B2B Marketing News: Trust Tops Brand Marketer Study, Top Email Engagement Day Shifts, YouTube’s New Comparative Data, & Ad Prices Rise

Brand marketers stick to trust-building strategies forged in 2020's fires, study finds 91 percent of brand marketers will keep focusing on the strategies aimed at building trust they developed in 2020 as a response to the pandemic, according to recently-released survey data of interest to digital marketers. Marketing Dive Ad Prices Forecast To Inflate 3% This Year Digital display ad price inflation for 2021 is expected to be 3.4 percent, with digital video slightly higher at 3.6 percent, while this year is expected to hold some recovery from the impact of the pandemic in 2020, according to newly-released forecast data. MediaPost In Engagement Shift, Friday Proves Top Day for Email Response Rates in 2020 With an 18.9 percent click-to-open (CTO) rate, marketing emails sent on Friday lead the way when it comes to engagement levels, according to recently-released survey data, with Saturday coming in as having the lowest engagement rates. MarketingCharts YouTube Adds New Comparative Data Tools in YouTube Studio, and Info on Other Channels Your Audience Watches Google's YouTube platform has launched new features that allow digital marketers to compare the performance of their video content from between 24 hours up to 28 days, offering a new glimpse into a variety of performance metrics, the video giant recently announced. Social Media Today Nielsen Launches Identity Sync, New Global Attribution System Nielsen has rolled out a new global attribution system, Identity Sync, the firm's identity-backed solution to the loss of cookie-based tracking systems, the firm recently announced. MediaPost LinkedIn's Developing a New Freelance Marketplace Platform to Facilitate New Opportunities LinkedIn has been testing features which could expand on the platform's existing ProFinder tool, adding enhanced professional freelancer connection functionality, according to an industry report. Social Media Today How IT Buyers' Researching Behaviors Changed in 2020 More than 54 percent of information technology buyers spent more time researching solutions during the second half of 2020, with some 24 percent reporting research time staying flat — two of several findings of interest to digital marketers in recently-released survey data. MarketingProfs 3 Steps to Better Virtual Meetings A clear definition of the behaviors an organization is trying to encourage will help forge more productive virtual meetings, as will finding and overcoming behavioral blockers, according to The Harvard Business Review, which recently took a look at how to make today's online meetings more collaborative and engaging. Harvard Business Review The Most Important Email Marketing Optimizations [Survey] 43 percent of marketers consider personalization the top characteristic to improve when it comes to email optimization, followed by data quality at 39 percent and email design at 34 percent, according to recently-released survey data. MarketingProfs ANA Finds Half Of Ad Execs Have No Plans To Travel/Attend In-Person Events In 2021 Just 2.5 percent of advertising executives have said that they’re willing to fly for business in 2021, according to newly-released Association of National Advertisers (ANA) survey data of interest to online marketers. MediaPost ON THE LIGHTER SIDE: A lighthearted look at “finding your brand purpose” by Marketoonist Tom Fishburne — Marketoonist YouTube Reveals 2020 US Bumper Ads Leaderboard of Top 6-Second Ads — Adweek TOPRANK MARKETING & CLIENTS IN THE NEWS:

• Lee Odden — What’s Trending: Revamping Content Marketing — LinkedIn (client)
• LinkedIn / TopRank Marketing — Debunking Full-Funnel Myths that Send Marketing Strategies Off Course — LinkedIn (client)
• Joshua Nite — What Should Be Your First Steps When Starting a Business? Consider These 10 Tips — Small Business Trends
• Lee Odden — 50 Quotes That Will Change The Way You Do SEO — SERPed

Have you found your own key B2B marketing story from the past week of industry news? Please let us know in the comments below. Thanks for joining us for the weekly TopRank Marketing B2B marketing news, and we hope that you will return next Friday for more of the most relevant B2B and digital marketing industry news. In the meantime, you can follow us at @toprank on Twitter for even more timely daily news.

The post B2B Marketing News: Trust Tops Brand Marketer Study, Top Email Engagement Day Shifts, YouTube’s New Comparative Data, & Ad Prices Rise appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Find, Engage and Close: Demandbase’s Jon Miller on Recasting the B2B Marketing Automation Journey #B2BMX

How can B2B marketers recast the marketing automation journey to meet today's challenges and be ready for those to come? Jon Miller, chief marketing officer at Demandbase, recently presented a session at the 2021 B2B Marketing Exchange Experience virtual conference, and explored new account-based marketing best practices. Although this pandemic year at #B2BMX won’t see B2B marketers gathered in the event’s usual sunny Scottsdale, Arizona location, many new attendee opportunities were on tap virtually. Refresh, renew, remix has been the conference’s theme this year, and to help ease the lack of physical networking, #B2BMX included a Spotify music playlist, live music performances, and even various charitable elements. Jon began by looking back at his journey starting Marketo — acquired by Adobe in 2018 for $4.75 billion — nearly 15 years ago, when marketers had a need to capture and manage online leads, a need that the company’s service met, allowing marketers to communicate and send leads to the appropriate departments. Marketo’s efforts during this era helped marketing build credibility and respect, Jon noted, as marketers became a part of their firms’ revenue engines. Today however, the world is changing and marketing automation tools aren’t necessarily keeping pace. We’ve reached the end of the era of traditional demand generation, which has become shipwrecked, Jon explained. The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and other global data protection efforts have made it more challenging for marketers to send emails in the way they were once able to, while in some instances sales teams are sending greater amounts of email now than marketers. “Marketers lost the keys to being the sole owners of communications,” Jon said, and noted that today’s larger buying committees also present challenges when trying to hold one-on-one interactions. This is where marketing can play a larger role, he noted. Firms today are often generating more revenue after the sale in the form of recurring revenue and a focus on expansion, Jon observed. There’s a strong bias in marketing automation tools against net-new business, while at the same time increasing revenue is being generated after the sale, which led Jon to share some of the limitations of traditional lead-based approaches:

