Businesses entered 2011 with optimism that an economic recovery was at hand and anxiously put plans in place for much-needed new projects,  a return to growth and innovation. As we know, 2011 is best characterized by the recovery that never came. The Greek crises and European woes, U.S. debt downgrades, and budget conflicts all conspired to put a damper on the year and set a pessimistic stage for 2012. B2B salespeople and marketers seeking better times for 2012 are facing more of the same with buyers forced to “do more with less” for yet another year. They also are facing more fiscal scrutiny from executives — a condition that has been defined as Frugalnomics. Achieving success in 2012 will require recognition of the continued malaise, and implementing new content marketing strategies and tactics to help buyers navigate tough budget waters and achieve goals despite the challenged economy. The following are our predictions of how economic pressures will define 2012, and four tangible ways...

The biggest challenge B2B marketers face is producing engaging content (36%), a Content Marketing Institute survey of 1,100 marketers revealed.  One way to address this challenge is to plan obsolescence in your content marketing strategy, a tactic recently explained by Joe Chernov from Eloqua. Today, I want to share another option with you: leveraging your content. Continue reading

Are you trying to sell to the C-level suite? According to the latest survey of senior executives from SiriusDecisions, you’ll want to focus on specific digital content marketing strategies to engage and connect with these busy execs. In short, you’ll want to roll out the “web carpet” not only with the message but also with the medium. Leading sales and marketing firm SiriusDecisions surveyed over 300 senior executives for its “2011 B-to-B Buyer’s Journey.”  The survey’s findings yield great insights into the buying journey of decision-makers, and show how to roll out the web carpet content strategies to successfully connect, engage and  sell content to “mahogany row.”Continue reading

Content marketing accounts for more than 26 percent of total marketing budgets annually, according to research from Junta42 and MarketingProfs that surveyed 1,100 marketers. What’s more,  over  50 percent of survey respondents plan to increase their content marketing spend over the next 12 months. However, even though budgets are growing, marketers have serious doubts about the return on investment, ROI, with only 41 percent indicating their content marketing efforts are effective. Continue reading

More than 1,100 North American marketers are spending 26 percent of their budget on content marketing projects, and 51 percent say they plan to increase their spend on content marketing over the next 12 months, according to Content Marketing Institute research. Great, right? Not so fast. IDC research indicates current marketing content such as white papers, webinars and videos are too lengthy and not as relevant to buyers as they could be. As a result, much of the content marketing investments are just not returning the dividends marketers expected.Continue reading

Marketing budgets are growing for most companies, but so are the requirements to reach more empowered, skeptical and frugal buyers via more channels. How can you know that the content you invest in will forge effective connections and engagements that will ultimately lead to incremental sales? To help define how to best market and sell your solutions, SiriusDecisions has created an innovative way to understand the market characteristics for your offerings, which improves the chances for your success.Continue reading

According to a new Accenture study, more chief financial officers (CFOs) are expanding their role beyond finance in the wake of the recession. These new responsibilities mean CFOs are much more involved in the buying decision process, which is critically important for content marketers to understand and address in order to keep winning business.Continue reading

Businesses are expected to increase spending on social media marketing by more than 40% percent in 2011, according to marketing research firms Altimeter and Alinean. Still, in today’s “age of austerity,” every significant investment requires proof of bottom-line impact and superior value – a condition called Frugalnomics. To deliver social media ROI measurement results for your company, you first need to answer two key questions: What investments are required? How much effort is needed to deliver specific results?Continue reading

As B2B marketers invest more time and effort into social media marketing, many are trying to figure out the practices that work best, and whether their investments are yielding results. In our research to determine the ROI of social media, Alinean (my company) examined the differences in social media marketing efforts and popularity of various platforms between companies in different industries. Continue reading