The Marketing Survivalist

Why I love legal and branding teams

2010-05-25T09:25:00.000-07:00

I spend a significant amount of my time writing materials and designing various programs for technology companies. I’ve been doing this for 20+ years and have worked with legal and branding teams that apply a whole new meaning to the word “review cycle.” My former colleagues at Microsoft know exactly what I am talking about.

I’ve also designed programs e.g. channel programs, referral programs, etc, that required extensive legal review and approval before they were ready for prime-time. Everything from contracts, to program guidelines to marketing materials needs to be reviewed with a fine-tooth comb lest I bring the entire company to its knees by implying something is required when it’s not legally allowed to do so, or inadvertently using the word “will” instead of “may.”

But I’m not complaining. In fact the legal and branding reviews are my favorite part of the process. Don’t get me wrong. I love the initial stages as well where I can unleash the creative left-side of my brain and dream about the possibilities of the program or come up with all kinds of creative phrases that sell.

But after a few rounds of that stage with the project owners, it’s refreshing to tuck away the creative and deal with the rules put forth by legal and branding.

You see, legal and branding are not usually ambiguous about what they will and won’t accept. In most companies, branding even goes so far as to lay it all out in a branding guidelines document. (If they don’t, they should) Legal may be a little less formal, but after a couple edit rounds you get a feel for what their risk tolerance is – where they will want attribution, where they require written vs email or verbal permissions, what implied promises they are comfortable with, etc.

Perhaps I love this stage of the editing process because it’s so predictable. When they say “I don’t like the way that’s phrased” they usually have a solid reason why. It’s not up to me to guess at what they like and what they don’t like. Contrast this with the creative phase where you are usually working with other creative people who have something in mind but may only “know it when they see it.”

Finally, like most marketers who are honest with themselves, I live for approval of my work. That may be the ultimate reason I find this phase immensely gratifying. Legal and branding people are some of my best supporters. They love people who understand and appreciate their contribution to the marketing process. They are elated when somebody takes the time to review their guidelines or gets to know what they look for in a document or program. Among the truths I’ve discovered about marketing over the years - it never hurts to have the legal or branding teams in your corner.

eMail Marketing – subject line length

2010-04-18T09:44:00.000-07:00

As the saying goes, “there’s nothing as constant as change” especially in marketing. Every now and then I have an epiphany and realize that I am blindly following a rule that I learned in the distant past. (In marketing the distant past is anything longer than six months ago.)

Some rules are made to be broken – or at least tested. Subject line length for your email marketing campaigns is one of them.

I Googled “subject line length” just to be sure the “experts” were still saying what I thought they were saying. Sure enough, most of them repeat the mantra “shorter is better.” 50 characters or less seems to be the common wisdom.

However, a few mavericks are starting to test longer subject lines, around 80 characters in length with some success. Certainly, they continue to put the most critical words up front in case the subject line is truncated in the receiver’s inbox. But, sometimes saying just a bit more in the subject line can impact the open rate.

Seems to be worth a try.

Cold Marketing - doesn't work any better than cold calling

2010-03-12T07:33:00.000-08:00

I think I’m the first to use this phrase – cold marketing. At least, I know the first time I heard it was when I said it to another marketer to try to explain why they were having problems with their email marketing.

Cold calling can be challenging because people are busy and they don’t want to take the time to listen on the phone to a sales person they don’t know, from a company they don’t know, who is trying to sell them something they probably don’t need.

The theory of email marketing, and direct mail, is that it’s less intrusive. You get more than the six seconds that a caller gives you on the phone because simply reading your email isn’t a tacit commitment on their part. Sometimes, in email, you may even get up to 30 seconds to state your point and get the prospect engaged. That’s the theory at least.

It may have worked in the old days (Ten years ago?) when very few companies did email marketing so their was less competition for attention. And, Blogs, Twitter, LinkedIn and other social media sites weren’t clamoring for attention and clogging up the inbox.

Now, people are getting hundreds of email every day. Most executives I know start their day out with an “email triage” session where they delete everything that is unnecessary. That even includes information from vendors whose lists they opted in to.

If your email campaigns are bringing in a dismal response, ask yourself if you are cold marketing. Do your prospects know you, your company or the value of the product or service that you are offering?

If not, the solution is an old-fashioned one. Message counts, as always, but so does consistency in your marketing. You need to build up your awareness in your market through a consistent message and regular targeted marketing programs. That takes time, effort and planning. Without it, even the best “campaigns” can fall flat.

Cold Calling? – Something’s Not Working Right

2010-02-23T06:49:00.000-08:00

Cold Calling? – Something’s Not Working Right

Cold calling is one of those topics that gets a lot of responses when posted in the forums. Generally, people are divided into two camps:

1. Those who hate it either because they hate to do it or they see it as an exercise in futility.

2. Those who swear they built their career on it.

For clarity, I think it is important to define cold calling as making calls to a list that you have no reason to believe is aware of your company or products. Follow up calls to people who stopped by your trade show booth are not cold calls in my book. (Although they may feel like it to the person making the calls!)

I will admit that there are times when cold calling is a necessity. For example, when you are a sales rep in a new industry or business with very little marketing support. Sometimes you just have to pick up the phone and do what needs to be done. Although, in those cases, I’d encourage you to make your “cold” calls as warm as possible by targeting prospects and doing some research ahead of time.

That said, in a well-established business with a formal marketing department, true cold calling could be a sign that something is wrong with your marketing programs. Possible root causes for the need to cold call could be:

1. You are not conducting campaigns that bring in a significant number of inquiries. I would not build my marketing plan around trade shows and the like as they are expensive and the number of qualified leads is often low. However, these kinds of campaigns that generate a large number of unqualified responses can be the foundation for other marketing programs.

2. You are not building your database. Maybe you are doing the aforementioned types of campaigns but these inquiries are not going into your database for future campaigns. Your Inside Sales team calls them, perhaps up to three times, and if they do not get a response, they go into a desk drawer and never see the light of day again.

3. You are not nurturing your database. If you are putting these inquiries into the database but not reconnecting with additional campaigns, that is little better than putting the list in the desk drawer. Consistency is also key. One additional campaign does not make up a nurture program.

If you are doing all three of these things, your lead generation efforts should be improving. Of course, there are still times when picking up the phone is necessary. For example, a new rep needs to build a pipeline as quickly as possible and might not have much to start with. But, having done all three steps, the marketing team should be able to hand this rep a list of likely suspects that gives them a much higher chance of quickly building a pipeline than if they opened up the phone book and started dialing.

Can you outsource all of marketing?

2010-01-12T18:21:00.000-08:00

Let the record show that I was a fan of outsourcing marketing long before I started freelancing. The question was always how much of it you could outsource. I have outsourced bits and pieces of marketing, such as collateral creation, in the past, but I usually maintained control of demand creation and other programs in-house.

For the last several months, I have been on the other side of the fence creating everything from complete campaigns to specific materials for my clients. I have concluded that technology companies can outsource most of their marketing, however there are a few tips that I thought I would share:

Choose a vendor that understands your business. If you want to keep your costs low and accelerate your marketing programs, it helps to have someone who does not need much training. Both my agency partner and I have a long history of working with companies like SAP and Microsoft. We can talk to a Subject Matter Expert (SME) and quickly translate their technology perspectives into language that makes sense to the average buyer. It takes more than just marketing knowledge to do that.

Experience matters. We hear about this happening all the time in business consulting. The firm convinces the client that they have vast amounts of experience in the business but once the contract is signed, all they see is junior level people. Of course, this helps the agency keep their costs down and, presumably, keep their fees low. However, it can raise the handholding you need to do. If you plan to outsource most of your marketing, you may be better off working with an agency that does not need as much support.

Keep someone on staff and accountable. Even if you outsource all of your marketing, the agency will need someone to be their main contact in-house. This individual can be instrumental in helping the agency understand the priorities of the company and develop the right contacts with SMEs, executives and salespeople. Having someone on staff with a marketing title, preferably someone with some credibility within the organization, can be important to project success.

All the best!

Melissa

Not Everybody Needs Nurturing

2009-11-18T14:18:00.001-08:00

I applaud the efforts marketers are putting into nurturing programs. It will allow them to make better use of their marketing investments and leverage their salespeople’s time more effectively. However, not everyone needs nurturing. No matter how long your sales cycle is, with the information available to buyers on the web, some people will be ready to engage the moment they contact you.

A couple of days ago, I was shopping for a service and clicked the “contact us by e-mail” button on the web page. The e-mail form asked for my information. I give credit to the company for not asking for my physical address. There was also a field that allowed me to comment so I briefly explained what I was looking for and asked someone to get back to me.

After hitting the submit button (yes, it did ask me to “submit” which is something I hesitate to do.) I got a response telling me that I had been added to their e-mail communications program. That was a little strange since this was a “contact us” form and not an “add me to your mailing list” form. But, being a marketer myself, I wasn’t too concerned and I assumed since I asked to be contacted in the comment field that someone would be getting in touch with me.

After two days and one promotional e-mail from the company later, no one had contacted me. Luckily for this company, I do need this service, I’m unhappy with my current provider, and they were recommended to me by someone I trust. I found a contact at the company (the CEO) and emailed them directly. Within a couple hours I got a response and everything is going smoothly now.

The point of my story is that nurturing is great, but make sure you are not losing potential opportunities in your zeal to implement nurturing best-practices. You may think this couldn’t possibly happen in your organization, but sometimes the people who field your frontline calls and e-mails don’t have the business experience you do. It’s easy for me to imagine a new marketing coordinator being told to enter every contact into the lead nurturing program. As they try to do the best job they can following your orders, they don’t realize the obvious – that I was ready to engage.

Working with your (internal) editor

2009-11-10T13:52:00.000-08:00

I’ve been doing a ton of writing for clients – brochures, presentations, website content and such. It’s a lot of fun, but writing for someone else is so much different that writing for yourself.

I start out the same way. First, I turn the little editor in my head on low and just let the words flow. Without a gate on the words I put on paper, I can come up with some clever and funny phrases. (At least I think they are.) At this stage I meander a bit but I don’t worry about it. Fixing that comes in the next step. For now, I’m just having fun.

Then I turn my editor up a little bit and look for the pieces that don’t support my, or really my client’s, main message. It never fails. The first bits to go are the clever little phrases that I love so much.

“But they will catch the prospect’s attention,” I argue with this second-level editor.

“But they detract from the message,” she (or is it me?) argues back. “Save it for your blog!”

She always wins. Actually I let her win because it’s good for my business.

Finally, I turn the editor on high and look for words that are not quite right, grammar mistakes, and cumbersome phrases. I really dislike this editor because she hates everything I write. I don’t always let her win because I know that sometimes the client and I are smarter than she is. But, more often than not she has a point and my writing is better when I take her advice.

All the best!

Melissa

P.S. My mental health is just fine and I am not really sitting at my computer arguing with myself – most of the time.

Microsoft Uses Twitter Testimonials to Launch Windows 7

2009-10-29T09:01:00.000-07:00

This has to be the most innovative use of Twitter for marketing that I’ve seen yet. Microsoft has changed their main screen to be one big Windows 7 add. On a side note, I like the look. It’s clean with some catchy call to actions that almost had me clicking.

But the really innovative approach is the rotating tweets about Windows 7. I've seen an occasional tweet used on other sites, but this is the most effective use I've seen yet. These tweets aren't a side not to the message. They are the message. And, when it comes to adopting technology like Windows 7, Microsoft knows that what the early adopters say about their product carries far more weight than anything they could claim.

These tweets should also carry more weight than the customer quotes you usually see on a website. Those quotes are often from customers who see something in it for them. I’m not saying they are paid quotes. It could be as simple as liking the attention they get from working with marketing.

Tweets are, presumably, spontaneous and unedited. The skeptics could say that these tweets came from Microsoft employees. I suppose that’s possible, although I’m not quite that jaded. Plus, Microsoft left off the Twitter ID, but they did give the time and date of the tweet. Those of you with time to waste could probably track down the original tweet.

And, yes, there are probably tweets out there that don’t shine such a positive light on the product. I don’t know that for sure, but it’s Microsoft – a pretty big target for those who like to sling arrows.

I like what they’ve done, but if I think about it further the take away for me is that Tweeps might hold more promise for many B2B marketers, especially in the technology industries, than even the bloggers. This is certainly true if you are trying to launch a new technology product. It’s a way to leverage the opinions of the early adopters who might be incredibly intelligent, but not always wonderfully articulate.

Outreach to bloggers should be part of your launch planning but the effort in writing a blog about your product is far greater than a 140 character tweet. Because of that effort you really have to have something spectacular for them to blog about. Plus, bloggers may only be reviewing your product. If they aren’t actual users, the blog can loses a slight amount of weight.

As you are planning your product launches and deciding who you want to be in your beta or in your early adopter phase, consider adding some of your customers who tweet.

Melissa

The Joy of Brevity

2009-10-28T07:32:00.000-07:00

I always hate the posts that start with “sorry I haven’t posted in awhile,” as though the reader of the blog was just hanging on every word. Believe me, there are enough other blogs out there to fill the void. Unless you are a Seth Godin or Chris Brogan I’m not sure anyone notices the absence. (And, maybe not even if you are Seth or Chris.)

I too have been incredibly busy lately with no time to blog. I joined forced with GrowthPoint a marketing agency that will allow me to offer a fuller line of marketing services. One of their specialities is lead management for channel organizations which I think is so cool – and much needed.

But, the other day as I was reading a post suggesting that you should blog before you Twitter, a point I mostly agree with, I realized that I was overlooking Twitter and the advantages of microblogging. (BTW, I am still looking for the link and as soon as I find it I will update this so that you can join that discussion. It's quite lively.)

I hate to let my blog lapse and my readership to dwindle, but you do what you have to do. If I have a client with deadlines, as I do now, I’m all over it. But that doesn’t mean I can’t continue to interact, I just need to be more brief. Twitter’s 140 characters is perfect. I can tweet my ideas and insights and continue to retweet posts from other thought leaders.

You can follow me at Melissa Paulik. I won’t promise to follow everyone back. See my personal Twitter guidelines. They've evolved somewhat since the original post, but are still relevant. For those of you who are interested in continuing the discussion I look forward to many more, if somewhat briefer, interactions.

And, yes, I will continue to blog between deadlines.

All the best!

Melissa

Should You Leave Your Content Up to Your PR Agency?

2009-10-14T10:05:00.000-07:00

There has been a lot of discussion in recent forums on whether PR is dead, evolving, being reinvented etc. I think the general consensus is that a good modern PR agency looks dramatically different from the agency of the past that tended to operate in a sort of “black box.” In the old days, you worked with them on a press release and then they worked their magic to get in the hands of the media and analysts. The end result was a “clip book” of your stories and mentions but little else.

In the modern era of PR the lines between PR and traditional marketing are blurring a bit. No doubt, a modern agency today uses social media tools such as blogs, Twitter, LinkedIn, and facebook to reach out to the audience. And, although the agency is focused on reaching out to the media, influential bloggers in your space, and your key analysts, they are also reaching out to your target customer as well. The content they create is easily accessible to a potential prospect doing a search on your keywords and can drive visitors to your website.

But, the area where I tend to draw the line between traditional marketing and PR is content creation. If, by “content creation”, you mean press releases and the types of content that go into your online media room, that works for me. But, I don’t think you should abdicate your entire content creation strategy to your PR agency. Unless they are truly content creation specialists and deeply understand the role of content in nurturing prospects, I don’t think you should be relinquishing the responsibility for the materials you use for your nurturing programs to your PR agency. Telling the story for the customer through a solid content strategy is different than telling the story to attract the media and analysts.

So do you agree? Disagree? Especially those of you who work within the PR agencies, has your product offering changed enough that you feel you can own the entire content creation responsibility?

All the best!

Melissa

Where Will You Invest in 2010?

2009-10-05T08:13:00.000-07:00

As this year draws to a close and we hopefully look forward to a better year in 2010, it’s time to start thinking about what we will do differently in the coming year to improve our results.

There is no magic answer to where to invest your marketing dollar for maximum effect in 2010. Lead nurturing programs would certainly rank high on my list if you don’t have an effective one in place. Aligning your sales and marketing team could also be of primary importance. Fortunately, this is often not so much a question of dollars as much as it’s a question of aligning your processes.

There is one area that I see holding technology marketers back that one could argue should be the first thing fixed – the website.

The problems vary from company to company, but take a look at almost any technology website and you’ll see common issues. Here are just a few, as told from the perspective of the visitor:

Self-centered verbiage. An incredible amount of “me, me, me” with most of the language focused on how great the organization is.

Very poorly written value prop statements. It’s darn hard to tell what value some of you add.

No clear indication of what types of companies you serve and what you do for them. I can see on your website that you “help global organizations succeed in today’s tough competitive world…” but what exactly is it that you do?

No evidence of any expertise. You tell me you can solve all my problems, but you don’t give me any evidence that you can. Where are your white papers and webinars that will give me the confidence that you know what you are talking about?

No calls to action. I would give you my contact information so you could follow up if you gave me something worthwhile to download.

No value in your downloads. I see I can download a brochure but that’s hardly worth parting with my email address.

Asking for too much information. You do have a couple pieces of information that I might be interested in, but it’s kind of hard to tell what’s really in them. I’m certainly not going to give you my physical address so you can send me junk mail. (Plus I suspect you might sell my personal information since I don’t see anywhere that you say you won’t.)

Poorly placed calls to action. I didn’t see that call to action because I had to scroll down past all of your self-centered self-talk about how great you are to actually see it. I never got that far.

While the website isn’t the Holy Grail of marketing any more than any other program is, it is a central hub for your marketing programs. Very likely your outbound marketing campaigns are pointing your prospects to a website for more information. Certainly inbound relies heavily on your website (or micro-sites) to convert visitors into prospects.

For many of your potential customers the website is the first (and sometimes the last) look they get at your company and what you do. Make sure you put your best foot forward in 2010 and spend at least some of your effort working on your site, testing it, and then reworking it again.

All the best!
Melissa

Don’t Give Me a Tour of Your Company. Give Me a Tour of Your Marketing!

2009-09-29T09:55:00.000-07:00

Did you ever go on one of those interviews that ended with a tour of the company’s facilities? You pass by rows and rows of cubicles… “This is marketing.” This is support.” “And this is our finance department.” You’re still so wound up from the interview that you couldn’t remember anybody’s name or department any more than you could remember the way back to the conference room you came out of.

The whole process seems at best anti-climactic. But more than that, it doesn't really tell me what I need to know.

Don’t get me wrong. Your people are important. After all, they are your biggest asset. (It says so right on your website.) I can already tell from our discussions that I am a cultural fit for your organization and I’m sure I will love working with the team.

What I can’t tell yet, and I am dying to know, is how much value I can really add. I’m sure I can fulfill the functions on the job description or I wouldn’t be wasting your time and mine. But you want someone who adds real value and not someone who just fills a slot on a chart. And, to fully understand my value-add, I need to get my hands on your marketing.

Just once, I’d like to be able to conduct the interview instead of the other way around. Here are a few questions I would ask:

1. What are your marketing KPIs?
2. Show me your website stats. I want to see what kind of traffic you are getting and where it’s coming from.
3. Tell me about your lead management process. Do you think it’s working well? (Please be upfront with me. I will keep everything confidential.)
4. Tell me about the relationship between marketing and sales. What opportunities do they have to collaborate?
5. What sales tools has marketing created for the team? How well are they being used? (I’d love to speak to a sales person)
6. What is your value proposition?
7. How are you generating the majority of your leads?
8. Do you have a lead nurturing program?
9. How does the organization feel about social media tactics like Twitter and blogging? (I need to know how forward thinking you are or if you are going to expect me to do the same things you’ve always done.)
10. What is your annual marketing budget? (Always good to know what you have to work with.)
11. Tell me about the marketing team. Who are the stars? Who needs coaching or mentoring?

There’s more, but this should give me enough details to know where I can make the greatest impact, or if I am better off looking for someone else who really needs me.

I know that many of the executives and HR managers who conduct the interviews may not be able to answer those questions. After all, one of the reasons they need someone like me is because they don’t have time for the details and they need someone who can steer the ship toward their vision. That’s why I’d prefer a round of interviews with several members of the team.

It goes without saying that I’d share my ideas and give my thoughts on the kind of impact I could have on your organization. In the end, you’d gain valuable insights even if we decided that I wasn’t the right fit. And, if I was, we’d both feel a lot more comfortable with the decision.

The other nice thing about the reverse-interview is that it’s a lot easier on the interviewer. No more sitting through a lot of rambling answers from people who aren’t qualified, can’t get to the point or just aren’t giving you enough info to get a feel for their fit.

What do you think? As a hiring manager or an interviewee, would this work for you?

All the best!
Melissa

To Get the Right People, You Have to Ask the Right Questions

2009-09-28T19:16:00.000-07:00

The business software and services industry is filled with start-ups and smaller companies led by very smart people with a vision. (I’m sure that describes a lot of industries.)

To put these visions into practice these firms need marketing staff. They usually start out by hiring some energetic and smart marketing professionals with a few years of marketing experience under their belt. If they hire well, they find marketing professionals that are great at execution.

After a couple of years, they realize that they have a problem. While they have the vision and their marketing staff has the ability to execute, neither have the marketing experience needed to bridge the vision and the tactics. They need someone to manage marketing who can help make sure that the company is doing the right things right. (To paraphrase Tom Peters)

It's still a small(ish) company so this “someone” needs to be a player/manager. In other words, they need to be able to manage the team as well as roll up their sleeves and do some of the work. You don’t need CMO level talent, maybe not even VP level, but you do need someone who can be strategic as well as tactical.

Marketing budgets are tight and you can’t afford to make the wrong decision. There’s lots of talent on the market right now (a.k.a. marketing professionals looking for work), but how can you be sure that you are choosing the right professional if you aren’t a marketing professional yourself?

To get you started, here are a few questions that you may want to insert between the “Tell me about yourself” and “When can you start?” I’ve added my two cents on what you should be looking for.

How were you measured in your last role? Was it appropriate?

You want someone who is comfortable being measured. One of the key benefits of a manager at this level is to take you from just doing more marketing to doing the things that count. A manager at this level should be able to tell you exactly which metrics make sense for the role.

However, just because someone was measured via a certain metric, doesn’t mean that it was appropriate. For example, if they were measured on click-throughs, give them the opening to tell you why that measurement was irrelevant.

How did you collaborate with sales? Are there other ways that sales and marketing can work together to improve business performance?

The closer the role is to closing business e.g. demand creation or collateral development, the more collaboration the team needs to have with sales. You want a leader that sees the sales team as a partner in driving business.

How do you keep your skills fresh?

Marketing is a constantly changing profession. You want a leader who understands how to leverage all of the great educational opportunities, many of them free, on the web in order to keep their skills fresh. This will be especially important if the marketing leader needs to mentor other, less experienced professionals.

What new ideas have you tried lately?

You want marketers who aren’t afraid to try new things. If they are doing marketing the same way this year as they did last year, they’ve gone stale.

Have you experimented with any web-based techniques? What are you favorites?

For those of you with limited marketing budgets, you want someone who is capable of leveraging the web. Chances are social media techniques will play a part in their answer, but I’d give a marketer extra points for talking about what makes a good web website. You can take away a few points if all they talk about is SEO.

What tactics have you stopped using?

This is just as important as the new tactics that they’ve tried. If they keep doing the same things the same way chances are they are great at wasting money.

Tell me about your lead nurturing program that you ran in your last company.

Even if they didn’t have a good lead nurturing program at their last company, they ought to turn this into an opportunity to expound on how important it is and how they should have had one. Any marketer who gives you a blank look or tells you that they put their leads on a call back schedule is not a strategic thinker that you are looking for.

For those of you who are marketing managers or have hired at this level, please add to this list. Let’s see if we can’t help put the right people in the right places.

All the best!

Melissa

With Social Media Everyone IS in Marketing

2009-09-24T08:16:00.000-07:00

It’s often said that everyone thinks they are a marketer. Marketers receive unsolicited opinions from colleagues on everything from the color of the logo to the target markets that the company should expand into.

I think one of the reasons why everyone has an opinion on marketing is because intuitively they know that marketing is fun and they want to be part of it. Yes, it’s not always as glamorous as it looks from the outside. As those of us who are professional marketers know, it’s a lot of hard work. However, you have to admit it can be one of the coolest jobs there is.

A recent post on the Left The Box marketing blog called 8 Ways Social Media Should Change Your Marketing got me thinking. One of the points made was that you should involve everyone – customer service, product development, and even public relations.

