Alberta Business Marketing

In “Going Mobile,” the classic song from The Who, Pete Townshend sings about the joys of “driving free” in his “home on wheels.” Nowadays, with the widespread availability of mobile communications devices, Townshend’s lyrics can be used to advertise not just the fun of roaming around in a car, but also the freedom gained through mobile access to the Internet, email and media. While still in its infancy, b-to-b mobile marketing is growing both in terms of relevance and adoption; we expect it to become a critical part of the b-to-b marketing mix in coming years. In this post, we explain why a focus on mobile marketing is becoming mission critical, and discuss the different forms it is taking.

Research by SiriusDecisions indicates that the number of marketing touches received per week by the average b-to-b buyer has grown by 32% since 2006, flying in the face of the fact that these buyers increasingly prefer to do their own research before engaging with vendors. When they are combined, these forces have without question made it increasingly difficult for marketers to attract attention, leaving them to seek new marketing channels to engage with their targets.

Enter mobile marketing. In recent years, the introduction of the iPhone, iPad, Android mobile operating system and advances in the Blackberry Web browser have made mobile Internet access for business users commonplace. According to Nielsen, smartphones will comprise the majority of new mobile phone sales in 2011. Whether accessing email, surfing the Web, viewing online videos or listening to podcasts, mobile marketing simply can no longer be ignored.

The primary goals for b-to-b mobile marketing tend to be awareness building, branding/positioning and relationship development. Direct response tactics are relatively rare because activities such as visiting/reading Web pages, downloading/viewing content and completing forms continue to be perceived as somewhat cumbersome despite recent advances in smartphone and tablet PC technology. In general, SiriusDecisions has found that mobile marketing tactics are best used as part of broad, integrated programs that benefit from a more varied mix, extended reach and additional touches. In addition to dedicated tactics, many organizations are adapting traditional tactics for presentation on mobile interfaces. The most common mobile categories currently drawing b-to-b attention include:

Mobile applications. Mobile applications are specifically developed by organizations for download on a smartphone. They are often an extension of an existing product (e.g. an interface to access a software-as-a-service offering), but also can be useful tools that align a target audience’s needs with an organization’s brand/positioning goals.

Mobile advertising. Services such as Google Mobile Ads and Microsoft Mobile Ads offer a wide network of mobile properties and applications for contextual text and display advertising. In addition, growing numbers of organizations are driving audiences to their own mobile Web sites and apps by promoting them via traditional print and television advertising.

Mobile Web sites. Mobile Web sites are designed to be displayed and navigated using the smaller screens of mobile devices. Organizations also optimize mobile device content for consumption by reducing copy, minimizing images and adjusting formats.

Short message service (SMS) alerts and campaigns. Text messages that are no longer than 160 characters and devoid of any graphics are increasingly being sent to mobile devices via SMS. While some organizations are beginning to develop opt-in text message programs, most are still struggling to create a value proposition compelling enough to convince business users to sign up for what is a relatively intrusive form of marketing.

Content marketing. Leading organizations, aware that customers and prospective buyers are increasingly accessing content via mobile devices, are developing new content creation and management processes to ensure that all relevant video, audio and text content is optimized for display on mobile platforms.

Email marketing. Since most mobile devices being used by today’s business people are much better at rendering HTML emails than they were even a year ago, many b-to-b marketers assume that mobile email design issues are yesterday’s news. However, marketers must still consider the specific needs of people accessing marketing emails on mobile platforms, including proper formatting for all common devices, designing messages to fit on smaller screens and understanding the unique situations of this growing audience.

Location-based marketing. Location-based marketing, which makes use of the recipient’s location to deliver targeted messages and services, is only beginning to emerge in most organizations, because b-to-b marketing rarely requires “just in time” messages about new coupons, local stores or sales. The most common use is at conferences and other events where some companies offer location-based services such as text alerts and announcements to improve the experience of delegates.

Sales/partner enablement. Leading b-to-b marketers think about the information salespeople need while in the field and how to make that information as accessible as possible. One common tactic is providing a mobile-friendly interface for sales information portals, customer relationship management (CRM) and sales force automation (SFA).

