There are several trends bubbling up to the top for B2B Marketing right now. If you’re not addressing or implementing them in the near future, you could get left behind by your buyers and your competition.

Online content is more important than ever in getting found on the Internet.

Now is the time to write articles, start blogging, create video, write whitepapers and eBooks, post slideshows and presentations. Not only should you write and post them, but you should share them and get your contacts buzzing about them. Google loves that.

New website programming languages make it easier to get found online.

Your legacy website may be holding you back from getting found on the Internet. If your site isn’t taking advantage of the latest website programming code and features, the search engines will have a more difficult time finding it. In old or legacy sites, the code is predominant or “heavy”, which makes it tough for search engines to find text, figure out what your site is about and index it for the right keywords and phrases.

Transparency and telling your story engages prospects and helps them trust you.

Do you believe that the less you tell your prospects the better? Have you left off your physical address because you don’t want to limit your audience? Do you have no employee photos and bios on your site? You must subscribe to the mushroom “keep them in the dark and feed them sh*t” approach to marketing. Let me tell you, in today’s world of total transparency and people who buy because they like your story – you are not establishing trust with your marketing presence.

Mobile shopping and buying will dominate marketing within the next few years.

When you update your website, make sure you include compatibility with mobile devices or a capability to create a mobile version or application. From what the marketing gurus are saying, you’re going to want to offer mobile sooner than you think.

So, B2B marketers, will you get left behind? Readers – feel free to add other trends that you think could put B2B Marketers in a position of getting left behind.

There are two major developments for B2B marketers I’m thankful for. One, B2B marketers are moving away from subliminal, artificial messages crafted by ad agencies to the more transparent “citizen marketing” of social media; and two, online marketing is much more measurable than offline.

1. Citizen Marketing and Social Media

In 2007 Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba wrote the book, Citizen Marketing. The book was about how social media was emerging as a marketing channel that sellers needed to pay attention to. Social media sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube and Google Plus have indeed grown and allowed the average citizen platforms from which to voice their preferences.

Social media marketing has led to the demise of traditional madmen (read my previous posts about this, From Subliminal Madmen to Lead Nurturers and Bye, Bye, Madmen; Hello, Lead Nurturers!)- we no longer need so many crafty creatives designing messages in their ivory towers and charging companies big bucks for their work. Marketing content has been democratized, and transparency is prized over the subliminal or sneaky (see my previous post, Transparency is the Best Policy for B2B Marketers). The cost of marketing has come down, providing more of an opportunity for small businesses to prevail over larger ones and reducing barriers for start-ups.

The time required to create marketing content has increased, but smart agencies are finding a way to fill this need (read my posts Fuel Your Online Marketing Machine with Dynamic Content and B2B Marketers – Repurpose Your Content with a Purpose). They will have to understand the voice of their clients’ customers and use marketing personas as they build content for them.

And B2B marketers who focus on a niche will have an easier time of cutting through the noise of online content. They will take advantage of the long-tail of demand, which allows them to get found online for even the most obscure products and services very cost-effectively.

2. Measuring Marketing Results is More Accurate

Because we can capture activity and behavior online, B2B marketers can better measure the results of online marketing. Website traffic, click-throughs, commenting, sharing, purchases are all captured for the marketer to analyze. Testing is faster as marketers can quickly set up landing pages to see which ones get the best results for a certain audience. Fact- and data-driven marketing helps provide a solution to merchant John Wanamaker’s comment, “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.”

What say you? Agree, disagree? What trends would you add?

Are you a small to mid-size business that needs marketing help, but you don’t have the budget to hire a full-time, senior-level marketing executive? One option is to hire a part-time or outsource CMO to drive your marketing success. Here are six important qualities to look for in your CMO for Hire.

