Wednesday, October 23, 2013

The Cost Of Dirty Data

 Bogus leads and misinformation in a database can have an adverse effect on your marketing efforts. After all, how many Mickey Mouse's and I.P. Freelys are there in the world?
 
You need to know the truth, no matter how painful it is. You need to know what all this junk email is actually costing you, alongside a calculated view on clean data to finally master the situation.  So go ahead, pull the proverbial curtain back, and take a long hard look at the cost of dirty data.
 
Minimally, a marketing contact (lead) includes email address, company name, first and last name and perhaps a job title.  Leads/contacts may be gathered from trade shows, outside lists, web events, etc. Online generated leads often lack mailing address, phone or other helpful data.
 
$1 per contact should be a reference point. Mass contacts may be as low as 50-60 cents per record while those generated at trade shows and special events can cost anywhere from $50 - $200 each. In B2B marketing, a greater scope of information for each contact, especially company segmentation and targeted information, is required to drive higher results. Poor targeting reduces response  and increased campaign cost.
 
The more information known about the prospect, the better for segmentations and marketing automation. Extremely granular targeting relies on data points to drive better results.  Typical targeting segments are geography, industry, revenues and employee size.  Better targeting yields higher email open rates, click-through rates, and more landing page conversions because messaging and campaigns are likely to be more relevant to the specific audience. 
 
Data quality goes downhill rapidly.  According to research from Marketing Sharpa, 2.1% of contacts go bad each month.  After a year, 25.1% of contacts at minimum are not valid. Invalid contacts may not be flagged as bad because auto-responder information isn't updating your database. Duplicate records are often created, especially if sales people also enter lists into your CRM.
 
Some clean their list by emailing it. Bad idea. Acquired lists are notorious for including "spam trap" emails created to identify companies emailing without permission. Bouncing emails signal the feedback loop that you are a reckless mailer.  Hitting spam trap emails signals you are a spammer and may cause all your email to be undeliverable. Mailing to bad records negatively affects future mailings. Low relevance, generic messages often have low open rates, low click-through rates, and high unsubscribes, which also affects your sender reputation. Without enriched data points, only generic messages can be mailed, and show poor response, which affects future deliverability.
 
Next time more about precision targeting.
 
 

Wednesday, September 25, 2013

Don’t Just Think ‘Lead’ Generation; Think ‘Need’ Generation

 
Article From: Production Machining, AJ Sweatt, principal from AJ Sweatt Logic & Communications
 
A mistake I often see in companies that serve manufacturing or industrial markets is in the system for managing “leads.” It’s not entirely a mistake, per se, but more of an overreliance on the system at the expense of customers. 
This approach almost immediately renders the prospect or customer as a number to conform with protocol. It creates the impression that the primary concern of the company is gettin’ the dough and moving on to the ‘next one.’ It minimizes the problems a prospect is trying to solve, while elevating the company’s bargaining position. And we rationalize this as just how business is done.
How many relationships—business or otherwise—are sustained or even last after a beginning like that? Maybe some. But I’ve seen far more partnerships fail under the weight of this system than those that were built on loyalty. 
To understand the point, think about this: Imagine the last time you were on the phone with your cable company, power company, or another service provider, trying to resolve an issue. We’ve all experienced the frustrations from dealing with automated systems and bureaucracy. How many conversations have we all had, lamenting the crumbling of our entire society and culture, based on our loss of basic customer service and social skills?
I’ve had these conversations, and many, many times with company owners and marketing cats. They share your (our) frustrations when bumping up against the cold, hard truths of relationships built on a lead rather than a need. They get just as angry and frustrated as we all do in those situations. And then they return to their jobs of demanding or sustaining the same type of system in their own companies that frustrates their own customer base in the same ways.
A customer isn’t a lead to be harvested, but a person serving something that needs help to grow. Yet, a lead-based system can permeate an entire organization, where overworked and misdirected resources follow flowcharts or standard practices to build revenue rather than loyalty. Consider this: Does your company promote a system that serves leads rather than needs by passing the responsibility of gathering the customer’s problems and challenges to sales or applications engineers for engagement, costing time?
Does your company promote a system that serves leads rather than needs by passing basic contact information down the line and counts this as success? Does your company not bother to follow up with the customer, even if the company doesn’t get the sale, to see if they’ve been taken care of? Does your company push automated, broad messaging designed to attract targets to an audience that actually has very specific, real needs? Does your company treat a new addition to a database as a success? Does your company look to generate a contact, rather than one that shows the potential the customer can realize by partnering with you?
Is the cycle of lead generation a seemingly unbreakable machine that can’t even be discussed, deviated from or challenged?
I’m not suggesting that sound lead acquisition and management systems aren’t critical to any successful manufacturing enterprise. What I am asking, though, is to think if the system to manage leads in your company has become the tail wagging the dog and may be unintentionally harming sales.
Some customer relationships just don’t work out. That’s a fact of business life. But many end too soon because they begin on a foundation that leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy of disappointment. These systems are often built on measuring a lead reaching a specific point in the chain through the seller’s organization and less about the progress the customer is making at each stage.
Consider our own frustrations as we deal personally with lead generators and bureaucrats. And then ask yourself, “Are we generating something valuable or just an invoice?” 
 

