Posts Tagged ‘B2B Marketing’
Five Questions Every B2B Marketer Needs to Ask – by Christopher Ryan
B2B Marketing is a tricky business with a lot of moving parts. To do it right, you need the answers to the appropriate questions. Here are five to get you started:
Is what you offer a commodity or a differentiated product or service? This is a critical question because it will determine how you must market to be successful. A differentiated product or service has advantages, but it must usually contend with a much smaller market niche. By contrast, a commodity
A Dose of Reality in B2B Marketing – by Christopher Ryan
Napoleon once remarked, “A general should consider himself successful if half of what he plans comes to pass.” This is not to say that you shouldn’t carefully plan. But the fact is that things don’t always turn out the way you plan (just ask Napoleon about a place called Waterloo). For example, the list is staler than you thought. The webinar topic is not as interesting. The offer is not as compelling. Your vendor misses the mailing or email date.
Don’t Major in the Minors of B2B Marketing – by Chris Ryan
One of the worst ways to spend your day as a B2B marketer is to “major in the minors.” By this, I mean spending your time on activities that have little or no impact on results.
As I write this, it is snowy in Colorado. There are three trucks in our company’s parking lot, scraping snow and sanding the pavement. They have been going at their business for at least an hour and I am impressed by how clean (and sandy)
10 Winning B2B Marketing Habits to Adopt in 2011 – Part Two
Last week, I talked about the first five winning habits you can adopt for more B2B marketing success in 2011. You can find that article here. Following are habits 6-10.
Habit 6: Work your social media plan. This is the year to really make social media work for your organization. If you haven’t already started in social media, now is the time to jump in. And if you are already swimming in social media waters, then this is the time to
10 Winning B2B Marketing Habits to Adopt in 2011
It’s been a while since I have neglected to end a year without doing some type of planning and goal setting for my business (or whatever company I was working for at the time) and my personal life. Like the saying goes, it’s hard to hit a target you don’t have, and goal setting is the best way to establish those targets.
Perhaps you are equally committed to goal setting. After you have set your SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and
In B2B Marketing Your Job is to Motivate – by Christopher Ryan
Successful B2B marketing strategies are not those that are clever, win awards, sound really interesting, or get people to pay attention. All of these outcomes are good, but they are not the reason we marketers should spend so much time thinking about our creative platform. Rather, our goal is to drive action. That action may come in a one-step process—where the prospect sees the promotion and buys immediately, or it may be in a series of steps beginning with creating
To Automate or Not to Automate Your B2B Marketing – by Christopher Ryan
I just read an excellent article by Lauren Carlson titled Tailwinds for Marketing Automation Software. I suggest you give it a read if you want to see the macro trends that are driving more companies to use technology to manage their marketing processes. I’ve been in the B2B marketing business quite a long time and co-founded a marketing automation software company so I have seen many successful marketing automation projects as well as a number of disasters.
Leo Tolstoy begins his
Are You Playing to Win in B2B Marketing? – by Christopher Ryan
While confidence is important in any endeavor, it is especially true in marketing and sales. You must believe that you have the right product or service; you must believe that it offers real benefits; and you must believe that you are promoting it to the right individuals using the best marketing strategy.
The economic trend may be poor. And yes, it is tougher to generate leads and revenue. You may have to work harder to produce the same result. But this is
The Perils of Perfectionism in B2B Marketing
I just read an interesting blog post at BNET, titled, Perfectionism is a Disease, Here’s How to Beat It. I liked the post because this is a pet peeve of mind and the subject mirrored a chapter in my book (How to Create an Unstoppable Marketing and Sales Machine) where I pointed out the dangers of perfectionism.
Perfectionism is one of those issues where a person’s strongest quality can also be their most glaring weakness. Perfectionists often take their work and
In B2B Marketing, It’s All About the Offer – by Christopher Ryan
Assuming that you have a quality product or service, with a compelling value proposition, aimed at the right target audience, the marketing offer will be a key difference in your success (or lack thereof). So what do I mean by offer? In simple terms, a marketing offer is what you propose to give to the prospect, and what you are asking for in return. The offer is the “What’s in it for me?” part of the marketing equation. How do