1. Experience in your industry plus others. While it’s great to have someone who knows your industry and can hit the ground running (or at least have a reduced learning curve), cross-industry experience can be a plus, too. CMOs with experience outside your industry can think outside the box and give you a competitive advantage. While your competitors market in the red, bloody ocean of competition, your marketing could take place in a blue ocean of opportunity – where no one else competes. (Read more about Blue Ocean Strategy in my blog posts, 3 of My Favorite Strategic Models and Why B2B Marketers Need Blue Ocean Strategy.)
2. A neutral party who has your best interest in mind (not  a front for an agency or marketing services firm). Watch out for the marketing consultant or CMO for Hire who owns an ad agency or services firm. When they recommend marketing activities for your company, are they just trying to feed their agency’s bottom line or yours?
3. Ability to explore new territory for each client, rather than taking a cookie cutter approach. Has your outsource CMO left a trail of cookie cutter designs and tactics with past clients? Or, are they willing to look at all possibilities and explore new tactics to get the right results for your marketing?
4. Walks in your door listening, not selling. When you first met your outsource CMO, did they ask a lot of questions about you and your company? Or, did they talk a lot about their company and their approach?
5. Skilled in new marketing tactics like social media and inbound marketing, but is not dogmatic about any tactic. If your CMO for Hire announces, “You need to be on Facebook!” without the research or data about your customers and your business to back that up, you might want to think twice. On the other hand if they say, “Let’s analyze your situation and survey your stakeholders before deciding on tactics,” they are taking a measured approach.
6. Ability to say “I don’t know the answer” – followed by “…but, I will find out!” Is your potential CMO for Hire a know-it-all? Or, are they willing to be realistic and admit that they may not have all the answers immediately, but they will get them!

In business there are hedgehogs and there are foxes. I believe the concept applies to marketers, too.

In the book Good to Great, Jim Collions wrote that great companies acted more like hedgehogs – simple, dowdy creatures that know one thing and stick to it. The comparison companies in the Good to Great study were more like foxes, wrote Collins, craft, cunning, fast and everchanging. The foxes knew many things but lacked consistency.

Great companies followed “The Hedgehog Concept.” They knew what they were good at and stuck to it. They saw through complexity and found unifying patterns. They simplified. So, too, do great marketers.

Great marketers plan their marketing in advance. They analyze past performance and cut under-performing tactics. They don’t jump onto the latest marketing bandwagon until they have a clear understanding of how it will or won’t support their primary business goals.

What do you think? Can you accept the image of the dowdy hedgehog marketer? Or will you go with crafty-like-a-fox?

There’s a perfect storm brewing in successful marketing campaigns these days, and there are three key components: great copywriting, optimization, and use of technology.

Just like in the book The Perfect Storm, in which author Sebastian Junger describes the confluence of three critical weather factors: warm air from a low-pressure system coming from one direction, a flow of cool and dry air generated by a high-pressure from another direction, and tropical moisture provided by Hurricane Grace, so too is there a perfect storm of marketing skillsets that accelerate results for your marketing efforts.

Marketing Copywriting

There are two things that copywriting is critical for today – social sharing and content. The more compelling content you have online that people can relate to and share with others, the more chance your business has of getting found online. And, it’s not just about writing “OK” content – it’s about writing great content – great stories with valuable information and compelling calls to action that get people to share their content.

Content Optimization

Your content needs to include and be tagged with the right  keywords and phrases. You need to know which are the most frequently-used when your target prospects search for your products or services. This is both science and art. There are certain places where you can include keywords and phrases that the search engine algorithms respond to. It’s constantly changing, including the shift from SEO (search engine optimization) to SMO (social media optimization).

Marketing Technology

Today as a CMO, marketing consultant or agency, you need to understand and use technology. Social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, websites, SEO (social media optimization),  marketing analytic dashboards, lead nurturing systems, customer relationship management (CRM) systems are all technology products that you need to use to be efficient and cost-effectively track results.

At New Incite, we think we’re in the perfect marketing storm. Our lead marketing consultant and CMO for Hire, Jen Beever, came from the software industry in 1997 to start New Incite. A great writer, Jen’s classmate and fellow English Major at Colby College was Linda Greenlaw, the captain of the Andrea Gail‘s sister ship, the Hannah Boden, who was featured in The Perfect Storm.  And, finally, Jen applies her software background as a techie – she has been getting results from websites and search engine optimization since 1998.