Wednesday, August 7, 2013

Ad Clickers - Less Likely Prospects

 Using a search engine or industry web site to find information, answer a question or reach a web site to buy something has become as second nature for most of us as using the remote control to surf TV channels.  Search advertising borrows from the inherent utility of the search engine and industry site - buyers are presented with links that match their query and are designed to quickly direct them to specific products and services.
 
Online display advertising, however, is a different story. Prospects go to web sites for information and engagment not to click on ads that send them elsewhere.  Recent research has only 16 percent of prospects clicking on display ads in a given month indicating that most visitors to a typical advertiser's site get there some way other than clicking an display ads.
 
So how valuable is click measurement as a means of assessing online display ad effectiveness?
 
Not very.  In fact, click-based display campaigns can run completely counter to your interests as an advertiser. Optimizing your campaign for click, instead of optimizing for conversions, is pursuing the wrong objective. For display advertising, clicks aren't just suboptimal, they're anti-optimal. And they're likely to produce significantly poorer results.
 
Search behavior is linked to an explicit and often an immediate need. There is a clear reason for searching, with a clear result in mind. When prospects consume most types of online content, they have arrived at their destination. There's typically no intent to leave at the earlies opportunity.
 
Prospects don't expect to click on an ad. Relying on display clicks to drive conversions is often a dead end.  Visitors most likely to click on display ads are often vastly different from your best prospects. If you're optimizing your campaign for clicks, there's a good chance you're actually anti-optimizing for sales. Instead, optimize toward your ultimate objective: the campaign conversion rate rather than toward the click-through rate.  Focus on developing the ncecssary systems and skills to understand the true impact of your ad investments throughout your prospects' path to purchase.
 
Connect with people who really are your prospects. The low click-to-conversion correlation doesn't mean display ads are ineffective. 
 
Next time: How to optimize for conversions.
 
Source: Konrad Felman, Quantcast
 
 
 
 
 
 

Monday, July 15, 2013

Five Things Good For Your Web Site

 Detailed Product Information: Your customers and prospects want to see up-to-date and comprehensive product information that is well organized, filled with product details and technical specifications to allow for product comparisons. The vast majority of your audience comes to your Web site to discover if and how your products can meet their needs.
 
Offers and Landing Pages: Your Web site visitors crave information that will help them do their jobs more effectively. Your job is to offer white papers, technical articles, application notes and other educational content. Sprinkle offers on relevant pages throughout your Web site and send prospects to specific landing pages that describe the offer in more detail to capture prospect information to generate leads.
 
Consistent Page Design: Keep your visitors on track and avoid confusion by adhering to consistent page design. Navigation menus should appear in the same place on every page, usually across the top or down the side, or both if your site has multiple levels of hierarchy.  A user-friendly design may use a wider column for the main content and a narrower column for secondary content. Make sure your headings, font size and typeface are consistent too.
 