These days, everyone from the Director of First Impressions (formerly receptionist) to that slightly strange developer (the one that only works nights and seems to live off of pizza and M&Ms) can set up a Twitter account, a facebook page, their own blog, as well as comment on other blogs. And, if you are in the technology industry as I am, chances are they will.

Each of these online impressions, especially those that are clearly tied to your company, can have an impact on your online brand perception. You no longer have the choice but to involve everyone in marketing because you can no longer control it.

Since the choice is taken out of your hands, why not look on this as an opportunity to leverage these creative juices? Here are some ideas to get started:

Set clear social media guidelines. For example, everyone should understand what types of information is confidential. And, black and white rules such as “never disparage a customer or business partner” can really help keep everyone inbounds.

Provide training to those who are interested. Provide training sessions for those who are new to social media to show them how to use it. If you have some great enthusiasts from outside marketing, leverage their expertise by having them do the training. You'll increase your buy-in if marketing isn't always in charge. “Lunch n’ learns” are a great format for this.

Create an idea board. Pull together your best social media enthusiasts to form a group that meets to discuss ideas for leveraging social media. It doesn’t matter what department these team members come from, but don’t call this an “advisory board.” This implies that they are advising you on what to do. The ideas generated from this group may very well not be marketing’s responsibility to execute.

Monitor. You don’t want to turn your back on what is happening. Your role isn’t to be the social media police, but you do want to be sure that you spot practices that could cause a problem for your organization. You can incorporate the course corrections into your company guidelines, training sessions, and idea boards as a way to subtly set things on the right path.

All the best! (and have fun!)

Melissa

Where Will You Put Your Money in 2010?

2009-09-23T18:19:00.000-07:00

A question was recently asked on the LinkedIn Business Development forum, “…what key marketing initiatives are you planning for 2010?”

The question is timed perfectly as it’s already late September and I’m sure many of you are getting ready to start planning for next year. You might even be getting a jump on planning for 2010 as you're eager to leave this year behind and start next year off right. The challenge is that you know your budgets won’t be the same next year. The odds of having an increase in marketing funds is not nearly as likely as the odds that you’ll have to find a way to do more with less.

In some ways, the question should be, “What aren’t you planning to do in 2010?” The programs and activities that you cut out of your marketing plans can make as much of a difference as any new initiative that you add to your plan. It’s well past time to stop wasting money on old programs, executed in old ways, that have long since stopped generating business.

Once you cut out the waste, however, what do you spend your money on? It would be comforting to say here’s a sure-fire way to generate qualified opportunities and all you have to do is invest roughly X dollars per opportunity that you want to generate. If marketing planning were that black and white, we’d be able to eliminate the yearly budget battles. Unfortunately, it never is.

The good news is that the improvements that most B2B marketers need to make don’t necessarily cost a lot of money. You can invest in these areas, but vast improvements can still be made in companies with very little marketing funding.

Below are the three areas that most of the marketing teams I work with need to focus on to see business improve in 2010. My comments on costs are to illustrate that money need not be the obstacle that keeps you from executing. You can invest heavily in each of these areas, but you can also make do with what you have and still see results.

Sales and marketing alignment
There are a number of actions that can bring your sales and marketing teams into alignment:

• Defining what a qualified lead looks like.
• Agreeing on the process for follow up. For example, if marketing generates a qualified lead, the expectation is that sales follows up within 24 hours.
• Tieing marketing’s qualified lead goals to sales goals.
• Establishing a regular cycle of meetings between sales and marketing to gather feedback. What obstacles is sales facing? How are the current sales tools working? What sales tools did they need to create? Have the leads that sales was given all met the qualified lead threshold? Etc.

Cost: Zero. However, if your sales and marketing teams are so far out of whack that they are at each other’s throat, it might be a good idea to bring in an outside facilitator. The right facilitator can overcome the conflicts between the teams and get everyone working together.

Lead nurturing
With sales cycles lengthening, and projects being back-burnered, lead nurturing is becoming more important than ever.

Cost: Variable. Building an opt-in list takes time, but since you can build your list as part of your established marketing programs, there isn’t an extra cost involved.

Lead management and marketing automation is extremely helpful in managing a lead nurturing program. You may already have these tools in-house, but you may not be using them to their fullest. If not, even those of you with modest budgets can find solutions that will work. And, the great thing about shopping around for a tool to manage your nurturing programs is that you’ll learn a lot about nurturing best-practices in the process.

Finally, you may need to expand your content library if all you have are a few brochures. Remember, brochures don’t count as content. You can cut costs by repurposing what you have, repurposing articles and other content written by objective experts, creating on-demand webinars and by blogging for quick and easy content. That leaves the occasional white paper or e-book to be outsourced. (if necessary)

Website improvements
Enough with the static websites that haven’t changed in years. Although I believe in SEO, too many lose sight of Target Audience Optimization while they seek to improve their click-throughs from the search engines. It doesn’t do you any good to get them there if you lose them right away.

You should study SEO techniques and determine what you can do in-house and what you might need to hire an outside expert to do. I think it’s a good idea to hire a trust-worthy outside expert so you can learn from them, but don’t blow your budget on this one line item. There’s a lot you can do to get found by using vendors like HubSpot and your own online marketing efforts.

Be sure you have a partnership with your webmaster and that you work with them to test variations of your site. The smallest changes can make the world of difference in conversions.

Cost: Minimal 2010 is the year to make your website the lead generation machine (and opt-in list building machine) that it was meant to be. It takes effort and time, but not a lot of money.

Good luck with the rest of this year and here’s to a prosperous 2010 for all of us!

Melissa

Tell Me About Yourself

2009-09-20T08:39:00.000-07:00

One of the most common mistakes I see from new (and sometimes experienced) Twitter users is the lack of a bio. As those of you who are fellow-Tweeps know, Twitter allows you to have a short bio in your profile. This shows up on your home page when someone clicks on it.

Here’s an example of what you’d see if you clicked on my ID:

I know it’s hard to come up with a quick, pithy summary of yourself. It’s tempting to decide to get back to it when the inspiration hits. But from what I can tell, a lot of you aren’t getting back to it.

I get followers all the time who don’t have a bio that tells me who they are. I can usually tell whether I want to follow them based on their Tweets. But, it helps to know who they are so I know where they are coming from.

If you really can’t think of a one-line bio, at the very least you can put a link to your LinkedIn profile. After all, Twitter is an online social network, and it’s hard to network with people you don’t know anything about. (Plus it feels a bit creepy!)

All the best!

Melissa

Your Value Proposition Stinks!

2009-09-15T06:23:00.000-07:00

I hate to say this, but the value proposition statements of most technology companies are pretty weak. I hate to say it because it’s marketing professionals like me who write them. So many of us write silly sounding (to everybody but us) little statements about how we’re the leader in some such technology or industry. Where’s the value in that?

Even those of you who have a statement that talks about the value you provide to your customers still bury it under your industry leadership statements. Some companies make their prospects dig through paragraphs of verbiage about how great the company is just to try to figure out how this greatness helps them.

Truthfully, I don’t think I ever wrote a good value prop until I started reading Jill Konrath’s books and blog. Now, I like to think I can take a weak value prop and turn it into something pithy and powerful with very little effort.

I highly recommend Jill’s book, Selling to Big Companies, but if you need value prop assistance in a hurry she’s also doing a free value prop webinar on Wednesday. It should be time well spent.

All the best!

Melissa

Is Twitter a Better Test Than Myers-Briggs?

2009-09-14T07:44:00.000-07:00

It occurred to me this morning that you can probably tell more about a person’s personality, approach to their profession and general outlook on life from looking at a picture of their tweets overtime than you can from the traditional standardized personality tests.

How many times do you get results back from one of these tests only to think “Are you sure this is me?” My very first Myers-Brigg’s test came back showing I was an introvert. I must have been having a bad day.

Here’s how to use Twitter to assess someone’s personality and approach to their profession:

If you click on an individual’s Twitter ID you can see a page full of their tweets. You can keep going back if you click the more button on the bottom. If the individual tweets several times a day, you may want to keep going back just so you don’t judge them based on their mood on one particular day.

Here are some of the conclusions that you might draw from a look at someone’s tweets. (By the way, these only apply to marketers. Those of you in other professions may draw your own conclusions.)

Not on Twitter – If they are in marketing and not on Twitter, I would be skeptical about any claims of social media expertise. At the very least, if they make that claim they better have a good reason for not having a Twitter account.

On Twitter, but no tweets – If they opened the account a long time ago is this a sign that they start projects but don’t finish them?

Doesn’t tweet very often – This could be a sign that they are new to Twitter but a laggard when it comes to adopting new ideas and technology. (Again, remember I am talking about marketers.) Or, it could be a sign that they are very busy and focused on their projects with no time to tweet. More investigation is called for.

Tweets all the time – I follow a couple individuals who tweet constantly. One is a personal branding specialist so I understand why he does it. The other individuals hold “real” jobs. I don’t know how they have enough time to Tweets 30-40 times a day and still get their work done. Enough said.

Tweets a lot, but usually all at the same time – This individual is a Twitter enthusiast (good) but still doesn’t get it. Tweeting ten times in a row at the end of every day is like doing a “drip” mailing and sending all mailers out the same week.

Tweets a lot of personal things – First, this individual still doesn’t understand the power of Twitter for personal branding or as a tool for marketing. Second, certain personal questions are illegal in interviews, but who needs to ask them when some people broadcast their life for the world to see. Be very careful with the personal tweets and think about what they say to those who may see the world differently than you.

Only tweets motivational quotes – These are the spice of life, but like vanilla, a little goes a long way. This individual is either convinced they are the world’s motivator or they are trying to motivate themselves. I like to think that the rest of the world isn’t wallowing in general apathy and ennui and that they don’t need the constant cheerleading. If they are trying to motivate themselves, and it works, then go for it. The rest of us will draw from your well when and if we need it.

Tweets their causes mixed with the professional – I think it’s great that people have things that they think are worth standing up for. However, if you are looking at someone who Tweets as much about their cause as they do about their profession, it’s probably reflective of their water cooler chatter too. Just be prepared is all I am saying.

Never tweets anything personal – This is the opposite of those who do too many personal tweets. The individual who never tweets anything personal, their own blog posts, simple comments, or direct replies, could be living their life vicariously through others. They need to get gain some self-confidence and let their voice be heard.

Topical blog tweets and retweets – Finally, you can tell a lot about the topics an individual is enthusiastic about by their tweets and retweets. If they tend to retweet blog posts about personal branding, social media, and content development then it’s a sure sign that those are three topics they follow and stay current on.

Just like with Myers Briggs, I think you should take my theories with a grain of salt. In fact, they’re probably wrong as often as they are right. But, maybe that’s the point. Perception is reality.

You should think about your tweeting style and consider what it says about you when someone clicks on your Twitter ID and “meets” you for the first time. Perhaps it never really matters what your personality is since others will always judge you by what they see.

OK, now you can tell me why my theories are all wrong.

All the best!

Melissa
Follow me on Twitter

Can You Avoid Making a Bad Hire?

2009-09-11T13:00:00.001-07:00

There’s no doubt about it. It’s a buyer’s market for marketing talent. Meeting 80% of requirements is no longer good enough. Hiring managers are holding out for candidates that meet 100% and have a track record to boot.

Yet, hiring a marketing leader who can do all that they say they can is still a gamble. You can only tell so much from a series of one hour interviews. I’ve seem many “consensus” decisions turn out badly.

The resume is a personal brochure. Marketers, being the wordsmiths that they are, ought to be able to create resumes that sell. But, how do you know that the results they achieve were actually achieved through their efforts? Or, what if they were a fluke?

Reference calls are necessary, but who gives a reference that’s going to give them a bad review? You can go to HR, but they are trained to only verify that the candidate worked there at the time and in the role specified. No real help there.

Some have tried to get a better feel for their marketing candidates by asking for a presentation. I think this approach ought to be used more often, especially since most marketing roles require top-notch presentation skills. Still, you shouldn’t expect much from the presentation itself as the candidates, despite hours of research, will only have seen your good points. They won’t know your challenges until they get a good peek under the covers.

Here’s a novel idea presented by the master of all novel ideas – Seth Godin.

Seth suggests that you work with someone for several months before actually giving them a job. His downside is that you lose the bragging rights of the “great find.” On the other hand, I think you lose the embarrassment of talking up a new hire only to have them fall flat or be mediocre at best.

I agree that your pool of candidates would be smaller since not everyone would be comfortable with the arrangement. However, I don’t agree that you will be limited to people like freelancers and interns. I think there are many marketers looking for opportunities right now that would consider a contract opportunity. To me, the potential downside is that they turn out to be a great hire but you lose them to someone else before you have a chance to make the offer.

Here’s a few more ideas for how to make this work:

Pay the candidate for their time or by the project. This is not the same thing as an internship where someone is looking for experience. You should expect real value from these people.

Be clear on the deliverables. For example, if you are looking to hire a marketing executive, you might ask them to review your programs, processes and people and create recommendations for how your marketing can be improved. If you need a social media expert, you might ask them to put together a workshop on how companies are using social media to drive opportunities. A webmaster could be paid to make recommendations for how to improve your website performance.

By making these paid engagements, you are paying the candidate to dig into your unique situation and propose opportunities applicable to your organization and your goals. Even if you decide not to hire the candidate, you will learn something from their recommendations.

Put it in writing. Put the deliverable and your payment terms in writing. You don’t want to find yourself paying for a candidate’s time only for them to lose interest or take another position before they deliver the final report.

Give them enough time. This will vary by role. A Marketing Executive might need a couple months to do a thorough assessment. A Product Marketer might only need a couple of weeks to review your messaging, collateral and sales tools.

Remember that you are paying for the deliverable and not their time. If the candidate needs to perform the work on site, remember that they are still a contractor. You shouldn’t expect to hold them to the same sort of work schedule that you might a full time employee. Many of these candidates will want to continue their search.

Give them access. Don’t limit their access only to those on the “interview circle.” Give them access to the people they would need to collaborate with if they had the job. This way you’ll get a 360-degree view on their fit in the organization.

Consider remote candidates. No one wants to go to the extra expense of relocating a candidate unless they are absolutely sure they can perform spectacularly. This option can allow you to consider some candidates that you might not have considered had you needed to relocate them first. For example, if you pay a potential marketing executive to perform an assessment of your programs, processes and people, much of this work can be done remotely.

What do you think? If you are a hiring manager, does this sound like a strategy that would work? Have you tried it? If you are a job-seeker, would you be willing to take a role on a trial basis?

All the best!

Melissa
www.twitter.com/melissapaulik

Yes, sales can write blog posts!

2009-09-10T12:51:00.000-07:00

Earlier this week I wrote Step 5 for Dumping your Marketing Department – Leverage Blogging. (Those of you who think I might actually be proposing getting rid of marketing might want to read the post before jumping to any conclusions.)

In that post I suggested that blogging is another way that sales can reach out to their market and generate their own opportunities as well as nurture those that they are already working. However, I recognized that many companies are loathe to let their sales reps anywhere near a blog.

Yesterday I found proof that sales can write their own posts and that allowing those who are closest to the customer is one way to keep your blog real and relevant.

Tyler Buskard is Sales Director for HighJump Software. He doesn’t own the company blog but he is a frequent contributor to it. His posts are entertaining, tight and right on the money. (They may not resonate with you if you haven’t spent time marketing to operations people like I have. You’ll just have to trust me that the message is spot on.)

HighJump’s blog Raising the Bar is also a good example of a blog written by multiple authors – a technique you may want to try if frequency of posts is an issue. The posts have the same style and tone. So much so, in fact, that I checked with Tyler before posting this to be sure that those with the bylines were the ones that wrote the posts. (They were.)

Although the team obviously has a format of sorts that they adhere to, there is enough individual personality in the posts that you feel like you know the bloggers. Chris Goldsmith’s post where he manages to tie the Viking’s acquisition of Brett Favre to a product launch is a great example.

All the posts promote HighJump Software without being excessively promotional. I think the length plays a big part in that. When Chris talks about the product launch he starts with a fun paragraph about Brett Favre and the Vikings. It is short enough not to irritate those who aren't football fans (or have developed a passionate dislike of Favre). Then he covers the product launch in another short paragraph. As a product strategist I’m sure he could have gone on for pages with details, but even while interjecting some of his own personality, he kept his audience in mind.

If you are looking for a good B2B blog to emulate, I encourage you to check this one out.

Happy Blogging!

Melissa

12 Steps to Dumping Your Marketing Department - Step 5 Leverage Blogging

2009-09-08T18:38:00.000-07:00

As a marketer, I don’t really believe that you could or should dump your marketing department. Of course, as a former sales person, I can also understand the frustration you feel when your marketing department fails to consistently deliver enough qualified opportunities to keep your pipeline full.

This is Step 5 in a 12 step series showing sales people how they can reduce their reliance on their marketing team. Marketers should also pay close attention as this series can give you tips that you can share with your sales team to help make them more successful and take a bit of the pressure off of you.

It’s been awhile since Step 4 and I’ll bet some of you thought I had given up on this series. Not so, but you have had over a month to implement Steps 1-4 and should be ready for Step 5. For those of you just joining us, Steps 1 – 4 are:

Step 1 - Target your market

Step 2 – Build your online presence

Step 3 – Hang out with your market

Step 4 – Nurture your leads

Step 5 is to leverage blogging in order to expand your credibility and continue to expand your online presence.

There are two ways to leverage blogging – write your own or take advantage of blogs from experts in your field. I highly recommend writing your own blog. For those of you with an opinion (and what sales person doesn’t have one?) and a small bit of writing talent it’s surprisingly easy to do. For ideas on blog topics read Save time (and make more sales) by blogging.

Another cool benefit of blogging is that, when done well, it gives you a fast and easy way to create content for your lead nurturing program. This can be very useful if your marketing team isn't doing well with keeping you stocked with fresh and compelling content.

However, some of you are probably working for employers who are a little uncomfortable letting you author your own blog or contribute to the company blog. That’s unfortunate, but if that’s the case, you can still leverage blogs from experts in your field. Here’s how:

Find blogs written by experts in your field. You can read all the sales blogs you want, but I am referring to blogs written about the product and services you sell. You are looking for blogs read by your target audience.

You can find these kinds of blogs by looking on association sites, trade magazine sites, blog directories like Technorati, or just by Googling a few key words and the word “blog.” You can even find them by checking out your competitors’ websites. Of course, look for links to external experts’ blogs as you don’t want to start promoting a competitor's blog.

Another great way to find blogs that occasionally talk about your area of expertise is to set up your Google alerts for keywords related to your field. You’ll churn up all kinds of interesting sites.

Read the blogs. Reading these blogs does two things. First, even if you are already an expert in your field you’ll broaden your own understanding and getter a better finger on the pulse of your market.

Second, you’ll get a feel for the personality of the blog author, the target reader, and what sort of comments would be appropriate. This will lead you to the next step.

Start Commenting. While comments aren’t the only metrics for blogs, nor even the most important, blog authors still love comments as long as they the comments are appropriate. Self promotion is ok as long as you aren’t honing in on someone else’s territory and the self-promotion is secondary to the value you add to the discussion.

If you find yourself commenting frequently on an experts’ blog, or engaging in a discussion after you post a comment, check to see if the author of the blog is on LinkedIn or Twitter. I have had tremendous success expanding my own network by reaching out to those whose blogs I read and comment on.

One quick caution. Blog comments are public and will show up if a prospect Googles your name or your company name so you want to spend as much time crafting them with care as you would any sales correspondence.

Tweet It! The final suggestion for leveraging expert blogs in your industry is to Tweet them. However, I’ll leave a full discussion of leveraging Twitter for Step 6.

Happy Selling!

Melissa

Your First 90 Days as a Marketing Executive or Manager – The Checklist

2009-09-03T12:45:00.000-07:00

Earlier this week I wrote a post about accepting unsolicited marketing advice. You can and should listen to the advice of your new colleagues to get the most complete picture possible. On the flip side, you were hired for your expertise in marketing and not simply to make everyone happy by implementing their suggestions. It’s up to you to take a professional look at the people, processes and programs.

Here’s a checklist of some of the things that should be assessed within your first couple of months in your new role.

90 Day Checklist

Target market defined? – Does the company have a general consensus on who the target market is? The consensus in this case is important. If you have differing opinions of what the ideal customer looks like you’ll waste a lot of time and money selling and marketing to the wrong targets.

Value prop – Does your company have one? Is it pithy and focused on customer value? Is it used in your materials and on your website to help explain what you do? Even if you aren’t selling to big companies all the time, Jill Konrath’s book Selling to Big Companies is an excellent resource for honing your value proposition, even if you aren’t selling to big companies.

Universal lead definition/lead scoring – Is there an agreement between sales and marketing on what constitutes a qualified lead?

Marketing metrics – Are there marketing goals that are linked directly to sales goals? Are they based on some reasonable assumptions of close ratios? How is marketing performing against these goals and are they held accountable?

Sales SLA in place and agreed to by sales execs? – Just as marketing should be held accountable for generating a prescribed number of qualified leads, sales needs to be held accountable for follow up. For example, there should be set expectations for the amount of time that passes between the hand-off to sales and the first contact with the prospect.

Feedback loop – Is there a feedback mechanism where sales can provide input to marketing on the quality of the leads? For example, if sales didn’t accept them as “qualified” why not and how does marketing need to change their qualification procedures to ensure that only qualified leads are sent to sales?

Ideally, this feedback mechanism involves a human:human exchange and is not simply a requirement that sales complete a form in your CRM system. It’s in the conversations that happen between sales and marketing where real understanding occurs. Reading a CRM report just doesn't have the same impact.

Lead nurturing – How are leads being nurtured? This paragraph is far too short for the importance of this piece, but I’ve written a significant amount about lead nurturing. It is imperative that you have the processes in place.

Content assessment – Is the content fresh, relevant and customer focused? You may have the lead nurturing processes set up well, but if you are sending out garbage you won’t be effective. Take a complete inventory and be objective about the real value of the available content.

Website – You should understand what your company has done to optimize for the search engines, but in the first 90 days, I would be more concerned with the target audience optimization. Is the site customer centric or too focused on the company? Are there plenty of calls to action that inspire your visitor to sign up for your mailing program? What are the bounce rates for your various pages? (Where are you losing visitors?)

A solid website is the foundation for a nurturing program as it should be your best tool for creating an effective opt-in list.

Sales Tools – Which sales tools are the sales team using and how are they being used? Which sales tools did they create themselves? Notice, I didn’t suggest that you assess what sales tools are available. I find that many companies think they have great sales tools, but the majority of them are never used.

Campaign metrics/processes – What are the metrics used to measure campaigns? What is the process for reviewing these metrics? Are they ever looked at? Are debriefs done to assess what worked and didn’t work with your campaigns?

As you go through this one you should get a good idea of which campaigns are working and which ones aren’t. Tread lightly in your first 90 days though. This is one of those areas that can be filled with political landmines. You may not want to blurt out that you are going to cut your EVP of Sales’ favorite tradeshow – at least until you understand the ramifications.

Customer satisfaction – What does the company really know about their perception in the marketplace and their customer satisfaction. When were the studies last done and how were they performed.

Although new business is typically a priority for new marketing leaders, existing customer business increases in importance during a recession. You may find it a priority, but that the company has no real understanding of their customers’ satisfaction levels, how to improve them, nor how to capitalize on them.

Each of these areas could spin off into other areas that you need to investigate, but these are the major ones that you can’t overlook. Some areas are likely to be “major disasters” whereas others might need some work, but can function for awhile without your intervention. Others may be working just fine even if the methods set up are a little different from what you’re used to. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Or at least focus your energies on the more important issues first.

From your assessment, and the opinions of others as mentioned yesterday, you’ll be able to create a plan of action that is prioritized and effective and you’ll be off to a great start.

Have fun!

Melissa

Social Media Guidelines

2009-09-02T06:59:00.000-07:00

I’ve written recently about setting Twitter guidelines for companies as well as shared my own personal Twitter guidelines. However, Twitter is just one small piece of the larger social media picture.

Kent Huffman in the Social2B blog wrote an excellent post about setting social medial policies and communicating these policies to your employees. He provides links to social media policy examples for several well-known as well as general concerns to consider.

The purpose of these guidelines isn’t to keep your employees off of social media. It’s to give them a framework to work within. Kent’s post should give everyone ample fodder for creating workable guidelines that make sense for their own company culture and industry.

Melissa

Leveraging Your First 90 Days as a Marketing Leader

2009-09-01T09:13:00.000-07:00

Everyone knows that the first 90 days in the role of marketing executive or manager can make a break your future within an organization.

