by tradesmeninsights | Dec 8, 2015 | Marketing Tools, Marketing Trends, Social Marketing
By John Sonnhalter, Rainmaker Journeyman, Sonnhalter
I think we’re all in agreement that Content Marketing is here to stay and is becoming a more integral part of overall marketing programs. Some of the reasons are that technology is broader, easier to use and more accessible. People are trying to do more in less time and are motivated to seek self-serve product information to reduce pre-purchase decisions.
Heidi Cohen recently wrote an excellent post on B2B vs. B2C Content Marketing: How They Differ that explains the differences. Here are some highlights:
The mistake most marketers make is not developing a content strategy, because the B-to-B objectives are going to be different from its B-to-C counterpart. That’s why you need a written plan. Make sure they include:
- Develop better content, not more
- Pick one problem to start
- Tie content to business goals
- Focus on the user experience
The top 3 tactics for B-to-B:
- Social media
- Case Studies
- Blogs
The top 3 effective tactics for B-to-B:
- In-person events
- Webinars
- Case Studies
The top 3 social media platforms for B-to-B:
- LinkedIn
- Twitter
- Facebook
The top 3 content marketing goals for B-to-B:
- Lead generation
- Sales
- Lead nurturing
The top 3 metrics to measure B-to-B metrics:
- Sales lead quality
- Sales
- Higher conversation rates
by tradesmeninsights | Dec 1, 2015 | Marketing Tools, Marketing Trends
By John Sonnhalter, Rainmaker Journeyman, Sonnhalter
One of our biggest challenges is to make sure we have the right message for buyers as they go through the buying process. Another challenge is to deliver it in a way that they want to receive it.
I recently read an article by Jeffrey L. Cohen in Social Media B2B, The Most Effective B2B Content Types for Each Funnel Stage that I found very helpful. He summarizes a study by Regalix that asked B2B marketers to indicate which content types were most effective at each stage of the sales funnel.
Awareness – it makes sense that social media, blog posts and infographics would be used to get your attention.
Consideration – they narrow their search by looking at white papers, visiting websites and web-based events.
Purchase – when they make a purchase the website, case studies, research reports and videos top the list in helping close the deal.
Loyalty – keep in front of them using newsletters, social media, email, mobile and web-based events.
Advocacy – when someone becomes your advocate, you’ve hit the holy grail. Best way to touch them is with social media, blog posts or videos.
How do these content types shape up to what you’re seeing?
by tradesmeninsights | Nov 17, 2015 | Marketing Trends, Social Marketing
By John Sonnhalter, Rainmaker Journeyman, Sonnhalter
Now that it’s time for budgeting for next year, the question is, where are you going to allocate your dollars? There’s always more opportunities than there is money to fund them.
Social media – have you tried some efforts in it this past year? What were the results? What were management’s expectations?
Mobile marketing – Has this been on your radar screen? Do you have plans to be mobile friendly in 2016?
I recently read a post from Jeffrey Cohen at Social Media B2B that highlights the latest CMO results on B-to-B Statistics on what and where money is being spent. You can get complete details here. What’s amazing is that only 23% of marketing projects run by B-to-B product companies use marketing analytics.
Here are some highlights on budgets:
- Marketing makes up 10% of overall company budget
- Product companies currently spend 8% of their marketing budgets on social media
- In the next 5 years, they will spend 18% of their marketing budget on social media
Here are some highlights on social media impact:
- 54% of B-to-B product companies have proven impact of social media on their business
- 40% of B-to-B product companies have a good sense of the impact of social media on their business
- 6% of B-to-B product companies have not been able to show impact on their business
Here are some highlights on mobile and internet:
- B-to-B product companies currently spend 5% of their marketing budget on mobile
- In the next 3 years, B-to-B product companies will spend 14% on mobile
- B-to-B product companies complete 7.5% of their sales over the internet
Hopefully these numbers will help you in your upcoming budgeting processes.
by tradesmeninsights | Oct 28, 2015 | Marketing Tools, Marketing Trends, Traditional Marketing
By John Sonnhalter, Rainmaker Journeyman, Sonnhalter
We’ve had conversations here before about independent industrial distributors missing sales opportunities by not keeping up with the latest technology available.