Contact Features: Because one of the primary goals of your Web site is to capture lead information, you must make it easy for prospects to contact you. A good idea is to have a phone number and email address on every page, plus a link in the navigation menu to a Contact Us page.  Landing pages should include forms as well as phone numbers and email addresses to give users multiple options for contacting you.
 
Basic Search Engine Optimation: Almost every site can benefit from basic SEO techniques to help drive more qualified traffic from search engines for specific keyword searches.  Make use of page titles, description meta tags, keywords in page copy, site maps and simple HTML pages to make your Web pages more search engine friendly.
 
Next time, five bad things to avoid for your Web site.

Tuesday, July 2, 2013

B2B Content Marketing


 B2B marketers often turn to content marketing for lead generation and prospect nurturing throughout the lengthy sales process. Recent research points to a growing number of B2B marketers ramping up content marketing for more brand-based goals, namely boosting thought leadership and brand awareness. Sales and customer acquisition were each cited by 29% of respondents.  Customer retention and loyalty were also important content marketing goals for about a quarter (26%) of marketers.
 
Though engagement as a campaign end goal was only cited by 20% of respondents, as a tactic, it was vital for content marketing success. More than half of B2B marketers used content marketing to foster greater audience engagement -- necessary for drawing leads and generating greater brand awareness. Other top reasons B2B marketers turned to content markeing to achieve their objectives included its ability to establish brand trust (47%) and offer marketers a way to create faster, more frequent touchpoints with customers and prospects (33%).
 
The creation of content assets needed to satisfy those multiple touchpoints appears to rest heavily on the shoulders of marketers. 94% of technology marketers created their own content from scratch, with 39% adding third-party content. About a third reported reusing content where applicable, and 30% encouraged user-generated content.
 
When generating content from scratch, engagement was again a common tactic. 81% of B2B marketers cited engaging and compelling storytelling as the most important elements of effective content marketing. Even within the technology sector, a highly technical, complex industry, engagement and originality trumped professional writing when generating content marketing. While prospects may rely on technical, professional content to make decsions, they are initially drawn to brands that offer a more engaging, dynamic content experience. 

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

SEO Techniques - A Love, Hate Relationship

There is a growing consensus among online marketers that over-
emphazing Search Engine Optimation (SEO) techniques is one of the worst things that a business can do -- not just because it's often a waste of money, but also because it can be counterproductive.  There is no telling how many company websites have been penalized by Google and Bing for their misguided SEO zeal. The bottom line is that, before your business goes overboard with SEO techniques, there are a few important cautions to consider.
 
SEO is not the end goal. To begin with, ask yourself this question: What's the purpose of your online business presence?  Is it to do SEO just for the sake of doing SEO -- or is it provide customers and prospects with superior products and services? The answer is the latter and, yet, many marketers get sidetracked, making the focus of their online presence on SEO rather than simply providing their products and services. SEO techniques are not necessarily helpful to your business. In many cases, they are simply distractions.
 
SEO can hurt. If you're familiar with Google's recent Panda, Penquin and Penquin 2.0 algorithmic update, you should know that SEO techniques can hinder just as much as they can help. Google is constantly seeking to reward websites that provide substantative, engaging content -- and to penalize sites that seek to "game" the system with SEO trickery. The recent Penquin 2.0 update, for example, penalized sites that used paid links and other duplicitous SEO practices.  The bottom line is that Google wants your site to focus on quality and content, not just SEO techniques and, as such, an overemphasis on SEO can actually hurt your website's online rankings.
 
True SEO meets customer and prospects needs. True search engine optimation is not about keyword stuffing, buying backlinks, or any other tricks and gimmicks.  True SEO is about answering customer and prospect needs and demands. What are your targeted customers actually searching for? What kinds of information are they seeking?  If you can provide them with the answers they need, Google will reward you for it. If you're too obsessive about flash-in-the-pan SEO techniques, Google will likely leave your site in the dust. Rather than treat Google as an obstacle to overcome, marketers should instead treat Google as an ally -- and that means playing by Google rules, not trying to circumvent them with SEO tricks. The solution is to focus on your core product offerings.
 