• It doesn’t make sense for marketers to be looking at leads while salespeople look at accounts
• Buyers have become harder than ever to reach, and have a greater reluctance to filling out forms than ever before
• Greater quantities of research that once took place on a business’ website are now done elsewhere, making the tools that track on-site activities less effective
• Buyer intent signals are hidden to traditional marketing automation software, as the digital body language has moved to third-party sites

Jon also pointed out a number of other factors that have contributed to the shipwreck that traditional demand generation has found itself in, including:

• Missed pipeline goals
• Poor alignment between marketing and sales
• Obstacles to moving upmarket
• Sluggish expansion revenue
• Inefficient complexity and wasted time

Jon then explored how B2B marketers can move from this to a dynamic process where sales and marketing work as a team, each able to access relevant information from today’s more complex buyer journey. Leaving behind the traditional marketing technology built more than a decade ago is a key step, Jon noted. Jon then asked, “So what’s next, and how do we move forward?”

Modern Sales & Marketing Alignment: Find, Engage, and Close

1 — Finding The Most Valuable Accounts

The first step in adapting to the new realities of B2B marketing and sales alignment is to find, by focusing efforts on locating the most valuable accounts, Jon explained. “When it comes to finding target accounts, one size does not fit all,” Jon said, and marketers should do deep-dive one-to-one level account research, using highly-customized programs for each major strategic account — a process that is often a significant investment. Another segment, one-to-few, focuses on moderately personalized deep cluster research — using micro-clusters of accounts focused on similar business issues, Jon explained. An additional level with a broader scope is the one-to-many level, which is where many account-based programs exist, with a basic level of light personalization and much less investment per account, Jon noted. The one-to-many level often benefits from greater use of technology such as intent data, making it more scalable. The broadest category of all is the targeted demand generation segment, Jon explained, usually using traditional marketing tactics to go after specific accounts. When considering which of these four levels to use for your business, the key is to find which one is truly the best fit for your selling style, Jon noted, and encouraged organizations to get creative and use custom level names such as tiers. Jon urged businesses to find their entitlements — the contract of how marketing and sales agree to treat each account and what each department will do — in order to learn how many accounts your organization can handle. Entitlements can be evergreen — offering continuing qualities that persist — or of the triggered and in-market variety, such as when an account is in an active buying process or has a new corporate executive, Jon explained. Businesses often place greater focus on these triggered entitlements. The process of finding your firm’s entitlements is a great way to bring sales and marketing teams together, Jon noted. Once the number of entitlements have been determined and you know how many accounts you can have, you can begin to use science and technology to focus on the key ones, and Jon shared the F.I.R.E. acronym:

• (F)it — how close is this account to your ideal customer profile
• (I)ntent — the interest accounts have in your products or those of your competitors
• (R)elationship — is this an account your salespeople are already talking with
• (E)ngagement — is this account coming to you and spending time on your website or attending your firm’s events

Combined, these form what Jon refers to as pipeline prediction, used to determine which accounts should be moved up to the next level, and find the accounts that really matter. [bctt tweet="“When it comes to finding target accounts, one size does not fit all.” — Jon Miller @jonmiller" username="toprank"]

2 — Engaging Identified Accounts

The second step in utilizing the new realities of B2B marketing and sales alignment is engagement, where the identified accounts are engaged, aligning your interactions with the buyer’s journey, Jon explained. Jon noted how in the past he has likened the use of ABM processes to fishing with spears for the big fish, while demand generation is more like fishing with a net. An overlooked issue when using those ABM spears, however, is that “Getting poked by a spear doesn’t feel very good,” Jon said. Smart ABM processes can overcome the reluctance and pain traditional methods often generate, by understanding where a buyer is on their journey and aligning all interactions appropriately, Jon explained. Jon then shared Gartner’s “Six Buying Jobs,” that all accounts ought to go through, to ensure that everyone on the buying team is working together. It’s important to have content that’s aligned to each of these six buying jobs, Jon noted, and also suggested keeping in mind that buyers don’t travel on their journey in an orderly or linear fashion, instead bouncing around in typically unpredictable and even chaotic directions. In the non-linear buying process Jon suggested using a football field’s yard line grid to determine how close to the scoring or buying point a buyer is, and considering the path that a football takes as it moves in many directions on the playing field. The buyer’s yard-lines tell us where in the journey they are, as well as the likelihood of an imminent score or purchase, Jon noted, and they can also inform our decisions as to which plays or plan of business approach we should execute. Businesses should create their own buyer journey definitions, and Jon shared how Demandbase organizes theirs, with:

• Qualified — ideal customer profiles
• Awareness — showing awareness and intent for our category, especially on third-party sites
• Engaged — engaging with our website, events, and programs
• MQA — Marketing Qualified Account, using intent data and the pipeline prediction process to know whether an account is in-market or in a buying cycle
• Opportunity
• Customer — A closed/won opportunity
• Post-Sale — Adoption and expansion

At this point sales and marketing teams can align their interactions to the buyer’s journey, such as building brand trust early in the journey in the “qualified” stage, to thought leadership in the middle stages, all the way through enhancing the post-sale experience by finding expansion opportunities, Jon noted. The MQA stage is especially well-suited for utilizing a multi-channel approach, Jon suggested, from customer relationship management (CRM) and marketing automation to ad platforms, direct mail, account-based chat, and sales engagement, among several other channel opportunities. [bctt tweet="“The explosion of digital noise means that traditional marketing channels like ads are becoming less and less effective. What marketers need to think about is, how do I orchestrate multiple channels together?” — Jon Miller @jonmiller" username="toprank"]