Slipping mobile devices into pockets before leaving home in the morning has joined checking for wallets, glasses and keys as part of virtually everyone’s daily departure routine. Thus, the time has come for b-to-b marketers to begin seriously considering how to integrate mobile marketing tactics and strategies into their existing mix.

Ally Motz

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Henry Ford once said that his customers could buy a car in any color – as long as it was black. He eventually regretted his words as an upstart manufacturer by the name of General Motors surpassed Ford’s sales by offering cars in a greater variety of colors and models. When we introduced the demand center concept nearly three years ago, many b-to-b marketing executives viewed it as a panacea for their cost, infrastructure and efficiency woes. As they tried to implement, however, they experienced the folly of blindly pursuing a one-size-fits-all approach. In this post, we define four demand center model options.

Model One: Virtual Demand Center
Often the first step organizations take in their demand center evolution, the virtual demand center is not a discrete function. Instead, it is characterized by strong marketing operations serving as a central hub that virtually connects selected portions of marketing (e.g. product marketing, marketing communications) into a cross-functional committee. Specific services include those typically found in marketing operations (e.g. data services, workflow management) but may include program development and asset management.

Virtual demand centers enable organizations to more broadly leverage specialized skill sets in marketing operations, and realize increased efficiency and effectiveness from more structured collaboration between functions. This model is also an excellent starting point that enables companies to learn with minimal disruption as they evolve.

Model Two: Demand Central
The demand central model is characterized by a highly centralized services team that focus on creating repeatable marketing activities such as data services, long-term nurture flows, workflow management, training and playbook development. For small and medium-sized organizations, demand central will be the primary demand center strategy; for larger global organizations, it often becomes the back-office organization that supports regional demand centers.

Benefits realized by organizations implementing a demand central model include improved leverage of marketing best practices, a more efficient demand waterfall, and greater consistency in the deployment and execution of global marketing programs. Also, field marketing is often relieved of some duties taken on by the demand center and is therefore better able to focus on supporting sales deeper in the waterfall.

Model Three: Regional Demand Center
Regional demand centers are geographically based centers of excellence that provide demand creation-related shared services; they often emerge from and are supported by a demand central model that was previously implemented in larger, global organizations. Services provided include advisory, assembly and/or execution services in are as such as program creation, teleservices and lead management.

The regional demand center model provides greater leverage, sophistication and consistency of marketing campaigns and programs across global regions. Implementation often results in an overall reduction in the number of campaigns created and launched because those built are more effective and easier to leverage. This model also provides local marketers with the equivalent of an internal agency, which allows them to focus more resources on execution.

Model Four: Specialized Demand Center
Specialized demand centers focus on specific industries or a limited number of companies. Services provided include account-based marketing (ABM) including both current account marketing and large account marketing, pipeline acceleration and perhaps account-specific sales enablement. Due to the narrowed focus on specific verticals or named accounts and the sensitive nature of marketing in these situations, specialized centers often define their strategic marketing contribution with significant direction from sales.

Like the previous two models, the specialized demand center model improves campaign sophistication and consistency. Services provided by specialized demand centers free field marketers to focus on tactical execution and make field sales reps more efficient and effective in their efforts to source business from specific verticals and large, complex accounts.

When planning a demand center strategy, begin by considering the unique circumstances of your organization. In the context of your go-to-market strategy, resources and skill sets in local markets, current areas of strength and weakness at central and local levels should define the specific services that the demand center will provide. If prior experience with demand centers is lacking, we recommend starting with a virtual demand center or pilot effort to minimize disruption during the learning process. Finally, keep in mind that even the best plans will likely fail in the absence of effective internal communications. Be sure to clearly define the role of the demand center model selected and ensure that all stakeholders are fully aware of its responsibilities and how to properly engage with it.

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Content. Social media. Lead management. Sales enablement. Data. In growing numbers of b-to-b organizations, sales and marketing leaders are realizing that it is around these five strategic imperatives that dramatic progress must be made to better align with changing buyer dynamics, and to achieve more predictable, accelerating revenues in 2012 and beyond.

As your organization plans for the upcoming year, now is the perfect time to assess whether it has the process discipline required to succeed in five cross-functional areas, and if not, what to do about it.

In this post, we share five key trends that we believe will impact marketing and sales functions in 2012, and discuss specifics around each.