Are you in the Marketing Perfect Storm? Swimming strong or sinking?

Photo from Flickr. The Perfect Storm, Some rights reserved by bernavazqueze

Now is the time for B2B Marketers to invest small amounts in marketing programs - by doing research to find new or validate existing market opportunities, confirming or updating marketing messaging, or identifying new marketing technologies and media that  might offer better or more cost-effective results.

I read a great HBR blog post by Stephen Wunker, Five Rules for Innovating in a Shaky Economy. Then this morning when I saw my colleague Lisa Anderson‘s post on LinkedIn referencing an Industry Week article about 1,000 U.S. companies hoarding cash (as of the end of 2010, $853 billion), I was inspired to post about it. Wunker wrote about Rule #2. Buy Vowels:

“In the television game show Wheel of Fortune, contestants have the option of solving a word puzzle (a potentially risky move that can generate quick winnings) or buying a vowel (spending a bit of their cash to improve their knowledge about what the puzzle says). Uncertain economic times present an excellent vowel-buying opportunity. By learning more about consumer needs, investing small amounts in technologies emerging from academia, or trialing new ideas in modest test markets, companies can build their understanding about growth options and position themselves to take bolder and riskier moves as the economy brightens.”

So, U.S. companies, what do you say? Isn’t it more than time to get a jump on solving your B2B marketing puzzles?

Blog entry excerpted from Jennifer Beever's Marketing chapter in The Book on Business from A to Z

What’s the best way to price your product or service for business to business (B2B) marketing? This is one of the most common questions B2B marketers have, and pricing your product or service wrong can be a disaster.

Pricing must take into consideration customer demand, price sensitivity and elasticity, the competition, and market conditions. Customers will be more sensitive to prices if they know there are substitutes or if they think your product lacks differentiation.  The demand for your product will be less elastic in response to a price increase if customers know that there is little competition out there, if customers are not apt to change suppliers often or if it appears that your product has a competitive advantage.

Cost-Basis Pricing

Many businesses price on a cost-basis, which includes fixed overhead costs such as utilities, salaries, rent and other costs that do not vary, and variable costs such as labor and materials. But with cost-basis pricing, you may be leaving money on the table. If you are able to differentiate yourself from your competition, there is a better way to price.

Value-Basis Pricing

A value-based pricing model that has proven to be a real differentiator in today’s value-oriented culture. This model includes calculating the actual bottom-line improvement your service/product creates for your customer and demonstrating that value to them in your sales conversations and in your marketing. According to Daniel Feiman, Strategic Planning/Financial Consultant and Managing Director of the consulting firm Build it Backwards, a great book on this topic is Value Merchants: Demonstrating and Documenting Superior Value in Business Markets by James C. Anderson, Nirmalya Kumar, and James A. Narus.

Some Pricing Issues

Be careful about reducing prices as a promotional effort to increase sales. In some industries a price drop indicates a decline in value or in quality and may be a detriment to sales. Instead, price increases can be used to close more sales before an increase is in effect, but they will not be effective if demand for your product is elastic due to lots of competition, ability of buyers to change vendors easily, and lack of differentiation.

Other problems with pricing include too much emphasis on cost and not enough on profit, failure to change prices with a changing market, prices that are not tied to positioning which affects the perception of the product, and lack of customizing prices to markets and product variables. When a company determines its pricing strategy, it is essential to communicate that clearly to marketing and sales as well as other departments.

How do you price your products? What works, what doesn’t?

Money Photo from Flickr, Some rights reserved by Casey Serin

Marketers need to understand their rights – and how to take action – when their online content gets copied.

