

Chris Koch

JUNE 15, 2011

Social media (along with skimpy marketing budgets) are causing a transformation in marketing to a degree that we haven’t seen for a lifetime. Think of me as your grief counselor for good ol’ message-based marketing. Another marketing channel on top of my existing workload, with no extra budget or headcount?

Social Media 100

Social Media B2B Thought Leadership Media Wikipedia 100

Chris Koch

FEBRUARY 26, 2010

The number of B2B buyers who are ready to buy as soon as they engage with our marketing is small—and social media will make it even smaller. This is where social media comes in. There is no social media strategy, only marketing strategy (thecustomercollective.com). Tweet This Post.

Social Media 100

Social Media Lead Generation B2B Thought Leadership Generation 100

Chris Koch

NOVEMBER 13, 2009

Despite all the breathless hype about social media these days, what I hear most from B2B marketers is frustration. Most of the marketers I talk to are trying to reach a few top executives in big organizations who make buying decisions about big, complex products and services. If you’re strapped for resources (who isn’t?)

Social Media 100

Social Media Allocation Media Marketing & Strategy 100

Chris Koch

NOVEMBER 13, 2009

Despite all the breathless hype about social media these days, what I hear most from B2B marketers is frustration. Most of the marketers I talk to are trying to reach a few top executives in big organizations who make buying decisions about big, complex products and services. If you’re strapped for resources (who isn’t?)

Social Media 100

Social Media Allocation Media Marketing & Strategy 100

Chris Koch

AUGUST 13, 2010

But we’re in the era of social media now, so there are breadcrumbs in the forest that lead us to a fuller explanation of who Slater is and why he did what he did. Social media fills in the background to the blowup. You can do that on a social media site called Glassdoor. out of 5 rating. What do you think?

Social Media 100

Social Media Media B2B SME 100

Chris Koch

JANUARY 8, 2010

There is too much wringing of hands and gnashing of teeth about social media objectives and strategy these days. We all assume that our organizations are unique and that we must devote great sums of time and money to figuring out what our particular motivation is for social media and how we will carry it out.

Social Media 100

Social Media B2B Thought Leadership Thought Leadership Media 100

Chris Koch

JUNE 25, 2009

To be successful with social media marketing, we are going to have to become social media guinea pigs. Social media will demand involvement that is much more personal. Here are five reasons why you need to get good at this stuff before your company does: Social media is real time.

Social Media 100

Social Media Paid Search Agency Social Marketing B2B Marketing 100

Chris Koch

OCTOBER 30, 2009

We just wrapped up our ITSMA Annual Marketing Conference this week and the strongest current driving the river of conversation was social media. Specifically, frustration over how to use social media to reach the C-suite. In fact, it’s hard for most of us to imagine these people using social media at all.

Social Media 100

Social Media Peer-to-peer Enterprise Management Media 100

Chris Koch

SEPTEMBER 18, 2009

We’ve all been reading a lot about the social media horse race. For marketers trying to figure out where to put their resources into social media marketing, the horse race looks more like a crapshoot. Will it be Facebook or MySpace? Or will it be Twitter by a nose? Permission model.

Social Media 100

Social Media Viral Marketing Tools Media 100

Chris Koch

JANUARY 22, 2010

I wish I could say that social media leads to sales. So when we think about social media ROI, we need to make a leap of faith. To make ourselves feel a little more comfortable with this idea, we may need to categorize social media with something whose hazy ROI we’re more familiar and comfortable with: PR.

Social Media 100

Social Media ROI Lead Ranking RSS 100

Chris Koch

DECEMBER 23, 2009

If you read this blog regularly, you know that I think that monitoring social media is one of four key aspects of a social media engagement strategy. Social media monitoring is a way to figure out what’s being said about your brand and reveals opportunities for engaging in conversations with customers and influencers.

Social Media 100

Social Media Tools Media RSS 100

Chris Koch

SEPTEMBER 18, 2009

We’ve all been reading a lot about the social media horse race. For marketers trying to figure out where to put their resources into social media marketing, the horse race looks more like a crapshoot. Will it be Facebook or MySpace? Or will it be Twitter by a nose? Permission model.

Social Media 100

Social Media Viral Marketing Tools Media 100

Chris Koch

DECEMBER 29, 2009

Even if we believe deeply in the power of social media, we all have that gnawing feeling deep in our guts that says that there’s little reason for a busy, intelligent person to want to receive frequent updates about our brands when those brands produce complex services and products with two-year sales cycles. The answer is we don’t.

Enterprise Management 100

Enterprise Management B2B Marketing B2B Thought Leadership Marketing Management 100

Chris Koch

APRIL 3, 2014

The franchise leadership also invested in marketing not just Man U but football itself as the true global sport. Research by my colleague Rob O’Regan has found that hanging onto the kind of global popularity enjoyed by Man U requires focusing on four key channels: Social media. Premier League sports marketing'

Planning 100

Planning Paid Search Agency Work Management Marketing & Strategy 100

Chris Koch

MAY 27, 2010

You should check it out; it’ll give you a great list of B2B marketers to follow. I met two of my favorite B2B bloggers at the event: Christine Kerley (AKA @ cksays ) who writes CK’s Blog and Jeff Cohen (@ jeffreylcohen ) who, along with Kipp Bodnar writes the Social Media B2B blog. Cohen on Vimeo. Tweet This Post.

Mobile Marketing 100

Mobile Marketing B2B Marketing Mobile Advertising B2B 100

Chris Koch

SEPTEMBER 24, 2010

I’m wondering if it’s time to take sales enablement away from marketing. Marketers helped salespeople put words to the insanely complex products and services they were trying to sell. Salespeople remained dependent on marketers for information. Social media changes sales enablement. Salespeople mostly ignored them.

Peer-to-peer 100

Peer-to-peer Wiki Marketing Management Internet Marketing 100

Chris Koch

AUGUST 5, 2011

Recently, I was preparing a workshop on social media for an ITSMA client. The marketer in charge of the company’s social media effort gave me a clear edict: “Look, I don’t want you focusing on Facebook, okay? What is B2B marketing all about? Is it any wonder that B2C marketing techniques dominate?

Facebook 100

Facebook B2B Marketing B2B Thought Leadership B2B 100

Chris Koch

MAY 21, 2010

Social media is beginning to teach us that long qual forms are going the way of the dodo. The question that we’re asking Facebook is the question that we should be asking ourselves in our marketing: Do we really need all this information? I find much more value in Twitter than in any of the other social media networks.

Privacy 100

Privacy B2B Marketing Lead Ranking B2B 100