Posts Tagged ‘b2b marketing’
Looking Back at 100: Top 10 Posts on the Webbiquity Blog (So Far)
Tuesday, July 6th, 2010Hard to believe that this blog, officially launched just a few months ago, has already surpassed 100 posts. But here we are! Thank you for reading, and without further ado, below are the 10 most-viewed posts on this blog to date. Some of the entries are surprising, but life can be like that. These are the posts that readers have “voted” as the best by their traffic so far.
10. How to Write an Ad Agency RFP
This one surprised me. Small companies don’t bother with agency RFPs (nor should they) and even mid-sized companies use them less today than in the past. But if your company wants to use an RFP process to help in selecting a marketing agency, this post will help you craft one that meets your needs without driving the responding agencies crazy.
9. Social Media is Simpler Than You Think
A post that explains why “social media marketing is simpler than you’ve probably been led to believe. At its core, social media is not about doing new things, but about doing things you’ve always done as a business person differently.”
8. (Almost) 100 (of the) Best Social Media Marketing Blog Posts and Articles of 2009
A bookmarkable collection of some of the best thinking about social media last year, grouped into specific topic areas such as “Social Media Measurement and ROI,” “Social Media Statistics and Research” and “Social Media Marketing Strategy, Tactics and Best Practices.”
7. What is Webbiquity? How to Be Everywhere Online
The inaugural post on Webbiquity explains the concept of web presence optimization—how websites, blogs, SEM, SEO, interactive PR, content marketing, social networking, reputation management and social media can work together to make a company or individual omnipresent online for their targeted description or value statement.
6. How to Write an Effective Business Blog
A Blogging 101 type article for anyone who wants to get started blogging on the right foot, and avoid the missteps and false starts common in the blogosphere.
5. Five Big Shifts in Social Media Marketing
How social media is a reflection of and response to broader shifts in the market and culture that make it increasingly difficult (and irrelevant) to try to buy attention, but critical to earn it. For example, brands no longer control their messages—their customers do. But social media provides marketers with the tools to monitor, participate in and help shape the conversations.
4. The One Effective Use of Facebook for B2B Marketing
Given the dominance of Facebook on the social media landscape, it’s not surprising that this most is among the four most-read pieces on this blog. It’s a bit surprising however that it didn’t stir up more controversy; maybe I’m right about this?
3. Best Social Media Stats and Market Research of 2009
It’s heartening to know that as a data junky, I’m not alone. Wondering how the demographics of Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook users compare? Which social networking site 80% of companies plan to use a primary recruiting tool this year? What percentage of consumers and b2b buyers read blogs? You’ll find those answers and more here.
2. How to Choose a Marketing Agency (Ad Agency)
I’m really surprised by this one. As with the how-to-write-an-RFP post noted earlier, this outlines a solid, traditional process for mid-sized companies but overkill for small firms.
Drumroll please…#1 with nearly 3X as many visits as #10 above is…
1. 11 Myths of Social Media Marketing
Social media is only for the young, it’s free, we can hire an intern to do it, and eight other myths destroyed. Well, at least some were destroyed; others sparked disagreement in the comments.
Now on the next 100 posts!
Social Media: Making Friends for Fun & Profit
Tuesday, June 8th, 2010Guest post by Kim Albee
With all of the hype surrounding social media, knowing how to dip your toe in the water without falling into the deep end of the social media pool can be challenging. Should you participate? What avenues will be most fruitful? And how do you optimize the time you spend with social media sites?
Excerpted from my new booklet, Effective Online Marketing In A Nutshell, here are some tips that will help:
1. Find 3-5 groups in your target market and join them. Follow the discussions, and when one comes up where you can add value (not just spout about yourself and your business), then participate – help people solve issues and think more effectively about whatever the subject is.
2. Subscribe to LinkedIn Answers for your segments and/or categories. Answer a question every day (be within the top 5 answers posted) until you are selected as the “Best Answer”. Then slow to 3 times per week until you get another “Best Answer” designation. Then slow to one per week (or keep it up if you’re having fun and have the time). The purpose is to build you up as an expert who adds value in your arena / subject matter.
1. Think carefully about your Twitter name. Use your name or a name that is memorable or says something relevant about what you do for your customers.
2. Tweet according to your content strategy. Push traffic to your available downloads. Use a URL shortener like bit.ly or su.pr to schedule tweets ahead of time.
3. Re-Tweet good posts and make friends.
The jury is still out on Facebook’s effectiveness for the B2B market. We’ve got some useful first steps in the booklet on Facebook specifically, as well as additional tips on both LinkedIn and Twitter.