3 — Closing As An Orchestrated Team

The third major strategy Jon shared during his insightful and energetic #B2BMX presentation was the closing element, with a focus on working as an orchestrated team and not merely the outdated hand-off of the account baton. How can businesses have sales and marketing work together in a new way? With today’s B2B buyer journey being so complicated, the baton hand-off approach doesn’t work, Jon observed, and encouraged a team approach more like the way a soccer team functions, passing customer engagement back and forth as needed, in a coordinated way. Comprised of three levels, the type of marketing and sales alignment that Jon spoke about can be broken down into:

1. Aligning data — Assuring that sales and marketing teams are looking at the same data
2. Sharing insights — Teams proactively alerting each other about relevant insights
3. Coordinating interactions — Working together as an orchestrated team

[bctt tweet="Marketers need to break free over the next 10 years by radically changing how they work with sales, stopping the baton hand-off model and moving much more of an integrated team. ” — Jon Miller @jonmiller" username="toprank"] Jon then shared a favorite tip, which he called a secret weapon for marketing and sales alignment — account standups. In these deceivingly simple account standup events, every few weeks the marketing and sales account teams meet without any executives or managers present, and talk about what’s happening and strategize. Jon explained that account standups are one of the best and simplest ways to move ahead with quality coordinated ABM strategies and tactics. Jon then shared the TOPO account-based technology stack, with its intent, account, and contact data all the way through to the processes of execution, measurement, infrastructure, and application workflow. Jon shared how the execution stage features many channels, which typically won’t all be used but each serve a specific purpose, and the overall chart is helpful for determining where to focus time and energy, he explained. Jon concluded his session by reiterating that account automation tools were built for a different time than the more complicated B2B buying landscape that we face today, which is much better met using the orchestrated methods he dug into during his presentation. It’s time to start thinking about new processes and technologies, especially those in the F.I.R.E. strategy, and to define your business’ entitlements and tiers, Jon urged. Learn more from Jon by watching our Break Free B2B Marketing video interview, and be sure to connect with him on Twitter and LinkedIn. Creating award-winning B2B marketing takes considerable time and effort, which is why many firms choose to work with a top digital marketing agency such as TopRank Marketing. Contact us today and let us know how we can help, as we’ve done for businesses ranging from LinkedIn, Dell and 3M to Adobe, Oracle, monday.com and others.

The post Find, Engage and Close: Demandbase’s Jon Miller on Recasting the B2B Marketing Automation Journey #B2BMX appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