1. Content Remains King
Creating compelling content that engages target audiences has been a primary focus of b-to-b marketers for more than a decade, yet most continue to struggle to keep up with evolving content requirements. B-to-b organizations realizing efficiencies and success in creating and managing highly effective content have done so through a disciplined approach, starting with assigning accountability for creating a content strategy that maps content to the information needs of specific buyer roles in defined buying cycle stages. SiriusDecisions research shows that the trend of b-to-b buyers engaging with sales reps later in the decision making process continues. Organizations are responding to this trend with inbound marketing strategies and the creation of better and deeper content to attract, engage and educate, which has resulted in buyers with deep knowledge, and well-formed opinions and perceptions. When they’re ready to engage, they expect salespeople to add even more to their knowledge, meaning that marketing needs to up its game in terms of the enablement content provided to reps and partners.

2. Leads: Volume Down, Quality Up
Marketing automation has made it easier than ever to design and execute multi-touch marketing programs that generate high volumes of responses. While this is great news, it hasn’t created the efficiencies many expected. Marketers are also busier than ever and spread so thin that it becomes difficult to do anything well. By focusing on efforts with lasting positive effects such as search engine optimization (SEO), search engine marketing (SEM), automated recycle nurture programs and Website conversion optimization (WCO), and integrating those efforts with serialized marketing programs, marketers can create a steady stream of leads via sustained tactics that simply need monitoring and tweaking over time. Leading organizations are using inbound marketing, WCO and other strategies to create more leads while executing fewer programs. In addition to fewer programs, marketers should review the volume of leads delivered to sales and consider turning down the volume and increasing the quality. Our research has found that fewer, better-qualified leads result in a far more efficient sales force and contribute to improved pipeline dynamics. If salespeople spend less time reaching out to prospects who are not ready to engage or buy, they can spend more time focused on deals that are moving forward.

3. Enablement’s Next Step
While product and solution marketers and product managers have always focused on supporting field reps and channel partners, what often have been ad hoc activities are evolving into a more formalized, continuous process known as sales enablement. The core goal of enablement is simply put: Increase rep and partner productivity. Product teams, business units and product/solution marketing will continue to set business goals, define strategy and act as subject matter experts (SMEs) for their domain (e.g. industry, solution, product, customer segment). But making a person or group of people (formal or virtual) responsible for standardizing enablement initiatives (e.g. program frameworks, content templates) from disparate business units or product teams is critical to ensuring that sales resources can absorb what is being delivered to them. This function also should be responsible for sharing enablement best practices across the organization, and performing the data collection and reporting necessary to demonstrate how enablement is improving sales productivity.

4. Integrated Social Properties
For too many organizations, social media strategy still consists of maintaining a Twitter account or two, updating a blog a couple of times a week and accepting LinkedIn group members. In larger organizations, different business units or regions often establish their own social accounts with little thought or insight into what their colleagues are doing. This results in social accounts whose focus overlaps, along with content and links that are endlessly repurposed and a general dilution of uniqueness and brand – not to mention the confusion that customers, prospects and other constituents experience when they can’t find the most appropriate social property to engage with. Organizations should conduct a social properties audit to determine the state of all of their social accounts and properties, including blogs. In some cases where there’s topic-area overlap or low levels of engagement, consolidate accounts to drive the highest levels of interaction. One of the best ways an organization can advertise its social presence is to create a landing page that lists all of its social properties by topic area to make it easier for individuals to find the most appropriate account.

5. Data: Better Buyer and Customer Insight
Data quality gets a lot of attention because it is the foundation of successful sales and marketing interactions. Unfortunately, having correct and complete contact and account records doesn’t mean much if they aren’t used to learn about buyers and customers, rather than just catalog and count them. Once data quality processes are in place and trustworthy data becomes available, use it for more than results reporting. Insights are needed to deliver the right assets and interaction options to buyers and customers at the right time. It’s not necessary to wait until a data project is finished. In fact, data improvement will never be finished; it’s an ongoing process. As data-related investments are made, look for incremental uses of data around analysis and action. Focus on “need-to-have” data elements first, then expand based on the potential value a new data element could bring to insight-driven marketing. Don’t forget to build a data dashboard to show progress.