On the upside, it’s a time when the company is inclined to cut you a little slack. You can and should take the time to perform a solid assessment of marketing programs, processes and people before jumping in with your ideas. Imposing your own ideas before you adequately understand the inner workings of an organization can cause you to burn bridges you never intended to burn, make mistakes that are hard to unravel, and waste valuable time.

On the downside, in your first few months in your new role everyone will have an opinion of what’s wrong and what you should do about it – and they’ll be more than happy to share.

Actually, that’s not as much of a downside as it may seem when they have you cornered in a conference room with their list of “suggestions” in hand. These opinions from all levels within the company can give you excellent insights into how things work and the human element (a.k.a. politics) of an organization. If you combine this information with your own assessment of how things are working you’ll get a more complete picture.

Instead of pushing away these ideas, why not court them? Listen to the ideas, try to understand what problem the individual is trying to solve, and ask questions about how they came to their conclusions. Done right and you’ll have plenty of allies that will stand behind your programs. Best of all, you never know where the next great suggestion is going to come from.

All the best!

Melissa

Who says blog comments don't count?

2009-08-28T10:39:00.000-07:00

SEO experts seem to agree that blog comments don’t count toward link juice. I bow to their expertise.

That said, don’t make the mistake of thinking that blog comments don’t matter. Blog comments can be picked up by the search engines and show up when someone searches on your name.

A case in point. Several years ago I was a product manager for Microsoft working heavily with the ERP applications designed for the manufacturing sector. I was quite into lean manufacturing principles and thought that everyone would benefit from applying these to every day life. I still do. I regularly read manufacturing blogs and every now and then I find a post that inspires me to comment.

I Googled my name and the phrase lean manufacturing. Below is a snippet of the results showing one blog comment and there is another one further down the page that didn’t make the cut.

Even if someone were to Google just my name, these blog comments could show up. I suspect that blog comments are more likely to show up if the blog you comment on is ranked higher by the search engines. I periodically have blog comments show up when I Google just my name. (BTW, I’m not doing for some sense of narcissistic pleasure. Googling your own name is something that everyone should be doing on a regular basis if they are concerned about maintaining their personal brand.)

The point is, blog commenting can work for you or against you in your effort to build your online brand.

It can work for you if you actively comment on blogs using the key words that you want to be associated with. I’m never going to show up in a search for “lean manufacturing”, but if I tell someone that I know something about it and they do the search for “Melissa Paulik” + lean manufacturing, I will have increased the evidence of my expertise (or at least experience in this case) because of my blog comments.

Blog commenting can also work against you if you comment carelessly. Commenting too much on blogs that are “off brand” might dilute your message if they start showing up in generic searches for your name. They can also work against you if your comments are poorly written or come off as “snarky.” I am always amazed at people who use the comment box as a chance to say something obnoxious.

Commenting on blogs is a great way to gain exposure. Just remember blog comments count toward your personal brand just like everything else you do online.

The TAO of Website Optimization

2009-08-27T13:12:00.000-07:00

I’ve seen a few discussions recently around the web regarding the effectiveness of SEO. The answers go one way or another, much of it depending on the skill set and job profile of the one answering the question. That’s not to say that anyone’s perspective is wrong, but we all look at the world through our own lenses.

That aside, it’s a valid question. SEO for a lot of organizations has failed to live up to the expectations set for it. It may have produced additional traffic to the website, but when a marketing manager (or a CEO) tells you that he or she is looking to drive traffic to the website, what they are really saying is “I am looking to drive opportunities.” No one wants traffic for traffic’s sake—with the possible exception of those who are measured on traffic metrics alone.

To make SEO pay off, you have to pay attention to TAO, or Target Audience Optimization, as well.

Taoism - philosophical system advocating a simple honest life and noninterference with the course of natural events

It seems that this should apply to our websites too. They should be as simple as possible to ensure that our visitors find exactly what they need as quickly and easily as possible. Of course, our information should be honest. And, the more we can work with the natural course of the way our customers buy, the more successful we are likely to be.

So how do you get to a TAO website? Here’s a few ideas to get you started:

Focus on the customer first. This may be the hardest for all of us since we are so close to what we do we think that it’s as important to the customer as it is for us. A good example of this is the awards that companies announce on their home page – some of them taking up a significant amount of real estate. I know you’re proud of the award you just won, and it should be important to the customer in their selection of a vendor, but between that and using precious website real estate for a valuable (to the customer) white paper that a customer I’d suggest the latter.

Focus on how your customers buy. Your industry may be different, but in the B2B technology industry where the sale can be long and complex, there’s a general flow that companies go through when making their purchasing decision.

Investigation/Compiling the long list – This is the first stage where the business may not even have a good handle on what their issues are, but they know they have a need to bring in an expert or a new solution of some sort. For high-technology marketing, this is your moment of truth – the one chance you have to pull them in and either engage or get them into your nurturing program before the write you off for good.

The main page should be geared toward a buyer in this stage of the sales cycle with loads free resources – white papers, on-demand webinars, podcasts etc. All of these should be readily visible and not buried behind your latest award announcement. The emphasis on this first level of resources is on the issues the customer faces and not necessarily on what your company does.

Evaluating Options – A decade ago, this is where the sales person came in, but with all of the information that is available to them on the web, buyers are starting the evaluation process without you. Since they aren’t inviting you in, give them a proxy by setting up an evaluation center.

This evaluation center would include more product specific resources that highlight your products in the best possible light – product reviews, commentary by analysts, product demos, product specific white papers etc. Given the sorry state of most product brochures these days, I’m inclined to say that you might as well skip those. However, we’ve trained our buyers to download these whether they look at them or not, so you might as well include that option. Just don’t confuse brochures with valuable content.

You don’t want this on the main page because the buyer who is visiting your website for the first time isn’t ready for it. It would be the electronic equivalent of leading with your product, which all of us who have been trained in some sort of solutions selling know is a “no-no.” If you make the “evaluation center” link a button which is ready visible your buyer at that stage of the sales cycle can easily access this level of information. And, no harm if your first time visitor decides to go there because they are self-selecting ro receive product info.

Sales Stage – In a high-tech complex sale there’s usually a break between the stage where they are evaluating options and the final stage where they are looking for the final affirmations they need before signing a contract. This break is where they bring in a sales person to put a face to the company they may do business with.

Clearly, your sales person needs to know their industry as well as how to help the prospect through their buying process. In addition, the more information you can give them about the prospect ahead of time, the more effective they can be. If you have tracked the downloads of your prospect, or maybe even the web pages visited, your sales person won’t be left to guess and spend too much time interrogating the company on the issues they face.

Final Evidence – After working with the sales person, the prospect typically reaches a final stage where they need assurance that they are making a good decision. These are the case studies, ROI tools, and other evidence that focus on how other customers like them have benefited. Once again, the focus is away from product and more on the existing customer’s story.

Once you’ve amassed a significant amount of compelling evidence., you may want to try putting a few case studies and quotes in the other areas of your web site, but placing the bulk of your final evidence in a secure area of your site. When you reach this stage of the process, you could give them their own log-in so they could go in and browse the evidence available as much as they want. This could raise the value of this information in eyes of your prospect. It could also save you from the annoying but common problem of prospects who call your customers in the early stage of the sales cycle.

Navigation. It goes without saying that navigation is important. Unfortunately, most of the B2 high tech websites don’t display much imagination. The biggest difference seems to be whether they put the menu down the left hand side or across the top.

Don’t copy your competitors. Most of them have no more insight into what works than you do. Be bold. Do something totally different and see how it works. But, remember, it’s not whether your colleagues in the company like it. It has to work for your prospects and customers.

Metrics. Do I know whether this would work for your organization? No, but that’s where metrics come in. Only the metrics, especially the conversion rates, are going to tell you whether the design you put together is working.

The point is that most of your current websites aren’t the lead generation machines they could be. They may be optimized for the search engines but they aren’t optimized for your target audience. I can’t tell you whether the approach I’ve suggested will work, but I can tell you that, for most of you, your current design isn’t working nearly as well as it should.

It’s Nothing Personal – Twitter is What You Make of It

2009-08-26T12:16:00.000-07:00

I was working through a client’s marketing plans the other day when I hit on the subject of Twitter.

“Have you set up a Twitter account yet?” I asked.

I heard one of the youngest of the team, maybe twenty-something, let out a snort. This was a conference call so I couldn’t see her expression, but it’s never good when a client snorts in the middle of a meeting.

“Well, I’ve heard of Twitter,” the CEO of the company replied, “but I’m not really sure what it is.”

I had a brief nanosecond to consider how I would describe Twitter to a serious business person when the young marketer chimed in, “It’s this thing where people say what they are doing at any given moment.”

I have to admit that this was my impression of Twitter not too long ago. I likened using Twitter to trying to get serious work done sitting in a grade school cafeteria. I saw it as hopeless amounts of inane chatter interrupting real work.

But Twitter has evolved. Or maybe it’s me that’s evolved. Either way, I don’t see Twitter in the same way I used to. I suspect, a great deal of it is because I’ve created my own Twitter guidelines. As a business user these have served me well so I thought I’d share these with you:

- I only use Twitter for professional purposes. My friends and other contacts can connect with me through facebook, email, or in-person since holograms aren’t available yet.

- Since I only use Twitter for professional purposes, I only follow those who are in my profession. Sometimes I’ll follow a client to see if they are getting the hang of using the tool, but for the most part, I follow fellow-marketers.

- When I find someone interesting, I will click on their ID to see their last several tweets and determine from those whether they stay on topic or not. For this reason, if someone has protected their tweets, I tend not to follow unless I know them really well.

- For the rare mistake I make, I have no qualms about unfollowing.

- Twitter is not IM and it’s not email. You aren’t expected to read every tweet. You could drive yourself insane trying to keep up.

- Since nothing I tweet is personal, I don’t protect my tweets. That means anybody can follow me unless I purposefully block them.

- I try to tweet a couple of times a day to stay involved. This is pretty easy for me since I have my blog linked to Twitter and it posts my blog. The other tweet is most often about a useful blog post I found, or a retweet of something that someone else tweeted. Both of these types of tweets help me “pay it forward” by recognizing the work of others in my field. Karma-wise, it seems to pay off.

- I use Twitter to research companies. My tool of choice is TweepSearch to find who from the company is tweeting.

- I use TweetDeck to segment those I follow into groups. This allows me to more easily focus on those I am closest to or find most inspiring.

- I follow the old rule, "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all." I suppose that someday if I'm stuck on the tarmac for six hours I could break that rule, but generally I tend to be pretty even-keel, especially online.

- And, for the one that will make most “Tweeps” gasp in horror, I don’t keep Twitter running throughout the day. I’ll open it up a couple times a day when I find I need inspiration – something to blog about, an answer to a challenge, or just a little pick-me-up.

Since most of you who read this blog are probably using Twitter, I’d love to hear what guidelines you’ve set for yourself.

Melissa
@melissapaulik

Pay it Forward – The Art & Etiquette of Retweeting a Retweet

2009-08-25T10:52:00.000-07:00

Retweeting is becoming a common practice on Twitter. I love it as it gives me a chance to give others the exposure they deserve. And, since I’m not completely altruistic, I also love the exposure it gives me. If you’ve set yourself a goal of a certain number of tweets a day in order to stay connected, try retweeting a few times a week. Sometimes, the best self-promotion you can do is to promote others.

Just when I think I’m getting past the newbie stage of Twitter, I uncover a really basic question that I think I should know the answer to. Today’s question is:

What’s the etiquette for retweeting a retweet?

Let’s say that someone retweets a tweet. The retweet includes a link to a blog post that you really like and you want to share it with your followers too. Do you retweet the original tweet? Do you retweet the retweet? The latter gives exposure to the first retweeter, which seems only fair, but can get kind of cumbersome. You only have 140 characters and a lot of retweets contain a short comment plus the original tweet. That’s not much space for two RT @(userID)s.

When in doubt, go to the source – The Blogosphere. (Almost as good as going to the mountaintop, but a lot closer!) Here are some thoughts from a randomly selected group of experts:

Are You a Twitter Retweet Thief?
This post focuses on the importance of giving credit to the original tweeter. That just seems to be common sense to me, but I thought I’d include this well written post as food for thought.

At least one of the commenters says that you must also give credit to the retweeters. If you run out of space, just shorten words - “are to r” for example. That just goes against my writer’s instincts. I’ve learned not to cringe at using less than full sentences, but I still prefer to use full words.

How to Retweet
This post shows you how to retweet a retweet but doesn’t really address the problem of too many RTs. I include it, however, because it makes a great point about why including RT in front of the @userID is so important. If you don’t, all you will be doing is replying directly to the user. This is something to keep in mind if you do want to reply to a user, but want your followers to be able to see it too.

“Twettiquette” Lesson: The ReTweet
This one gives a couple of great examples of how to retweet – especially when you are retweeting a retweet. Always give credit to the original tweeter. If there’s room, you can give credit to the retweeter as well. A nice example of how to do that is given.

If a tweet has gone viral, don’t keep giving credit to the retweeters. The blogger gives a great example of a reporter who cites his source by saying “It was heard from Mrs. Jones that Mr. Marks heard that John Doe heard that Mary said she like tofu.”

This last post makes the point nicely and with that I’m satisfied that I have found the answer I was looking for. Do you see it differently?

Melissa

Twitter Guidelines - An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure

2009-08-20T12:34:00.000-07:00

Despite what I said about not fearing the competition when developing a social media strategy, there are some companies who are concerned about how their employees will behave as tools like Twitter become mainstream. (I’ve met some of their employees and some of these companies are right to be concerned.)

As with teenagers, a little discussion of expectations up front can go a long way. Of course, there are no “one size fits all” rules. Each company has its own employee challenges and cultural norms. Each set of guidelines drawn up will be as unique as the people who wrote them.

But where to start? For a closer look at Twitter guidelines, here are a few posts to get your thoughts rolling on how you want to set expectations with your own employees:

Guidelines for Brands Using Twitter - A few good examples of social media experiments that went well. Plus, the best advice for all of us – listen before talking.

AP Issues Strict Facebook, Twitter Guidelines to Staff
A bit from the darker side of employee guidelines. AP is instructing their employees to avoid all mention of political affiliation from their profiles… Unless you have a strong need to appear unbiased (and maybe the AP does) I think it’s a little overboard to require this of your employees.

British Government Publishes Twitter Guidelines
I think my examples just went from strict to absurd. A quote from the story,
“Now, other government departments will join these offices in producing between two and 10 tweets per day, which will be approved before they are posted, according to the guidelines. In addition to waiting at least 30 minutes between each Twitter update, civil servants are also advised not to follow anyone who isn’t following them.”

Did I mention that Twitter Guidelines may be different because of cultural differences? Hmm, perhaps a bit too regimented for my tastes.

Use common sense when creating your own guidelines
If none of these posts spur ideas for your own set of guidelines use a bit of common sense and develop your own. First, consider what kinds of mistakes can happen online and create guidelines that attempt to prevent these from happening. Often, these mistakes are made unintentionally by employees and with a little education ahead of time, could be avoided. Here are a few examples:

Leaking confidential information – Make sure all employees understand what information is confidential and what is not. This is especially important if you are in a company that tends to share confidential information further down the chain. Everything from financial info to product plans should be considered. Not all employees have a good handle on what they can share and what they can’t. Sometimes confidential information is leaked when the employee was only trying to be helpful.

Who’s asking? – While you can’t control who sees their tweets, sometimes your employees will have specific individuals reaching out to them. Make sure your employees use caution when commenting one on one with people they meet on the web. Long before the age of social media, reporters have been getting scoops from naïve and unsuspecting employees. Make sure all employees know where to route these types of people if they are asked for comments.

Venting inappropriately – Consider making it a rule that your employees never, ever make a disparaging comment publicly about a customer, vendor or business partner. These kinds of comments reflect even more negatively on your organization than if the employee were to make the comment about you. These are also the comments that leave you most open to legal action.

Inappropriate content – What’s inappropriate for some may not be inappropriate for others. While I don’t believe in policing your employee’s personal sites like the AP seems to, you have every right to require that they steer clear of certain content when they are using social media professionally. And there is a fine line between personal and professional these days. For example, even if your employees Tweet under their own name, that’s a professional account if they use it to Tweet about your company or industry. Twitter doesn’t limit the number of accounts you can have so consider encouraging your employees to separate the personal from the professional.

If you have additional idea for gudelines or stories about what has worked for you, please share them. You can comment on this blog or send me a tweet @melissapaulik.

All the best!

Melissa

Social Media Paranoia – Is it Justified?

2009-08-17T16:56:00.000-07:00

I recently asked the question, “Is Twitter a useful tool for channel communications?” I had some interesting responses on the LinkedIn IT Channel Alliance forum where I also posted the question. Offline, most people admitted to being a little paranoid about the competition gaining access to their secrets.

This concern is nothing new. Since the first printed word was used in a commercial sense, marketers have been trying to figure out how to communicate with their target market without the information leaking into the wrong hands. However, after reading this article in BtoB Magazine on social media and marketing intelligence, I’m not so sure the paranoia is justified.

Of the 314 marketers polled:

- 33% said they find valuable information through social media.
- 21% said they use social media but not for competitive intelligence.
- Another 21% said they didn’t use social media at all.
- The final 25% didn’t know what competitive intelligence was. (Tip: Asking the question, “Are you in marketing?” at the beginning of the survey can help you weed out unqualified respondents.)

So roughly a third of your competition is using social media for competitive intelligence. Of that third, one has to ask, how many just answered “yes” on the survey because they were embarrassed not to. And, how many have a regular program of gathering competitive intelligence this way? Probably not many.

Granted, sales people may be more likely to use social media for transactional competitive intelligence but so many sales people are still selling “the old-fashioned way” that I wouldn’t worry much about them yet either.

When it comes down to it, “competitive concerns” seems to be losing its luster as a legitimate excuse for staying out of the discussion. Your competition will gain access to your “news” through other means. Unless you plan to never release any new products or services, there’s just no way around the competition getting their hands on this information. The “leaks” aren’t likely to come from within your organization. They will come from your business partners, customers, or former employees. These leaks will happen whether or not you are on the social networks.

The same is true for complaints about your company. Users have been complaining about their vendors since the first electronic bulletin boards came into existence. (The first one I remember was the late-80s)

We all know the saying that for every complaint we hear there are ten complaints that we never hear. Social media has made it far easier for customers to spread negative comments, but it’s also made it much easier for marketers to be aware of these comments. Better to be involved in the discussion by having a staff of people who understand the medium and are trained to respond effectively, than to not be aware of the conversation about you. Ignorance is no longer bliss.

Melissa

Yes, B2B websites can be prospect-centric

2009-08-14T09:40:00.001-07:00

If you read my recent poston on chasing the elusive prospect-focused B2B website you know that I am searching for a good prospect-centric B2B website that I can use as an example in my work. The best sites so far have been sites from marketing companies that focus on marketing solutions. You would think they’d do well, so I want something with a more “industrial” flavor. I’m looking for a site that sells the ubiquitous “widget” to other businesses.

I know it can be done but so many of the sites that sell to other businesses are stagnant electronic-brochures that talk about all that they do in language that is barely decipherable. The calls to action tend to be few and only give the visitor the opportunity to download “more product information” and other company-centric materials.

Mike Frichol recently talked about the overwhelmingly self-centric websites produced by business software companies in a recent post on The Marketing Melange. Using FutureNow's WeWe Monitor he tested ten well-known business software companies. These ten companies were only focused on the customer an average of 12% of the time!

I’m happy to say that I have found a contender for best customer-centric B2B site. I ran across Trend Micro’s site while doing my research the other day. I like the look of the site as it’s fairly clean and does a good job of segmenting visitors so they know where to go. Trend Micro provides internet security tools to both consumers and businesses so it isn’t strictly B2B, but they clearly have a strong focus on an industrial audience. There are plenty of calls to action with free tools and a pretty interesting Threat Watch Meter that shows the current threat level on the web and from spam and malware that resembles the Department of Homeland Security’s threat levels. This familiarity makes it instantly understandable.

That’s not to say that there isn’t room for possible improvement. For example, I’d test the positioning of the free tools. It’s possible they have already done this and decided that the current position was best, but these tools seem fairly buried in a small grey menu on the right. They have a newsletter as well, but the ability to sign up for it is also a bit buried on internal pages. (Nice name though – First Line of Defense Newsletter)

I also like Trend Micro’s verbiage. Given the technology they produce, they could have a site written strictly for IT users of the product. Although their user base may be technical, especially on the business side, my guess is that a significant number of their buyers are average business people who want to know what the solutions do for us, not exactly how they do it. They did a great job of speaking to this audience while also supplying the information their more technical audience would want.

Finally, I ran the site through Hubspot’s Website Grader and Future Now’s WeWe Monitor. (I know these may seem a bit gimmicky but they are fun and I’ve found them very useful in pointing out problems to marketers who are too close to their products.) Apparently, Trend Micro’s webmaster knows what he or she is doing as HubSpot gave it a 98.3. There were a whopping 428,000+ inbound links. (Add one more after I finish this post)

The WeWe Monitor gave it a very respectable customer focus score of 58.33% showing the percentage of the time they speak about the customer and not themselves. I think their site is proof positive that you can be customer-centric and still market yourself.

I’m going to continue my search for the best customer-centric B2B website, so if any of you think you’ve found one (or have one) that you believe can top Trend Micro’s site let me know.

Melissa

Are the “new rules” for marketing incompatible with lead nurturing?

2009-08-10T17:41:00.000-07:00

When I wrote the post Are web forms old school?, I referred to David Meerman Scott’s New Rules of Marketing and PR. I saw some incompatibility between letting go of your marketing materials and lead nurturing concepts. I suggested some ways to compromise such as only putting your best materials behind a form and limiting the amount of information you collect.

However, the thought that the two concepts were fundamentally incompatible just wouldn’t leave me. For example, one of the great things about lead nurturing is that you can tailor your follow up nurturing programs to the prospects interests based on what they download. If you only know a fraction of what someone downloads, you’ll only have a partial picture.

In addition, if you know how often they download something you can gauge their general level of interest and whether it’s worth your time and theirs to follow up with a call. They may download ten items from your site, but if you only have one of those items behind a form, you run the risk of missing a great opportunity to engage. Or, conversely, you may decide to call everyone who downloads that one item thereby wasting a lot of energy and the prospect's time.

I decided to ask the question on the B2B Lead Generation Forum on LinkedIn to see if others were wondering the same thing. Apparently I wasn’t the only one. You can follow the full discussion here including a comment from me on why I changed my mind about putting only your best content behind a form.

Your help needed - Chasing the elusive prospect-focused B2B website

2009-08-06T11:22:00.000-07:00

As I was trying to make a point with a client about making your website prospect-centered, I realized that I don’t have a truly good example of a B2B website that they can relate to. I use Hubspot’s site all the time to demonstrate as it’s practically a resource center for its target market. However, I’d like to find a website that most of my technology clients can relate to. How do you take a company like a business software provider or one that provides network security and create a website that puts the prospect first? Better yet, does anyone have an example of a company that has really done it well?

I asked this question on the B2B Marketing Forum on LinkedIn and got several examples that were very company-centric. That experience only serves to prove the point that as marketers, we are often too close to our products to be a good judge.

If you think you have a site that qualifies as best-in-class for its customer focus, let us know. I don’t really care about design, keyword optimization or any of that. I just want to find one that shouts, “I care about you more than I care about me.”

All the best!

Melissa

Are Web Forms Old School?

2009-08-05T13:39:00.000-07:00

I just abandoned a registration form for a webinar I really wanted to attend because the form asked for my physical address. I don’t mind giving them my name, company name and email. It’s information that they can use to understand who I am and better follow up (or not) with me after the event. But, why would they need my physical address?

Being the paranoid consumer I am, I have to assume they are going to do one of two things. They are either going to sell my personal information to someone else and try to make a buck off of something that I consider my property. Or, they are going to send me junk mail, thereby wasting my time, cluttering my home and eventually filling my local landfill. Both of these assumptions turn me off so much that I rarely complete a form that asks for my address.

I’m not alone in my aversion to sharing unnecessary information on a web form. Mike Frichol writes about his research into the way ERP Software vendors are using forms on his blog The Marketing Melange. He says that the worst example he found was for a vendor that required the visitor “to create a full profile with over 25 data fields to become a supposed member of some privileged inner circle group before you see their information.” Yikes!