Source: Zsolt Bicskey, Business 2 Community
 

Thursday, June 6, 2013

Forgetting To Fish Where The Fish Are






 
 
 
 
Make sure your line is always baited and in the water. In other words, you must have your message in front of customers and prospects on a regular basis. Sporadic advertising efforts that come and go will cause you to miss out on significant chunks of sales opportunity. It's not the case of the big fish that got away; the big fist never new about you. Make sure you're attracting prospects while they are looking which should be every day, 365 days a year.
 
Today, virtually all engineering, technical and industrial buyers use print and online resources throughout their buying processes, including locating suppliers, manufacturers, components and products. That means you must make investments in appropriate media to reach this audience and forge more, and more frequent, connections with customers and prospects.
 
Focusing on lead quantity versus lead quality.
 
More leads! More leads! This may be your strategy, but it's more effective to have a balanced focus on both lead quantitity and lead quality. If marketing focuses lead generation efforts solely on quantity, fewer leads will convert to customers, more sales resources are wasted, and sales people will quickly learn to distrust leads that marketing generates. Ask any sales rep. They will tell you they'd rather have a handful of highly qualified prospects than a suitcase full of unqualified leads.
 
Abandoning brand exposure.
 
Brand exposure is so important, but some companies shove it aside in order to increase emphasis on lead generation. Yet, continually exposing customers and prospects to your brand keeps your compnay top of mind, increases lead generation opportunities and helps reduce sales cycle because prospects will already be familiar with your brand and value proposition.


Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Buying Has Changed Forever - Part IV

 
"Stay In Touch" eamail campaigns are useful for all prospects that are not immediately ready to engage with sales. They form the backbone of your lead nurturing program by "dripping' out relevant content to prospects over time, helping to educate them and build trust and credibility for your company. By touching prospects regularly, they help keep your brand top of mind so that the prospect will contact you when they are ready to move to the next step.
 
A good place to start is with the "Buying Committee" -- the group of individuals that will be involved in the purchasing decision. Even at medium size companies (100 - 500 employees) research shows the average number of people involved in a decision is 6.8 -- and the number goes as high as 21 individuals on a buying committee at larger companies. Your nurturing content will need to to speak to each of them and address their unique needs.
 
Most of the people that you speak to at a company will fall under categories related to your marketing efforts, whether they have final say in the purchase or not. The category definitions may include the "Champion," a user with purchasing authority; the influencer, a person without the buying authority but with significant input, such as a consultant or middle manager or user; and the executive staff.
 
People want to do business with people. We're human, and we crave interaction with people who know us. When you build content especially for your buyer personas, you build a relationship with people before you've even met them.
 
 

Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Buying Has Changed Forever - Part III

 
Determine if prospects are ready to engage with sales.
 
For most marketers, the decision about which leads to nurture begins here.  The process of defining what constitutes a "sales-ready" lead requires marketing and sales to agree upon the profile of an ideal prospect and a lead scoring methodology.  Scoring methodologies should use a combination of:
 
     Demographic attributes (company size, role, industry, etc.
 
     Lead source and offer.
 
     Budget, authority, need and timeline.
 
     Completeness of data profile (do you have enough information).
 
     Behavioral attributes (number of responses, overall engagement).
 
Based on the above criteria, leads can be sorted in a variety of ways: bucketed into cold, warm or hot leads; ranked on a numerical scale; placed into lead stages; and so on.  Depending on the sorting method you use, some leads will be deemed "sales-ready" and others will need to remain in (or return to) marketing for further nurturing.
 
Here are a few ideas to help you define what it means to be sales-ready:
 
     Does the prospect visit your web site? If so, how often and which pages were visited before and
     after registering on your site?
 
     What search terms did the prospect use to find more information about you?
 
     Has the prospect visited "high-value" pages such as pricing or contact information pages?
 
     Have other propsects from the same company visited your web site?
 
     How has the prospect responded to your follow-up email campaigns or offers?
 
     What interactions has your sales team had with the prospect and when?
 
Regardless of how you choose to score and categorize your leads, implementing lead nurturing must begin by collaborating with all stakeholders to define the process for determining which leads get sent to sales and which leads get nurturing.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Wednesday, May 15, 2013

Buying Has Changed Forever - Part II

 
Marketing and sales alignment is a popular topic that is frequently discussed but not universally practiced in today's B2B businesses. The basic principles of good lead nurturing are predicated on marketing and sales teamwork at every stage of a single revenue cycle.
 