Much uncertainty remains in the global economy, making it unlikely that marketing budgets will grow significantly in 2012. To succeed, those responsible for marketing and sales must focus their resources where they will make the most positive impact. Another key to success will be finding leverage points and preparing for the future. By employing strategies with longlasting effects (e.g. inbound marketing, WCO), marketing can deliver better-quality leads with fewer programs.

Finally, when planning for the year ahead, be sure to determine on a monthly, weekly or even daily basis the steps that must occur to accomplish your goal. While the goals may be exciting, the key to success is the execution.

Ally Motz

Tags: Research, Strategy
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Marketers have a love/hate relationship with the word “free.” It’s love at first click when giving things away prompts prospects to accept a complimentary trial offer; this love fades fast, however, when these prospects fail to convert to buyers. Marketing shared services groups understand this dilemma. When their services come at no cost to internal users, it’s easy to take for granted the time and resources involved; if an internal chargeback model is adopted, external services begin to seem more attractive. The key to effective shared services funding is balancing the right mix of services and cost. In this post, we describe three models for funding shared services, as well as their advantages and disadvantages.

1. Centrally Funded
The simplest model for funding shared services is a central budget. Each year, as part of the marketing budget process, groups considered shared services (e.g. communications, internal creative agencies, market intelligence, analytics, demand centers) receive a share of the marketing budget and deploy resources using that funding to meet expected demand. Internal clients using these services are not required to provide budget for the work they request; while the services are free, there’s no mandate to use them beyond the obvious cost advantage.

Pros. This model enables the shared services team to control its own budget and make decisions about how best to optimize resources. It works when budget and resource allocations are determined based on prioritized needs, and not every internal client must get equal support. Based on various internal client requirements, the shared services group can estimate its own resource demands and maximize effective, efficient delivery. This is also the right model to choose when the objective is to meet cost, quality, process and other consistency goals by discouraging the use of outside resources.

Cons. Groups using a service without being mindful of what their requests actually cost may not be judicious in their requests. In other words, it’s easy to overuse a shared service or request “nice-to-have” work that never gets used. Another issue is internal perception of quality, especially if the shared services group is not measured or held accountable for internal client satisfaction and cost effectiveness.

2. Agency
Some organizations want shared services users to fund the work from their budgets. For each project, the scope and cost is agreed upon with the internal client, creating an internal contract for the work. A very limited central budget covers the salaries of the shared services team and some infrastructure costs, but the majority of yearly program spend comes from outside the group.

Pros. Agency models make it clear that using a resource has a cost, incenting shared services users to make judicious choices about budget allocation much as they would if using an outside resource. This model also drives a shared services to deliver high-quality work because it is competing for budget dollars with outside suppliers. This model is most effective when budget and resource allocation is not centrally mandated; shared services are allocated based on budget decisions by lines of business, geographic marketing groups and sales.

Cons. Agency models are complex to manage and require administrative support to keep track of budget chargebacks. As a result, they add a layer of cost that has no impact on the quality of service. Agency models also make it easier to bypass internal services and use outside resources, which reduces potential for cost savings and other advantages of internal shared services.

3. Client-funded
A third option is a blended model, where some budget is allocated centrally and some is charged back to internal clients via budget or personnel allocation. Chargebacks are used for situations where the request exceeds what’s budgeted, or outside services are required to fulfill the request.

Pros. The client-funded approach balances efficient central management with recognition that additional help may be needed to deliver the best work. It keeps the shared services group accountable for service quality because some funding is at the customer’s discretion. Since central funding is higher than in the agency model, the cost of the services is subsidized, making it more difficult for internal groups to justify taking budget outside. This model works best when geographies or business units are autonomous, but marketing wants to establish some central efficiency for commonly used services. This client-funded model can also help marketing organizations to reduce dependency on a multitude of outsourced service providers, manage these relationships centrally and decide what services should be brought in-house.

Cons. In the client-funded model, discretionary funding is easily withheld or reallocated. The risk is that the shared services group will be funded at a minimal level but will not be utilized or supported by internal clients, which instead decide to outsource or do the work themselves. If the organization wants to drive process consistency and encourage the use of central shared services, a client-funded model slows down that change by allowing variability.