Those of you who follow David Meerman Scott, author of The New Rules of Marketing and PR know that he is a proponent of tearing down the gates in front of your content. Joe Pulizzi recently quoted some stats he brought back from David’s presentation at the Branded Content Conference. He says that “a white paper or eBook will be downloaded 20x and up to 50x more WITHOUT a gate in front of it.” This allows people, such as bloggers, who are the most likely to share your content easy access to it. And, it improves the chance that good content can go viral.

Mark Palony at SoftBrands, an ERP vendor located in Minneapolis is testing this theory. In his company blog, he’s shared with his prospects and customers that he has removed all the forms in front of his content. When I asked Mark what lead up to the decision he cited the higher abandon rates on the forms and that he wanted to remove any obstacles to getting the information in the hands of his prospects.

As for me, I’m not ready to abandon forms completely. If you are looking for a way to build an opt-in list web forms are a great tool. However, a well executed form strategy is needed to avoid turning off today’s savvy (or paranoid) customer. Here are a few tips:

- Don’t put your brochures behind a form. I know you spent a lot of time and effort putting those together but they just aren’t that high of value to the customer.

- Watch the download rates. Put what you consider a great customer-focused piece of content behind a form and watch the bounce rates for the form as well as the download rates. Then take the form out from in front of it and see if your stats come anywhere near the stats quoted by David Meerman Scott.

- Test various landing page and form layouts. It could be the layout or verbiage of your landing page or the form itself. Try some A/B testing to see if you can increase your response rates while still keeping the form.

- If you decide to take Mark’s plan and remove all forms, watch your inbound contact rate. It is sure to take some time, but if the number of calls you get doesn't increase, your problem may not be the forms.

- Ask for no more information than is absolutely necessary. In most cases, name, company name and email are sufficient. You may think you need the phone number but asking for that information can increase your abandon rates. How many people do you know want a rep giving them a call? If you really do need to follow up by phone, the numbers aren’t all that difficult to obtain through other sources.

- Allow for an opt-in on every form you have. If you can get prospects to opt-in to your nurturing program, you'll feel less compelled to out everything on your site behind a form simply because you are desperate for leads.

All the best!

Melissa

Is Twitter Useful as a Channel Communications Tool?

2009-08-03T08:38:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I posted this question on ChannelWeb and a couple of channel focused discussion groups on LinkedIn. For those of you who aren’t part of these forums or a member of the LinkedIn groups, here’s the text of the question:

It seems to me that Twitter holds some promise for building relationships between vendor and channel partners. It probably won’t be the main communication method any time soon, but perhaps it offers an opportunity to take the relationship to a new level.

Vendors – Are you using Twitter to communicate with your channel Partners? If so, how’s it working?

Channel - Are your vendors using Twitter to communicate with you? If so, how effective is it?

You can respond via this blog or log into ChannelWeb or join one of these channel discussion groups to provide your feedback:

Everything Channel

IT Channel Alliance

All the best!

Melissa

Lead Scoring 101

2009-08-01T06:45:00.000-07:00

I’ve often mentioned lead scoring in my series on lead nurturing and in other posts on improving the connection between sales and marketing. For some time I’ve been meaning to go back and give a better explanation of lead scoring. No need. Jep Castelein did a great job covering it in his recent post Lead Scoring 101.

All the best!

Melissa

Metrics for Marketing

2009-07-31T09:36:00.000-07:00

In the Modern B2B blog, Marketo posted an interview with David Taber, author of Salesforce.com Secrets of Success. The interview is a worthwhile read. Toward the end of the interview David suggest a few metrics that marketing should be tracking through CRM:

• Time to "first touch" of a lead
• Number of converted leads per rep per month
• Average time to convert
• Number of fully qualified leads accepted by sales each month
• Number of sales cycles started due to marketing efforts
• Value of sales pipeline started due to marketing efforts
• Proportion of leads rejected (and neglected) by sales
• Marketing cost of acquiring a new customer
• Value of sales pipeline influenced by one or more campaigns (SFDC's new campaign influence feature makes this much easier to measure)
• Profitability of new customers due to marketing efforts
• Loyalty of new customers
• Percentage of repeat business

This is a great list. While you may not measure each of these monthly, reviewing some of them on at least a quarterly basis can alert you to problems. For example, “time to first touch” can help you identify bottlenecks in your lead follow up process. This “first touch” is probably someone on an internal telemarketing team so you might also consider measuring “time to first touch by sales.”

This latter metric will measure the handoff of qualified leads between telemarketing and sales. You can look at the aggregate metric to see how well the defined process is working. You can also look at the metric by sales person to see if any particular rep is bringing the metric down. (If that’s the case, I suggest marketers let sales leadership handle the performance issues.)

I also really like the 7th metric “proportion of leads rejected (and neglected) by sales.” The percentage of leads accepted will tell you how well your team is sticking to the lead scoring and the universal lead definition that you worked so hard to create. If there are neglected leads that met the scoring thresholds, then you know sales isn’t living up to their end of the agreement.

A 100% acceptance rate is unrealistic as prospects will sometimes tell the telemarketer one thing and sales something totally different. And, in these days of shifting budgets and vanishing projects, things really can change in a matter of hours. However, whenever there is a lead that is not accepted by sales, it’s an opportunity to gather valuable feedback from your sales team.

Marketing should meet with the sales reps regularly to review each lead that was rejected. Why was it rejected? Are there questions that telemarketing should be asking to better qualify the prospects? Do we need to rethink our lead scoring thresholds? Should we add this lead to a nurturing track?

Finally, the 4th metric “number of fully qualified leads accepted by sales each month” is the “quota” on which marketing should be measured. If your Universal Lead Definition and lead scoring thresholds are set appropriately and you have a solid understanding of sales ability to close qualified opportunities, then this metric should allow you to predict sales results with a fair degree of accuracy.

All the best!

Melissa

Nurturing Your Channel Prospects

2009-07-30T12:44:00.000-07:00

Lead nurturing is not just for end-user prospects anymore!

I’ve spent a significant amount of my career involved in creating channel programs, recruiting channel partners, and helping channel partners market and sell more effectively. As I’ve been writing a series of posts on lead nurturing it struck me how well this concept would work when recruiting channel partners.

When I was on the front lines doing the recruiting, I never got much help from the marketing department. Yes, we got plenty of product content that we could share with our prospective resellers. We PowerPointed them to death with our latest product portfolios. But, as someone who has talked with literally hundreds of businesses selling sofware I can tell you that product wasn’t usually the number one concern of my prospective business partners.

Yes, they want a good product, but more important to anyone who is trying to start or grow a business reselling, implementing or consulting on software or hardware, is the relationship they have with their vendor.

They want to know things like:

• What marketing materials will you provide to me?
• Who owns the customer? (Anyone involved in the software industry will immediately understand the ramifications of this one!)
• How do you handle my support calls?
• What kinds of training opportunities will your provide to me?
• Who will be my main contacts at your organization and how will I interact with them?
• And on, and on, and on.

If all you are doing is staying in front of your reselling prospects with product information, then you are breaking the cardinal rule of lead nurturing. You have to stay in front of them with information that is most relevant to them. When someone is thinking about betting their business on a relationship with you, they want to know about a lot more than just your products.

If you are serious about channel recruitment, why not build a separate lead nurturing track for your prospective channel partners? Examples of good content include:

• A blog on the latest happenings in your industry. This is different from a technical blog that focuses on product. I wrote a post recently called Save time (and make more sales) with blogging where I suggested that you take your most frequently asked questions and blog about them. This would work really well for a prospective channel partner blog.
• A blog that shares ideas on how to market and sell more effectively. If you are concerned about sharing great ideas with resellers that are just going to use it to sell your competitors' products more effectively, then make it a “members only” blog.
• White papers that focuses on business building techniques.
• Free webinars that do the same.

Way back in the dark ages when I started my career, I can remember the reps that came into the computer store I worked in. (OK, I know it wasn’t the dark ages if PCs were around.) The only ones that we made any time for were the ones that had something useful to offer besides product info. The more things change, the more they stay the same. These businesses still look to partner with companies that have more to offer than just a great product.

Happy recruiting!

Melissa

12 Steps to Dumping Your Marketing Department - Step 4 Nuture your leads

2009-07-29T11:56:00.000-07:00

As a marketer, I don’t really believe that you could or should dump your marketing department. Of course, as a former sales person, I can also understand the frustration you feel when your marketing department fails to consistently deliver enough qualified opportunities to keep your pipeline full.

This is Step 4 in a 12 step series showing sales people how they can reduce their reliance on their marketing team. Marketers should also pay close attention as this series can give you tips that you can share with your sales team to help make them more successful and take a bit of the pressure off of you.

So far, we have covered:

Step 1 - Target your market

Step 2 – Build your online presence

Step 3 – Hang out with your market

In Step 4 we’re going to talk about building your own lead nurturing program.

It’s no accident that I have been running a series of posts on lead nurturing. Here’s a quick list of some of the posts you should go back and review if you are unfamiliar with the concepts:

7 Ways to Build an Opt-in List for a Lead Nurturing Program

Don't Ignore the Bouncebacks

Quarterly Newsletters, Mailing Lists, or Both?

Lead Nurturing Advice You May Not Want to Hear

If your marketing team isn’t actively nurturing prospects, you need to step in and fill the void. However, even if they are actively nurturing prospects, there’s going to be a subset of prospects that YOU really should take ownership of.

Never underestimate the competitive advantage of a salesperson who is seen as a “trusted advisor” by a prospect. Lead nurturing, done by the sales person, is an opportunity to establish your expertise and your credibility in the eyes of your prospects regardless of marketing’s ability to create credibility in your market.

Of course, these nurturing campaigns should be 1:1. It’s a regular communication between you and the prospect. You email will be targeted at their specific hot buttons. You can still have an editorial schedule for your nurturing campaigns, but the mailings you send to two customers in the same industry might be very different depending on what they care most about.

Because of the personalized nature of sales-led nurturing campaigns, you want to be selective on the number of prospects you nurture. In the same way you might target a pipeline that is 3X your quota, you might choose to manage a nurturing base that is 5X your pipeline. You need to figure out what is workable and required in order to meet your goals, but keeping your target tight allows you to be much more effective.

Finally, don’t look to marketing to create your emails. They don’t have the relationship with your prospects – you do. In fact, the fancy html emails that marketing creates will do more harm than good in sales’ hands. Your prospects know that you didn’t create that email. A personally signed text email from you mentioning a previous discussion and containing a customer-focused call to action such as white paper download will carry far more weight.

Happy selling!

Melissa

Lead Nurturing Advice You May Not Want to Hear

2009-07-27T11:07:00.000-07:00

As a marketing consultant I’m often asked to give input on my friend’s marketing programs. I’m happy to give a quick look for free, but it’s a little harder to actually give the free advice. It’s one thing to be paid to be critical. It’s another to be critical when the person on the other end is someone who isn’t paying you to damage their ego.

The other day, a friend asked me to look at the lead nurturing programs he had created. He sent me a series of monthly newsletters that were very visually appealing. The problem was that most of these newsletters only contained articles about the latest product releases and company announcements.

Let me state what I’ve said before – brochures don’t count as content in a lead nurturing program. (Nor do brochures disguised as a newsletter.)

I realize this is a pretty big mental block for some marketers. As an old manager of mine used to say, “You must be pretty proud of that [stuff]” This applies even more when we’re proud, not only of the products, but of the marketing pieces we create to showcase the benefits of our products. How could our prospects not get the same joy out of reading our brochure as we do?

However, when it comes right down to it, our brochures look pretty much like everyone else’s. I know you don’t believe it, but it’s true. Your layout might be a bit more pleasing; your benefits statements a bit clearer, but to your customer there just isn’t that much difference.

Do you still think that you can get away with product brochures as content? ClickInsights gathered up 6 B2B Marketing experts and asked them what the biggest mistake in B2B content marketing is.

While I think the biggest mistake is “trying to get away with using brochures as content,” each of their answers was a little different. However, every one of them assumed content that was more customer-centric and less [your company]-centric than a brochure. They may not have chosen my #1, but I’m pretty certain every one of them would agree that brochures don’t make good content.

All the best!

Melissa

Quarterly Newsletters, Mailing Lists or Both?

2009-07-24T09:54:00.000-07:00

One of the on-going threads on this blog in recent weeks has been nurturing programs. A common question I am seeing is "Where do quarterly newsletters fit in?"

Many of you probably have a quarterly newsletter program of some sort. In the post Winning Customers and Influencing Prospects, I mentioned that quarterly newsletters can play an important part of a lead nurturing program. However, since they are only quarterly, they aren’t very effective by themselves at winning mind-share from your prospects.

Even if you are among the few who have the time and the discipline to create a monthly newsletter program I would suggest that a one-pronged approach to nurturing opportunities is also not very effective. Some people will respond to newsletters whereas others will sign up for them but never get around to reading them. (Or, is that just me?) Other people don’t respond to newsletters at all because they are too much information. Whereas, a targeted email focusing on something that really matters to them will be more effective.

If you invest in a newsletter program you should maintain a separate opt-in for your mailing programs. Someone who signs up for a quarterly newsletter is not necessarily consenting to receiving regular emails from you. A database of opt-in for newsletter and email programs would look something like this.

Some would sign up for your newsletter, some for more regular emails, and some for both. Of course, unlike the simple diagram, your lists may not be the same size. In my experience, newsletter opt-ins run a bit higher but that may just be because the newsletter programs I've been involved in were more mature.

Yes, in the US our laws are pretty lax and as long as you remain compliant with CanSpam, your prospects don’t have to explicitly opt-in to both your newsletter program and a mailing list. However, having both programs lets your prospects tell you how to best communicate with them. Communicating with prospects in the way they want to be communicated with is one of the things that makes inbound marketing work.

All the best!

Melissa

Website Makeover - Step 1

2009-07-23T15:00:00.000-07:00

As some of you know, I’ve been blogging for a couple of years now, but I finally launched my own website last week. I’m turning my attempt at being Webmaster into a “teachable” moment. (And a lesson in humility on my part.)

As I mentioned last Friday, content is king so I started by adding content that I thought was most appropriate to my audience. I’m still not completely satisfied with it, but I believe in testing everything. I will play around a bit with the content and layout to test the impact this has on conversions down the road. For now, the trick is to be found because if you can’t be found, you can’t convert no matter how stellar your content is.

After putting 8 pages together over a couple of evenings, I ran it through Hubspot’s Website Grader to see how it performed with absolutely no optimization what-so-ever. I’m pleased to say that I scored a 21, which means that my website is better than 21% of the other websites that Website Grader has had the opportunity to review. I was amazed I scored this well because I really did absolutely no optimization at all. Makes me wonder what those other sites look like.

My first steps in optimization were the obvious ones:

- I added H1 Tags
- I added a meta description for each page.
- I added key words

After running the site through website grader again, I scored a 27. Not a huge improvement, but I didn’t do all that much so it was a good beginning.

Thanks to Hubspot, I also realized I had made a couple small mistakes. My description was a little too long. Hubspot and other experts recommend no more than 150 characters. That was easy to fix. Luckily, Twitter has many of us used to thinking in 140 characters or less.

I also had a few too many keywords. Hubspot recommended 10. More and you run the risk of diluting their effectiveness. That was a little harder to fix, but narrowing down my keywords should allow me to better optimize my copy when I come back to that.

I also had more than one H1 tag per page. Hubspot didn’t see this as a major issue but that was simple to fix as well so I took care of it.

I’ve taken my first step in this journey of a thousand miles. Now it’s time for step 2. I’ll keep you posted. And, if any of you are interested in providing your own feedback and ideas for the most important things to fix, you can find my site at The Marketing Survivalist. I welcome your input.

All the best!

Melissa

Another Cool Tool

2009-07-23T09:34:00.000-07:00

Mike Frichol, a friend and former colleague of mine, has found another great free tool for those of you who are trying to upgrade your web skills. If you manage a site promoting business software you should read his post Is your website wewe-ing? Actually those of you who manage any sort of B2B site should read it as I’ll bet your industry does little better.

Mike points out how you can see how "self-centered" your website is by using the WeWe Monitor from FutureNow. But, since you don't need to put any code on the site, you can also monitor your competitor's sites. That's always fun!

All the best!

Melissa

Don't Ignore the Bouncebacks!

2009-07-21T13:17:00.000-07:00

In most email and nurturing programs, bouncebacks (undeliverable emails) are rarely considered. If you purchased the list from a broker, you may pay attention to the bounceback rate just to make sure the vendor is living up to their promises.

If you are using your own database, bouncebacks may not even be looked at. Since the cost of an undeliverable e-mail adds nothing to the cost of the e-mail program, administrators of the database may not even take the time to clean the name off of the list.

I see bouncebacks as an opportunity to gather some excellent intelligence, especially if you are targeting very specific prospects with your programs. Here are some ways to leverage the opportunities that bouncebacks present:

Call the company to see if this person is still part of the company and who has taken over their position in the company. See if you can connect with the new individual and ask them if they would like to stay informed as well. In addition to a new name, you may be able to gather a little intelligence about what is happening within the company.

If you can’t get decent intel by calling, OneSource and Hoovers are good sources of information about new company hires at the executive level. However, for those of you with more modest marketing budgets, I’d suggest LinkedIn.

If the company has a profile on LinkedIn, it will show you new hires – as long as those individuals are on LinkedIn and have updated their profile. Here's a snapshot from a page on SAP's LinkedIn profile showing new hires and recent promotions and changes.

Note that if you "click more" when you are on the profile, you can see more that just the top 5. LinkedIn is useful if you aren’t always selling at the executive level as new hires in middle management are far more likely to show up than in OneSource or Hoovers.

You can also look up your former contact on LinkedIn to see where they are now. If they are with a new company, reach out and ask them if they would like to continue to receive information. Sending an email through LinkedIn is a good way to do it because most people don’t get many LinkedIn emails and yours stands a better chance of standing out. (This is far different from spamming people through LinkedIn. I am absolutely against using LinkedIn as a permanent alternative to regular email unless your contact is a close associate.)

If they are unlucky enough to be caught in one of the all-too-frequent lay-offs, and your comfortable doing this, reach out to them and invite them to connect. Let them know you’d be happy to provide an introduction to other contacts if they are interested. Remember, they are probably going through uncertain times so this is about them and not about you. Keep your emails focused on what’s top of mind for them. In my experience, most people who have been recently laid off are happy to network with anyone who shows an interest in helping. It is about them, but you can earn yourself some huge karma points.

Even if the prospect hasn’t updated their profile, you can still reach out through LinkedIn and let them know you received a bounceback. You can ask them if they would like to continue receive information at a new email address and hopefully get a chance to create a stronger connection.

All the best!

Melissa

7 Ways to Build an Opt-In List for a Lead Nurturing Program

2009-07-20T10:33:00.000-07:00

Building a list of prospects who opt-in to receive information from you can sound like a daunting task, but it doesn’t need to be. Keep in mind a couple of fundamental principles:

First, lead nurturing programs do not need to be large to be effective. An effective lead nurturing program could have 100 prospects in it. This is quite different from a “push” e-mail or direct mail campaign where a list that small may not be worth the expense of putting together a campaign.

Second, building an opt-in list is not a “once and done” effort. A consistent effort over time will allow you to build a list that will become one of your greatest assets. Many companies talk about the size of their database. Show me the size of your opt-in nurturing list and then maybe I’ll be impressed.

Here are some simple but often overlooked ways to build an opt-in list:

1. Your website – You know that the best websites have a call to action on every page. You want your websites to be lead generation machines, but so often, those who download your literature or on-demand webinars are really “just looking.” Every time you put a download behind a form, you should give that prospect an opportunity to sign up for regular emails from your organization.

2. Your newsletter program – I recommended having both a newsletter program and a mailing program. There are going to be some prospects who will sign up for a newsletter, but just aren’t ready to sign up to receive regular emails. It’s far less “risky” in their mind if you give them the choice.

Of course, every newsletter you send should also give them the opportunity to opt-in to your mailing program if they want to receive the same kind of information more often.

3. Your telemarketing team – Most of you probably have someone, or maybe even a team of people, assigned to field calls from suspects who contact you. It can be a mind-numbing job, especially in a down economy when it seems like your hot prospects are few and far between. As any telemarketer will tell you, they are only as good as the number of hot (qualified) leads they’ve delivered to the field.

You want to remain focused on the goal of delivering qualified leads to the sales team, but you should have a secondary goal of building your nurturing list. Most people who call into a company will ask for “more information” if only because they don’t know what else to do. That is a perfect time to ask them if they would like to be kept up-to-date and receive additional educational information.

I am in favor of making qualified nurturing prospects a key metric. You may not compensate your telemarketers on it, but set a goal and celebrate it when it’s reached. Pizza parties still fit into most marketing budgets and it’s a great way to show your telemarketers that you appreciate their efforts and see them as key contributors to the success of the company.

4. Your sales team – If your sales team know you have a solid lead nurturing program, chances are they will begin to send you names. If not, keep promoting your program to them, and keep asking them if they have anyone they would like to add to the program. Once they start seeing the benefits, their attitudes will turn around.

5. Networking events/trade shows – These are different types of events, but they both have one thing in common. You typically collect business cards from people who claim to be interested only to see them fizzle out as the memory of the conversation wears away.

Next time you collect a business card at an event, ask them if they would like to receive more educational information and industry updates regularly from you. Most will say “yes.” If they say “no” they are telling you that they are not really interested and you’ve lost nothing by not treating them as a lead.

6. “Revival” campaigns – If your lead nurturing program is new, chances are you have hundreds of leads in your database that are no longer active. You’ve probably all run, or at least heard about, campaigns where you use telemarketers to do a call down to these “leads” to see if they are still interested.

This approach isn’t much different from the “calling to touch base” that I derided in my first post on lead nurturing. However, since you haven’t had any real contact with these people in some time, you don’t have much choice.

Instead of judging the effectiveness of your revival telemarketing on how many hot leads you find (which probably won’t be many) make it a goal to add qualified candidates to your nurturing program.

7. Your blog – A year ago, this might not have made the list since so few had corporate blogs. Now it seems like everybody does. Remember to give your readers an opportunity to sign up for your e-mail program through your blog as well as on your website. This is in addition to allowing them to subscribe to your posts either through e-mail or a reader.

Building an opt-in list can take some time, but it is an essential element of a good lead nurturing program. Some of these techniques, such as the revival campaign or a well-attended trade show can give you a great jump-start.

Some will tell you that you can buy a list and give the recipients an opportunity to opt-in when you send a one-time e-mail. In my experience, it’s never worth the cost. E-mail lists are expensive and the average response rates are often as low as 1% or less. One e-mail to a purchased list is not going to build your opt-in list for you. It takes work, but it is well worth the effort.

All the best!

Melissa

I am on the web!

2009-07-17T13:01:00.000-07:00

It’s not all too uncommon these days to start with a blog and never get around to creating a website - especially if you are an independent consultant like I am. Still, I decided that a blog didn’t offer me all the advantages of a website so I needed both.

I am pleased to say that I am finally on the web. You can visit The Marketing Survivalist for a look. But, before you get all excited (or critical) let me say that this is a project that is still in its infancy.

I’ve worked with webmasters for years, so it’s been kind of interesting to play at being one. I thought I’d share my experiences with you as I hope it might motivate some of you who have been thinking about creating a website. Plus, as I continue to improve my site, I’ll share those things that have had the greatest impact.

First, I decided to host my domain with GoDaddy and use their Website Tonight product. Chalk one up for gross (IMHO) advertising. It is memorable. It helped that I decided to work on my site while watching this year’s Tour de France and their ads are all over VS. (Along with some even grosser ads.)

I’m not an HTML coder so it’s nice to use a website building tool that is designed for someone who understands the theory behind building a successful site, if not the coding that goes into it. For me, the Website Tonight product was a little quirky, but not that bad. My 8 pages were more like Website [tomorrow] Night but it was close enough.

I will say that the support I received when I called in was really good. I had accidentally purchased more than I needed and they were the ones who pointed it out to me. They very promptly refunded the extra, which I very promptly spent on some more services from them. (It was the thought that counts.)

Even Google will tell you that content is king, so instead of focusing on creating title tags, meta tags, page descriptions, backlinks and the like, I just focused on the content. In other words, if you try to find me using a search engine right now, I am probably invisible.

I thought I’d have some fun and have Hubspot’s website grader look at my raw product and see how it ranked. It’s still having problems finding it so I’ll probably come back as a 2. (Which means that 98% of websites out there are better built than mine.) Actually a 2 might be too optimistic.

This weekend, I’ll start optimizing the site for the search engines. I’m eager to put the things I recommend into actual practice and see what kind of impact I can have on my site. They say “a journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step.” I’m looking forward to sharing my journey with you.