In today's web-centric world where buyers are reluctant to engage with sales until much later in the decision-making process, there are at least three areas where marketing and sales collaboration become a necessity:
 
    * The definition of a sales-ready lead derived from co-defined lead scoring values.
 
    * The appropriate type of customer communication, associated cues and optimal timing.
 
    * The lead profile and history that is most valuable to sales, expecially for recycled leads.
 
Similar to the trusted advisor relationship your company is building with prospective customers, marketing and sales must share a common revenue goal, an interdependence that relies on earned trust and respect, and joint credit for revenue achievement.
 
The Return On Investment Of Lead Nurturing
 
A discussion on the value of lead nurturing would not be complete without exploring ROI.  Let's take a look at some compelling statistics gathered from several research organizations.  Companies that excel at lead nurturing:
 
    * Generate 50% more sales-ready leads at 33% lower cost per lead.
 
    * Reduce the percent of marketing-generated leads that are ignored by sales.
 
    * Raise win rates on marketing-generated leads (7% higher) and reduce "no decisions."
 
    * Have more sales representatives make quota and a shorter ramp up time for new reps.
     
Additional, anecdotal evidence suggests that nurtured prospects buy more, require less discounting, and have shorter sales cycles than prospects that were not nurtured.
 
Next time: Tips to develop a lead nurturing program.
 
   
 
 


Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Buying Has Changed Forever

 
Many companies do a good job at generating leads.  The problem is that most new leads are not yet ready to engage, so if a sales rep does try to contact a lead before he or she is ready, it reinforces the general impression that marketing-generated leads are no good. As a result, leads risk getting lost, ignored, or snatched up by competitors.
 
To prevent this from happening, marketers need to hone their lead nurturing...the process of building relationships with qualified prospects regardless of their timing to buy, with the goal of earning their business when they are ready. Building a relationship with a prospect is the same as with any long-term relationship -- you can't force someone to commit to a purchase, but you also cannot afford to lose individuals because their willingness to buy doesn't match your readiness to sell.
 
Most non-sales-ready leads will eventually be ready -- and it is up to you to both provide them with relevant information and to be there when they are ready to make a buying decision.  According to a DemandGen Report, up to 95 percent of the qualified prospects on your web site are there to research and are not yet ready to talk with a sales rep, but as many as 70 percent of them will eventually buy a product from you -- or with one of your competitors.
 
To make things even more  challenging, the B2B buying process has fundamentally changed. Prospects are spending more time on the Web doing independent research, obtaining information from their peers and other third parties.  That's why companies are meeting prospective buyers earlier than ever, and is a key reason why having sales attempt to engage with every early-stage lead is premature.
 
Next time, some lead nurturing basics.

Tuesday, April 9, 2013

Brands Matter - Part III

 
 
Customers buy in a blink. Malcolm Gladwell;s book, Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking asserts that customers make most buying decisions (and the best choices) by relying on ther two-second first impressions (or their adaptive unconsciousness) versus a long, drawn-out process involving lots of rational information.  Gladwell and others have exposed a dirty little secret known in marketing research circles that customers usually cannot articulate how they really feel, what they actually think or why they buy a particular brand.  The driver of their real feelings, thoughts and actions, is their unconscious.  Buyers make split-decisions based on stored memories, images and feelings -- which is what a brand is all about.  A strong brand equals a strong two-second impression whether you're buying potato chips or specifying a machine tool, cutting tool or software product.
 
Strong B2B brands are branded from the inside-out, top down and bottom-up. Aligning the whole organization from customer-facing reps to inside employees with the corporate brand strategy is crucial to driving brand value and customer loyalty, especially in the B2B world. If every employee does not "live" the brand strategy, then the company may face lost sales and unhappy customers.  On the other hand, if every employee understands its brand promise, there may be minimal negative impact on sales and customer satisfaction.

