Content Marketing is not a Shiny Object
When I first got into the demand gen game fifteen years ago, we used a basic teleprospecting model: dial for leads, qualify anyone you were lucky enough to make contact with, and push the good fits to field sales. We’ve come a long way since the beginning of the millennium—inbound marketing, permission marketing, social media, etc.—but two recent conversations have me wondering if we’re close to completing the circle back to the year 2000 (I will happily grant that 2 data points does not a scientific survey make, but they did get me thinking).
The first was a conversation with a former colleague—currently VP of sales for a software company—who told me he has been bombarded lately with calls from teleprospecting/ appointment setting firms looking to drum up new business. I’ve been a marketing executive for a while now, and I can’t remember the last time I received such a call. The second was a conversation with another marketer who told me that they are changing their demand gen model by placing a heavy emphasis teleprospecting targeting senior executives at enterprise-level companies. All well and good, but it was the second shoe dropping that really got my attention.
As a tradeoff for diving into teleprospecting, the company has decided to curtail their content marketing program. That concerns me because getting the ear of a senior executive is next to impossible, but without the air cover of a robust content marketing campaign, you can remove the “next.”
Don’t believe me, read this from Business2Community, or call to mind your own experience. If the average buyer is 70% of the way through the buying process before they even engage with a vendor, what chance does any company have if they’re relying on a calling campaign to drum up new leads?
Content marketing isn’t a silver bullet. Nothing is. But it’s also not a shiny object that’s run its course. Content marketing is critical, especially in the upper funnel where you establish your brand. Without it, how will you take a prospect on the journey that lands them at your doorstep, reaching out when they’ve 70% mark. The simple truth is you won’t.
And on the rare occasion when one of the telemarketers makes a connection and has a meaningful conversation with a decision-maker who’s in an evaluation cycle, they’ll find it nearly impossible to squeeze their way onto the dance floor unless they are in the very early stages. Simply put, without a content strategy to support it, teleprospecting is a waste of precious marketing budget.
At the turn of the century, the most common responses teleprospectors heard—when they were lucky enough to make connection—were, “Thanks, but we’re not looking,” and “We are evaluating, but we’re down to our short list.”
The evolution of content marketing changed that by tipping the balance toward inbound leads that were already well on their way to making a decision.
Teleprospectors will have their share of conversations. By putting the right content in front of the right eyes at the right time, and the odds turning those conversations into leads will be much improved when teleprospecting makes a comeback.
Social Media: Presence matters most
The lead fr0m the eMarketer article says it all:
Social media marketers feel that having a presence on social sites is more important than advertising there, but there are still challenges related to keeping a community running online.
And so it is today as it was in the beginning: Social media is about showing up and showing what you know. Because, let’s face it, in today’s world no one will give your ad a second look without trusting you first. That’s especially true in the B2B space. And that is the beauty of the power of social media.
Blogs, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter, to name the biggies, give you ample opportunity to seek, build and engage an audience in a way that positions your people – and by extension your company – as industry experts. And when you take the step of sharing your expertise in public forums the market takes note and comes to see that your people can be relied on to offer counsel without without an invoice attached.
So we all seem to understand the importance of taking part in social media, but where we, all of us, still struggle is the all-important content creation. It’s not a question of how to do it, it’s a question of how to find the time to do it. I wish I had a good answer for you other than making time – 20-30 minutes – every day, or every other day, to scan your Google alerts for ideas (where do you think this came from) and decide how you want to handle them: Is it blog-worthy, or will a simple tweet do, and then handling them.
Of all the possibilities for social media involvement Twitter is, by far, the most forgiving. It takes very little time, yet it will expose your company and it’s people to an audience you won’t find anywhere else. Add a hash tag or two into the mix and you have the potential to grow your audience even faster.
Let’s be honest, we are constantly making accommodations for our time, letting something slide because another, more important, thing pops up, or dropping activities altogether. If you believe there’s value in social media, you will find the time to work it in. And as its value to your marketing programs grows, you’ll find yourself dedicating more time to it.
Regardless of time, market expectations say you have to be involved, so it’s time to get in and make your presence known.