All the best!

Melissa

Burning Blogging Question - Answered!

2009-07-16T11:42:00.000-07:00

My blog is a large part of my social media strategy. (It’s a large part of my life too – but that’s another story.) I understand the quid pro quo of blogging. If you want to seriously engage through blogging, you can’t just write your own blog. You need to comment on others as well.

But I don’t always get to read my favorite blogs right away. In fact, the ones I get to most often are those that allow me to subscribe via email. I’m a bit old-school in that my inbox acts a bit like my to-do list – at least until I realize I’ve spent too much time answering emails and decide to get some real work done.

Unfortunately for me, but fortunately for the bloggers, many of my favorite blogs get tons of really great comments. For example, Doyle Slaton’s Compelling Argument Against Cold Calling post on SalesBlogcast.com has 84 comments as of this moment. By the way, this is a really interesting debate that I suspect might have evolved into a food fight if it was held over a lunch.

As I said, it’s unfortunate for me because by the time I get around to reading the post, let alone composing something relevant and pithy to say, I’m usually way down the list with at least thirty or more comments ahead of me. I should be so lucky in this case. By my count, my comment is number 54 in the list. This begs the question, “Is it still worth commenting?”

One of my other favorite blogs, copyblogger, answered my question in a post written by Brian Clark. Is Commenting on Blogs a Smart Traffic Strategy? It’s an excellent post with several great points.

My key take-away is that it’s OK to be late in the game when it comes to commenting because it’s really more about what you say than when you say it. In the case of Brian’s post, I am #165 in the list of comments, but now I don’t feel so guilty about it.

All the best!

Melissa

Not All Backlinks Are Created Equal

2009-07-16T10:17:00.000-07:00

I received an email from Tiffany Otten at GlobalSpec who wanted to thank me for mentioning her organization in 12 Steps to Dumping Your Marketing Department – Step 3 Hang Out with Your Market. She also brought up a very good point that I really should mention as a follow up.

Google, and other search engines do not view all backlinks equally.

A backlink is a link back to your site from another site. However, most paid directories such as GlobalSpec track the link through their site so that the link ends up looking something like this:

http://www.globalspec.com/Goto/GotoWebPage?gotoUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Elawson%2Ecom%2F&gotoType=WebHome&VID=120925

Google, and other search engines, do not consider that link as legitimate as one that is “free and clear” of any other sites. A link of higher quality would look more like:

http://www.yourdomain.com

It’s tough to find a clean answer from the SEO experts on how exactly Google sees the first link. e.g. Is it worth 10% as much as a clean link? 25%? 30%? If you’re like me, you want the specifics so you can manage your SEO efforts more effectively. However I suspect the vagueness of the responses has a lot to do with the ever-changing rules of SEO and that Google is a little coy about releasing any of their search engine algorithms.

Yahoo, as I understand it, has a little looser restriction on the backlinks, but that could change by the time I post this. I haven’t seen anything about how Microsoft’s Bing sees backlinks yet. Any SEO experts want to weigh in on this one?

That said, these paid links should not be included in the same category from other paid links that the SEO experts will warn you about. As long as paid directories like GlobalSpec are consistent with your theme, you shouldn’t be dinged for using them. (At least according to the rules as of this moment!)

Thanks again Tiffany for suggesting this clarification.

All the best!

Melissa

How Do You Measure Blog Conversions?

2009-07-14T20:38:00.000-07:00

Conversions are often the metric used to measure the success of electronic marketing. But, what exactly is a conversion? Is it a sale? Is it getting the prospect to call you? Is it an opportunity in the pipeline?

A conversion is getting the visitor to take the action you want them to take on a specific page.

For example, if you have a Google Adwords campaign that links to a landing page, a conversion is when someone clicks through the ad, lands on the landing page, and then takes whatever action you desire on that page – usually fills out a form.

You can calculate your conversion rate with the following formula:

(Number of forms completed / the number of click-throughs) * 100.

If you have ten click-throughs from the ad and two of those visitors fill out the form, your conversion rate is 20%.

(2/10) * 100.

Blogs can be a bit tougher. Is a conversion getting someone to comment? Comments are not necessarily a great measure for success. You could be getting dozens of visitors a day and still not get comments.

Is it getting people to stay on the page and read the posts? You should look at metrics such as the length of time your visitors stay on the site (indicating that they actually read something), the number of pages visited, and bounce rates as an indication of the success of your blog. But, it’s still difficult to tie these measurements back to your pipeline metrics.

You could use your blog to drive people to your web site or to something they can download This would give you a very solid conversion number with a value to the business that is a bit easier to assess. For example, if they click through to your website, it’s an indication that your post piqued their interest in your products.

However, measure blogs by the amount of web traffic they drive and you run the risk of making your posts too commercial.

You can also measure the success of a blog in metrics that have nothing to do with conversion rates. For example, blogs can be a great way to build evidence for your media outreach program. That’s a very valid goal, but not necessarily a “conversion rate.”

How do you measure the “conversion rate” of your company blog?

All the best!

Melissa

Winning Customers and Influencing Prospects Through Lead Nurturing

2009-07-13T11:55:00.000-07:00

I think I’ve been remiss by not covering lead nurturing in any real depth in the couple of years since I started this blog. The more I work with marketing teams, many of them great in many respects, the more I am convinced that lead nurturing is the “secret sauce” that is missing from their efforts.

I want to thank Brian Carroll and his team at InTouch for helping me really cement my thoughts on Lead Nurturing and its importance in any marketing plan. My opinions are not necessarily always representative of theirs (so don't blame them!) but they are an impressive organization with an incredible amount of expertise.

Let’s start with what lead nurturing is. Here’s a quick quiz to test your knowledge.

Lead Nurturing is:

A. Telling your prospects that they are wonderful and you know they’ll become great customers someday.

B. Calling your prospects every few weeks to “touch base” and see if they are ready to buy yet.

C. Staying in front of your prospects with information that is useful to them and that they want to receive and that brings them closer to engagement with you.

The answer is C, of course.

I think most of you probably guessed that A was an attempt at humor. And, although most of you probably guessed C was the right answer, it’s amazing how many companies will say they have a nurturing program that, upon further investigating, consist of B – with maybe a few email campaigns thrown in.

Critical elements of lead nurturing
C is a pretty broad statement and doesn’t really capture the essence of the elements of lead nurturing so let’s take a look at a few of these in more depth:

Staying in front of prospects – This implies that you “touch” your prospects on a fairly frequent and consistent basis. The frequency of contacts in more sophisticated lead nurturing programs may be different by type of prospect. Some companies will even allow their prospects to define how often they want to be contacted.

At the very least, you don’t want to let so much time lapse that the prospect forgets who you are. In my opinion, if a lead is worth nurturing it’s probably worth at least one touch a month. This is one of the reasons why quarterly newsletter programs can play a part in lead nurturing, but by themselves, they don’t complete the picture.

Useful information – The type of information sent is also critical to a solid lead nurturing program. We’ll spend more time in a later post on types of content and tips for creating good content. For now, I want to focus on the word “useful.”

What prospects really want to see is information that is useful to them. In most cases, this does not mean product information. Save that for the sales process.

At this early stage, prospects want information that educates them. This educational information may help them understand their situation better. It may help them think about their problem in a different light. It may equip them with knowledge they need to make better decisions. It may answer some of the most common questions that others in their situation have.

It probably goes without saying that this education information is not focused on your product or your company. The focus is on your prospect and their needs. Brochures do not count as lead nurturing content.

Want to receive – This doesn’t mean that the prospect requested the specific information per se, but it should be information that is not intrusive. That begs the question – Do prospects in a lead nurturing program need to opt-in to the program?

Opt-in is not legally required in the U.S., but in a lead nurturing program, opt-in is a fundamental component. In the next post, we’ll talk more about how to build your opt-in list for your nurturing program.

All the best!

Melissa

Better Branding on LinkedIn

2009-07-12T12:41:00.000-07:00

Following LinkedIn’s evolution over the last several years has been fascinating. They continue to improve the product and make it more relevant to individuals who are looking to brand themselves as well as their company. I have to imagine that LinkedIn has some great product managers who really listen to their market.

As in all things in life, sometimes it’s the little things that make a big difference. Here’s a new feature I stumbled upon recently.

Most of you who use LinkedIn are probably familiar with adding your sites to your profile. These sites could be your company site, your blog, or any other site that you feel adds to your profile and your online brand. But, did you know that you can change these tag lines from “My Blog” or “My Company” to the wording of your choice? (within the allotted number of characters, of course.)

Here’s a snapshot of what my website section of my profile looks like now:

The first is my blog. The second site is My Google Group. In this case, I used the title “My Google Group” because the title of the group wouldn’t fit and I wanted to make it clear what the site was anyway. The last site is my group on LinkedIn.

It’s a small touch, but I think this looks better than “My Blog,” “My Company” and “My Website.”

All the best!

Melissa

12 Steps to Dumping Your Marketing Department - Step 3 Hang Out With Your Market

2009-07-09T16:57:00.000-07:00

Step 3 – Hang out with your market

As a marketer, I don’t really believe that you could or should dump your marketing department. On the other hand, as a former sales person, I can also understand the frustration you feel when your marketing department fails to consistently deliver enough qualified opportunities to keep your pipeline full.

This is Step 3 in a 12 step series showing sales people how they can reduce their reliance on their marketing team. Marketers should also pay close attention as this series can give you tips that you can share with your sales team to help make them more successful and take a bit of the pressure off of you.

In steps 1 and 2, we covered:

Step 1 - Targeting your market

Step 2 – Building your online presence

Step 3, hanging out with your market, expands on that using both traditional and more modern web based methods to “see and be seen” in your target market.

Associations
This is nothing new, but in my experience, very few sales people take the lead on this. They may get involved with an association if marketing signs them up for it. But even then, participation is sketchy.

You need to figure out which associations, both real and virtual, your target market is participating in. This is one of the reasons step 1 is so important. It’s hard to determine which associations are critical to a target market without first defining that target market.

Clearly, you won’t have time to participate in associations for very many markets so narrow your choices down to one or two top markets that you really want to become known in.

Then participate!

Trade Shows
Again, nothing new. But don’t wait till marketing signs you up to stand in a booth for hours handing out trinkets to people who are collecting them for their grandkids.

You need to go back to your target market(s) and figure out which conferences, large or small, your market attends. Don’t forget to look for virtual shows or conferences.

When I was the Life Sciences Industry Manager for Microsoft’s Business Solutions division, I attended a training class on FDA regulations for pharmaceutical manufacturers taught by EduQuest. I made a few connections at the class, and the “diploma” really added to my credibility.

In any conference, you can get more opportunities by actually attending the conference and having conversations with fellow conference attendees than you can by standing in a booth. Plus, you have the added benefit of getting closer to the issues that your market cares about. (Product Marketers and Managers you should be attending these conferences too and not just hanging out in the booth!)

Speaking Opportunities
Look for speaking opportunities at these conferences.

I know what you’re thinking. “But I don’t have nearly enough credibility or experience to be a speaker at a conference!”

I know because I was there too. But, my motto is “you never know until you try.” Plus, I had a great mentor in Mike Frichol who encouraged me.

Most of these conferences want to hear from people in the industry and not vendors. Instead of being the expert yourself, enlist one of your best customers to present a case study with you. Just remember, you will need to shelve your innate instincts to sell. The stage at a conference is not the place to do it.

Marketers, look for sales people who are interested in doing this and do whatever you can to help them get on that stage. Tasks such as handling the logistics with the customer and making sure everything gets submitted to the organization on time will help things go a lot smoother.

The better your presentation (generally) the more business cards you’ll collect. Mike Volpe at Hubspot recommends asking people if they want to be on your mailing list when you accept their card. Let them know that you often produce additional educational information like the presentation they just watched and you’d be happy to let them know about it. You’ll be surprised at how quickly this can help you grow your opt-in mailing list.

When I worked for Mike Frichol at Microsoft, he did a series of presentations on “Lean Accounting” at APICS. He must have collected hundreds of business cards every time he presented.

LinkedIn Groups
I mentioned LinkedIn Groups and LinkedIn Q&A in step 2, but this bears repeating. If your market is hanging out on LinkedIn, you need to have a presence. And, you need to engage.

Other Online Forums
Look for other online forums that attract your target market. When I was a Product Manager at Microsoft for their ERP applications in the manufacturing sector, I spent quite a bit of time on IT Toolbox.

Take note, though. If you don’t have anything meaningful to say, don’t say anything at all. “Call me. I can help you solve your problem,” is not a qualified response on these forums. You’ll likely find yourself publicly derided by the members if you can’t keep yourself in check. They want information, not pitches.

At the very least, you should make sure your profile on these forums is complete. Some of these forums have also added the ability to connect with other members the way you do on LinkedIn.

You might also want to check for Google or Yahoo groups that might exist in your industry. If active, these are another chance to interact with a target market that might not have found networks like LinkedIn.

Blogs
A couple days ago, I wrote a post called Save time (and make more sales) by blogging showing sales and marketing how they could improve the sales process by answering common questions in blog format.

But, for purposes of hanging out with your market, let’s focus on blogs other than your own. You need to find the ones that your market reads. And, you might be surprised to find that these are not usually blogs owned by your competitors.

A good place to start looking for these blogs is to check the publications written for your market. Chances are they have at least one blog associated with their group. You can also research independent consultants whose expertise is synergistic to the products and services you offer. Or, just Google some of your keywords and the word “blog” and see what pops up.

There are blog directories available, but so far I’ve had more luck finding appropriate blogs using those simple tactics than by searching directories. This is especially the case if your topic is one that is not generally mainstream.

Now you need to start commenting to build up your credibility in your market. But, as with the forums, if you have nothing really interesting or compelling to add, don’t bother. “Great post. Keep it up!” doesn’t count as it looks like you probably didn’t even read the post. Not great for your cred.

The other piece of advice I have is one that you probably heard many times from your mother,

“If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.”

That doesn’t mean you always have to agree with the blogger. Your comments can express a different point of view. Just do it in a respectful and thoughtful way.

Directory Listings
While you are hanging out on the web looking for blogs and associations, don’t forget to look for directory listings. You have to pay to be in some of these listings, but there are many of them that are free.

The irony is that the better ones, at least from a targeted market perspective, tend to be less expensive. The audience that the directory reaches is probably significantly smaller, but they probably matter much more than the more well-known directories.

Hopefully, you can enlist the help of marketing is providing you content such as product descriptions. Maybe they’ll even take over the maintenance of the directories if you just let them know which ones you think matter.

The added benefit to your organization is that these directories usually allow you to post links back to your website. Some directories like GlobalSpec have numerous ways you can posts links – everything from allowing you to post press releases, to articles and white papers, to product descriptions. All of these links can help you build your organization’s standing in the major search engine results.

This post ended up being significantly longer than I intended, and I’m sure I’m still missing a few things. There’s also a lot of overlap with Step 2 in building your online presence. Everyone of the techniques in step 3 that involves being online will help you build on the LinkedIn profile you built in step 2 – assuming you didn’t have one already.

But, that’s the point of each of these steps. You need to make sure you’ve covered each of them, in order, as the early steps build the foundation for later steps. If you haven’t refined your target market or built your LinkedIn profile, go back and read steps 1 and 2. If you already have those covered, look for ideas you can execute in step 3. Finally, stay tuned for Step 4. I’m still debating which idea makes the most sense to cover next, so I’ll have to stay tuned too.

All the best!

Melissa

Be a Webmaster - or Just Sound Like One

2009-07-08T11:42:00.000-07:00

You may not have the responsibility for creating your website or managing it, but if you are responsible for generating leads, you certainly benefit from the fruits of your webmaster’s labor.

Your website can be the best marketing tool you have, or the weakest link in the chain. Your website will either help you convert visitors into prospects or, it will confuse your prospects and cause you to lose opportunities before you even know about them.

In my experience, webmasters can be pretty tough cookies. They aren’t called webMASTERS for nothing. These folks are usually quite intelligent, but they don’t always see the world through the eyes of a marketer. Chances are they see marketers as a bit talkative and “fluffy” while they are more comfortable alone with their computers tweaking pixels. I’m probably getting a bit carried away with the stereotypes but the point is the website is their domain and they don’t always appreciate you sticking your nose into their business.

In order to improve your marketing, you need to be able to collaborate with these technically oriented colleagues. And, in order to collaborate you need to be able to speak their language. Maybe not fluently, but enough to communicate effectively.

There are two halves to making a website work for you:

First, you need to drive visitors to your website.

Second, you need to get them to take the desired action once they get there. This is usually referred to as a conversion. This action could be any number of things such as downloading a whitepaper, signing up for a webinar, calling your sales department, or even just clicking through to a sub-page that you are trying to direct them to. We’ll save the discussion of the relative quality of these various “calls to action” for another day.

Drive visitors to your site through search engine optimization
There are obviously a number of campaign tactics that drive visitors to your site. Your webmaster is going to be more concerned with Search Engine Optimization. This means setting up your website so that the search engines see your site and you show up higher and on the first page of the search results.

To speak the language of your webmaster, you should learn as much as you can about search engine optimization. If you are a member of MarketingProfs, you’ll find more than enough educational materials to get you going. If not, here are a couple of links to free webinars from very reputable sources:

Network Solutions webinars Scroll down past the live seminars for the recorded webinars
SEO 101

I’ve worked with Network Solutions and I’ve long been a fan of HubSpot although I haven’t had the opportunity to work with them yet. (These are not endorsements, but then I’m not getting paid for recommending them either.)

Convert your visitor to leads
A few posts ago, I mentioned Conversion University, a free training offering from Google that focuses on their free Google Analytics tool. You can take a certification exam for $50, which may well be worth it if you ever need proof of your competence. (Perhaps an opportunity to enhance your resume?)

You should also take a look at Google Website Optimizer. This is another free tool that allows you to easily test various versions of a web page to determine which one performs better.

It doesn’t matter whether your webmaster actually uses these tools or something else. The tools all manage basically the same things, although some with more sophistication than others. As long as you are understanding how to interpret conversion rates, bounce rates, abandon rates and other website metrics you’ll be on your way to a meaningful discussion with your webmaster.

All the best!

Melissa

The Quid Pro Quo of Blogging

2009-07-07T07:15:00.000-07:00

Getting lots of comments on your blog posts is not the holy grail of corporate blogging. Other goals, such as:

• improving your search engine ranking
• building content for a nurture program
• improving media outreach

may be even more important to your organization.

However, lots of comments feels good. It validates that your readers are actually reading your posts.

If you are looking for comments, you can’t afford to ignore the quid pro quo of blogging:

If you want to build your comments you need to be reading other blogs and adding comments to their sites.

This is one of those “Do as I say and not as I do” moments. I don’t spend nearly as much time as I should commenting on posts on the great blogs that I read. (Sorry guys. I will try to do better.)

Many bloggers who are new to corporate blogging may find this a bit difficult at first as many of the blogs with similar themes may be produced by competitors. That just means you need to dig a bit more. Blogs created by independent consultants, associations, trade press, and business partners are all good sources.

An added benefit to looking for these blogs is that they often inspire posts of your own. And, if you’re short on ideas (or time) in a given week, find a post whose ideas you really like and where you have some valid input to add. Create a short post with your comments and link to the blog.

Most bloggers love it when others link to their posts. (Actually, I’ve never met anyone who doesn’t but I suppose the possibility exists.) These links increase the chances that their blogs will be read and be found by the search engines.

All the best!

Melissa

Conversion University Now Open

2009-07-06T14:24:00.000-07:00

I have recently become a stronger advocate of hiring people for marketing positions who don’t necessarily have a degree in marketing. (I do in case you are wondering.) I am more impressed with the individuals who go out and grab the education that is readily available on the web than I am with those who can recite the 4Ps, but little else.

Google has been great about giving away a free education. They recently opened up Conversion University to cover the ins and outs of Google Analytics. Analytics itself is a free, but powerful, site monitoring tool offered by Google.

It’s interesting that Google does charge $50 for their certification exam - the Google Analytics Individual Qualification Test, or IQ test for short. But all things considering, $50 is a long way from what most of us paid to learn the 4Ps.

All the best!

Melissa

Save time (and make more sales) by blogging

2009-07-06T14:18:00.000-07:00

Every now and then, one of my colleagues will comment on the frequency of my posts. I try to blog at least several times a week. When I’m on a roll, I’ll blog daily.

The strange thing about blogging is that although it takes time, it makes my networking efforts more efficient. The secret is where I get my post ideas from.

Since my blog focuses on practical marketing and career advice for marketing professionals, most of my ideas come from reading the questions on the forums on LinkedIn and MarketingProfs. I take some of the more common questions and turn these into blog posts. Next time the question gets asked, I usually write a small paragraph that is based on the question, but then I include a link that answers the question in more detail.

This paradox of saving time by blogging doesn’t apply just to marketing consultants like me.

Let’s say you sell ERP software and you spend a lot of time answering questions like:

“Can you explain Microsoft’s Dynamics product strategy to me?”
“What the heck is .Net anyway?”
“Is BusinessByDesign from SAP going to be around in a couple of years?”
“I’ve never heard of your software, why should I buy yours instead of one of something from a company I recognize?”
“Why would I want an SaaS application?”

Those of you not in the ERP Software world, just substitute the most commonly asked questions from your prospects.

Now take each of these questions and write a blog post answering them. You’ve probably answered them hundreds of times during presentations and in email correspondence. Writing a post shouldn’t take that long. And, once you have the post, next time you are asked the question just send the link to the post (with a personal message) instead of retyping the answer from scratch.

Marketers, consider letting your sales people write some of your blog posts if they are interested. It wouldn’t hurt to loosen the reigns a bit and get them involved. You’ll help them establish their personal credibility and save you time. You can still edit the content prior to posting.

If they aren’t interested in writing (or never get around to it) participate in their sales calls and see what kinds of questions they get over and over. If that’s not feasible, just ask them. Answer these questions in your blog and then let your reps know.

To close the loop, watch how and if they use the blog to help them in the sales process. Your blog will still be useful as a marketing tool even if they don’t use it. However, your reps may have some great ideas for how you can improve the blog and help them close business in the process.

All the best!

Melissa

Email Marketing for the Rest of You

2009-07-05T09:46:00.000-07:00

I have to admit that I get a bit bored when the conversation turns toward formatting email marketing for the latest electronic gadgets or email systems.

Alas, I know that stuff is important, but I’d rather focus on good content and creating a relationship with the prospect. I’m happy to leave the nitty-gritty up to those who are happy to spend their lives dealing with it so I don’t have to.

For those of you who want or need the details, you should add Mark Brownlow’s blog to your “must read” list. Here’s an example of just a few recent posts that you may find exciting:

Outlook 2010: Bad news for HTML email design, but...

Outlook 2007 and HTML email design: a summary

Mobile email: the marketing challenges

For all of you techies out there, go ahead and knock yourselves out. There are tons more where these came from. (And, thank you for doing what you do so I don’t have to.)

All the best!

Melissa

Social Media's Role in a Successful Marketing Program

2009-07-02T18:58:00.000-07:00

Every time I attend a social media presentation I feel compelled to clarify my position. I’ve written several posts disparaging social media. I’ve also written a few in favor of social media.

Social Media Experts are Like My Chiropractor
The Truth Behind Social Media Enthusiasts
If I had 100K – My Response

I’m sure there will be more of both kinds in the future.

Let me just say that I am not against social media per se. I spend way too much time blogging and on-sites like LinkedIn for an anti-social media stance to ring true. And, in my Back to Basics Marketing workshop I spend a significant amount of time on strategies for testing social media and measuring the results.

Back to Basics is NOT about going back to traditional methods of marketing like physical direct mail pieces and trade shows. (Believe me, I’d die happy if I never had to spend another minute in a booth!)

There are three very simple principles for building a successful marketing plan in Back to Basics Marketing:

1. Stop doing what no longer works. A lot of companies I know will spend thousands of dollars on programs that haven’t brought in a dimes worth of business in over ten years.

2. Do more of what does work. If you’re having success with email marketing, how can you expand on that?

3. Test, test, test.

The final one is important because that’s where social media comes in. Social media is rapidly maturing but it’s new enough that most marketers don’t have a track record of building successful social media marketing programs. By “successful” I mean ones that keep the pipeline full of qualified opportunities. Therefore, social media generally falls under the 3rd priority.

The order of these three principles is deliberate. Most of us don’t have unlimited budgets so we have to stop doing what doesn’t work before we can do more of what does. Doing more of what does work has to be before testing because you need to be generating some business in order to stay in business – or keep your job. Testing is third because, whether it’s social media or something more traditional like a new telemarketing program, you don’t know what’s going to work yet. You don’t build a consistent lead generation program by starting with step 3.

