by tradesmeninsights | Feb 21, 2012 | Marketing Trends, Traditional Marketing
According to a recent article in BtoB Magazine, Making the Most of Mobile is beginning to change. Here’s an interesting stat – in December of 2011, eMarketer released a study that showed mobile had surpassed print readership. Mobile increased by 30% in 2011 to 65 minutes a day compared to print at 44 minutes. Magazines are finding that their content consumption on smartphones and tablets are beginning to boom.
This trend isn’t just in the B-to-C market. B-to-B publications are beginning to focus on different delivery options. Summit Media Group who owns Packaging World found in a recent survey that 46% of their subscribers owned a tablet and that 78% planned to own one by the end of the year. Of those that currently own tablets, 74% said they read work-related digital magazines on these devices. They have incorporated “responsive design” into their websites which allows for optimum readability automatically.
Ziff Davis, a tech media company, is moving ALL its print magazines to digital and mobile and is clearly a leader in this endeavor. Newer media companies like WTWH Media which just started a few years ago focuses heavily on the digital aspect. Cygnus Business Media, Penton Media and others are starting to follow suit.
So bottom line for those of us that are trying to reach professional tradesmen, we now have another opportunity and avenue to reach them. Benefits of digital are:
- We can measure responses
- We can enhance our message by including links to videos, testimonials, etc.
If you haven’t included digital in your marketing plans, maybe it’s time you consider it.
by tradesmeninsights | Feb 7, 2012 | Marketing Trends, Traditional Marketing
Moving forward in 2012, is mobile media going to be part of your overall marketing strategy?
According to a recent survey by the Association of Strategic Marketing (ASM), 2011 Trends in Mobile Marketing, 58% of respondents indicated that they were not using mobile marketing.
As a matter of fact, mobile seems to rank somewhere in the middle of overall marketing practices behind email (which ironically is number one) and SEO. The 42% that do use mobile in their marketing plans are optimizing their websites and emails and are beginning to use QR codes.
If you like this post you might like:
Is Mobile Marketing the Best Way to Reach the Professional Tradesman?
What Are You Doing to Reach the Young Professional Tradesman?
The Mobile Marketing Trends Study was created to allow marketing folks to see what similar organizations were doing. Some highlights of mobile marketing goals include:
- Sales/revenue – 33%
- Product service info – 25%
- Customer retention – 15%
- Lead nurturing – 11%
- Customer opt-in – 10%
- Alert reminders – 6%
For those of us in the B-to-B space, and especially for those of us trying to reach the professional tradesman, mobile should be a part of your marketing plan.
Not sure where to start? The easiest place to start is to optimize your website for mobile. Secondly, consider sending mobile-optimized emails.
The key is to make a plan and do something, monitor the response and do something else. As I’ve said before, I don’t believe mobile is going away, and there are many opportunities to reach our target audiences.
by tradesmeninsights | Feb 2, 2012 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Trends, Social Marketing, Traditional Marketing
Today’s Internet-enabled customer has made it clear that they decide what content looks like and how it should be distributed. Content Marketing has emerged as the primary mode of engaging business prospects. This holds true especially in the technology sector where Eccolo Media, in the fall of 2011, released a report on the trends in marketing collateral. The survey, Eccolo Media 2011 B2B technology Collateral Survey Report is available free.
Customers expect that your collateral material will provide them with info they can use – not info on a particular product. Highlights of the survey include:
- Users are consuming more content, but from a greater number of resources.
- Social sharing buttons influence all type of content – 77% said if they had an easy way to share, they do.
- Collateral goes Mobile – 37% consume content on tablets or smartphones.
- Collateral goes interactive like embedded videos – 92% of users say it positively affected overall influence.
About the survey. This is the fourth year Eccolo Media has done it. They surveyed C-level executives and the survey represents 501 usable respondents.
One of the key take aways from this is that those of us who are developing content should be considering a library of suitable content for their marketing efforts.
by tradesmeninsights | Jan 11, 2012 | Marketing Trends, Traditional Marketing
INDUSTRY OVERVIEW/TRENDS/ISSUES
A lot of our clients know they need to get into the “green” arena but do not know how to approach it or how to bring value to the “green” market. Thus, the following is both an overview of the alternative energy industry (focusing on certain segments within the larger context) to be used as a means of educating, and a list of trends and issues to be used for planning for the types of products and services needed in the future.
Renewable Energy Consumption in the Nation’s Energy Supply, 2008
This overview covers the following portions of the Alternative Energy market:
•BioMass/BioFuels/BioProducts
•Geothermal
•Hydropower
•Solar
•Wind
For those of you who might want to look at this market, the 54-page report highlights the industry, trends and issues. We also touch on associations, training, codes, trade shows and publications that cover this market. You can sign up to receive a copy here.
by tradesmeninsights | Jan 5, 2012 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Trends, Social Marketing
Content marketing expert and founder of the Content Marketing Institute, Joe Pulizzi will review the practice of content marketing and why it’s one of the fastest growing areas of marketing today. In this hour presentation, Joe will discuss eight initiatives that all marketers need to consider now when it comes to corporate storytelling and social media.
Joe is a leading author, speaker and strategist for content marketing. Joe is the founder of the Content Marketing Institute and the CEO of SocialTract. He’s also co-authored Get Content Get Customers and Managing Content Marketing: The Real World Guide for Creating Passionate Subscribers to Your Brand.
I’ve heard Joe present before, and you are in for a real treat. Please join us on February 2nd at 1 PM EST for this free, informative presentation. Joe will also be taking questions at the end.
This webinar is available on our YouTube channel – click here.
by tradesmeninsights | Jan 4, 2012 | Marketing Trends, Social Marketing
It’s not like social media just came out. The B-to-C space has been using it successfully for the last 3-5 years. So why are B-to-B practitioners slow to adapt?
I think it’s because they don’t know where to start. You should probably start by developing a strategy that is included in your overall marketing plans. If you use social media to help build better relationships with your customers, I think you’ll find that it can help with more than just brand building.
I read a post recently in emarketer.com on why B-to-B was still unsure about social media strategies. Some highlights include:
- 66% of marketing executives view social media as extremely or very important, but only 7% were leveraging it heavily.
- 9% of B-to-B marketers weren’t using social at all.
Nearly 50% said that new tools and technology would make their social efforts more effective.
So if you’re a B-to-B marketer, what’s holding you back? Is it a resource issue?