Social media is in the press every day. Its impact on many industries is still murky, but how it is re-shaping marketing strategy and activities like market research and demand generation continues to get clearer and more understood.
Utilizing social media as part of your overall marketing strategy and understanding where it fits in your marketing mix are critical to effectively leveraging your participation and time.
Effective Online Marketing In A Nutshell covers the 10 essential items of Internet Marketing – the 10 critical factors to focus on to be as effective as possible. It offers more information on social media, where it fits, and ways to use it effectively in your online marketing strategy.
To your Internet Marketing Success!
Kim Albee is Founder and President of Genoo, a marketing automation and online marketing tools vendor for small and midsize businesses. She is a frequent speaker at marketing conferences, such as Marketing Sherpa’s B2B Summit, the Online Marketing Summit national, virtual and upcoming regional conferences, as well as the upcoming Niche Digital Conference in Chicago this September. She founded the B2B Online Marketing group on LinkedIn, and is committed to providing information and tools that allow businesses to compete and win in their online marketing activities.
FTC Disclosure Notice: I have absolutely no financial relationship with Genoo whatsoever, and have not been compensated for this post in any way—other than hopefully getting a few retweets.
Best Facebook Marketing Tips and Guides of 2009
Tuesday, May 11th, 2010Okay, so you’ve seen the jaw-dropping statistics: Facebook now has more than 400 million users, and it’s still growing. If it were a country, it would be the third largest. Half of all users log in on any given day. The average user spend nearly an hour per day on the site. It’s either the first or second-most visited site on the web (swapping places with Google, depending on the day). So despite the site’s questionable value for business, particularly in the b2b realm, marketers can’t afford to ignore it. If your company wants to be where the action is in social media, you need a presence on Facebook.
Here in some of the best blog posts and articles about using Facebook for marketing from the past year, get tips on creating a compelling page for your company, attracting fans (or “likes”), and learning from the experience of successful brands on Facebook.
4 Reasons Why Marketers Should Choose Facebook Pages Over Facebook Groups by Inside Facebook
Jessica Lee explains the advantages of Facebook Pages for businesses, including rich analytics and increased links for SEO benefit.
The Super Simple Guide to Setting Up Your First Company Facebook Page Without Blowing a Gasket – Part One by Search Engine Guide
***** 5 Stars
With a title like that, you know it’s got to be a great post. In her own entertaining and inimitable style, Jennifer Laycock walks through the process of setting up a basic company page on Facebook, plus links to posts covering more advanced next steps.
5 Ways to Optimize Your Facebook Marketing by iMedia Connection
Frequent best-of contributor Daniel Flamberg advises Facebook marketers on strategy, style and tactics for success, such as how to craft effective content: “huge numbers of users come to Facebook to fill time gaps, relieve boredom or catch up on friends and family. Your content has to fit into that mindset to be successful.”
10 Successful Facebook Business Pages by Penn Olson
Willis Wee showcases 10 examples of Facebook brand success, from Ben & Jerry’s and Starbucks to FML and Red Bull.
10 practical tips for Facebook fan pages by iMedia Connection
Carnet Williams provides valuable tips for Facebook marketing success, such as establishing your strategy in advance, providing a stream of fresh content, and giving your audience a reason to become fans.
Learn Facebook Page SEO Mastery In 7 Easy Steps by All Facebook
Nick O’Neill offers SEO tips for increasing the prominence of your company’s Facebook page and website in search.
Tips To Get People To Join Your Facebook Fan Page by Small Business Trends
The brilliant Lisa Barone outlines a strategy to convert your Facebook fans from “passive observers to a full-blown brand evangelists.”
The Big Money Facebook 50 by Slate
Brief summaries of the 50 most popular brands on Facebook, and their approaches for achieving that success.
Alert! Facebook Pages Are Changing: Are You Ready? by MediaPost Online Media Daily
Michael Lazerow walks through the details and implications for marketers of several design changes implemented by Facebook late last year and early this year, such as the increasing importance of applications.
How Marketers are Using Social Media for Business: New Report
Tuesday, April 27th, 2010Whatever questions you may have about social media marketing, you’ll probably find the answers in the 2010 Social Media Marketing Industry Report from white paper guru Michael Stelzner. This excellent study provides a wide array of answers, statistics and insights. If there was any doubt that social media has become a mainstream marketing channel, 91% of respondents said they are using social media for marketing. Given the nature of the respondents, that figure is very likely higher than the overall business population, but there’s no doubt that social media is now being used in a sizable majority of organizations. Here are a few more of the key findings and my own observations.