The goal of marketing shared services is to provide equal or better services to what can be found outside the company for lower cost, with the benefit of central oversight and consistency. If quality and utilization are deficient, the budget model doesn’t matter. The shared services group can easily become an underutilized resource and a drain on resources and profits, while internal clients continue to do things their own way. Shared services groups must pay attention first to service quality, then focus on optimizing how services are used by internal customers.

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In this post, we examine the causes and implications (both negative and positive) of shorter sales cycles and identify opportunities for b-to-b organizations to capitalize on this potential shift.

Nearly two-thirds (64%) of the respondents to our ongoing sales forecast and pipeline survey stated that their companies’ sales cycle length is either stable or decreasing. This data suggests that the long documented trend of steadily increasing sales cycle length is finally coming to an end. While this change may be driven in part by the gradual improvement in the economy, our research indicates a fundamental shift in buying behavior is also occurring.

Many buyers are now better at self-educating, having learned how to search, source and filter the information available on the Internet. Consequently, sales is engaging with more informed and proficient buyers who already understand core features and comparisons of alternatives; what they want to know is how a product/service being evaluated will perform in their unique environment. They engage sales reps much later in their active buying process, which leads to shorter sales cycles.

Buyers are also becoming more efficient at managing the collaboration of multiple internal buying roles. While the finance team may dictate the process for requesting and allocating funds, business units drive the needs assessment and justification to support the investment. Processes for establishing priorities, gaining necessary approvals and meeting requirements for return on investment (ROI) and total cost of ownership (TCO) are unique to every organization and initiative. As buyers engage in a purchase decision every couple of years or so, depending on the product or service, they slowly but steadily improve their ability to execute the buying process efficiently.

While shorter sales cycles are good news when they are driven by better sales processes and favorable economic trends, they can backfire when they are driven by more mature buyers who are less dependent on sales reps for knowledge and guidance. If sales reps have a narrower timeframe and fewer interactions to influence buying decisions, the selling organization’s leverage over these outcomes will be reduced unless it takes effective countermeasures.

Bad News Equals Opportunity
By adapting aggressively to the requirements of mature buyers, b-to-b organizations can turn the potential bad news of shorter sales cycles into competitive opportunity. Below are three strategies that organizations should consider:

1. Bad news: Buyers are able to source information freely from multiple independent sources before engaging with sales.
Opportunity: Progressive marketing teams must construct dynamic web experiences to guide and inform the buyer, stimulate inquiries and identify buyers entering into an active buying cycle. Marketing should inform sales about the buyer’s previous behaviors and activities when passing marketing qualified leads to sales, analyze and educate reps about competitors’ and third-party Web resources, and share what sales should expect the buyer to know. Sales and marketing should build and link common value messages based on a buyer’s online experience, giving the salesperson an advantage over poorly integrated competitive sales and marketing functions.

2. Bad news: Shorter sales cycles result in fewer interactions for the sales rep to influence the decision.
Opportunity: Sales organizations should track sales cycle length by sales stage to identify when, where and how buyers engage with sales. It should then refine sales processes to ensure the right set of selling activities are in place to synchronize with buyers’ needs and increase the impact of the reduced number of interactions. Messaging or targeted playbooks based on buyer profiles should be developed to provide the sales rep with the information needed to maintain his or her knowledge advantage when selling to a more mature buyer.

3. Bad news: While sales cycles are shorter, sales capacity (the number of deals that the sales force actively manages) hasn’t increased.
Opportunity: As informed buyers engage with sales later in the buying process, sales can defer to marketing to take more responsibility for educating future prospects and passing the results to sales when these prospects enter into an active buying phase. Sales can then fine-tune its qualification criteria to focus on deals that are already active and more likely to close, reducing the amount of time spent chasing “no decisions” and increasing the number of active deals in the pipeline.

Due to today’s increasingly knowledgeable and prepared buyer, the long-established trend of expanding sales cycles may be stabilizing or reversing. Shorter sales cycles for mature buying organizations are in fact the result of these companies’ effective use of technology and consistent buying processes to drive better, more efficient decisionmaking. B-to-b organizations must likewise exploit technology and optimize their sales and marketing processes to meet the needs of empowered buyers and increase rather than decrease their leverage over buying decisions.

Ally Motz

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