There is a fourth very important principle and that is to make every marketing dollar count by building a nurturing program, but more on that in a future post.

All the best!

Melissa

All Product Marketing is Product Management

2009-07-01T06:42:00.000-07:00

In the high-tech industry, the profession of product marketing can sometimes be seen as less glamorous than product management. After all, product managers decide what goes into the product. They often manage the P&L for their product. And they get to interact with customers. On the other hand, all product marketers do is create collateral based on what the product managers tell them to say. Right?

Like all roles, product marketing is what you make of it. In fact, I would contend that all product marketers are really product managers.

• Your collateral is your product.
• Your sales team is your customer.
• Your task is to create great products that your customers want to use.

Just like the product managers in your organization who manage the products you sell to the customer, you also need to follow the principles of sound product management:

- Talk to your customers.
- Gather feedback on your products.
- Watch them use your products, or those they create themselves, in action.

If your sales team isn’t using your products then you’re not creating great products that your customers want to use. It’s time to spend even more time with your customer. As Pragmatic Marketing says,

“The answer is not in your building.”

This basically means that product managers don’t create great products by asking their colleagues what their customers need. They ask their customers. Same with great product marketers. Don’t ask other product marketers (even the experts) what your sales team needs. Ask your sales team.

All the best!

Melissa

Are You an Insecure Marketer – Part 2

2009-06-30T06:42:00.000-07:00

My recent post Are You An Insecure Marketer? continues to be one of the most read of all my posts. I got a couple of comments on the post and a few more when I posed the question on LinkedIn. There were some great discussions and I encourage you to check out the responses on LinkedIn.

Search LinkedIn Answers for the words "Are you an insecure marketer" and you should be able to easily find it. For some strange reason, I don't seem to be able to get a direct url that works.

Some of the most thoughtful responses were from Marketing Managers who had reported at one time or another to both great managers and horrible ones. Who hasn’t been on both sides of that coin?

There is no doubt that horrible managers can undermine your sense of self-worth in a myriad of ways. However, even after years of poor management, these marketing professionals found their self-confidence was quickly healed by having an opportunity to work for some really great managers.

But, how often do these true gems of marketing management come along? And, do you really want to leave yourself at the mercy of whomever you are reporting to?

Years ago I spent a lot of time listening to Zig Ziglar while I drove around Chicago for my first real sales job. He had a saying that stuck with me. (At least I think it was Zig. This was a couple of decades ago!)

“If it’s to be, it’s up to me.”

If your self-confidence is being undermined by a poor manager, you need to find ways to build it up instead of waiting for a new manager to come along. I’m not suggesting that you switch jobs. Although, I do suggest that gearing up to switch can be a real morale booster.

For some more thoughts read Now is a Great Time to be Looking for a New Job.

A great book about taking personal responsibility is QBQ (The Question Behind the Question). You can easily finish this book on your next flight, but I think you’ll want to keep it around for a quick "pick me up."

Another great morale booster is to work on your online brand. Build your LinkedIn profile. Answer questions on LinkedIn and start building your “expert in…” status. Ask for references. Engage in discussions on marketing blogs. Build your own blog if you have the time and inclination.

After you’ve been active in the online marketing community for awhile, Google your name to check your online relevance. Then Google your manager’s name. In my experience, horrible managers are almost never digitally relevant. I have no idea why. Maybe it’s because they are so inwardly focused. The next time your horrible manager is tearing down your self-esteem you can remind yourself how irrelevant they are - at least digitally.

The point is, don’t let your self-confidence be dependent on someone else. Find your own ways to build it regardless of who you work for.

All the best!

Melissa

The Question of Marketing Compensation

2009-06-29T12:43:00.000-07:00

In all my writing about metrics, I don’t think I’ve touched on the question of compensation for marketers.

Should you tie a marketer’s compensation directly to sales? Or, should it be based on some other sort of performance metric?

I’m of the belief that marketers, especially those who are charged with delivering qualified leads to sales, need to have some skin in the game. That said, I think revenue goals are a little too removed for them to connect with.

I’ve seen plenty of marketing teams that had nice big chunks of incentive pay waiting for them if sales reached its quota. There was no doubt that these marketers could influence revenues by driving opportunities to sales. Unfortunately, in almost all cases, the incentive payments were not a motivator for these marketers. Two main reasons were:

Time - There was too much of a time lapse between generating the opportunities and the closing of the deals. This is probably an unflattering analogy, but for those of you who have ever trained an animal you know that there has to be very little time between the behavior you want and the reward. Of course most marketers are smarter than the family dog, but if you delay their reward by a period of months or even years, the motivation is going to be diminished.

Control – There’s a feeling of lack of control as well. After all, once the marketer generates the leads there is no guarantee that the sales team will actually follow up. And, if they do, how does the marketer know they can actually sell?

This lack of control also points out one of the big challenges that arise from tying a marketer’s compensation to sales. If they generate the required number of qualified leads and sales still doesn’t make its goal, a resentment can start to build.

I would recommend putting all marketers on an incentive pay plan. In fact, I’d probably make incentives a larger part of the plan than most marketers are traditionally comfortable with.

I would tie this incentive pay to the metrics that lead to sales and that marketing has some control over.

The % of qualified leads generated is the most directly linked to sales but one in which marketing has control over. This metric requires that you have defined what a qualified lead is and have worked with sales leadership to determine the number of qualified leads required. For more on this see The Heart of a Ferengi.

If you based marketing’s incentive plan on nothing more than this metric, I think you’d be doing well.

To keep your marketing team from overspending, you might also consider incenting them on reaching a cost per qualified lead benchmark. This goal will keep them focused on one of the key principles of creating a successful marketing plan – stop doing what doesn’t work.

Unfortunately, this metric loses its meaning if your marketing team is also responsible for awareness marketing like trade publication advertising. Or, if for political reasons, marketing is forced to continue investing in campaigns such as a major trade show that has abysmal returns but that the company feels “we need to be at.”

This issue of incenting marketing can bring out opinions in even the most reserved of people. There are plenty of people whom I respect and admire who completely disagree with me. Usually, they want sales to be the one and only metric.

Then again, there are marketers who abhor the idea of being on any sort of incentive plan. Even great marketers who almost always reach their goals sometimes balk at an incentive plan because it’s not the way they were designed. They will do the best they can regardless of how you pay them. (I have to admit that I don’t completely understand this line of thinking. Some of us are just fundamentally “coin operated.”)

So what’s your opinion? Should marketing be on incentive comp plans the same way that sales is? If so, what would you base them on?

Melissa

12 Steps to Dumping Your Marketing Department - Step 2 Build your online presence

2009-06-29T06:16:00.000-07:00

This is Step 2 for sales people who need to take their destiny into their own hands by taking responsibility for filling their pipeline. Step 1 was Target Your Market. This is a critical step and you should reread this post if you haven’t taken this step yet.

Step 2 – Start Building Your Online Presence

In a worst case scenario, your company is doing little to establish itself as a thought leader or even an expert in your target market. That’s OK. Those of you who have been successful in selling know the kind of influence a qualified sales person can have on a buyer.

Step 2 is to begin to build your own online presence as someone your potential customers want to consult with before they make a purchase.

I know there are lots of networking sites that sales people can belong to, but unless your target market is other sales people, you should start with LinkedIn. I’ve heard (but never seen it in print) that LinkedIn claims to have executives from every fortune 500 company as members. True or not, I don’t think there’s another networking site that is more widely accepted by the business community than LinkedIn.

Most of you probably have a LinkedIn profile already. If you don’t, that’s your assignment for this week. For those of you that do, here are a few next steps you should take:

Expand your network. We’ll be using LinkedIn in some of the future steps and it’s critical that your network is as wide as possible. (Keep it real though. Connecting simply for the sake of building your number of connections will diminish the value of LinkedIn.) Here are some sources for connections:

Current customers – Link to everyone you can think of within your current customer base. Especially those customers who are within your target market.
Colleagues - Link to as many people within your company as you can.
Prospects – This one you have to sort of feel, but if you have a prospect who is a big LinkedIn advocate, you should send an invitation to connect when you think the timing is right.
Vendors – Sales people don’t work as often with vendors as marketers do, but if there are vendors, e.g. sales trainers, that you’ve worked with they can be another good source for network connections.
Friends – Don’t forget your friends. If you still keep in touch with childhood friends or college buddies, by all means add them. They can widen your network significantly if they work in other industries.
LinkedIn suggestions - In the upper right hand corner of your LinkedIn homepage, LinkedIn will offer suggestions for people you may know. I look at these almost every time I log in as LinkedIn does a great job of reminding me who I know - and forgot about.
Let LinkedIn search your Outlook files - LinkedIn can also search your Outlook files for additional connections. Chances are good that it will suggest a few great connections that you hadn't thought of.
Join a group – Do a search for groups that your target market might belong to. Or, as you expand your network, look at their profiles to see what groups they belong to.

Start a group – If you can’t find a group to join, start a group and invite your contacts to join. Remember, I’m talking about groups that are of interest to your target market. (Specifically, the one you defined in Step 1) While it’s fun to join groups that other sales people belong to, these won’t be useful to you as you try to build your opportunities.

Build expert status. Once you start a group or join an existing group, build expert status by answering questions from group members. People who ask questions can rate the answers. If they rate your response as “best” that will show up in your profile for others to see.

That’s enough on LinkedIn for this week. Just like in Step 1 where you defined your target market, building your LinkedIn profile is a critical step to take. We will revist LinkedIn again in future steps.

Next Step – Figure out where your market hangs out. In the meantime, get that LinkedIn profile started and join The Sales and Marketing Connection Group on LinkedIn.

Happy Selling!

Melissa

If I Had 100K – My Response

2009-06-26T06:32:00.000-07:00

No one took me up on the Friday Dilemma If I Had 100K. Perhaps the thought of only having 100K to spend on marketing was too miserable to even consider. However, it’s not that uncommon for a high-tech start-up.

I thought I’d share my take.

In this scenario, a start-up company with a “killer app” is just entering the market. The founder of the company is not a marketer and is wondering if he should hire someone or maybe outsource marketing completely. He has set aside 100K for marketing in this first year and he’s asking you, as a marketing expert, what he should do.

For me, there are several things that stand out about this scenario:

- The founder of the company thinks he has the next “killer app.” That tells me that this is probably something he wants to market to early adopters. There’s also a good chance that this group of early adopters is tech-savvy. That’s not always the case, but if you’re marketing a new type of software app, your early adopters often are.

- This founder is also very realistic about what he can expect from his 100K this year. Obviously, he doesn’t want to waste the 100K, but he knows he’s building a foundation for years two and three.

The marketing expectations for this business are a little different than what you would expect from marketing for a more established B2B company with a sales team that needs marketing support.

Because the target market of early adopters is likely to be easy to reach via social media, this is one situation where I think it makes sense to start there. In addition, the potential killer-app status of this product, makes it a likely opportunity to reach social media influencers such as bloggers who might be open to spreading the word.

One small caveat to the social media recommendation. He needs to make sure that he includes traditional web based marketing like a website in his plans. This may or may not be the same vendor that handles his other social media marketing requirements.

I would tell the founder of this organization to reach out to someone who can help him put together a social media marketing plan. His options could include independent social media specialists to companies like HubSpot that provide a variety of social media (or what they call inbound marketing) services. Even if the founder is social media savvy, it helps to have a marketing specialist put together a plan.

He should talk to several vendors, get several proposals, and work with the ones who he feels understands his situation best and he feels most comfortable with. He won’t be able to do everything for 100K, but he can make a decent dent. However, the skills sets and approaches are likely to vary widely. He should give this careful consideration before he starts signing contracts.

In this case, I would also suggest that he hire an intern to help him manage the work with the vendors. There's always going to be a lot of miscellaneous legwork that he shouldn't have to be personally bothered with. A smart, eager intern can handle a lot more than most people think.

I like the idea of an intern in this situation because chances are that someone that young will be involved already in social media in a big way. Although I’ve always liked hiring interns outside of marketing (English or journalism majors, for example) this is a situation where I’d suggest sticking with marketing. Hopefully, he can find a great intern that he’s comfortable turning the marketing over to in years two and three.

Since he’ll have an intern who is still in learning mode, a key criteria for any social media vendor(s) that he works with would be that they allow this company to learn from them.

If his eyes are glazing over by this point I would suggest that he spend a little bit of money up front hiring a marketing expert to pull the plan together for him. (Sorry if that sounded a bit too self-promoting but by the time I’ve reached this point the founder of the company has started to doze off a bit.)

Anyone see this scenario differently?

Melissa

What's in a Name?

2009-06-25T15:50:00.000-07:00

Instead of a Friday Dilemma this week, I’m going to throw out a question for discussion. It’s one that I know a lot of you care about.

In marketing, does your title matter?

For example, in some organizations, you can’t be a manager unless you manage people. These companies will use titles like “marketing specialist” for individuals that have been running marketing for years, but don’t manage people. Other organizations feel that manager signifies your autonomy in a role and your ability to make crucial decisions. “Promotion” to the role of manager should not be reliant on actually managing people.

Some organizations try to have parity between their marketing roles and their sales roles. They reason that if marketing is to function effectively when they work with sales they need to be seen as equals and not underlings. Other organizations have no problem with marketing being seen as underlings and may even have marketing report into the sales managers.

Within one organization I know well, the role of Product Manager was very high profile. They had a lot of clout in the organization but were also held to very high standards. Unfortunately, Product Marketing came to be seen as a lesser role. That is, until someone in a position of power figured it out and turned almost everyone into a Product Manager – even those with no direct link to a specific product.

I worked with another organization where almost everyone I met was a VP – some of them even fit the title.

So what’s your take? Does title matter?

Melissa

A Nice Touch

2009-06-25T08:12:00.000-07:00

A lot is written about how to network with your network. One way is to get off on the right foot.

A couple of the large ERP vendors that I have worked with recently went through lay offs in their sales and marketing departments and I am getting a lot of requests to connect. Don’t get me wrong, I love the requests to connect and I always want to know who is looking. You never know when I’ll run across something that might be right for someone in my network.

That said, a lot of people I’ve known for years, but haven’t spoken to in awhile, are sending me the standard, “Since you’re a person I trust…” message from LinkedIn. I suspect that this is due in part to the way LinkedIn allows you to search former colleagues and then send an invitation to connect en masse.

However, I’d always encourage people who want to really network to search the list of former colleagues on LinkedIn, write their names down, and then send them an individual message that shows your personality. You can even send the same “individual” message to all of the people you want to connect with. They’ll never know, but it will feel more like a real connection.

All the best! (Especially to those of you who are searching for new positions.)

Melissa

Building an Opt-in List

2009-06-24T15:04:00.000-07:00

We’re lucky enough in the US not to have to have our prospects opt-in before we can send them an email. Or, are we really all that lucky? Not having laws as stringent as those in other parts of the world has allowed many marketers to get a little careless.

Hopefully, you know that having permission to market to someone (an opt-in) is a lot more effective than not having permission. But, how do you build a decent opt-in list?

I was creating my own list of ways to expand your opt-in database when one of Kathleen Gage’s emails popped up in my inbox. (I’ve always liked the old saying, “When the student is ready the teacher will come.” )

I thought I’d share her quick video with you. It has some great ideas.

Build an opt-in list with survey information

All the best!

Melissa

No One Cares About Customer Loyalty Anymore

2009-06-24T05:44:00.000-07:00

OK, I get it. No one cares about customer loyalty.

I got so few readers to my recent posts The Trials of the Customer Loyalty Specialist and Customer Loyalty By The Numbers that they don’t even show up in my Google Analytics reports.

And, only one reader so far has answered the poll question “Do You Have a Customer Loyalty Specialist or Manager in Your Organization?” Their answer was No.

While I wouldn’t call a poll of my readership scientific, the lack of interest in that topic is somewhat surprising – especially given the cost of acquiring new customers vs selling additional products to the ones you have.

Maybe this isn’t so surprising. Stories abound about B2B companies using entry level support specialists who barely understand their product let along how business really works. Don’t you love it when you can hear the pages of a manual rustling in the background while you’re explaining your problem?

Other companies are employing off-shore support specialists that have trouble with the language. I don’t necessarily have a problem with using off-shore support, but lowest cost isn’t always the only criteria for choosing a business partner that will have a significant impact on your company's reputation.

Then there are the websites that were clearly built by people who never spoke to a real customer. The writers are drinking too much of their own kool-aid and the navigation stinks.

Is it me, or is there an overwhelming lack of concern for the customer experience?

Melissa

12 Steps to Dumping Your Marketing Department

2009-06-22T18:04:00.000-07:00

Not all sales people are lucky enough to work with great marketing teams. What’s a great marketing team? It is one that gives sales the opportunities and supporting materials they need to exceed their quota. All else is optional—at least from the point of view of a sales person.

Unfortunately, for some of you in sales, qualified lead generation is hit or miss. For others, the closest thing you’ve seen to a lead is a stack of business cards from the last trade show.

Normally, this blog focuses on bridging the gap between sales and marketing. But what do you do if the divide is too wide, or you’re not getting the support you need to effect change? In this series of posts, I’m going to speak directly to those sales people who have decided they need to take their destiny into their own hands.

Of course, I’m not in favor of dumping the marketing department. Hopefully, you can get your own marketing team to step up their game when they see you taking action. And, even if you have a great marketing team, these 12 steps will only complement their efforts.

Step 1 – Target Your Market

If your marketing department or company hasn’t narrowed down your target market from “anyone who wants to buy our product” to something more manageable, you need to do this yourself.

You need to decide what types and size of businesses that are most likely to buy your product from you. Here are some things to consider:

Product fit – It makes no sense to try to sell into a market, even one flush with funds, if the product doesn’t fit.

Your background - If you have a particular expertise in a key market, and it’s one that the product fits, I would spend the bulk of my efforts in that market. Every one of the 12 steps that I’m going to give you should be applied to this market. For every other market, your approach should be reactive. That is, if marketing hands you a “lead” go ahead and qualify it, but be very selective about which leads outside of your core market you spend your time on.

Company support – We’ve already established that marketing isn’t sending you qualified opportunities on a regular basis. However, they may have other supporting materials that can you count on. If there are brochures, case studies, white papers, presentations and other materials that you can take advantage of, this is a plus.

I can’t stress enough how important it is that you take this first step. Success of each additional step I’ll explain in the weeks ahead is dependent on this. Make it your goal this week to define your target customer.

Step 2 is going to focus on building your brand. In the meantime, remember to join The Sales and Marketing Connection group on LinkedIn.

Happy Selling!

Melissa

Is Twitter Dead?

2009-06-22T12:46:00.000-07:00

This article my Mike Elgan on Datamation described my experience with Twitter to a “T”. Who Killed Twitter? I was one of the many who signed on to Twitter, used it for a bit, became disillusioned and completely quit using it.

As some of you may have noticed, I’ve reconnected my blog to Twitter, so I guess I’m back on. However, I would still say that I am among the skeptics.

That said, I have started following a couple of companies on Twitter. For example, I am now following LawsonPartners to find out how my friend and former colleague Marie McCarthy is using Twitter to stay in touch with Lawson’s channel partners.

Skeptic and all, I’m eager to see where the business community is going to take Twitter now that the initial shine has worn off.

If any of you know of other examples, let me know.

Melissa

The Sales & Marketing Connection Now On LinkedIn

2009-06-18T05:04:00.000-07:00

As readers of my blog know, one of my favorite topics is bridging the divide between sales and marketing. To further the discussion, I've started a new group on LinkedIn called The Sales & Marketing Connection.

For those of you who are new to Groups on LinkedIn, the easiest way to find a Group is to use the drop down search box to search for the name of the Group. If you type in The Sales & Marketing Connection, you should be able to find it.

Let's take the discussion to a whole new level though the power of LinkedIn.

See you there!

Melissa

Deep Inside Every Sales Person is the Heart of a Ferengi

2009-06-17T05:13:00.000-07:00

Enough is Never Enough
Ferengi Rules of Acquisition #97

Ask any sales person how many leads they need and they’ll probably tell you something like, “Enough to make my quota!”

It’s a no lose proposition for them. If they make their quota, it’s due to their fantastic selling skills. If they don’t make their quota, it’s because they didn’t get enough leads from marketing.

So how do you take back some control over your relationship with sales? It’s a fairly simple equation. You can make it more or less complicated depending on your sales process, but in its simplest form it looks like this:

Monthly Sales Quota in Dollars = X
Average Sales Price = Y
# of Sales Needed = X/Y
% Close Ratio of Qualified Leads = Z
# of Qualified Leads Needed Each Month to Hit Quota = (X/Y)/Z
# of leads that sales can be counted on to bring in = W
(through things like referral selling and networking opportunities)
# of leads marketing needs to generate = (X/Y)/Z – W

Here an example using real numbers.

If a sales person has a quota of $100,000 for the month and the average selling price is $25,000, they need 4 sales to reach their quota. (1000,000/25,000) If their close rate on qualified leads is 25%, they will need 16 qualified leads to reach quota. (4/.25) If they can bring in 2 qualified leads every month on their own, that means that marketing needs to bring in 14 qualified leads.

Do You Use Appointment Setting?

2009-06-16T08:58:00.000-07:00

A question was recently asked about using “appointment setting” in the B2B Lead Generation Roundtable group on Linked In. I thought I’d share my experiences and see what you think as well.

For those of you not familiar with this approach, it’s basically a telemarketing approach that focuses on setting appointments with prospects who are interested in speaking to a salesperson from your company.

Here’s what I see as the pros and cons.

Pros
(These specifically relate to the vendors I’ve looked at. You will want to check these out for anyone that you consider using.)
• The vendors I’ve used for appointment setting are very good at what they do. They met their promises and stuck to the parameters we gave them.
• You can use a targeted list. Either one supplied by you or one supplied by the appointment setting organization.
• You can set parameters such as “only VP and above.”

Cons
• The prospects are not “qualified” leads. They are simply prospects who are open to an appointment. For that reason, I would suggest limiting appointments to only those companies where the sales person wants a “foot in the door.”
• Also, if marketing is going to budget for appointment setting, and the leads are not technically qualified, your KPI performance can take a hit.
• Since the leads are not qualified, you may want to consider only setting appointments with leads that are within driving distance. Or, for the very coveted accounts, set a parameter that says you’ll put a sales person on a plane for an appointment, but only if the title of the person they will be meeting with is VP or above.
• In my experience, there are some stringent rules for contact with the prospect such as not being able to call and qualify them ahead of time. You should make sure that you and your sales team are comfortable with the rules before you sign the contract.

Bottom-line
Like all things, I think appointment setting is worth investigating. If you think it might work for you, set up a pilot and then be sure to do a thorough debrief. Remember to involve sales in this debrief as they will be the ones to tell you whether these appointments were worth their effort.

All the best!

Melissa

Customer Loyalty By The Numbers

2009-06-15T08:16:00.000-07:00

Last Tuesday, I wrote the Trials of the Customer Loyalty Specialist. This was a fairly light post about the difficult job of a Customer Loyalty Specialist where I said that you need to determine how the leadership of the company defines customer loyalty. It’s likely that, no matter what platitudes they give about “superior customer service”, they have revenue as the ultimate benchmark for success. That’s what they get paid to measure.

Good friend and former colleague, Mike Frichol, has been writing a series of posts in his blog about calculating Lifetime Customer Value. In simplest terms, this is the value of the customer to the company in monetary terms over the lifetime of the company’s relationship with that customer.

If you find yourself in a position of Customer Loyalty Specialist, Lifetime Customer Value is a calculation you will want to get familiar with. LCV helps define the value of customer loyalty and, therefore, the value of the Customer Loyalty Specialist. The last thing you want to be in right now is a position where the value can’t be defined. If you can define the value of your role in hard dollars, all the better.

It will also give you a concrete estimate of the value of customer loyalty that you can use with the executives to gain their commitment. As I pointed out yesterday, sometimes tough decisions need to be made. Taking a look at these decisions and their impact on customer loyalty in dollar terms can help you build your case.

If Lifetime Customer Value is something you are interested in learning more about, I encourage you to read Mike’s blog The Marketing Melange. But, fair warning, Mike goes pretty deep into the matter and it’s going to take more brain cells than your average post. That said, I reported to Mike for several years when he and I worked together at Microsoft. I encourage you to ask questions. He is a great teacher.

