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. I resisted treating it as a standalone in the survey.

Social Media 100

Social Media Marketing Strategy Marketing & Strategy 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. In other words, unless we become idea organizations, we’re not going to have much to say to customers, prospects, and influencers in social media.

Social Media 100

Social Media Organization Peer-to-peer SME 100

Chris Koch

DECEMBER 2, 2011

If you had asked me a few years ago whether the traditional marketing campaign had any place in social media I would have scoffed. After all, “engaging” is one of the four components of social media management. You’re just warming up to social media campaigns because you work for ITSMA and these are the companies who won your contest.

Social Media 100

Social Media Campaigns B2B Thought Leadership Media 100

Chris Koch

DECEMBER 2, 2011

If you had asked me a few years ago whether the traditional marketing campaign had any place in social media I would have scoffed. After all, “engaging” is one of the four components of social media management. You’re just warming up to social media campaigns because you work for ITSMA and these are the companies who won your contest.

Social Media 100

Social Media Campaigns B2B Thought Leadership Media 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. And until Hurd was fired, his picture went next to that 2.4

Social Media 100

Social Media Media SME B2B 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. Primary and secondary research. When ideas are an expectation, social media participation is easier. Awards programs.

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. In three plus years of tweeting, I’ve picked up what I perceive to be the general etiquette for engaging on Twitter. I’ve rolled all that up into an approach that I doubt constantly. I don’t seem to be alone.

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. In three plus years of tweeting, I’ve picked up what I perceive to be the general etiquette for engaging on Twitter. I’ve rolled all that up into an approach that I doubt constantly. I don’t seem to be alone.

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Twitter Social Networks 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. For these marketers, the pool of customers and prospects is small and many of them do not want to engage publicly in social media or are simply ignoring it altogether. I think that’s the right decision—up to a point.

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. For these marketers, the pool of customers and prospects is small and many of them do not want to engage publicly in social media or are simply ignoring it altogether. I think that’s the right decision—up to a point.

Social Media 100

Social Media Allocation Media Marketing & Strategy 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

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

NOVEMBER 24, 2009

One of the cornerstones of a social media strategy is having a clear set of corporate social media guidelines or policies. Here are some recommendations based on a cross-section of social media policies from B2B companies, including social media policy examples from some leading B2B companies. This [Choose. Blog, Space.]

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Guidelines B2B 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. and, of course, came up with a theory.

Social Media 100

Social Media Peer-to-peer Media Wikipedia 100

Chris Koch

MARCH 12, 2010

Social media is raising the bar on customer intimacy. Social media is making that fact plain. We’re all struggling to move from the traditional arm’s-length, temporary campaigns to the always-on, direct relationships inherent in social media management. Social media reduces the incremental cost of content.

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Thought Leadership Work Management 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. In my seven years as a social media acolyte, I’ve spoken with many marketers who grew up at the knee of message-based marketing. Image via Wikipedia. This can’t be happening—not to me.”

Social Media 100

Social Media B2B Thought Leadership Media Wikipedia 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. But I think we lose sight of the revolution by looking at social media in isolation.

Social Media 100

Social Media Media Paid Search Agency Viral Marketing 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. Now don’t get me wrong.

Social Media 100

Social Media B2B Thought Leadership Thought Leadership Media 100

Chris Koch

JANUARY 15, 2010

He swung his expanded briefcase up onto the table, pulled out a media kit bulging with press releases about speeds and feeds and plunked it down on the table in front of me. Pledging to do more with social media isn’t the answer. Getting into social media really means getting into publishing. That’s for you,” he said.

Social Media 100

Social Media Work Management Marketing Management Marketing Automation Services 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 is always on.

Social Media 100

Social Media Paid Search Agency Social Marketing B2B Marketing 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 B2B. Conversations.

Social Media 100

Social Media Social Marketing B2B Marketing Personalization 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. Return on media impact.