10 Marketing and Communications Leaders to Inspire You in 2021

Even the best of marketers can be challenged in times like those we've all experienced over the past 12 months. But it is those who rise above those challenges that fuel the inspiration we all need to succeed in our industry. On this blog, we've made a point to highlight inspirational marketing voices with lists of top marketers by discipline (B2B marketing, social media marketing, content marketing) and our famous lists of Women Who Rock in Marketing since 2010. Over the past few years, we've tried (not hard enough) to be more inclusive in these lists to represent women and people of color. During Black History month, many brands have made efforts to shine a light on contributions made in the world by individuals the black community. But why should honoring such contributions be limited to one month? For our small part, how we represent marketers of color in the content on our blog, on social networks and in marketing content as well as the influencers we work with has changed significantly over the past few years. It's not enough, but we're continuing to learn and grow our awareness, understanding and action when it comes to the importance of diversity and inclusion. As I reflect on those who inspire me on a daily basis to be more, to be better as a marketer and marketing leader, the following list of women of color stand out. I encourage you to learn more about their backgrounds, achievements and to pay attention to the contributions they are making to the world of marketing and communications in both B2C and B2B. Beverly Jackson @BevJack - in/beverlyjackson/ Vice President Global Brand and Consumer Marketing at Twitter With past experience working at The GRAMMY Awards, Yahoo!, MGM Resorts and Activision Blizzard, Beverly now serves as Vice President of Global Brand and Consumer Marketing at Twitter. Beverly is a dynamic, senior marketing executive adept at building, mentoring and managing high performance entertainment and digital marketing teams while establishing long-term strategic relationships to drive revenue. Beverly has extensive agency and in-house experience launching brand extensions and new products, utilizing metrics to analyze growth, developing innovative digital strategies to drive brand loyalty and awareness via social media, mobile and community engagement. We've interviewed Beverly in the past and recognized her several times on our lists of top marketers over the years. She joined Twitter as VP in January 2021. Bozoma Saint John @badassboz - in/bozoma-saint-john/ Chief Marketing Officer at Netflix Boz got her start in marketing at Spike Lee’s advertising agency, Spike DDB. She then went on to manage brands within the PepsiCo beverages portfolio, before becoming Head of Music and Entertainment Marketing at the CPG giant; followed by Head of Global Consumer Marketing at Apple Music & iTunes; then went on to serve as Chief Brand Officer at Uber; before taking on the CMO role for Endeavor (including WME, IMG, UFC, Miss Universe, 160over90 etc). Boz launched a podcast alongside award-winning journalist Katie Couric, “Back to Biz with Katie and Boz,” which explores the ways thought leaders, CEOs and innovators are responding to the societal shifts that have been ushered in by the coronavirus pandemic. Boz’s philanthropic efforts include representing Pencils of Promise as a Global Ambassador to Ghana and serving on the boards of Girls Who Code and Vital Voices. With such contributions, Boz was an easy pick to recognize in our Women Who Rock in Marketing list. She took on the CMO role at Netflix in June 2020. Candace Steele Flippin @CSteeleFlippin - in/candacesteeleflippin/ Senior Vice President and Chief Communications Officer at Acuity Brands Candace has 20+ years serving B2B and B2C domestic and international companies in the financial services, medical device, biopharmaceuticals and pharmaceuticals industries before taking on the role as SVP and Chief Communications Officer at Acuity Brands. Candace is a globally recognized multigenerational workplace scholar, TEDx speaker, industry thought leader and author that specializes in development and implementation of Corporate Communication and Public Relations strategies that support business growth, navigate change and mitigate crises. She is also a Research Fellow at the Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western Reserve University. Candace took on the SVP role at Acuity Brands in November 2020. Dara Treseder @daratreseder - in/daratreseder/ SVP, Head of Global Marketing & Communications at Peloton Interactive A veteran Chief Marketing Officer, Dara was previously the CMO of Carbon and the CMO of GE Business Innovations & GE Ventures. Earlier in her career, she led marketing and growth efforts at Apple and Goldman Sachs. A champion of public health, women's issues, and diversity initiatives, Dara is the Vice Chair of the board of the Public Health Institute (PHI). Dara also serves on the board of PG&E. Dara graduated cum laude from Harvard University with highest honors in field and holds an MBA from Stanford University. We were happy to recognize Dara in our 10 year anniversary list of women who rock in marketing. She joined Peleton as SVP and Head of Global Marketing and Communications in August 2020. Deirdre Findlay @deirdre_findlay - in/deirdre-findlay/ Global Chief Marketing Officer & Consumer Revenue at Condé Nast  As a former Google, Stitch Fix and eBay marketing executive, Deirdre is a passionate marketer with progressive experience in integrated marketing – brand, product, customer relationship marketing, loyalty, offline and online direct marketing, business to consumer, and business to business. Deirdre serves on the boards at Sonos, Olaplex and Effie Worldwide and has an MBA from Dartmouth. She joined Condé Nast as CMO in January 2020. Gail Moody-Byrd @gailmoody - in/gailmoodybyrd/ Chief Marketing Officer at Noodle.ai Gail's experience at McKinsey & Company, The World Bank, Levi Strauss, and over 10 years at SAP lead her to the CMO role at Noodle.ai. There, she is responsible for delivering awesome brand, demand, digital marketing, events, sales enablement, product marketing and AR/PR by motivating her team to let the world know how great a company Noodle.ai is. An MBA graduate of Harvard Business School, Gail serves on the Board of Directors at Juma Ventures. focused on empowering low-income youth to transcend challenging circumstances, fulfill their inherent potential, and positively impact their communities. Gail appeared in our 2020 list of Women Who Rock in Marketing. She joined Noodle.ai as CMO in November 2018. Jeanine Liburd @JeanineLiburd - in/jeanine-liburd/ Chief Social Impact and Communications Officer at BET Networks Previously serving as VP Communications at MTV, SVP of Corporate Communications at Viacom and Chief Marketing & Communications Officer at BET Networks, Jeanine is now Chief Social Impact and Communications Officer at BET Networks where her responsibilities include leading and elevating a portfolio of multi-platform social change initiatives that empower BET Networks' audiences to have an impact on the critical issues facing the black community today. Her current role also focuses on utilizing content as a catalyst to create awareness and build action oriented impact campaigns globally. She also oversees strategic partnerships and community engagement at the local and national levels. Jeanine has been recognized in our annual list as a Women Who Rocks in Marketing. She has been in her current position at BET Networks since September 2019. Leah Frazier @TheLeahFrazier - in/theleahfrazier/ President at Think Three Media Leah is an experienced Publicist, Content and Influencer Marketing Consultant with a demonstrated history of working with brands in the fashion, apparel, beauty and lifestyle industries. As a 2X Emmy Award-Winner, Best Selling Author, TEDx Speaker, and publisher of a top 30 Podcast In Marketing, she is skilled in Media Outreach and Relations, Entrepreneurship, Public Relations, Influencer Campaigns, Strategic Planning, and Marketing Strategy. She is also a strong business development professional with a Juris Doctor (J.D.) focused in Law from Texas Wesleyan University School of Law. Leah has been president of Think Three Media since June 2016. Lisa Maxwell @LisaMaxwe11 - in/itslisamaxwell/ Vice President Marketing, Data & Services at Mastercard Lisa Maxwell has a proven track record of reinventing and reinvigorating brands through business turnarounds and creating business reinventions grounded in consumer insights. Lisa orchestrated the successful turnaround, from negative to sustainable double digit growth, on recognizable brands like Nicorette, NicoDerm CQ, Abreva and K-Y brand. She has created several innovating and long lasting omni-channel campaigns that included TV, public relations, electronic consumer relationship marketing (ECRM), social media, digital and shopper marketing. In her current role at Mastercard, she develops integrated campaigns that highlight Mastercard Data & Services solutions across Loyalty & Engagement and Advisor offerings. Lisa is a recipient of the 2012 Tribute to Women in Industry (TWIN) Award, an alumnae W.O.M.E.N. in America and a Committee of 200 Scholar. She currently serves on the Board of Directors of GrassROOTS Community Foundation. Lisa was promoted to her VP of Marketing role at Mastercard in April 2020. Tyrona (Ty) Heath @tyrona - in/tyronaheath/ Director, Market Engagement, The B2B Institute at LinkedIn With more than 17 years of experience in digital and product marketing education at Google Inc, consulting within IBM as a social business manager and leading a B2B agency consulting practice, Ty now serves as the Global Lead for the B2B Institute @ LinkedIn where she delivers thought leadership to help marketers stay on top of the latest in B2B marketing strategy through research, teaching and writing about B2B marketing, social selling as well as leadership, diversity and inclusion. Ty is also the former President of LinkedIn's Black Inclusion Group (BIG), Co-Founder of LinkedIn's annual TransformHER conferences, author of "Marketers of Tomorrow: A Step by Step Toolkit for Inbound Marketing" and a two time Olympic Trials qualifier in track and field. Ty has made numerous appearances on our blog through interviews, covering her industry presentations and recognition on our lists of Women Who Rock in Marketing. She joined the B2B Institute at LinkedIn in September 2020. (LinkedIn is a client of TopRank Marketing) I am fortunate to call several of these top marketers friends and I appreciate their direct and indirect influence on my efforts to be a better marketer myself. Above all, I hope that this list provides both recognition for their contributions as well as inspiration to our readers when it comes to marketing leadership, best practices and achievement. Who would you add to this list? Please share in the comments or post a reply to us on Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook.

