3 Ways To Use the Value of a Like or Follow

Dan Zarella and Hubspot gave the “what is your social media audience worth” pot a good stir last week.

It doesn’t matter if you like Hubspot’s formula or not (at least not for this article). One day many businesses will put a value on their social media audience, if it is in the form of monthly impact to their business or the average value of an audience member.

Then what? How do you use the value of a like, follower, circler, or similar to improve the value of your marketing and your business? [Read more…]

7 Steps to Find Your Content Marketing Sweet Spot

The Content Marketing Sweet SpotYou are ready to take your content marketing to the next level. Until now, you have been producing mostly mid and late stage content.

Your content supports the sales process and effectively communicates the value of your solutions to prospects.

Now, you are ready to use content marketing to raise the profile of your company overall.

Content that drives overall visibility for your company is different. To broadly improve your visibility within your market, you need to focus [Read more…]

Inbound Marketing for B2B: Discussion Recap

Join #B2BChat on Twitter every Thursday at 8:00 PM EasternInbound marketing is a clear trend in B2B marketing. In fact, Sirius Decisions, a research firm focused on B2B markets, predicts more than 75% of leads will be sourced through inbound channels by 2015.

What are the key challenges to B2B inbound marketing, how does inbound marketing change the type of content B2B marketers need to create and what tools are critical to inbound marketing?

These are some of the questions discussed during #B2Bchat on March 15, and I had the privilege of moderating. Here are my key takeaways from the discussion. [Read more…]

A New Definition for Inbound Marketing

Inbound marketing is a hot topic in B2B marketing. However, as more B2B marketers grab the inbound marketing flag, many will miss the two keys to making inbound marketing effective:

  • Be found through the recommendation of others.
  • Delight those that find you.

According to Hubspot, a leader in inbound marketing, the definition of inbound marketing is “marketing focused on getting found by your customers.” The most common functional definition of inbound marketing is the combination of search, social and content. [Read more…]

20 B2B Marketers Losing their Brand on Pinterest

Pinterest LogoPinterest is the marketing flavor du jour. Media and press are touting the ability of Pinterest to drive traffic and the time spent on Pinterest.

Many B2B marketers do not have any presence on Pinterest. In my search for major B2B marketers on Pinterest, I only found a handful using it actively. Here are three of the better B2B marketing examples I found. [Read more…]

Connecting Thought Leadership to Lead Generation in B2B Marketing

IMG_1202Many B2B marketers look to content marketing as a key part of establishing thought leadership. However, companies frequently expect the same content marketing program to capture contacts or leads as well.

The problem is, registration and thought leadership are at odds with each other. Thought leadership requires your point of view to be broadly distributed and recognized across a peer group, where it can drive discussion and shape opinions. [Read more…]

Five Keys to Creating Content that Drives Awareness

StartCurrent marketing wisdom says content should be mapped to buying cycles. Yet according to a study from MarketingProfs and Junta42, 78% of B2B marketers say awareness is an objective of content marketing.

Question: Where is awareness most valuable in the buying cycle?
Answer: Early stage research and creation of a consideration set.

Question: Would it be better if prospects were aware of your company when they started the research process?
Answer: “Well, DUH!”

It is time to step back from planning content for the buying cycle and focus on Stage Zero Content. [Read more…]