According to Forrester Consulting, a 2014 study shows that 52% of business buyers expect at least 50% of their purchases to be made online in 3 years’ time. This should be an eye opener for distribution, but some are ignoring the facts. The big boys like Grainger (40% of their sales are from the internet) and MSC Industrial (over 50% of their sales come from online) are certainly taking advantage. Shouldn’t that set the tone for the independents? Forrester forecasts that B-to-B e-commerce will exceed $1.1 trillion and comprise 12% of all B-to-B sales by 2020.
I’ve said in the past that for smaller industrial distributors to survive, they need to use the internet. They can’t count on the business model of contractors coming in at 7 in the morning or around lunch time to pick up what they need. Time is money, especially for them.
Industrial Distribution magazine recently released some research on The state of B2B e-commerce in Industrial Distribution. Here are some highlights:
- Independent distributors are slow-moving in implementing e-commerce programs.
- Technical challenges are making sites user-friendly, making it aesthetically appealing and staying ahead of the competition.
- Primary reasons of not engaging online was lack of demand, technical obstacles and lack of marketing/promotional resources.
Customer satisfaction and the customer experience are the key factors in developing an online presence. Ironically, that’s how the independent distributor built their business in the first place. Now they just need to transfer that to a different platform, not only to keep existing business, but to grow additional revenue.
Source: Industrial Distribution
My worse fear is that the Amazons and the Alibabas of the world are going to make the independent extinct in a few years. I understand that the AD buying group has just instituted a new program to help members deal with some of these issues. It’s too early to tell if it’s making an impact, but at least they recognize the issue and are trying to help.
If you like this post, you may want to read:
What’s the future of small independent distributors?
Are independent industrial distributors helping Amazon to succeed?
Distributor Strategy: What’s yours?
Aesthetic issues (product descriptions, product images, graphics, logos) 22.1%
Cost 7.1%
Keeping pace with or staying ahead of competitors 18.6%
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by tradesmeninsights | Oct 7, 2015 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Tools, Marketing Trends, Tradesmen Insights
By John Sonnhalter, Rainmaker Journeyman at Sonnhalter
First of all, do you have a lead nurturing program? If the answer is no, you may want to consider one and here’s why.
In a recent article in eMarketer.com, there were some interesting findings in a study done by Demand Gen Report (DGR) in July of 2015
- Over 50% of U.S. B-to-B marketers said nurturing programs outperformed their counterparts from 10-30%.
- These leads outperformed others in moving through the sales funnel, and respondents reported a 10-30% increase in sales opportunities.
The key in lead nurturing is being able to define specific markets and subsequent messaging. You need to be relevant. Email was the most widely used tactic with over 94% using it.
Another interesting stat is that 42% of consumers will delete an email if it isn’t mobile friendly, so keep that in mind.
So do some of these stats resonate with what you’re doing?
If you like this post you may want to read:
Lead Nurturing: What Industrial Marketers Need to Know.
For Your Lead Nurturing Program-Where do you Find Good Content?
What’s the Difference Between Lead Nurturing and Follow-up Calls?
by tradesmeninsights | Oct 6, 2015 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Trends, Social Marketing, Tradesmen Insights
By John Sonnhalter, Rainmaker Journeyman at Sonnhalter
We live in a society that expects immediate gratification. This spills over into our business lives, and companies expect an immediate ROI on almost everything today — Content Marketing is no exception.
Some companies are putting more eggs in the content marketing basket and are expecting big results in a short period of time. The problem is, to build a loyal audience, it takes time. They need to get to know, like and trust you and that doesn’t happen overnight.
If you want immediate results, use traditional outbound tactics like direct mail to generate short-term activity.
Joe Pulizzi, Founder of Content Marketing Institute found in interviewing a number of entrepreneurs for his book, Content Inc., that it took at least 15 months to grow a loyal audience.
This is no surprise for those of us who have been doing this for some time. For those that are trying to get a content program going they need to do some ground work to let management what to expect and when to expect it.
Joe offers some suggestions on getting in the game while you try to build a case for the BIG push.
- Do a pilot program – choose a market category and put metrics like increases search engine ranking or number of leads that will demonstrate to the bean counters that it’s working.
- Fear Factor – analyze your competition and make the case that your company is losing web visibility.
- Find a sugar daddy – identify solutions to key pain points for your sales leaders and you may find that they not only will become your advocate, but may find funds short term to fund your efforts.
The bottom line is that it takes time, so be patient!