The post 10 Marketing and Communications Leaders to Inspire You in 2021 appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Microsoft’s Miri Rodriguez on How B2B Marketers Are Embracing Empathy For Better Customer Storytelling #B2BMX

How do B2B marketers who fully embrace empathy build stronger relationships? Miri Rodriguez, storyteller and internship program head at Microsoft, recently presented the opening keynote at the 2021 B2B Marketing Exchange Experience virtual conference, and asked this important question. Although this pandemic year at #B2BMX won’t see B2B marketers gathered in the event’s usual sunny Scottsdale, Arizona location, plenty of new attendee opportunities were on tap virtually. Refresh, renew, remix has been the conference’s theme this year, and to help ease the lack of physical networking #B2BMX included a Spotify music playlist, live music performances, and even various charitable elements. Miri began by looking back at the history of empathy in B2B marketing, to when empathy was new to the B2B space, especially the practice of considering it a leading component of the digital experience.

Storytelling Uses Empathy to Move Past Numbers and Facts

Storytelling is not just the telling of stories, Miri explained, it’s also a design approach to stories that work on the human-to-human level of business marketing. Telling stories in such compelling and connected ways that your messages are then also easily and willingly transmitted to your audience’s customers is a goal of B2B marketing that infuses genuine empathy, Miri said, and then began exploring empathy’s important role in brand storytelling. Miri explained how in her role at Microsoft she began an examination of empathy by looking at what storytelling is not, asking industry brand professionals at many different levels for their insight. Storytelling isn’t so much information, data, facts, or numbers, but the emotional transfer of that information using memorable characters, plots, and conclusions which all foster empathy, she noted. The emotional transaction is the glue that binds customers to a brand’s message, making them feel connected at the most human level, Miri explained, and mentioned LinkedIn’s January 2020 report which found that empathy was the platform's top 2019 theme — one that offers strength to both brands and customers. “Brands want to transact with people who are showing high levels of empathy,” Miri noted. [bctt tweet="“Brands want to transact with people who are showing high levels of empathy.” — Miri Rodriguez @MiriRod #B2BMX" username="toprank"] Since the pandemic began, empathy has only increased in its importance for B2B brands, and increasingly employees want to work for brands that include high levels of empathy, she noted. How can you begin leading with empathy? Miri mentioned the oft-used Bill Gates “content is king” adage as a jumping off point for all that exists beyond content for today’s B2B marketers seeking to infuse greater empathy in their brand storytelling efforts. One key is finding a universal truth, especially when it’s an actionable emotion that your brand lives by, and Miri suggested that these types of truths often derive from a brand’s mission statement.

What Feeling Is Your Brand Story Sparking?

During her #B2BMX opening keynote Miri also put out the question, “What feeling is my brand story seeking to spark?” Sometimes examining or even rethinking a brand’s mission can help B2B marketers find these key feelings, she suggested. In her example from Microsoft, Miri shared how the firm came up with empowerment as its new mission several years back — a feeling that CEO Satya Nadella and the organization have embraced in many ways since. Miri then asked, “Is your brand leading with a feeling that they can share with their customers?” She urged B2B marketers to make brand stories easy to consume, which in turn will make them convenient for customers to pass on to their own associates and customers. Miri also explored cognitive empathy, and the importance of seeing your customer first and foremost as a human. She urged B2B marketers to always keep in mind that there is a human on the other side of the screen, the other side of every email, in a physical room, or wherever you communicate with a customer. It’s important for B2B marketers to allow themselves to recognize the type of emotional empathy that reaches out and makes connections on a more human level, and Miri shared how marketers can benefit when they retrain their brain to think about your humans instead of your customers. Having conversations that go beyond the mere facts about a product or service and its features, to instead form deeper and more empathetic connections, will build the kind of trust that makes business transaction elements more meaningful, Miri observed. She also looked at the type of compassionate empathy that can begin when B2B marketers take the time to assess themselves introspectively, examining personal vulnerabilities. Empathize by being cognizant of the experiences your customers are going through, and recognize that especially those in the GenZ and millennial demographics frequently make connections that are more on the emotional side with the brands they do business with, Miri noted, and explained that these younger customers also aren’t necessarily buying a product merely for the product alone. Often they are looking at a brand’s mission before deciding to do business with them, and some will even refuse to work with a brand that defaults to having no public mission or stance on social and other important issues, she said.

Seeing The Humans Behind The Brand

Miri spoke about the importance of allowing B2B customers to see the humans behind the brand, and urged marketers to pay attention to who they’re delivering a B2B brand’s story to, being mindful of the fact that an audience isn’t just your customer in B2B, but also the audiences of those customers. Miri then asked several key questions:

• Why should your end-user care about your story?
• What insight does your content include?
• Does it educate and otherwise help your customers, beyond simply helping with a particular feature of a product or service?

For every B2B marketing story you set out to tell, Miri recommends first asking yourself who the story is dedicated to, how it can help them, and how it will hopefully make them feel, especially when the story is tied in to one of your brand’s universal truths. Showing the origin of your brand’s story is important, Miri said, as is reminding your customer why your brand is important to them. An ideation phase includes finding the solutions your customers want in the formats they prefer, and Miri shared an example from Microsoft in which customers pointed out that they preferred blog content written not so much by marketers but by people directly involved a particular area of expertise. Low-cost and low-effort story prototyping can also be a great way to test a variety of creative concepts, Miri noted, before moving on to the testing and implementation stages.