Melissa

Friday Dilemma - If I Had 100K

2009-06-12T05:33:00.000-07:00

In today’s scenario, a friend of yours is an entrepreneur in a high tech start-up company.
He has a brilliant product – perhaps even the next “killer app.” The past year was spent on development and testing. Now he’s ready to go to market.

Over coffee, he tells you that he knows that he needs someone to launch the product, generate leads, talk to the press among other things. He know that’s typically the responsibility of marketing, but that’s about all he knows about marketing.

He has some funding (thank goodness!) but it’s not much. He estimates that he can afford to sink about 100K this year into marketing. He thinks he’s being realistic by not expecting too much of a return on the marketing investment in the first year. Afterall, it makes sense that even marketing needs to ramp up by creating the website, product brochures and other materials before they can start generating leads. He confides that he hopes that it’s realistic to assume that marketing will pay for itself in year 2 and 3.

His first question to you is “who much does it cost to hire a marketing professional?”

You tell him that that you get what you pay for when you hire marketing staff. Someone with limited experience, but with a marketing degree, could be had for about 30-40K a year in your region. A more seasoned marketer could easily cost you 60-70K a year. A real pro…well more than he has in his budget this year.

He’s given this considerable thought and has decided he has a couple of options:

1. He could hire a full-time marketer. He can obviously only afford one. If he hires someone with less experience, he’ll have money left over for programs, but will a newbie be able to get the job done? If he hires someone with more experience, they will take up more of his budget, but maybe they will be more effective and self-sufficient. Is it a worthwhile trade-off?
2. He’s also heard of companies that outsource their marketing. If he follows this route, does he still need someone on staff to manage it? Does he outsource all of it, or a part of it?

You are happily employed and wouldn’t dream of going to work for his start-up. However, you want to point your friend in the right direction. What do you tell him?

Now is a Great Time to be Looking for a New Job

2009-06-11T08:24:00.000-07:00

Many of the 90% of you that are still employed are probably thinking,

“I’m going to do everything I can to hold on to the job I still have.”

Fear is a great motivator, but is it really a strong foundation on which to build a career? And, does it allow you to give your best effort to your current employer?

Right now is a great time to be looking for a new position. Notice I said “looking” and not “leaving.” Those are two entirely different things.

When you start looking for a new and better opportunity, even in the middle of a recession, some positive things can start to happen for both you and your employer.

You update your resume. As marketers, we understand the importance of strong collateral that effectively sells the benefits of our product. It amazes me when I hear from marketers that haven’t updated the brochure for what should be their favorite product – themselves.

Unfortunately, things look like they’ll get worse before they get better and some of you will find yourselves looking for your next opportunity when you didn’t expect to. If you haven’t updated your personal brochure lately, “Get’r done.”

You start thinking about your impact. To build a strong resume you have to show compelling value. If you aren’t already measuring your performance in metrics that relate to the bottom-line, start doing it now.

For marketers responsible for demand generation it’s easy to find metrics that link to revenue. These should be metrics like:

• Percent of qualified lead generation goals met

• Improvement in qualified lead generation performance over prior years

• Improvement in cost of qualified leads

You can also include accomplishments that highlight improvements such as “established a lead nurturing program that cut marketing costs by X% and improved qualified lead performance by X%.

Those of you who are further removed from sales still need to find ways to measure your performance in ways that show a positive impact on the company’s objectives. Avoid the marketing speak and pretend you are explaining your value to a CEO who really doesn't understand marketing.

If you aren’t making an impact or aren’t measuring your impact, do it now. You’ll find that creating a compelling resume is easier, and you’ll have metrics that you can use to prove your worth to your current employer.

You look for ways to develop your skills. As you look for interesting opportunities, you will notice new skills that are being required by employers. Don’t know much about email marketing, social media or “Web 2.0?” It’s time to expand your skill set. Once again you’ll not only improve your opportunities, but your value to your current employer as well.

But, what if your employer is one of the many who have eliminated discretionary training budgets?

This isn’t about waiting for your employer to spoon feed career development to you. It’s about taking control of your own destiny. A year’s premium membership to Marketing Profs is around $249 and gets you all of their resources including free access to their webinars.

If that’s still outside your personal budget, read my post on taking advantage of free educational resources on the net. No Training Budget? No Problem!

You start thinking about possible references. Who would be willing to provide a reference for you on LinkedIn? If your list is short, you might want to think about your interactions with your colleagues. Are you improving their professional lives or detracting?

Marketers with a lot of internal fans are usually the last to go. But, if you find yourself looking, these are also the people who are likely to be the most benefit in your job search. Start developing those relationships now.

You build your network. I can usually tell when someone has been laid off because I will get a request to connect on LinkedIn quickly followed by a request to write a reference.

I have no problem helping former colleagues who unexpectedly find themselves looking for a new position. I love to write references for those whose work I respect and admire. However, I think it’s easier to build a strong network if you work on it while you are employed.

You start assisting your network. I’ll bet you have a lot of friends who are on the market for a new job. If you are looking while you are still employed, you start to notice opportunities that your friends and former colleagues might be interested in. Take the time to pass these on. Next to providing a reference before it is requested, this is one of the most thoughtful things you can do for someone who has suddenly lost their job.

These things don’t automatically happen. It takes some deliberate effort and a commitment to be ready when opportunity knocks. But, looking while you are still employed is not about finding something new. It’s about taking personal responsibility for your own career path and your own value to an employer. This is true whether it’s your current employer or a future one.

All the best!

Melissa

Cold Calling - A Desperate Cry for Help

2009-06-10T11:28:00.000-07:00

It seems that no one in sales is ever ambivalent about cold calling. They either love it or hate it. They either swear by it or think it’s a total waste of time. I’ll admit to being in the latter camp.

Not too long ago, Doyle Slayton ran a post on SalesBlogcast.com called Compelling Argument Against Cold Calling. As of right now, he’s up to 57 comments and they keep coming in. Amazingly, many of them seem to be in favor of cold calling. Perhaps that shouldn't be a surprise as so many sales people were brought up on the power of cold calling. It’s hard to give up what you've been taught works – even with no evidence to support that it works for you.

In his post he reprints with permission an article by Jeremy Miller that describes cold calling as an “act of frivolity.” From a marketing standpoint, I consider it a desperate cry for help from your sales team.

Chances are, if your sales team is cold calling, they aren’t getting what they need from marketing. Most of them probably hate cold calling and, who do you think they’re blaming for making them do it? (hint: In sales, it’s always safer to blame marketing than it is to blame your boss.)

So, if your sales people are telling you that they're cold calling, that’s one more sign that you need better alignment with sales. I've added a category called the Sales and Marketing Connection to this blog. Click on that category for ideas on how you can bridge the gap between these two roles.

All the best!

Melissa

The Trials of the Customer Loyalty Specialist

2009-06-09T09:08:00.000-07:00

With the economy’s small glimmers of hope sometimes seeming like nothing more than an oasis on the horizon, many companies are starting to turn inward toward their existing customer base. Yes, we all know the mantra, “It’s more expensive to bring in a new customer than to keep an existing one.” However, going out and getting the new ones is more fun, so many of us haven’t paid a lot of attention to the base.

Some companies even go so far as to hire (often from internal ranks) someone for the role of Customer Loyalty Specialist. If you’re one of these people and you’re in an organization that has traditionally revered new customers and celebrated the “big deal” then you have your work cut out for you.

I have two suggestions that may make your life a bit easier.

Define Success
Like all areas of marketing and sales, you need to define how you will be measured so you will recognize success when it happens. Is it customer sat ratings? Repeat business? For those of you in the software business, is it percent of customers on maintenance plans? Referrals from customers? Number of customers willing to be references?

Chances are the executives of the company are most interested in revenue. But, the danger in leaving it at that is that your Customer Loyalty Specialist ends up as nothing more than a glorified Existing Customer Sales rep. If all you do is carry a quota for repeat business, customers will see through your agenda fairly quickly and it will do little to improve loyalty.

You need to take it to the next level and decide what metrics actually help drive revenue. For example, in many businesses, more satisfied customers are likely to bring in more repeat business and referrals. Therefore, customer sat ratings make sense as a metric for the customer loyalty initiative.

But, driving sat ratings is something the Customer Loyalty Specialists can’t do on their own. It takes commitment from the entire organization, and that leads to the next suggestion.

Executive Buy-In
Customer Loyalty programs will not work without executive buy-in. For example, if you’re trying to drive customer sat numbers you need executives that will back you when you need to address the short-comings of the company. These executives need to agree to standards of conduct for interactions with customers, and if anyone in the company treats the customer in a sub-standard way, they need to hold them accountable. (This isn’t about the customer always being right. It’s more about treating the customer with dignity and doing what you promised.)

Of course, the executives of the company will be interested in the bottom-line numbers as well as top-line revenue. They may not have an attitude of “we’ll do whatever it takes to make it right” because that isn’t always possible or economically feasible. Sometimes, you have to admit it’s not a good customer/vendor relationship and even “fire” your customer.

But, on the other hand, the executives can’t cower behind the front line Loyalty Specialists either. When the company needs to admit that they messed up, or a tough message needs to be shared with a customer, the executives should take center stage.

It can be tough to get executive buy-in, but it’s absolutely necessary. To ensure this happens, keep the execs involved at every step in the process. Bring them into the discussion on how sat should be measured. Document your customer loyalty plans and keep them in front of company executives. Hold regular briefings so that you can share the successes and discuss the obstacles. And, of course, measure everything.

Discussion Question:
Here’s a final question for my readers. Earlier, I cautioned you against measuring this role only in terms of revenue. However, do you believe that the Customer Loyalty Specialist should carry a quota, or should the Customer Loyalty Specialist role be separate from the role of an installed base sales person?

Melissa

6 Steps for Sales and Marketing Alignment

2009-06-08T09:18:00.000-07:00

I’ve talked many times about ways to bring sales and marketing into alignment. Let me take it one step further and outline what the steps are. Of course, there is more to marketing than just aligning with sales. However, if you don’t have these bases covered, your marketing (and your daily enjoyment of your profession) will suffer.

Step 1: Agree on what a qualified lead looks like.

Step 2: Set metrics for the number of qualified leads that need to be generated.

Step 3: Gain agreement from sales, and especially sales management, on the level of lead follow up that can be expected. That is, if marketing sends leads to sales that meet the definition of qualified, sales will follow up within a specified timeframe.

Step 4: Put together a consistent, solid marketing plan that will allow you to reach your goals. This is obviously a much more complex discussion than can be covered in one step, but for the purposes of an alignment discussion, this is sufficient.

Step 5: Measure your marketing efforts and report on the numbers. Sales is always under the microscope. Marketing should be too.

Step 6: Do regular debriefs on the qualified leads generated so you know whether you are truly generating qualified leads as agreed and so that you know whether sales is following up as agreed.

Although not necessarily part of the sales and marketing alignment, it makes sense to give another nod to a solid nurturing program. If you are only giving qualified leads to sales, you need to do something with the other leads that didn’t quite meet the definition. A nurturing program can help you capitalize on these leads and turn them into future opportunities for far less than it costs you to generate them the first time around.

Is Viral Marketing Infecting Your Internal Customer?

2009-06-08T07:42:00.000-07:00

Continuing my rant against starting with social media and other fun stuff, I want to caution you to think about how your extracurricular activities look to your internal customers – your sales people.

While I worked for Lawson Software, they produced a series of cute little vignettes about a character (a mascot of sorts) names Lars Lawson. These videos poked gentle fun at our competition.

The videos did pretty well on YouTube, but I don’t know that the company was ever able to tie these back to actual inquiries, market recognition, sales or anything measurable that could be linked to the bottomline.

Nevertheless, I didn’t see a problem with Lawson’s creation of these videos because they didn’t take away from any of the programs being run by my team. (My team was responsible for driving lead generation in North America.) They were extremely well done and we could use these to add interest to our campaigns as appropriate. Since my team had nothing to do with the creation of the videos, it didn’t take away from the effort or dollars we put into driving lead generation for our sales team.

Contrast that with a smaller company where marketing is understaffed and underbudgeted. The marketing managers in these organizations fall in love with social media and begin twittering, blogging and looking for ways to go viral. All the while, their lead generation lags behind and their sales team becomes increasingly skeptical of marketing's competence.

My point is that those of you who are responsible for lead generation should make sure that your marketing plans have a solid traditional foundation for lead generation before you start experimenting with social media.

Once you have the foundation in place, then you can start playing around with social media. It’s like having desert, but you have to eat your vegetables first.

If you decide to start experimenting with social media even while your lead generation goals aren’t being met I'd suggest you experiment quietly. Don’t expect the sales team to be impressed with your latest use of Twitter if you haven’t passed them a decent lead in awhile.

Melissa

Friday Dilemma - Is Marketing Responsible for Individual Territory Performance?

2009-06-05T06:43:00.000-07:00

It’s been awhile since I posted a Friday Dilemma, but I think I have a good one for you today. Those of you who have been in marketing management have surely been in this situation a time or two.

In today’s scenario, you are a marketing manager responsible for generating qualified leads for a team of 6 sales people in the US. Each of these sales people has an assigned territory based on geography – Northeast, Southeast, North Central, South Central, Pacific Northwest and Southwest. Each of the sales people has been with the company a number of years and has a relatively successful track record. (If they didn’t, they wouldn’t still be with this company.) Each territory carries the same quota.

Because there isn’t a significant difference in the messaging you use for buyers in different parts of the country, the campaigns you run are all nationwide in scope. The buyers in each region receive the same mailers, email campaigns, webinar invitations etc.

This year, lead generation in the Northeast, North Central, and Pacific Northwest is doing fairly well. It’s down from last year, but staying within sight of goal. The sales people in these regions have been happy with the quality of the leads as well.

The Southwest is outperforming goal and because of this performance, you are actually at 110% of your overall lead generation numbers for the year.

On the other hand, the South Central and Southeast regions are struggling. Lead generation is about a quarter of agreed upon goals. Again, the same marketing programs are being run in these regions, but for some reason, they just aren’t pulling the same level of responses as they are in other regions.

The salespeople in the South Central and Southeast regions are desperate. They are calling you every week with requests to run special programs for their region alone. Or, if you can’t do that, they want you to teach them how to run their own campaigns. They’ve even resorted to cold calling despite not having any success with it in the past.

First, I think the larger question needs to be asked. Is marketing responsible for the performance of individual territories? Should this marketer feel accountable for the lead generation goals and quota attainment of each sales person?

Whether you decide that the marketer is or is not responsible, I think we can all feel for the sales people in the territories that are underperforming. How do you respond to them?

The Truth Behind Social Media Enthusiasts

2009-06-04T08:14:00.000-07:00

A friends sent me this one and it's just too good not to pass along. Social Media T-Shirt.

I predict that this will be a big hit at the next Web 2.0 Conference.

Real Value for Real People

2009-06-03T12:50:00.000-07:00

In my last post, Why Don’t Corporate Blogs work? I said that for a blog to be successful you needed to provide real value for real people. In a blogging sense, I would define value as something your prospect can use and that he or she wants.

As an expert in your field, you should be able to provide information that will be useful to prospects. Tips, ideas, information that is relevant to their daily lives are all great examples. (Just be sure to stay on theme!)

If you are not the expert but are still responsible for the blog, be sure that you’re reaching out to the real theme experts in your organization before posting. If you are new to the business, but a decent writer, you can even be your own organization’s blog ghost-writer. Experts love it when you can make them look like experts. If you’re like me and you like helping other people reach their goals, it can be very rewarding.

If you are the expert, I think you will agree that a lot of us are way too close to what we do. We think we know what our prospect wants, but do we really? There are two fairly simple ways to find out what topics your audience will be interested in.

Forums
The audience for my blog is fellow marketers (and sometimes sales people) so I get a lot of my ideas from questions that I read on the marketing and sales forums. By reading the forums regularly, I get a feel for which questions are on the minds of potential readers and I try to make these central themes for my posts.

If your audience is other types of business people look for the forums that pertain to them. Back when I was marketing software to manufacturers I spent a lot of time on IT forums that manufacturers belonged to. I could see the kinds of questions they asked each other and got a feel for the types of issues they might be interested in hearing from me about.

Stats from Your Own Blog
If you have been blogging for awhile, be sure you pay attention to which posts get the most attention. Comments are one thing but readership and length of time on the posts are also critical. Write more posts around those topics that draw well so that you can expand your readership. Every now and then, you can test out new subjects to see if these draw readers in as well as your old standbys.

If it’s not obvious, I’m currently testing blogging as a subject. It’s not a scientific test by any means, especially since I’ve been posting more frequently since I became a marketing consultant. Still my readership should give me some indication if the topic is of interest to other marketers.

On a final note, there are a lot of tools you can use to analyze your blog stats. I just use Google Analytics. It’s easy, free and gives me what I need.

Why Don't Corporate Blogs Work?

2009-06-02T12:17:00.000-07:00

I feel like I’m on a roll disparaging social media and blogging. A blog is an odd place to do that, don’t you think? I even do some ghost-writing for a blog for another company. In fact, I believe social media and blogging is a viable component of a good marketing plan. (Not the foundation though!)

That said, do Corporate Blogs work?

I think it’s safe to say that more than a few corporate bloggers are becoming a bit disillusioned. They spend a lot of time and effort on their posts, but they never get comments and very few readers. They are beginning to question whether or not it is worth it and their blog is being shoved to the bottom of their vast list of priorities.

So what’s the problem? I think there are two reasons corporate blogs are so often a disappointment.

Unrealistic Expectations and Poorly Defined Reasons for Blogging These two reasons are so intertwined that I will treat them as one.

If you ask a new blogger their reason for blogging it will probably be something like “To have a dialogue with my customers.” That sounds like it came right out of the “Blogging For Fun and Profit” brochure. (I don’t know if one exists, but if it did, it would probably have that quote in it.) Some may even have a few metrics in mind like number of readers, time spent on the site, and number of comments.

There are blogs that get an amazing number of comments. For example, Doyle Slayton’s SalesBlogcast.com usually has a lively discussion going within minutes of anything he posts. But this blog is a different breed than the average corporate blog. Blogging is part of Doyle’s profession. The same can’t be said for the average corporate blogger.

Earlier, I said that blogging is a viable component of a good marketing plan. If the number of readers, time spent on the site and number of comments aren’t good metrics, what are?

I suggest thinking of blogging as a means to an end and not an end in itself. For example, blogging is very useful as a tool for nurturing leads. You can plan posts as part of your lead nurturing campaigns or use them ad hoc to augment the planned campaign content.

Your sales team can also use blog posts to keep the dialogue moving forward with their current prospects. Great blog posts give prospects valuable insights and establish your organization as an expert in the field.

Which leads me to the second reason. Many of the corporate blog posts just aren’t that valuable to the reader.

Self Serving Corporate Blogs
There are two types of self-serving corporate blogs. First is the one that serves the blogger’s ego. (Is that too harsh?) These blogs are easily recognizable because they focus on the blogger himself. On the surface it may look like it’s on theme because it’s about something the reader should care about e.g. an industry conference. But, when you take a step back you realize that it’s really about the blogger’s experience at the event and offers no real value to the reader.

The second type of self-serving blog is the corporate brochure blog. You get about as much out of these blogs as you do a product brochure. Whereas in the first type of self-serving blog, there is too much of the blogger’s personality, the second type is usually impersonal and dry as dust. And, again, no real value for the reader.

The Magic Formula
OK, I lied. There is no magic formula, but there is a key ingredient that should be obvious by now. Every blog post has to have value for your reader. Real value for real people.

The people you’re trying to reach have more to do than sit around reading your blog. Even if they do happen to hit on it while reading their email and drinking their first cup of coffee, without real value for them, they won’t stay.

Are You an Insecure Marketer?

2009-06-01T07:58:00.000-07:00

Insecurity can be one of the biggest threats to a marketing career. Insecure marketers can also create real headaches for their managers and hamper the achievements of the entire team.

It’s easy to recognize the insecure marketer by a couple of tell-tale traits. Unfortunately, the individual with the insecurity is usually the last to know. See if any of these fit your profile or that of someone you know.

Never asks questions
This marketer will accept any assignment and assure you that he or she understands it completely. They are afraid to ask questions because they are afraid if they do they will show what they don’t know and that you and others will assume they are incompetent.

Never asks for assistance
Not only do they not ask for assistance from their boss, they don’t ask for assistance from their co-workers either. I have seen many examples where insecure, and somewhat overworked, marketers refused to ask for assistance from other marketers who were between major projects. I know the assistance would gladly have been given, but the insecure marketer was afraid of having to share the glory as well.

Doesn’t work well with vendors
If the insecure marketer is a manager, chances are they will have very few vendors. As one marketing manager once told me, “If we hire outside, they will think that we can’t do the work.” He was basically a staff on one for a $100M organization so his statement bordered on the absurd. It also showed some real insecurity.

Not open to ideas from others outside of marketing
The insecure marketer will immediately dismiss ideas from others – especially sales. They will roll their eyes and say things like, “They just don’t understand marketing.”

Skips the debrief stage of most campaigns
Lastly, the insecure marketer will usually skip the debrief stage of their campaigns. If the campaign didn’t work as well as expected, they won’t take the time to dissect what went well and what could be done better next time. If they are required to complete a debrief, they will do it in a vacuum without any inut from others involved in the campaign or with insights to share.

Managing a new, inexperienced marketer is easy compared to managing an insecure marketer. Even the seasoned ones can be a nightmare as they relive the same year of their careers over and over. Their professional skills never get any better and, their people skills seem to get worse as they get more and more insecure over the years as their careers fail to meet their expectations.

So what do you think? Can a manager help an insecure marketer overcome their issues? Or, is their a point of no return when you just have to say, “We have a job to do” and replace the individual with someone who is more eager to learn and participate as part of the team?

Melissa

Social Media Experts are Like My Chiropractor

2009-05-30T11:28:00.000-07:00

I love seeing the give and take on the marketing forums like MarketingProfs and LinkedIn’s Q&A. But, I have to chuckle at times when I see the advice given by social media experts. In a way it reminds me of my chiropractor.

My chiropractor is the best doctor I have ever been to. He knows what he’s talking about and he’s great at what he does. His specialty goes beyond aligning bones and into nutrition and sports therapy.

I have jokingly suggested that he thinks everything can be solved with chiropractic care. According to him, one of the best times to see him is when I have a cold. Apparently, alignment can make all the difference.

He is also a strong advocate of eating right and exercise. That may be putting it too mildly, but he knows that without a strong foundation no amount of alignment is ever going to put one on the path toward better health.

I trust him - certainly more than any MD. But, it’s because of the breadth of his knowledge and not because he’s a chiropractor. It’s also because of his integrity. I know he’d tell me if he couldn’t help me and I needed to see another type of specialist. He cares about the rest of my health and not just my alignment.

So why do social media experts remind me of my chiropractor?

No matter what kind of marketing dilemma the person asking the question on the forum asks, it seems there’s always a social media expert to suggest that social media is the answer.

I respect the social media experts for their knowledge and skills, however, suggesting that someone who barely understands the basics of marketing that they should start blogging seems a bit like telling a sick person who is not taking care of themselves that a weekly visit to a chiropractor will do the trick.

Before someone gets involved in Blogs, Twitter, forums etc, I’d suggest they master the basics and develop a marketing plan that will give them some consistency in their lead generation. Many of these elements of their plan are likely to be much more traditional in nature. e.g. a well-defined target market, traditional campaign development, and a lead nurturing program. Social media may be part of the plan, but like chiropractic care, it is part of a much larger equation and not the sole answer.

I applaud the social media experts who truly are like my chiropractor and who see the big picture. These professionals usually developed a strong foundation in other marketing disciplines before they got involved in social media. Those of you without this breadth of experience would do well to broaden your horizons so that you can see the “whole patient.”

Full Disclosure – I’m no longer unbiased about marketing consultants

2009-05-29T10:42:00.000-07:00

I write so often about using outside vendors that I need to tell you all that I have recently become one. I try as much as I can to make this blog about you and not about me, but humor me this one time and let me share what I’m up to.

I left my current employer last Friday and have been busily setting up my consulting business. As those of you who know me understand, I love to write and to tell people what to do. Consulting is perfect!

All jesting aside, I’ve always loved the Zig Ziglar saying, “You can get everything in life you want if you just help enough other people get what they want.”

I learned that while in sales and driving around Chicago early in my career. I actually think I spent more time on the expressways than in customer’s offices so I heard it a lot as I listened to Zig’s tapes. (CDs weren’t invented yet)

This saying has been a primary motivator behind my marketing career. You might even say I’ve been using it as my mission statement. Although I certainly didn’t write it, it feels like mine. And, it’s an attitude that has served me well over the years.

