Andy DeBrunner is social media manager at Godfrey and has worked with Fortune 100 companies to tackle their social media needs. He was also a contributor to Godfrey’s e-book “Jumpstart Your B2B Marketing.” Follow him @adebrunner or follow Godfrey @GodfreyB2B.
Your customers are using social media. That’s no surprise. So is it appropriate for you to join in on the fun and get your business on board? I know what some of you are thinking. “Sure, I know everyone’s using social media, but my company sells products that cost a ton of money and sales can take years to close. I can’t generate a sale, or even a lead, for any of my products using Facebook or Twitter.” If you just said some version of that to yourself, let me reframe the way you might want to think about social media for your business.
All too often, Facebook and Twitter dominate marketing meetings and boardroom conversations about social media, both in B2B and B2C. (read more…)
Deluxe is in the middle of a big brand and strategy shift. It is the world’s largest printer of checks, but it is working to become a brand known for products and services that help small businesses expand.
To demonstrate this shift, Deluxe launched Project REV, a yearlong marketing lab in which nine small-business owners were given $5,000 in Deluxe marketing products and services as well as expert consulting. In his BlogWell presentation, Deluxe’s Nathan Eide walked us through the program and explained how social media played a critical role in its success.
A few of Eide’s big ideas: (read more…)
This post is by TJ McCue of TechBizTalk.
One of the challenges of business-to-business sales is that it has such a long funnel — compared with consumer goods one might buy on a whim. You’re looking at several connections, possibly with multiple people before you get to “yes.” How do you keep that connection alive long enough to make the sale?
Most B2B customers and prospects don’t want a call from you. They might want a relationship, but they probably want it on their terms, not yours. At the core of any deep B2B relationship is one essential skill or trait: The ability to listen and empathize (with a customer’s experience, in this case). The top brands are able to use that skill to establish authentic communication — authentic in that it creates trust and a willingness to keep the relationship alive.
I asked a few of the top minds in the B2B marketing field for their best advice on how to create and maintain lead relationships — and how to convert those leads into customers over time. (read more…)
I attended — and tweeted from — the Center for the Polyurethanes Industry’s Technical Conference in Nashville, Tenn. On the final day, Rob Krebs from the American Chemistry Council led a session on online and social media with a simple premise: influencing the online discussion of topics and keywords that are crucial to your company.
It sounds trite and condescending to say that companies still fear e-mail, much less the Web, or that they feel any online communication is a legal minefield. Yet that was the mood among some participants in CPI’s social media session I attended. Professionals can’t influence the online conversation if they can’t even get company approval to join it.
Another false assumption is that online discussion about companies and industries and their products is always negative. But it’s not, said Krebs, who presented one study showing that most conversations about relevant keywords are “neutral.” What does “neutral” mean? (read more…)
This essay is by Jeremy Victor, president of Make Good Media and editor-in-chief of B2Bbloggers.
When asked to describe the state of business-to-business social media marketing, I see two camps. There are the “haves”: companies that have committed to developing a strategy, implementing it, adapting upon seeing results and reaping rewards. And then there are the “have-nots”: companies that continue to wrestle with the return-on-investment question, reading case studies and risking missing possibly the biggest marketing opportunity in years.
The good news for “have-nots” is that business-to-business companies still have time to get started, and much can be learned from “haves.” If you fall into the “have-not” camp, here are four common characteristics of “haves.”
- Social media are integrated into their overall marketing plan, with specific goals that are tracked and measured.
- Good listening is in their nature. When their brand is mentioned on the social Web, they adopt tools to enable them to hear it.
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