During a discussion about copyrighted material on websites, one of my clients – an attorney – told me about a  program called www.copyscape.com. I ran some of my website pages through the program and found that two consultants had copied two of my most popular articles – The Truth About Trade Shows and Why Can’t Sales and Marketing Just Get Along?. I consulted with an IP attorney who told me that I had no legal recourse since I had not registered my articles with the U.S. Copyright Office.

I did send cease and desist letters to the consultants and to an online publication that had published my article under one of the consultant’s bylines. The editor of said publication responded immediately, apologized profusely and took the page down. The consultants also took down the web pages containing my articles that they copied – one said they had hired a ghost writer and had no idea that person copied my work. The other simply apologized. This was in 2006.

As I’ve followed this topic of online content rights over the years, I’ve found out that there is more you can do. The Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) of 1998 gives content owners the right to send an official notice to the copier’s  online partners. So, in my case, if either of the consultants had failed to respond and take down my content that they copied, I could have contacted Google and the consultants’ site hosts to demand that their page with my content be de-listed (Google) and removed from their server (site host).

Copyscape.com is free and considered reliable, according to a blog entry on Top Online Plagiarism Checkers by Search Engine Journal. Copyscape.com also has paid services that allow you to automatically monitor online plagiarism of your content.

Others have written on this topic, and some blog entries I found helpful include:

• How to Protect Your Intellectual Property Online by Michael Hyatt, Chairman, Thomas Nelson Publishers
• How to Protect Your Blog from Content Thieves by Jean-Baptiste Jung, Cats-Who-Code
• Dealing with Online Copyrights Infringement in Accordance with DMCA by Marketing Dock

I’m sure there is a lot more knowledge out there on this topic – please share your experience and information below.

Photo from Flickr, Some rights reserved by Will Lion

There’s  a new normal in marketing, and if you want to be successful and get results from your marketing, it’s important to understand how things have changed.

Marketing has changed in the last ten or so years due to the disruptive innovation called the Internet. Because the Internet has changed the way people buy, marketers have to change the way they market. What has changed is buyer behavior. Buyers don’t want to be bothered by the interruption of ads or telemarketing calls. Buyers want information about products and services when they want or need to buy something. Buyers are in control.

Because of the focus on the buyer, a new term and a new activity has emerged in marketing today – lead nurturing. Lead nurturing is how marketing supports the buyer through the buy cycle and the four stages of awareness, information, assurance and loyalty.

According to Brian Carroll, it is marketing’s job to engage buyers and provide relevant and consistent dialog with viable prospects regardless of timing to buy. Part of this involves analyzing the buy cycle and identifying the right touchpoints with which to put information in front of the buyer.

This is a major paradigm shift – from Advertising Madmen who attempted to control buyers minds to Lead Nurturers who walk down the buying path with them. See the difference?

Photo from Flickr, Some rights reserved by Katherine_Davis

Sometimes I’m surprised that people ask the question, “What is Marketing?” Here are some of my favorite definitions and distinctions about what marketing does.

One way to begin to answer this question is to ask, “What is marketing not?” Marketing is not graphic design, advertising, PR or sales.

Blog entry excerpted from Jennifer Beever's Marketing chapter in The Book on Business from A to Z

A good distinction between sales and marketing is that marketing makes your phone ring, your email in-box fill up and helps engage customers in the buying cycle. Sales closes deals.

Done well, marketing can impact not only new customer sales, but also existing customer sales, wallet share (the amount of revenue you get from each customer) and employee attitude and retention rate. According to Philip Kotler, author of the popular textbook Marketing Management:

“Marketing is the business function that identifies unfulfilled needs and wants, defines and measures their magnitude, determines which target markets the organization can best serve, decides on appropriate products, services, and programs to serve these markets, and calls upon everyone in the organization to ‘think and serve the customer.”

Mike Schultz and John Doerr, authors of the book Professional Services Marketing, state that marketing has the ability to “engage potential customers, increase the close rate, increase revenue and increase affinity with employees.”

What’s your definition of marketing? Does it differ from the viewpoints above?

Photo from Flickr – Some rights reserved by eblaser