Making Genuine Audience Connections That Evoke Emotion

Are your brand storytelling efforts evoking the type of emotion you want to foster with your content? Miri explained that reach and engagement are both helpful in determining which efforts are making genuine connections with your audience. Miri concluded her insightful and energetic #B2BMX keynote presentation by reinforcing the notion that genuine B2B brand stories always contain a character, plot, story, and conclusion, and that powerful storytelling only happens in the B2B space when marketers tell their stories for their audiences, and not to them — ideally with empathy, creativity, authenticity, and heart. Empathy in B2B marketing is a topic near and dear to our team at TopRank Marketing, and to learn more about bringing it to life in your own marketing efforts, contact us, and check out the following five recent resources we've published:

• 5 Ways to Humanize Your B2B Content Marketing – And Why It Matters
• 28 B2B Marketing Insights To Energize & Humanize Your 2021
• Boosting and Deepening Engagement through Empathy in B2B Marketing
• 5 Ways to Humanize B2B Content Marketing
• Your Guide to Effective Storytelling in B2B Content Marketing

The post Microsoft’s Miri Rodriguez on How B2B Marketers Are Embracing Empathy For Better Customer Storytelling #B2BMX appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Problem Solved: Increase B2B Content Marketing Success by Conquering 4 Conundrums

In his recently-published book, What’s Your Problem: Become a Better B2B Marketer by Enhancing Your Problem-Solving Skills, Steve Goldhaber argues that the discipline of content marketing boils down to a simple consistent objective: solving problems. It’s a reasonable framing. Almost every piece of marketing content is essentially aimed at solving a problem. This really gets to the fundamental intent of B2B content marketing as a practice: by helping our audience solve day-to-day problems and overcome business challenges, we hope that they’ll eventually consider using our product or service to solve a bigger problem. But content marketers can’t focus solely on solving problems for customers. We also need to look inward and address key challenges that threaten the value and impact of our problem-solving content. The old saying about “getting your own house in order” comes to mind. Here’s a look at four prevalent conundrums faced by B2B content marketers today, and how I recommend confronting and conquering them.

How to Overcome 4 Vexing B2B Marketing Conundrums

Content marketers need to reckon with these stumbling blocks before they can race to big success with their strategies. Conundrum #1 ? More brands and platforms than ever are competing for the diminishing currency of attention. On the surface, it seems like a clear positive: Fueled by social distancing and a lack of in-person experiences, audiences flocked online more than ever in 2020. Usage of mobile devices and social media apps has risen dramatically. In theory, this means it should be easier than ever to attract eyeballs and engage users via digital marketing. So, why the conundrum? Two reasons. First: every brand and content-creating entity is aware of this trend, so there’s been a widespread increase in supply to meet the demand. That means more competition. Second (and not unrelated), audiences are fatigued after a year of being necessarily glued to their screens. Without question, it’s growing more difficult to earn and sustain someone’s attention, not to mention drive action and engagement. What To Do?  It has never been more important to adopt a quality-over-quantity approach. Zero in on a narrowly defined audience whose problems you can help solve. Create highly focused and directly relevant content. Personalization holds the key to breaking through with a clear message in an online environment full of buzzing static. [bctt tweet="“Personalization holds the key to breaking through with a clear message in an online environment full of buzzing static.” @NickNelsonMN #B2Bmarketing #personalization" username="toprank"] Of course, the heightened competition also calls for a re-emphasis on capturing the attention of a scrolling user. Go against the grain and deliver something your audience isn’t expecting. Rock the boat in a sea of sameness. Our clients at LinkedIn Marketing Solutions recently shared tips for thumb-stopping content that catches a user mid-scroll and invites engagement, including examples. I especially like the bear ad example from eCornell. Conundrum #2 ? Measuring results is difficult when direct links to revenue aren’t always clear or straightforward. During times of economic duress, there is a natural inclination for businesses to scale back on discretionary spending. In its early days, content marketing was often viewed as discretionary, or a complementary aspect of business development. While that perception has generally changed, marketing leaders still can face an uphill battle when vying for a fair share of reduced budgets. What To Do? The connection between content marketing and revenue is not as overt or direct as some other investments, that’s true. But it is undeniable. The ability to map content to revenue is becoming a key asset for marketing departments, and in some cases it may require rethinking conventions. For example, some organizations need to slow down their campaign measurement, to align with a complex and lengthy buying cycle. Another opportunity: refining attribution methods to deliver more clarity and comprehensiveness. Do you track user actions across channels? Are you accounting for both post-click and post-view conversions? Are you quantifiably measuring brand awareness and engagement? If not, these are worthy aspirations in a results-oriented business landscape. Conundrum #3 ? It’s tough to authentically integrate influencers into content when audiences are suspicious of brand sponsorships. Influencer marketing is a broadly-applied term, and in some applications it can feel a little sketchy. When people relate the concept with Kylie Jenner shilling for Pepsi in a tone-deaf Super Bowl ad, or Instagram celebrities promoting a disastrous tropical festival, it’s understandable how they’d become skeptical. The credibility gained by associating your brand with a respected figure is negated (and then some) when the influencer isn’t genuinely interested or invested. When done right, influencer marketing is highly effective. But more than ever, marketers need to be strategic, and mindful of optics. [bctt tweet="“When done right, influencer marketing is highly effective. But more than ever, marketers need to be strategic, and mindful of optics.” @NickNelsonMN #B2Bmarketing #personalization" username="toprank"] What To Do? It all starts with selecting the right influencers. Identify voices with strong topical and audience alignment. Aim to be more relationship-based than transactional in your partnerships. Deliver clear value to the people you work with to spur enthusiastic participation. Co-create content and find interesting ways to incorporate influencers’ expertise, perspectives, and stories. Above all, make transparency a fixture. You don’t want your audience left to wonder about the motivations of people involved — or worse yet, feel misled. Conundrum #4 ? Fast-rising new channels don’t have obvious applicability for B2B marketing purposes. When glancing at recent trends and stats in content marketing, it’s hard not to notice the meteoric rise in usage of apps like TikTok and WhatsApp. Brands are gravitating toward Instagram Stories. These channels are intriguing, but they don’t intuitively have much applicability in B2B marketing. What To Do? The last thing you want to do is jam a square peg in a round hole for the sake of seeming cool or hip. But that’s not to say there aren’t creative and contextually-fitting ways to market a B2B brand on B2C-centric platforms. Doing so effectively is an opportunity to stand out and differentiate, in accordance with our solution to Conundrum #1. [bctt tweet="“Finding creative and contextually-fitting ways to market a #B2B brand on B2C-centric platforms is an opportunity to stand out and differentiate.” @NickNelsonMN #B2Bmarketing #personalization" username="toprank"] For inspiration, courtesy of PixelMe, here are 10 creative Instagram ads from B2B companies (led off by our clients at monday.com).