Social Media 100

Social Media ROI Lead Ranking RSS 100

Chris Koch

SEPTEMBER 23, 2011

A study by Yahoo Research found that 50% of tweets are generated by an “elite” group of 20k users and that those users tend to follow one another rather than branching out—what many refer to as the social media echo chamber. 99% of the time, they’re sharing links to content—blogs, research papers, news stories, etc.—that

Twitter 100

Twitter Broadcasting Social Media Advertising Mediums 100

Chris Koch

SEPTEMBER 23, 2011

A study by Yahoo Research found that 50% of tweets are generated by an “elite” group of 20k users and that those users tend to follow one another rather than branching out—what many refer to as the social media echo chamber. 99% of the time, they’re sharing links to content—blogs, research papers, news stories, etc.—that

Twitter 100

Twitter Broadcasting Social Media B2B Marketing 100

Chris Koch

MARCH 26, 2010

One of the biggest challenges for B2B social media marketers isn’t creating content, it’s helping others create content. Marketing is the default head of social media management in most companies. Filter research. Customer research can provide tons of fodder for content, but you can’t just dump it on SMEs unfiltered.

B2B Thought Leadership 100

B2B Thought Leadership RSS Enterprise Management Thought Leadership 100

Chris Koch

OCTOBER 22, 2010

In part it is being driven by social media. 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. And finally, the trade press and general business media are dying.

Lead Management 100

Lead Management Marketing Management Automation Marketing Automation Services 100

Chris Koch

APRIL 24, 2014

Ines Mergel, in her book, Social Media in the Public Sector, describes this phenomenon in the United States as the “Town Hall Divide,” according to research by my colleague Regina Maruca. Latest Post Social Media' They can make decisions more quickly, with a higher confidence level than they ever had previously.

Social Media 100

Social Media Communities Education Media 100

Chris Koch

MARCH 23, 2012

It’s an important part of social media management. ITSMA research shows that buyers want the whole menu of content—not just a white paper here or a video there. Let’s face it, there are some B2B executives who wouldn’t read a white paper even if you threatened them with lima beans (what, you like lima beans?

Paper 100

Paper Social Media Social Marketing B2B Marketing 100

Chris Koch

FEBRUARY 18, 2011

Social media are growing up. Interesting research from Edelman shows that there has been a decline in trust in “people like myself” and “regular employees.” Clearly, there’s a growing hunger for thought leadership in social media.

Peer-to-peer 100

Peer-to-peer Thought Leadership Social Media Storytelling 100

Chris Koch

APRIL 22, 2011

Social media management and innovation. ITSMA’s social media research (free excerpt available) shows that marketing is responsible for monitoring social media and for training, governing, and supporting the organization in using social media. This shift in innovation has big implications for marketing.

Enterprise Management 100

Enterprise Management Work Management Marketing Management Social Media 100

Chris Koch

APRIL 3, 2014

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. As part of its sponsorship of UK soccer team Tottenham Hotspur, Under Armour ran a social media contest that attracted entries from fans in more than 50 countries.

Planning 100

Planning Paid Search Agency Work Management Marketing & Strategy 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 research confirms it.

Enterprise Management 100

Enterprise Management B2B Marketing B2B Thought Leadership Marketing Management 100

Chris Koch

NOVEMBER 12, 2010

Most journalists have discovered social media as an important research tool. And research shows that even the stodgiest C-level executive does at least three web searches per day. Those people may receive media training, presentation and speaking training, etc. to prepare them to be public representatives of the company.

PR 100

PR Peer-to-peer Press Public Relations 100

Chris Koch

SEPTEMBER 24, 2010

Social media changes sales enablement. But then social media came along and it really did change everything. Salespeople are becoming heavy users of social media, and it takes less than a minute to set up an internal-only micro blogging network, wiki, or online community for them to share their own words with each other.

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? We don’t see the value of it for B2B and we want it off the table. That’s gotta get old pretty quickly. What do you think?

Facebook 100

Facebook B2B Marketing B2B Thought Leadership B2B 100

Chris Koch

OCTOBER 8, 2009

And he wants me, Mr. Research, to find them. Now we do have some research data about the impact that the recession is having on marketers and actions they are taking. Social media is one new way. Posted in Marketing Strategy Tagged: B2B marketing, ITSMA, Marketing Processes, Marketing Strategy, social media strategy.

Practices 100

Practices Best Practices Paid Search Agency Marketing & Strategy 100

Chris Koch

OCTOBER 8, 2009

And he wants me, Mr. Research, to find them. Now we do have some research data about the impact that the recession is having on marketers and actions they are taking. Social media is one new way. Tags: Marketing Strategy B2B marketing ITSMA Marketing Processes social media strategy. How are you doing that?

Practices 100

Practices Best Practices Paid Search Agency Marketing & Strategy 100