Is Social Media a waste of money
According to Gordon Beattie of Beattie Communications, social media is a waste of time and money for many companies.For those on a limited budget, and who doesn’t claim that to be a reality, Beattie suggests they are better off:
getting their websites to the top of the search engines or grabbing the headlines in the press and media is going to give them a much better return than a social media marketing campaign. The truth is that the majority of companies are wasting valuable manpower and financial resources on social media. I come at it from the standpoint – if it does not drive sales and build a brand, it’s not worth doing.
There’s a lot to unpack in here.
First, I agree that SEO needs to be a priority – regardless of budget. But what Beattie is ignoring is the important role social media can play in turbocharging PR efforts, especially for companies that have limited budgets. In my world, limited budget is shorthand for small company, and I know very few small companies that are capable of “grabbing the headlines.”
Limited-budget companies that employ good social media practices of listening, responding and creating solid original content, are not only building brand, they’re laying the foundation for future PR efforts by establishing their subject matter expertise and credibility. I have always had more success with media when working from a foundation we, the company, built, than by working the traditional pitch model.
To be sure, there are companies that are wasting time and money in social media, but that stems more from poor execution than from not belonging in the space. Done right, social media can work for most any company B2B or B2C, and for Beattie to dismiss it as being a waste is shortsighted.
It’s hard to argue with Search Engine Land’s B2B Social Media tips
Every so often I run across an article that has me nodding in complete agreement, and this one from Search Engine Land had me doing exactly that. The article – while using the work “tips” – actually outlines four reasons B2B companies need to be involved in social media.
Putting aside tactics like Facebook, Twitter and blogging, SEL’s Strictly Business points to the four basic elements of why:
- Influence your online reputation
- Better position your brand
- Engage prospects & customers
- Improve customer service
If you’re not doing these things for your company, others will do it for you. And those others will include customers (happy and not so happy), competitors (looking to gain an edge), and media.
Not only does social media give us the power to monitor and comment on what others are saying, it also provides the opportunity to drive what is being said. It’s an offer that’s hard to refuse and one that can be accepted in 4 simple steps.
Isn’t it time to take the first step?
Playing with the LG Revolution for social media evolution
By day I’m the director of marketing for OptiMine, a paid search bid management solution and I spent last week in Boston exhibiting at Shop.org, a trade show for online retailers. Most of our marketing efforts are executed across the Web and social media is becoming a major part of that. I say becoming because we are a young company, almost four years old, and, as the first marketing hire, I got started only three months ago.
Using a smartphone while on site is a must for anyone who is doing trade shows. There is no better way to capture the activity. For Shop.org I was fortunate to have gotten my hands on the LG Revolution with Verizon service. I say fortunate because it allowed me to accomplish everything I set out to do.
While meeting prospects and customers is the primary objective for any exhibitor, Web 2.o and smartphone technology has made it possible to go beyond, bringing the wider experience to a much bigger audience. I’m talking about more than live tweeting with a hashtag. For example, the video below was shot using the Revolution. I was standing a few feet away from the subject and, although you can hear the background noise, y0u cannot appreciate just how loud it was. That’s how good the mic on the Revolution is. In terms of use, shooting video and stills and immediately uploading to YouTube, Twitter or Facebook is as simple as selecting “Share” and deciding where you want to send it.
The Revolution is 4G and the speeds are amazing, but the call quality does leave a little something to be desired. While I didn’t experience any problems, I did use the phone to call several people and a few did comment it sounded like I was speaking in a cave.
If you’re looking to shoot video, or stills and upload to your favorite social networking site – for business or pleasure – the LG Revolution is a great option.
Is Google+ a consolidation of power
Like most of you, I’ve been following the Google+ talk through the thousands of blog posts that have popped up in the past several days. There is no shortage of Feature to feature comparisons with Facebook, nor is there a lack of opinion and analysis of what Google+ means for the future of Facebook. I did, however, come across a post that considers Google’s latest offering for what it means to the Google as a whole.