Break Down B2B Content Marketing Barriers

Both challenge and opportunity can be found within each of the conundrums presented. Those B2B marketers who take the right steps to solve them will enjoy a more smooth and frictionless path to success. Keep four things top-of-mind as you venture ahead:

• Create with a purpose (and flair)
• Measure robustly
• Partner strategically
• Experiment away from the beaten path

For more advice on overcoming obstacles to resonate with your audience, check out my recent post on five B2B content marketing pitfalls to avoid.

The post Problem Solved: Increase B2B Content Marketing Success by Conquering 4 Conundrums appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

How to Elevate B2B Marketing with Always-On Influence #B2BMX

The post How to Elevate B2B Marketing with Always-On Influence #B2BMX appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

B2B Marketing News: New Influencer Marketing & Social Reports, LinkedIn’s B2B Engagement Study, & Google My Business Gets Messaging

LinkedIn Provides New Tips on How to Create Engaging B2B Content [Infographic] LinkedIn (client) has launched a new 17-page guide offering B2B marketers tips, statistics and a variety of insight and examples surrounding the production of successful B2B creative on the Microsoft-owned platform, the firm recently announced. Social Media Today 2021 Social Media Industry Benchmark Report Overall social media posting frequency has fallen, while engagement has declined on Instagram, according to newly-released report data from Rival IQ, which also found that platform-specific hashtags have seen growing success. Rival IQ Dentsu Finds 'Social Good' Branding Attitudes Index High Among Most Nations, Less So In Japan Brands that actively promote a variety of social good initiatives garner positive attitudes towards those brands, according to recently-released global survey data of social media users, examining how social media user attitudes differ in various nations. MediaPost Facebook is Reportedly Developing its Own Clubhouse Clone Facebook has begun development on its own incarnation of the popular new Clubhouse audio-call-based communication app, according to The New York Times, in a move that aims to bring Clubhouse's functionality to the social media giant's platform. Social Media Today What B2B Marketers Need to Know About LinkedIn [Infographic] 45 percent of those who read articles on LinkedIn are high-level decision makers, and the social platform generates 80 percent of overall B2B social media leads — two of several statistics of interest to digital marketers contained in a new infographic focused on LinkedIn for B2B sales and marketing. MarketingProfs Media buying’s ‘race to the bottom’ on price may be over, finds study Quality purchases of advertising are more valued among marketing professionals than commodity ad buys, with 92 percent of marketing and media professionals noting that advertisers that treat media as not just a commodity buy are at an advantage, according to recently-released survey data. The Drum State lawmakers override veto, become first in nation to tax online ads Maryland has imposed a tax on digital advertising, becoming the first state in the U.S. to implement such a tax, in a move that could both affect B2B marketers and be a harbinger of similar taxes from other states, and Ars Technica takes a look. Ars Technica Apple Tests New Search Ad, Moves To Become Safe Advertising Supplier Apple had begun testing digital advertisements in its app store, in the form of search ads that appear as suggested items before a search is conducted, a move that comes as part of the technology giant's app tracking transparency policies. MediaPost Google My Business adds messaging to desktop interface Google has incorporated messaging into the Google My Buusiness desktop version, which had previously only been available via mobile. With the new communication feature rollout, businesses can chat with customers from within the standard web Google My Business interface, the search giant recently announced. Search Engine Land The State of Influencer Marketing 2021: Benchmark Report A greater number of brands have shifted their influencer marketing focus to generating tangible results, with 38.5 percent of marketing professionals saying campaigns should be gauged by resulting conversions and sales, while 32.5 percent are most interested in the engagements generated from influencer marketing campaigns — two of many insights of interest to digital marketers contained in newly-released influencer marketing report data. Influencer Marketing Hub ON THE LIGHTER SIDE: A lighthearted look at “the status quo and resistance to change” by Marketoonist Tom Fishburne — Marketoonist Guy Who Summarizes Pay-Walled Articles in the Comments Nominated for Pulitzer Prize — The Hard Times TOPRANK MARKETING & CLIENTS IN THE NEWS:

• LinkedIn — LinkedIn Launches 'Return to Growth' Digital Magazine, Outlining Marketing Tips and Notes — Social Media Today
• Lee Odden — The Juice newsletter by Jaffe AKA Jaffe Juice — Joseph Jaffe
• Lee Odden — 2021 B2B Marketing Exchange Gears Up To Help Marketers Refresh, Renew & Remix Their Strategies For A Digital-First World — Demand Gen Report

Have you found your own top B2B marketing story from the past week of industry news? Please let us know in the comments below. Thank you for joining us for the TopRank Marketing B2B marketing news this week, and we hope that you'll return next Friday for more of the most relevant B2B and digital marketing industry news. In the meantime, you can follow us at @toprank on Twitter for even more timely daily news.