The Biggest Question
A year ago, the top questions most marketers had about social media related to tactics, with ROI second. This year, questions about ROI top the list. The report notes that “the question of whether social media works has dropped off the charts completely.” One in three marketers said that measuring results and identifying best practices are their top questions about social media marketing.
Expertise Without Experience?
While 65% of marketers have been involved with social media marketing for a few months, only 14% of businesses are outsourcing any aspect of their social media marketing. This is eerily reminiscent of research findings reported by MarketingSherpa a year ago on the large percentage of marketers who felt they could be social media experts without having social media experience. Diving into social media without guidance from an outside expert risks ineffectiveness at the least, and possibly much worse. You could learn to drive a car without an instructor too, but it’s certainly not recommended. This new report does point out that the use of social media outsourcing does vary by company size, but still only 25 of medium to large enterprises are taking advantage of outside expertise.
Social Media Takes Time
How much time? More than half (56%) of respondents said they spend six hours or more per week on social media marketing, with 30% spending 11 hours or more and 12% spending more than half of their time with social media. Furthermore, the time commitment required grows with experience; those getting started in social media spent on average just an hour per week on it. But for marketers who have been using social media for a few months or longer, the median time jumped to 10 hours per week. That makes perfect sense–as marketers develop more social media connections, it takes longer to manage those relationships. And as social media marketing marketing begins to pay dividends, marketers are motivated to spend more time on it. The one question missing here was what gets included in social media time. Content development is one of the most time-consuming aspects of social media marketing, but other than blogging, it isn’t clear if writing is included in these figures.
Exposure vs. ROI
Interestingly, while guidance on measuring ROI topped the list of questions, “increased exposure for my business” was cited as the top benefit of social media marketing, with 85% of respondents achieving this. The next three most common benefits noted–increased traffic and email subscribers, new business partnerships and help with SEO–are also more measures of exposure than tangible financial return. Metrics related to ROI, such as leads generated and direct sales, were mentioned by only about half of the survey respondents as key benefits of social media marketing.
The report notes that last year, only about a third of marketers said that social media helped reduce their marketing expenses, while nearly half made that claim this year. This seems somewhat surprising; while social definitely reduces media/advertising expenses, it increases labor costs. It would seem logical that for many companies, marketing costs would be shifted, but not necessarily reduced, by the use of social media. Again, it isn’t clear what all gets lumped into this category. If content generation is included, overall costs aren’t likely to change much.
Social Media Means (Business-to) Business…
Nearly 74% of marketers who have been using social media for at least two years report that it has helped them close new sales. B2B marketers were slightly more likely to report increased sales than than their B2C counterparts. And small businesses with anywhere from 2-100 employees were most likely to see this benefit.
Social media is also valuable for establishing new business partnerships. More than half of marketers using social media said it had helped them forge new partnerships. Again, this benefit was more prevalent among b2b companies (61%) than b2b firms (49%).
…But Facebook Means Consumer Marketing
The top social media tools used across all respondents are:
Twitter – 88%
Facebook – 87%
LinkedIn – 78%
Blogging – 70%
Among experienced social media users, those who have been at it for at least two years, an astounding 96% use Twitter. Digging further in the details, b2b marketers are considerably more likely to find value with LinkedIn, and slightly more likely to utilize blogs, than their b2c peers. However, b2c marketers are much more likely to use Facebook; in fact, it is the top social media tool in the b2c space, used by 90% of b2c marketing pros.
What the Future Holds for Social Media Marketing
When asked to look forward, two-thirds of marketers said they plan to increase their use of blogs, Facebook, video, Twitter and LinkedIn. Blogs are the top area in which marketers plan to increase efforts, and small businesses are more enthusiastic about blogging than their larger counterparts.
Only 4% of marketers overall said they have no plans to use Facebook, though again it is favored more highly by consumer than business marketers. 80% of b2c companies, and 85% of large companies, plan to increase efforts here.
93% of all marketers are already using Twitter, and 71% plan to increase this effort.
Consumer marketers are slightly more likely to utilize online video and YouTube than their b2b counterparts (76% vs. 71%), but video is the top area of increased investment for the most experienced social marketers across the two segments.
B2b marketers are significantly more likely (72% vs. 59%) to increase their use of LinkedIn than those on the b2c side.
Finally, mobile marketing is growing in importance, but is a much higher priority for large bc2 companies than for smaller firms or b2b marketing teams.
There’s much more in the 2010 Social Media Marketing Industry Report as well. It’s a fascinating read for anyone interested in the current state and future of social media marketing.