Friday, April 5, 2013

Brands Matter - Part II

 Brands drive B2B marketing.  Those that recognize this fact and leverage their full brand assets will create a true, strategic competitive advantage.
 
Ironically, technology has led to brand importance in the B2B world. The growth of the Internet and e-marketplaces along with accelerating technological product obsolescence has resulted in a hyper-informed and commoditzed B2B marketplace.  Buyers are overwhelmed with myriad logical choices, features, benefits, information, data, metrics -- parity and clutter. They want to make an easy, safe and right choice. Thus, "brand' becomes the compass or default for navigating the purchase process.
 
B2B customers often evaluate potential suppliers according to numerous, rigorous criteria -- a scientific request for proposal (RFP) process.  But does anyone really think a big dollar decision will come down to a numeric score or check list?  How does a supplier even make the RFP list?  You guessed it: through their recognized brand.
 
Strong B2B brands benefit from organically created branded, web-based communities of loyal customers who evangelize the brand. When it comes to marketing technology products, marketers all too often ignore the full package of customer benefits to instead focus only on product features.  I rather suggest three dimensions of benefits to build positioning platforms:
 
     1st - Functional (what the product does)
     2nd - Economic (what the brand means to the customer in time and money)
     3rd - Emotional - (how the brand makes the customer feel)
 
Brands that deliver beyond functional and economic levels with emotional benefits will command an incremental price premium and create strong competitive advantage and customer brand loyalty.
 
Emotive propositions resonate in B2B markets whether customers admit it or not.  People say that they are not influenced by advertisements but data suggests otherwise. In the early-to-mid 1980s, IBM did not have the best computer systems or pricing.  "Big Blue," however, became the enterprise systems market leader because you never got fired for buying IBM.  IT Directors "bought" a relationship, company, reputation, service, people, assurance. In other words, they bought goodwill of the brand.
 
Recent research supports the notion that buying decisions in B2C and B2B spheres are largely based on irrational impulses often unknown to the buyer.  For example, the IBM customer was strongly motivated by job security and peace-of-mind. Today's B2B customers may articulate their need for ROI, higher performance, a better mousetrap.  Yet, they really want to do business with a name or people they can trust -- to buy from a "leader."  Strong brands play to these important drivers.

Tuesday, April 2, 2013

Brands Matter

 To stay alive and flourish in highly competitive environments, business-to-business companies spend more time and money on R&D. Companies focus on making their products smarter, faster, more cost-effective and reliable. They also find ways to improve and add services so that they provide customers with a complete and satisfying experience.
 
But how can these B2B companies truly differentiate their offerings and be relevant to customers over the long-term?  This is where branding applies.  Brands matter in B2B markets.  In fact, they matter even more in B2B than business-to-consumer.
 
Cut throught clutter: Brands matter because the B2B marketing communications world is characterized by numbing sameness, commoditized feature wars and laundry lists of product benefits. In other words, there is a sea of noise, parity, clutter and dullness. Branding, however, allows a company to distiguish goods or services.  Branding today is a strategic tool that helps the supplier cut through the clutter of the market, get noticed, and connect with the customer on many levels and in ways that matter. A strong brand becomes the customer's "shorthand" for making good choices in a complex, risky and confusing marketplace.
 
Tap into emotional drivers: Brands matter because companies act just like people when it comes to evaluating what products or services they buy. Along with a number of explicit rational criteria, a powerful irrational impulse is always present to influence the purchase decision. A strong brand with an effective positioning strategy speaks to and taps into the totality of the buyer needs.
 
Facilitate delivery or promise: Brands matter when supplier teams are doing business with buyer teams. Through effective branding efforts, the brand becomes the "glue" that binds the supplier culture and organization together, enabling the brand to make good on its external promise. Customers will reward a brand which delivers a unified, consistent and satisfying experience with repeat business.
 
However, common beliefs in B2B marketing tend to overlook the importance of brands. Consider the following thoughts:
 
Consumer brands are defined and presented largely on emotional appeals -- "warm and fuzzies." In B2B, products and services, rather than "brands" are pitched, sold, and transacted through cold logic.
 