The post B2B Marketing News: New Influencer Marketing & Social Reports, LinkedIn’s B2B Engagement Study, & Google My Business Gets Messaging appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Break Free B2B Marketing: Sarah Barnes-Humphrey of Shipz and The Art of Consistent Change

For more than a decade our team at TopRank Marketing has fostered a potent community of leading influencers, developing close relationships with subject matter experts in a wide variety of industries. When it comes to B2B influencer marketing, it's only natural to wonder just what an influencer actually looks like? In our third season of Break Free B2B Marketing video interviews, we’re continuing in-depth conversations with a powerful selection of top B2B influencers, and taking a close look at the issues that each expert is influential about in their industry. Every successful B2B influencer has a rare mix of the 5 Ps — proficiency, personality, publishing, promotion, and popularity — as our CEO Lee Odden has outlined in “5 Key Traits of the Best B2B Influencers.” Holding all of these qualities and many more is Sarah Barnes-Humphrey, CEO at Shipz, who we’re delighted to be profiling today. Supply chain: the steps that need to be taken in order to get a product or service into the hands of the consumer. It's a complicated process, and it's one that matters to many B2B marketers. Why? Because if the supply chain breaks down, you won't have anything to market. A successfully managed supply chain can weather unforeseen circumstances — like a surprise year long quarantine — while helping businesses to reduce cost and remain competitive. Sarah Barnes-Humphrey is a pro when it comes to talking about supply chain. She's the CEO of Shipz Inc., bridging gaps between shipping providers and mid-market importers. She hosts the Let's Talk Supply Chain podcast, covering topics that matter to those in the supply chain business. She's been labeled as one of the Top 100 Women Leaders in Supply Chain and has earned that distinction over a successful twenty year career. Long story short: if you want to learn something about the role of the supply chain in modern business, you're going to want to hear what she has to say. These reasons are precisely why TopRank Marketing’s own Joshua Nite interviewed her for today’s new episode of the Break Free B2B Marketing interview series.

Break Free B2B Interview with Sarah Barnes-Humphrey

If you’re interested in checking out a particular portion of the discussion, you can find a quick general outline below, as well as a few excerpts that stood out to us.

• 1:48 - What has the pandemic done to supply chain?
• 4:22 - What technologies are being used to handle changes in supply chain?
• 5:49 - Increased attention on the supply chain: is that good or bad?
• 6:50 - Internal collaboration and how it impacts supply chain
• 7:17 - Do you think the progress currently being made with supply chain will last?
• 8:11 - What can marketing leaders do to reach out to supply chain folks?
• 9:25 - Breaking down organizational barriers to make room for supply chain
• 10:40 - What mistakes are being made in supply chain that should be getting corrected?
• 13:45 - How should B2B leaders right now be adapting so that they can have a great 2021 and beyond?
• 17:08 - How Sarah found her following and successfully launched her podcast
• 20:06 - What Sarah believes keeps her audience coming back
• 23:05 - When being approached for contributions or interviews, what things make you more likely to say yes?
• 25:17 - How to juggle multiple big projects and still find success
• 27:43 - Where should people go to find Sarah's content?

Josh: Do you feel like we're seeing some good progress? And do you think that this is going to stick once we get back to what I'm laughingly referring to as normal, should we ever get there? Do you think there's some progress being made, and are these lasting changes? Sarah: I would hope so. I mean, I don't have a crystal ball. So I don't really know what that's going to look like, but I would absolutely hope so. On my show, I say that collaboration is the future of business, and I truly believe that. I think the only way forward is to really be able to understand what your colleagues in marketing, or understand what your colleagues in customer service, or understand what your colleagues in procurement are going through, and what they do on a day-to-day basis that can really enhance what you're doing as an individual in your department to really create the best environment and the most accept success for the company that you're working for. [bctt tweet="“I think the only way forward is to really be able to understand what your colleagues in marketing, customer service, or procurement are going through.” @bevictoryus #BreakFreeB2B #supplychain" username="toprank"] Josh: That makes a lot of sense. So prepare for change, and expect the unexpected, but also expect the unexpected? Sarah: Yes, absolutely. It's tough being a leader out there, whether you're in marketing, supply chain, or what have you. It's tough — they're being pulled in a lot of different directions, and nobody really knows where that's going to fall. You know, some companies are staying remote till, some conferences have been canceled, up until April 2021. So how do you prepare for that, when you've got a conference that you're supposed to be putting on in March? What do you do when you don't even know whether you can go ahead with that? What are the parameters around that? Are we going to have to provide proof of vaccine before we go to a conference? And is everybody going to be able to get the vaccine prior to that? I don't know. What is the insurance that you're going to be able to get around that event? That's going to be based on a lot of factors from a marketing standpoint. Everything's going virtual, everything’s going digital, and everybody is looking at different ways to really get their story out there, and they can't really plan as far ahead as they used to. [bctt tweet="“Everything's going virtual, everything’s going digital, everybody is looking at different ways to really get their story out there. And they can't really plan as far ahead as they used to.” @bevictoryus #BreakFreeB2B #supplychain" username="toprank"] Keep your eye on the TopRank Marketing Blog and subscribe to our YouTube channel for more Break Free B2B interviews. Also check out episodes from season 1 and season 2. Take your B2B marketing to new heights by checking out out previous season 3 episodes of Break Free B2B Marketing:

• Episode 1: Kevin L. Jackson, GC GlobalNet — The Future of Cloud Computing
• Episode 2: Tim Crawford, AVOA — The New Normal
• Episode 3: Oliver Christie, PertexaHealthTech — The Future of Artificial Intelligence
• Episode 4: Liam McIvor Martin, Time Doctor — Trends in Remote Work

 

The post Break Free B2B Marketing: Sarah Barnes-Humphrey of Shipz and The Art of Consistent Change appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Why Influencer Marketing Should Be a Priority 2021 Tactic for B2B Brands

The post Why Influencer Marketing Should Be a Priority 2021 Tactic for B2B Brands appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.