Five Big Shifts in Social Media Marketing
Monday, April 19th, 2010Social media reflects a larger trend toward buyer empowerment that has changed not only the practice but the underlying philosophies of marketing over the past several years. Power has gradually shifted over the past couple of decades from manufacturers (e.g. HP, P&G) to the channel (e.g. TigerDirect, Wal Mart) to consumers and b2b buyers. Prospective customers are now using technologies like iPods, TiVo and ad blockers to avoid advertising messages. Interruption marketing isn’t quite dead, but it is no longer nearly as effective as it used to be. Marketers now have to work harder and smarter to earn the attention of potential customers, not just buy it.
While many if not most marketers have adjusted to the new practices required, one still sees corporate Facebook pages with few fans and no clear purpose, Twitter streams filled with nothing but obnoxious “Hey! Buy my stuff now!” messages, repackaged marketing brochures masquerading as thought leadership content and the like. B2c and b2b buyers alike are tuning out such messages; they increasingly listen to each other, to key influencers, and to marketers willing to add real value beyond just schlepping their own products and services when making their purchase decisions.
Just as social media has changed the sales practice, here are five shifts that savvy marketers recognize and capitalizing on to increase sales in an age of consumer empowerment generally and the rise of social media specifically.
Buyer control vs. vendor control: in traditional interruptive marketing, vendors produced messages (advertisements, direct mail, email blasts) and prospective buyers consumed these messages. Production was active, consumption was passive. That equation is now reversed. Buyers control which messages they want to see. Prospects seek out the information they want, and respond to messages that are entertaining, compelling and/or informative. They will help spread great content virally, while ignoring or mercilessly parodying what they don’t like.
Desired content vs. marketing messages: responding to the first trend, marketers are now challenged to produce helpful or interesting content rather than just brochures and marketing collateral. To be sure, marketing content still has its place, but that place is now when the prospect wants it, not at the front end of the consideration cycle. To earn a buyer’s attention up-front, marketers must produce attractive content, whether through entertainment or games in the b2c space, or problem-solving, research-oriented materials in b2b marketing.
Dialog vs. broadcast: in perhaps the biggest shift produced by the rise of social media, prospects now seek two-way communication with vendors rather than passively consuming marketing messages. In the early days of the internet, traditional forms of media (magazines, newspapers, marketing brochures) were simply moved from print to online; communication was still primarily one-way. Forums and blogs began to change that, empowering prospective purchasers to ask questions of vendors, and of each other. Now, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other social media tools have exploded this capability. Conversations are less expensive than broadcasting from a media standpoint, but much more costly in terms of time. Budgets consequently must shift from buying one-way media to adding personnel or supplementing staff with outside experts who can successfully engage potential buyers in product conversations.
Ongoing vs. campaigns: Traditional marketing often revolved around campaigns, such as a defined run period for a specific advertisement or series of ads, that had a clear beginning and endpoint. Social media marketing, in contrast, is ongoing. Try using a blog specifically for a campaign and you’ll end up with an abandoned blog and disillusioned readers. Traditional campaigns were about producing sales in the short term; social media is about developing relationships that lead to (increased and ongoing) sales over the long term. Well-crafted campaigns led to one-time buyers, who may or may not have returned. The successful use of social media produces long-term customers and brand advocates. This shift has also altered best practices for successful product launches.
Indirect vs. direct measures: Traditional advertising and marketing campaigns often lent themselves to convenient, direct measures of success (or failure), e.g.: 100 people saw our ad, 10 responded, and two purchased. ROI was a simple calculation. Social media can be measured, certainly, but the metrics are frequently less direct and ROI challenging to measure with any precision. While research shows that social media engagement increases revenue, direct tactical measurement is difficult. For example, while it’s generally better to have more Twitter followers than fewer, quality matters more; better to have fewer but more engaged followers than a bunch of spammy followers who inflate follower count without adding any value. Retweets are valuable, but exactly how much are they worth? What’s the value of engaging an influential blogger who may indirectly drive buyers your direction, even though he or she will never actually be your customer? What’s the value of answering a question or engaging in a discussion on LinkedIn? Certainly, marketers should measure what they can, such as website traffic driven by various social media sites and the quality (conversions, time spent on site, etc.) associated with that traffic, but beware the temptation of excessive “last click attribution”—just because a visitor who came from Twitter ended up buying your product or service doesn’t mean the microblogging service should get all of the ROI credit. They may very well have seen your messages and interactions in a dozen other social media and more traditional forums first.
The genie of consumer empowerment is unlikely to be stuffed back into the magic lamp soon, if ever. While the specific tools for engagement and social media interaction will no doubt continue to evolve over time, marketers who understand and adapt to the shifts produced will be well positioned for ongoing success, and unaffected by the continuing decline in the power of interruption marketing.