In marketing, I can get everything I want if I help enough sales people get what they want. As a manager of marketing teams, I can also help other marketers get what they want by mentoring them. Now, as a consultant, I can help other businesses get what they want by helping them avoid so many of the mistakes that marketers make.

I’m really looking forward to this new chapter in my career and I’m eager to continue to reach out to all of you through my blog and help you get what you want out of your marketing campaigns and careers. Thanks for keeping me on your reading list.

All the best!

Melissa

Can a Salesperson Be a Good Marketer?

2009-05-27T11:53:00.000-07:00

Yes! Unlike some of my fellow marketing professionals, I think a background in sales is a stellar base on which to build a marketing career. Maybe it's because that's how I got to where I am, but I've also seen it work for others. With the proper guidance, a salesperson can make a great marketer.

If you have a marketing post to fill and are thinking of moving one of your salespeople into the role, here are some suggestions for the types of roles that fit well and what you can do to help prepare them.

Demand Creation – This may be the best fit for a salesperson since this role is so close to the world they are familiar with. Salespeople have a natural sense of urgency that is unfortunately often lacking in marketing professionals. They understand the connection between marketing and sales and how marketing drives sales performance. They are comfortable being judged by the numbers so they more readily accept performance plans based on results. Finally, their natural competitiveness may make them eager to show other marketers how it’s supposed to be done.

If the salesperson needs to work in a group, you may need to provide careful coaching so that the sense of urgency, competitiveness and other “sales traits” don’t drive the rest of the marketing team batty. There are usually a few “coachable moments” as salespeople accustom themselves to the world of marketing. Stay close and be available as a sounding board.

I would also invest in a Marketingprofs or Marketing Sherpa subscription so that the salesperson has ready access to the latest marketing ideas. Watching the webinars as a team can promote camaraderie between the new marketer and the rest of the team. It also ensures that it gets done.

Product Marketing – Also an excellent role since the salesperson readily understands how the collateral and messages get used in the field. They probably have a good understanding of what materials still need to be created. And, if they’ve gone through a decent sales training program, they should have a decent grasp of selling benefits and not features.

This was the role I first moved into when I left sales. I had a marketing degree but no practical marketing experience. The biggest challenge I had was getting a true grasp of the responsibilities of a competent professional product marketer. There was a lot more to the job than just creating whatever brochure sales wanted.

To help prepare a salesperson for a role in product marketing, I highly recommend sending them to a Pragmatic Marketing course.

Product Management – I moved fairly rapidly from Product Marketing to Product Management. The line between the roles varies from company to company but Product Managers usually drive the future direction of the product and may be responsible for the P&L for the product line. In my case, I also managed the Product Marketers so having filled that role helped prep me for Product Management.

The challenge for salespeople moving into a Product Management role where they are going to drive the future direction of the product is learning to balance the different drivers on product direction.

To a salesperson in the field, the most important driver is adding the features that can help them close the latest sale. Product Managers have to balance the requirements based on which features are required by the highest number of future customers in the agreed upon target market. Then they need to balance that against features that are required for current customer satisfaction. Sometimes this means they will need to disappoint their former teammates in sales.

Once again, the courses from Pragmatic Marketing can be extremely beneficial for new Product Managers.

There are, of course, other roles in marketing like website development, public relations, analyst relations and branding. These roles are further removed from sales and not usually attractive to someone who was originally drawn to the world of sales. For example, I can’t imagine any salesperson actually wanting to be part of a branding project. These folks are a breed unto themselves.

All the best!

Melissa

What New Ideas Have You Considered Lately?

2009-05-14T06:43:00.000-07:00

I would contend that if you aren’t on at least a half a dozen email lists from marketing vendors, you aren’t serious enough about your profession.

How’s that for a different take on spam mail? And, for those of you who don’t know me, I do not work for a marketing agency so I have nothing to gain from making this statement.

So many people complain about the “spam” they get from vendors. If you aren’t getting regular emails from vendors with offers to download their latest thought leadership white paper or attend a webinar, then your are probably doing the same things this year that you did last year. And, although you may be working harder at it, you’re probably not making much progress.

How many email lists you are on is a reflection of how much searching you do for a better way. What are the stumbling blocks in your organization? Lead nurturing? Getting to the decision maker? Low direct mail response rate? Poor targeting? Lack of Competitive intelligence? Poor website traffic and retention? Lack of qualified leads in general?

Take those terms, or ones like them, and Google to see who has something to say about tackling these issues. Attend the webinars. Read the white papers. Do not be afraid to talk to vendors who have something to say and a service or product to offer. You never know when you’ll find what you are looking for. If you aren’t finding it, don’t be afraid to say so.

Yes, your inbox will grow in size, but you have a delete button for a reason. If the subject-line doesn’t compel you, don’t read the email.

If vendors flood your inbox with irrelevant or less-than-useful info, you can always ask to be taken off their mailing list. I would suggest that you should have regular turn-over in your vendor solicitations as you want to keep the ideas coming in as fresh as possible. There will, of course, be a few standbys that have good ideas year over year.

By the way, if any of you put me on your mailing lists after this blog post, please make your emails pithy and show some thought leadership. I do opt-out regularly.

All the best!

Melissa

Words of Wisdom

2009-05-13T05:24:00.000-07:00

In this fast-paced world where hardly anyone gets the ackowledgement they deserve, I think this quote attributed to Abraham Lincoln is precious.

“Don't worry when you are not recognized, but strive to be worthy of recognition.”

Apparently, recognition was something people craved in the 1800s as much as they do today.

Take time out from your day today and say thanks to someone who really deserves to be thanked. I recently said thank-you to a co-worker who handles a mundane, administrative task. It's not a difficult task, nor is it time-consuming, but she does it extremely efficiently and reliably. She also seemed genuinely grateful for the small bit of recognition. (Which made me feel really good in return.)

All the best!

Melissa

LinkedIn Rides to The Rescue

2009-05-10T14:30:00.000-07:00

I’ve had this blog for quite some time and I’ve really enjoyed writing for it. I’ve been a little disappointed with the sparse number of comments I’ve been getting. I didn’t think it was my topics so I thought it might have been my writing.

Finally, Mark Smith from InTouch, told me that it was a bit of a hassle leaving a comment because you had to sign-up for a Google account. I hadn’t uncovered that in my own testing because, of course, I already have an account. Thank you, Mark!

Not being a professional blogger, I wasn’t sure what to do. I wanted people to leave comments because that’s half the fun. I didn’t want to use a new tool because I was afraid I would lose all of the history with my blog. I was sure there had to be a way to do this within the Blogger tool, but like most people I never RT*M. (ask your IT department if you don’t get the acronym.)

I decided to ask the question in the Blogging section on LinkedIn. Pretty soon I had 8 answers. WordPress got a pretty strong endorsement from most of the respondents. With such a strong response, I may try it out in the future. And, many of the respondents told me how I could export my current blog information to WordPress so I wouldn’t have to start all over.

But, a special thanks goes to Anthony Shireman who told me in clear simple terms how to change my settings so that anyone can leave a comment. Anthony, thank you, thank you, thank you!

The generosity and helpfulness of complete strangers never ceases to amaze me. The internet is a powerful and sometime dangerous tool to be sure. But it also brings out the best in people. If you have a question, chances are good that someone on LinkedIn has an answer.

Now that I’ve changed my settings, I hope a few of you can try it out and let me know how it works.

All the best!

Melissa

Is It Important to be Liked - Part 2

2009-05-07T20:23:00.000-07:00

I thought it would be interesting to see what the LinkedIn community thought about the importance of being liked to effective leadership.

Here’s a link to the original question and the responses: Do you need to be liked in order to lead?
There were many thoughtful responses along with some great suggestions for additional reading. The most interesting suggestion was to download the Army Field Manual on Leadership. I’ve added it to my reading list.

As I expected, the majority of responses (8 by my count) said that it was not necessary. A couple said that it was necessary. Several said “it depends.” Maybe they were afraid they wouldn’t be liked if they took a stand.

“Respected”, “Honest” and “Ethical” were all mentioned as necessary traits in several responses.

Other adjectives included: visionary, intelligent, inspiring, compassionate, respectful, humane, humble, fair, unbiased, and trusted. There was even one that said it was important to be “acceptable.” That last one seems like a fairly low bar to me.

Melissa

Is It Important to be Liked?

2009-04-28T18:33:00.000-07:00

There is no doubt in my mind that most marketers like to be liked. Our profession is all about getting prospects and customers to like our products and our companies. This need to be liked helps us put ourselves in their shoes and create messages that resonate with them.

But what happens when a marketer becomes a manager of marketers? Does this need to be liked get in the way of being an effective manager?

I was prompted to think along these lines after reading a post on the Linked2Leadership blog How to Lead Ugly People. Luckily, this post wasn’t about the unfair advantage attractive people have. The author redefined “ugly” to mean “offensive.” I think a less loaded description would be to call them “difficult” employees. You know the ones I’m talking about.

The writer claimed that you should manage all people as thought you want to date them. (Read the post of you don’t believe me.) If you find out what motivates them and get them to like you they will be easier to manage.

I think difficult people behave the way they do because that behavior has historically worked for them. They may have current issues that they are dealing with, but their style of dealing with these issues is something developed early on.

I’m not saying that people can’t change. But if your primary goal of management is to be liked, you run the risk of enabling the bad behavior. And, if those that are easy to like (and to be managed) see you bending over backwards for their challenging co-worker, resentment can build and affect those who are behaving well.

Most of the comments on the post agreed with the writer. Maybe we all want to be liked so much that we’re afraid to offer a different opinion. So far, I am the only one that I has a different opinion. Am I wrong?

All the best!

Melissa

How honest should you be?

2009-04-27T19:26:00.000-07:00

An interesting discussion was started on one of the LinkedIn group forums. It suggested that you should exploit your vulnerabilities and weaknesses to boost your marketing.

For those of you who belong to the ProMarketers group on LinkedIn, here’s a link to the discussion.

For those of you who don’t, here’s a link to the blog post referenced.

Essentially, the message is that openly sharing your problems can help you build a closer relationship with the customer. I’d agree to that to a certain extent, but with some conditions:

• This is not a strategy to be used too often as it will come across as whining and your customers will begin to lose confidence in you. People like to follow confident leaders and they want to buy from confident companies.

• This strategy won’t work if you are continually sharing the same issues over and over again. A software company that is constantly telling its customers why the latest release is delayed should rethink their release process and the process for communicating dates. (Unless of course you are a certain large software company where it’s just expected that you will be late with your releases.)

• If you caused a problem, you need to share how you are going to fix it.

• Once you’ve apologized and shared the remedy move forward. Too much apologizing can get tedious. And, for customers that tend to be a little hotheaded, it continues to remind them that it was your fault.

• If the problem is severe, do not send the message electronically. Your customers deserve a call.

• Always use your best communicators to share the message. Those who need to get the last word in, or who feel the need to be right, need not apply for this.

• You might consider restraining your PR and marketing folks. I’ve seen many of these communications over the years that passed through the hands of marketing and PR. The resulting communication left you dizzy if you know what I mean.

• This is not the time for Execs to hide behind the frontlines unless your execs are some of your worst communicators. (Some are!)

Now, putting all SEC and SOX rules aside, I’d love to know how you have successfully shared bad news with your customers and come out the better for it.

All the best!

Melissa

What Not to Say When e-Marketing

2009-04-19T18:16:00.000-07:00

I confess. One reason I like getting e-mail solicitations from marketing vendors is because it gives me fodder for my blog. The poor ones give me plenty of examples of what not to do.

Here’s a great example. This was the beginning sentence of an e-mail from a marketing firm trying to sell me something. What they were trying to sell was not entirely clear from the e-mail.

“I was reviewing a variety of information regarding (your company’s) solutions and I’m interested in learning more about the ROI and TCO initiatives within your group.”

So, in other words, she is interested in using my time to educate her without any real promise of value to me? She lost me right there.

I was listening to a marketing webinar the other day where the speaker said the age of the consultative sale is pretty much over. That’s paraphrasing, of course, but I listen to a lot of these. If I could remember who it was I was listening to, I’d go back, quote the source, and get it right.

I didn’t think much about the statement at the time, but the speaker’s point hit me when I read the first line of this e-mail. Today’s buyers do not have time to spend educating you on their business so you can uncover some need that you can sell to.

To be sure, you should be looking for unrealized pains that your services can address, but with as busy as people are these days, you have to go in with an answer even before you know the question.

I know this is antithetical to the way many of us were educated in sales and marketing! But, as we compete for attention in an increasingly frantic world, your value proposition needs to resonate immediately with your target audience. More than ever, you have to prove in the first communication that you have the answer.

The e-mail continued, “…our firm has a great deal of experience in quantifying the value of ERP solutions using ROI justification. I would like to share some of that knowledge with you and your team.”

That sounds so nice, doesn’t it? But if she wanted to share that knowledge she could have done so by linking to a white paper or a webinar within the body of the e-mail. Had I downloaded it, she would have had the added advantage of knowing that her message resonated with me.

“(our company) enables technology companies to quantify the economic business impact of their solutions using third-party validation. Our team develops custom ROI and TCO business value sales and marketing tools for every stage of the selling process from lead generation to close.”

I assumed from her interest in my ROI and TCO initiatives that their firm offered something along these lines. I’m less interested in their “great deal of experience” than I am in what they have accomplished during that time. If they focus on ROI and TCO practices they should understand how important ROI is to any prospective buyer. How about some examples of value provided?

I went to the website more out of curiosity than any real interest in her poorly stated value proposition. The web site was far stronger than this introductory e-mail and had plenty of content they could have linked to. She could have added value to me and improved her chance of adding me as a customer. Today’s best practices in e-mail marketing are a win-win for both seller and prospect.

I deleted all references to the company sending the e-mail since it’s not my intent to embarrass anyone. If this marketer reads my blog, hopefully she will forgive me for using her as a sample of what not to do. In the end, I hope this example can make all of us better at adding value to our prospects lives and reaching our future customers.

All the best!

Melissa

Help! I have to do it all!

2009-04-03T05:36:00.000-07:00

It’s Friday again! That means it’s time for another Friday Dilemma. For those of you new to this series of posts, let me explain how this works.

Every Friday, I post a scenario that poses a dilemma to marketers. These dilemmas are less about the science of marketing and more about the art of getting the job done. I try to pick scenarios where there is no obvious right or wrong approach and you really have to think about the advice you would give to the marketer in the scenario.

In today’s dilemma, imagine you are a marketer in a mid-sized IT shop. The annual revenues are roughly $50 million and the organization has achieved year over year growth for the last several years. However, this year the demand for the technology services your organization offers has declined significantly. In order to meet financial goals the staff was reduced by almost a third.

The marketing team was made up of three people. You, a peer and your manager. Your team was primarily responsible for lead generation but you were also tasked with some PR work and developing sales tools. In your “spare time” you did a bit of competitive research as well.

Marketing was affected by the down-sizing more so than other parts of the organization. After the layoffs, your team is down to one – you.

At first, you had a bit of survivor guilt and you felt really bad for your colleagues. You even wondered why you were spared. You figured that maybe it was the recognition of your hard work that you’ve always dreamed of. But no matter what the reason, you were just glad you still had a job.

After a couple of weeks the shock of losing your colleagues to the layoffs wore off a bit and your eye was back on the job. While you would never say it out loud, you were thinking this may be the opportunity to show what you are really worth. When the economy improves and staff can be added, maybe you can even get promoted into a management position.

After a month or so, the bloom is off that rose. Not only are you a third of the marketing staff the organization once had, your programs budget was slashed in half. Now you have to do it all and you have less money to do it with.

It’s also apparent that your organization, especially the sales team, seems to think that you can market your way out of this recession. If anything, they are asking you to produce more than you did with the money and staff you had prior to the cuts.

Whether it takes months or years for things improve, how do you best meet your goals and maintain your sanity?

The Questions That Should Have Been Asked

2009-04-01T05:46:00.000-07:00

I ran across a quick article on a blog that focused on the questions a prospective CMO should ask when determining if a role and company is right for them. While it’s water under the bridge now, some of these questions might have helped our hapless executive in Champagne Taste, Beer Budget. Actually, the questions offered in this article would be beneficial for any seasoned marketer looking at taking a new position.

Here’s the link to the article. What do the best CMO candidates ask in an interview?

Questions like “How do you Plan to define success for the (position title) over the next 12 months and the first three years?” can tell you a lot about how the role is seen in the organization. It can also tell you how long you have before you’re expected to produce “big things.”

There was one company I knew that had a standing joke about the Superman cape that was put on every management-level new hire. As soon as the individual accepted the role, the rumors would start about how brilliant he/she was and how they were going to do great things.

After three months, when the new manager didn’t single handedly orchestrate a turn-around, the cape started fraying a bit. By six months, it had disintegrated completely and the old-timers in the organization were starting to ask how such a poor choice could have been made.

Even if you’re one of those who ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time and are now looking for work, these questions should still be asked. With so many competitors for the same position out there, it’s tempting to just take the first thing that comes along.

In the case of the marketing executive in Champagne Taste, Beer Budget, I’m sure the answers would have been less than ideal. But even if the individual decided to take the role, at least they would be going in with their eyes open.

AIG – What Would You Do?

2009-03-30T17:27:00.000-07:00

Last week a poll was running on LinkedIn in which the question is asked, “Would you rebrand AIG?”

I responded to the question and then checked the current results. Frankly, I was amazed to see an even split between those who favored rebranding and those who didn’t. At the time I checked, it was 43% for each with a few “I don’t knows” tossed in to round it out.

My immediate reaction to this poll question was much more black and white. At first blush I couldn’t possibly imagine that rebranding AIG could be the right answer.

For the sake of this discussion, let’s put aside the history of how AIG got to where it is and whether or not the public reaction to AIG’s woes (and other companies like them) is justified or not. As all marketers know, perception is reality. This wouldn’t be the first company to be sacrificed, or at least wounded, at the altar of public opinion.

Anyway, what good would rebranding the company do? Did 43% of the people think that the public was stupid enough to be fooled by a new name and logo?

But later that evening I started thinking about my reaction. A company’s “brand” is not necessarily the same as their logo and name. Certainly that is one aspect of it, but it’s more about what that logo and name represent.

As one branding expert once explained to me, branding is all about a “promise of experience.” What do those that interact with AIG either as customers or shareholders expect to experience? (Should we include taxpayer’s in this?)

McDonald’s is the classic branding example used when I was back in school. The McDonald’s promise of experience is pretty much the same from Hong Kong to Hawaii. Yes, there is some variation in the menu based on local cultural tastes, but not much. Whether or not YOU care for the McDonald’s experience is irrelevant. This experience appeals to their core target market and it is the reason they have been successful for decades.

So back to AIG. Whether or not they need to rebrand depends on whether their promise of experience appeals to their target market. I’m not qualified to answer that since I’m not privy to their marketing strategy, but I can speculate that the brand has taken a hit with their core lately.

So, on second thought, I think they do need to rebrand. But, I would keep the name and logo. To change that while you’re changing the image of the company could easily appear deceptive. It’s the image of the company that needs to change and that’s a lot harder than changing a name and logo!

So what lessons can we learn from this? I could count on two hands the number of times someone in my career someone has suggested that we change the name of the product or the logo. (for clarification, not with my current employer) I think the AIG question emphasizes how irrelevant the name and logo is, when it comes to rebranding. If you don’t have a strategy for changing whatever perceptions need to be changed, rebranding won’t do a darn thing.

All the best!

Melissa

Champagne Taste, Beer Budget Part 2

2009-03-27T18:14:00.000-07:00

Last week’s Friday Dilemma was about a marketer who leaves a well-funded company to take an executive level marketing position in a start-up. It’s a great opportunity for advancement, at least in title, for the individual. However, like many start-ups, marketing is not well-funded and the founders have unrealistic expectations about what they can expect from the marketing investments they have made.

Jack makes a couple of great points in his comment and I particularly want to call out the first one. It highlights a mistake that I see many marketers make when they join a smaller company.

Jack suggests a “dose of pragmatism” and to “have a realistic view of the financial condition.” I couldn’t agree more.

Even the largest companies have a limit to what they can spend on marketing. They may have more money, but they also have more places they need to spend it. Start-ups have it the hardest because the money tends to flow out faster than in. Even those with well-heeled investors aren’t usually given a blank check for marketing.

“How can I get the CEO to spend more on marketing” is a question I see asked all the time by marketers at all levels. While I think it’s a valid question, one has to realize that it has to be a realistic investment.

An executive at the level of the marketer in the story should understand how marketing ties into the P&L of the business and the need to balance priorities. Like a lot of tough situations that life throws at us, this is an excellent opportunity to learn.

If the marketer doesn’t have a good understanding of the P&L and business priorities, the regular meetings with the CEO that JML suggests may help. (CEOs tend to be big on the P&L!)

If you have another angle on Champagne Taste, Beer Budget, let us know.

All the best!

Melissa

No Need to Boil the Ocean

2009-03-24T18:37:00.000-07:00

If you are continuously working on your craft, chances are you get a bit frustrated now and then with how far you are from perfection. Marketers who are honest with themselves could probably list a dozen things that they could do better. The perfectionist in most of us is tempted to try to work on everything at once – “to boil the ocean,” as they say.

While we should always try to do everything we do to the best of our ability, if you really want to make lasting improvements, I think you need to focus. Pick one thing that your organization, team, or even you can improve on and really work on it.

Let’s say your biggest weakness in your marketing strategy if your website. Taking a website from nothing more than a weak electronic brochure to the tool that is the centerpiece of your marketing strategy, is a monumental task for any marketer. To make matters more complicated, even though you rely on the website, it may not be under your control. Maybe it’s even the IT department that has ultimate responsibility for the site.

First learn everything you can about the area you have targeted for improvement – in this example you need to learn everything you can about what makes an effective website. Watch webinars. Read best practice white papers. Don’t be afraid to talk to marketing vendors who work on websites for a living. You can learn from them and you may even enlist one in your quest for the perfect website.

Share this learning with others in your organization, especially those whose help you will need to enlist in your quest for perfection. Share the learning not with an eye toward convincing them, but from learning together. Seek their opinions, not an opportunity to give them yours.

Then, together, map out a strategy that moves you to where you want to be. Sometimes small increments work best. Trying to do too much can wear out your colleagues and ensure that your efforts never get off the ground.

Friday Dilemma - Champagne Taste, Beer Budget

2009-03-20T05:03:00.000-07:00

I have to admit this is my favorite Friday Dilemma that I've come up with yet. I see a variation of this story over and over again on the marketing forums. I know I've personally faced a variation of this dilemma at least a couple times in my own career. Each time, I've handled things a little differently, but I'm never sure I handled it the best way I could.

I want to find out what you would do, so please respond.

Champagne Taste, Beer Budget

You’ve spent more than a decade working in the marketing department of a very well-known company with a reputation for outstanding marketing. Sure, they make mistakes, but for the most part you’ve learned a lot about how marketing should be done. Having worked in several different areas, you also have a well-rounded background in many aspects of marketing. It is the best start to a marketing career that you could possibly imagine.

Your one frustration is that you don’t seem to be able to move up within the organization. One day, opportunity knocks within a small start-up company looking to lead their marketing effort. You know that the company is strapped for cash as they are just getting the business off the ground. You’re even willing to take a pay cut and work longer hours just to be part of the management team. You’ll have a VP title and report directly to the CEO who is also one of the founders.

After you start in your new organization you begin to realize that the founders are engineers at heart. They really don’t have much experience with marketing, or much respect for the breadth and depth of the marketing function. However, they’ve also worked for large well-run organizations. In short, they understand what marketing can do, they just have no idea of the work it takes to get it done. They want all those glossy brochures, a snazzy logo, a top notch website, placement of your story in the best business publications, and more….they just don’t want to pay for it.

As you sit in your office contemplating your budget (which is about a tenth of what you need) and your staff of two hard-working marketers – fresh out of college, you wonder of you made the right choice.

What are your options? Should you look for a new position somewhere else? The job market isn’t looking too good right now. Should you try to get your old job back? You left on great terms with your former employer, but they aren’t hiring. Plus, you didn’t like your lack of advancement opportunities. Should you try to educate the CEO on what it takes to market a product in your industry? Should you just try to weather the storm and do your best?

What would you do?

Melissa

P.S. You can still respond to my last two "Friday Dilemmas" if you're feeling like handing out a little career advice to the marketing world. As I mentioned in Wednesday's post, commenting on blogs is a great way to showcase your expertise!
Should You Say Something?
Where Do Your Loyalties Lie?