Consumers are drawn to brands' irrational benefits (status, prestige, affinity, self-security). Business customers speficy and purchase based on rational drivers (pricing, specifications, product peformance, metrics).
 
I suggest that such thinking by B2B marketers is not only naive, and defies logic, but also undermines their ability to drive incremental business value and ROI.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Five More Tips To Develop Your Brand













These additioinal tips are too important to keep you in any suspense beyond yesterday's blog.


5. Conduct a brand assessment. Ask twenty of your customers to name one word that they would use to describe your brand. If your twenty responses all come back different, you need to work on your Consistency. If the large majority of them don't meet the message you were hoping to send, then your Clarity needs improvement.

6. Conduct a SWOT Analysis. A SWOT Analysis is a method often attributed to strategic planning that calls for the analyzer to evaluate the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats involved with a brand.  With a SWOT Analysis, you can create a detailed and honest assessment of where your brand soars and where it suffers. You can also find key avenues which might grow your brand and, of course, determine potential threats to your brand awareness and uniqueness.

7. Understand your value. There is only one of you. That has value and that has power -- but only if you know your brand value and power. What do you bring to the table that no one else can? Why would someone want to buy your product? What makes you different than everyone else? These are all questions whose anwers belong in your brand consideration.

8. Define your positioning strategy.  When your customers think about your brand, what kind of thoughts do you want them to have? When you have the answer to that question in mind, you're in a position to craft a brand that will reach your target market effectively. Remember, however, that it's important to conduct a brand assessment frequently to ensure that your message is being delivered and received as you intended.

9. Deliver your authentic self. When building brand awareness, you must deliver your authentic self. Be original, be yourself and be honest. The more of your authentic self that you bring to the table, the more successful you will likely become.

By R. Kay Green, IKG Marketing Solutions

Monday, March 25, 2013

Nine Tips To Develop Your Brand


While these nine tips were published in our Manufacturing Marketer last week, they're important enough to repeat again for those that missed them.
 
A brand is the power of you on paper or on screen.  It is the extension of yourself that your marketing materials attempt to project. Brands work the same whether large of small. The brands that succeed are the ones that are unique, but they're also the ones that are authentic.  A brand must come from the heart. It must define who you are. A brand is a direct representation of you as well as your promise about what you will deliver to your customers. With this in mind, let's examine a few key insights into how to develop a brand.
 
1.  Determine your vision and your purpose. Ask yourself one question: "What is my business really about?"  The goal of a successful brand is almost always to make something happen first and foremost. So what is it that you want to make happen?  Answer this question honestly and thoroughly, then write down in the fewest number of words possible.
 
2.  Determine your target market. Ask yourself who is the most profitable segment of market that is likely to purchase your product. Once you've answered this question...you may then craft your strategy to attracting these prospects. You must be clear on who you are targeting and how to attract them.
 
3.  Determine who your competion is.  If you're stuck on what your brand should be, the best way is to study what the competion is doing. It could be that there's something specific about their brand that might help you to shape your brand. Maybe you perceive a shortfall on the part of the competition's brand -- one that will fit nicely into your brand message. Maybe from a survey into your target market, you determine a flaw in something the competition is doing. That's something that you may use to your competitive advantage.
 
4. Remember the three C's for branding. The three C's for branding are Clarity, Consistency and Constancy.  With regard to clarity, you want your brand image, purpose and message to be unassailably clear. When prospects see, think about, or learn about your brand, you want them to know immediately and exactly what you stand for. Consistency is a matter of keeping your message uniform.  You can't present your brand in print differently than you do in person.  Constancy is a matter of getting the message out there to the point where it is most ever-present.
 
Tune into my next blog for five more compelling tips.
 
By R. Kay Green, IKG Marketing Solutions


Sunday, March 17, 2013

Why Sales People Don't Follow Up Good Leads - Part II

Let's return to "where's the disconnect" from my last blog....

Here's a statistic that would surprise most sales reps -- and might surprise some marketeres as well. About 45% of business-to-business leads, that is prospects who've inquired about a product, will end up buying.

Going back to our salesperson, out of those first 100 leads, assume 45 will eventually buy.  Of course, not all of them will buy from our salesperson,  but out of 45 opportunities, he can expect to close about 15.

