B2B Marketing Experiences

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• Dear Tom,
  After reading your article, the first explanation that came to my mind is the following: in most companies finance is busy with the past (how did we perform last year), sales with the present and marketing (should be) busy with the future.
  The result of this is, that marketing objectives are merely long-term objectives. But as we all know, short-term thinking has replaced the long term. This - for me - is the main reason why I found it so hard in my career until now, to prove effectiveness of what marketeers do.
  Secondly, we should not mix marketing communications with strategic marketing. The first is focused on communicating with our present and future customer. The way our customers want us to communicate is changing rapidly. As you pointed out the consequence is a dramatic return on most campaigns, be it online and offline.
  But if we look at the second responsibility, we see great things happening which are very measurable. Just think for example of the Bpost turnaround or the emergence of ready-made dishes by Hot Cuisine/Univeg. In both companies, marketeers convinced their management of a changing consumer behavior, which resulted in new product & service solutions. I am quite convinced that marketeers came up with graphs of these evolving behaviors and needs.
  So, what to do about the first problem of marketing campaigns not delivering and showing ROI? First of all, in the internet business I am working in, I see that campaigns can be effective (e.g. the DreamBaby repositioning as independent Colruyt brand). BUT, campaigns should become more relevant for our consumers. And this I guess, is where a lot of marketeers are missing out nowadays. I would like to recommend the book by Bob Galbraith on 'The next step in Marketing'. I use it every day to check wether my ideas are relevant or not to our customers. And believe me, relevant communication & solutions are very measurable and will quickly show results. And (sales results) will finally convince a CEO where the opportunities are.
  Good luck in finding the relevance for your customers.
  Wim

• woauw, Wim, I am honored by such and extensive response.

  I guess I am indeed mixing strategic marketing with marketing communication strategy. Thank you for pointing that out.

  Advertising is a tactic used in a marketing strategy. And multiple tactics are applied to execute a marketing strategy. You had success with Dreambaby, which seems B2C to me. Where I come from is B2B, and that might be different. But your general remark is that advertising must become more relevant for our customers. And that's the key, which is turned by marketing strategy.

  You mentioned that you had similar problems in your career, "until now". What has changed that you now understand it ? The book from Bob Galbraith ?

  Thanks for your comment, appreciate it. That really adds to this blog post.

  Tom

• Hi Tom,

  I do believe marketers are slowly shifting budgets towards content. It's slow in part because they don't want to up-end the apple cart, and it will continue to be slow, particularly for larger marketers that have refined their advertising.

  I think one of the challenges to watch out for is the tendency of digital marketers to claim a portion of everything they touch, but just because marketing touched it (ie a prospect downloaded a paper) doesn't mean marketing changed they outcome.

  For us to really show that marketing is driving ROI, we need to start showing that marketing is changing the outcome, not just that it is part of the process. And that is, in many ways, an even more challenging nut to crack.

  Good questions, that's the only $0.02 in reply I have for you yet. Looking forward to hearing more about how your transition goes.

  -- @wittlake

• Thanks Eric. "Showing that marketing is changing the outcome" was something that I also had on my radar. A great way of doing that is by selecting one single strategic subject that is entirely new (and that can be related to your business strategy), start your marketing around that subject, and start tracking the results.

  This subject should not be your regular stuff. It should be something you never do in your day-to-day type of marketing. If you've never done a webinar, do a webinar. If you've never done an e-book, do an e-book. If you've never published fresh data, do a study/survey, etc...

  That's all top of funnel activity, but when you are able to track from top to bottom (with marketing automation for example), you can track it right down to your CRM and ERP system.

  Thanks for the comment Eric, it adds. Really appreciate it.

  Tom