But here's the problem: Reps often underestimate how long it takes for those leads to turn into sales. Some statistics show that about four will buy the first month, about the same the second month, and so on.

It makes sense if you think about it.  A prospect could be anywhere in the buying cycle when the rep calls. Some are ready to make a final decision while others are just beginning to explore their options. In other words, only about four are ripe. The rest are too green to pick. And, unfortunately, a green lead can seem like a bad lead. They're not focused.  They're not ready to set an appointment.  It's easy to assume they're not really serious prospects.  But they will be once they ripen!

The worst thing that our salesperson can do with green leads is to throw them out and start with a new batch. He's already done the hardest part -- making contact and establishing a connection.  Now he needs to cultivate those opportunities.

But most don't. Believing that the leads have gone stale., he puts them in the "when I get to them" file and never gets to them. So he doesn't get those 45 sales opportunites.  He gives up after a few months and maybe gets only eight or ten -- which only reinforces his belief that the leads were lousy to start.

What does it mean for marketers? You have to work closely wth your own sales force and dealer organization to make sure they understand how leads continue to ripen. And you need their buy-in to keep following up on those leads.  Do that, and marketing and sales will be pulling in the same direction.

Thursday, March 14, 2013

Why Salespeople Don't Follow Up Good Leads


No matter how much effort marketing puts into delivering high-quality, actionable leads, most salespeople remain convinced that marketing-generated leads are lousy.

The problem usually isn't the leads, however; it's how salespeople follow up on them.

Let's look at a typical experience from the salesperson's perspective.  He gets 100 leads. Marketing promises that these leads are golden. The tire-kickers have all been screened out. Each is an inbound lead from someone actively looking to buy - prospects who called the toll-free number or clicked on a web page asking for information.

The salesperson blocks out precious hours - hours that he's taking away from existing customers and deals already in the pipeline, and starts calling.  By the time he gets to the bottom of the pile, he's won exactly two sales.  Next month, he gets another 100 leads and gets the same results.  The month after that, he gets another 100, but by now he's not getting any sales from them because he's shoving them into a bottom desk drawer to ignore them.

So where's the disconnect?

Tune into my next blog. :)

Thursday, January 24, 2013

Key Elements of B2B Branding

 
While I continue to find articles and people pronouncing the demise of business-to-business branding, I would like to offer a different viewpoint: B2B branding is not obsolete.  At the same time, it has to be redefined to fit the context of marketing today.
 
In today's market, people stick to what they know and trust.  You may have heard stories about consumer buyers' voice mail greetings saying, "If you're not from Microsoft, Cisco or HP, don't bother leaving a message." 
 
Branding is now how prospects and customers get to know you. It is how your target prospects internalize your value proposition and differentation into a coherent and memorable message.
 
What does it take for branding to be effective in the B2B world?  Key elements follow:
 
Targeted: Your value proposition must be relevant to your tarket market, which means that the target market must be clearly defined.  You have to find the right balance defining your target market in a way that will make enough people feel that you really talk to them.  In some cases, this means narrowing down your tarket market to fit your budget.
 
Value Based: While branding in the B2C world can trigger impulsive purchasing, B2B purchasing usually requires demonstrable justification. Association with a clear value proposition is a requirement for a strong B2B brand.
 
Differentating: There is no market without competition. Being able to compare and contrast is an opportunity for your prospects and customers to understand why your are best positioned to deliver on your value proposition. It is also an opportunity for you to positition yourself against the competition that helps you clearly demostrate your advantage.
 
Coherent: Translating your value proposition and differentation into a coherent message is what makes your brand stick in the minds of your prospects and customers. The only way to know is to test it. Ask your prosects and customers if they understand your value proposition. See if they understand why you are different.
 
Memorable: This is the ultimate test of your brand strength.  Even if you did all the right things, and built your value proposition and differentation into a coherent message that speaks specifically to your target prospects, you still haven't done much if they can't remember it.
 
 
 
 
 
 

MY OBJECTIVE:

To share common sense lessons learned with 40-plus years experience in marketing, sales and as a B2B publisher.

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