Alex Salkever’s column in StreetFight is written from the perspective of hyper-local, but his observations and analysis apply across the spectrum of local to global. Simply put, Salkever posits the notion that, with Google+, Google has added the third and final leg it needs to become a “one-stop-shop for multiple facets of local advertising, all sold through its automated self-service sales machine.” What’s more, the machine will be self-feeding. The other two legs are Google Offers and, of course Adwords.
Individually, each has varying degrees of market penetration, but taken in total the three have a very good chance of creating the Web-dominating force Google has long sought.
There are far too many variables in play to determine when, if ever, the consolidation Salkever envisions will come to pass. But based on the early reviews of Google+, I wouldn’t blame Mark Zuckerberg for feeling a bit nervous at the moment.
Blowing Taps for Twitter?
Seems impossible, doesn’t it? Just a few short years after Twitter took the social media world by storm, at least one industry veteran is asking, “is the party over?”
Kristine Schachinger of SitesWithoutWalls makes a strong case built on many of the moves Twitter has made recently, not to mention a couple of individual’s moves away from Twitter – Biz Stone and Ev Williams. Buying TweetDeck, shutting down API access, clamping down on third party developers (without whom Twitter would be nothing) all point to Twitter’s inevitable decline into mediocrity according to Schachinger.
Will Twitter go away? Doubtful.It’s become too much a part of the social media fabric to every disappear completely, but there may come a day when it is replaced – however slowly – by “the next big thing”. We don’t know today what that will be, but there’s risk for Twitter is high. After all, management’s moves are creating an insular company that is turning away the very people who made it the cutting edge communications tool it is today. They need somewhere to turn and Stone and Williams just might have a home for them at The Obvious Corporation.
Ducking the Social Media Sledge Hammer
I got sucked-in today and am still beating myself up over it. I fell for the old bait and switch not once, but twice, and got hit by the social media sledge hammer. In this case the sledge hammer came in the form of two whitepapers that went from informative and educational to heavy-handed marketing in the span of a couple of paragraphs.
One was going to tell me how to determine when it was time to leave the free paid-search management tools (Google Adwords, etc.) behind in favor of a more robust version paid version. The second, still dealing with paid search, said I would learn about the different ways of tracking conversions and the variety of cookies that can be placed on a searcher’s computer. Sadly, neither came close to providing me with anything I would considered even remotely educational. Both showed a complete lack of depth and were anything but interesting. Both were spectacular failures.
But that’s not the worst of it.
While reading it became very obvious that both were thinly veiled marketing brochures. I may be a purist when it comes to whitepapers, but I am of the belief that their role is to educate readers and, while doing so, establish the author – individual(s) or company – as a thought and industry leader. A well written and thoughtful whitepaper doesn’t need any marketing spin because the reader will make all of the necessary connections simply by consuming the document.
When I come across marketing fluff disguised as thoughtful analysis, my first thought is that the company doesn’t have the resources to create the content, lacks the internal SME’s, or doesn’t have confidence in their own abilities.
Traditional marketing is for making claims. Social is for substantiating those claims. Each should inform and support the other, but mixing them can leave a bad taste in your prospect’s mouth.
Timing is everything for this marketer
Just a few short weeks ago I joined OptiMine Software as the first director of marketing. OptiMine is a 3 yr old technology company that develops and sells bid optimization software for companies engaged in large (+$30K monthly spend) paid search campaigns. As their first member of the marketing department I walked into what is, for all intents and purposes, a blank slate. That is why the 1o marketing lessons in this article from Mark Suster was a welcomed find.
I’ve been involved in technology marketing for most of the last decade and spent much of that time in a start-up-like division of a company with annual sales of $100 million. OptiMine is a true start up and the marketing plan I presented to senior management today is the first in our short history. Thanks to Mark Suster’s article, I will benefit from his experience and his 10 lessons.
Timing is everything.
Join your LinkedIn network? But I hardly know you
I took a call from a potential vendor the other day. Anyone who works in the digital media space will recognize the name, so I’ll keep that detail to myself. The call went well and, in the end, I think I can make use of some of their products and services to help achieve OptiMine’s marketing goals. At the end of the call, I asked the rep to send me additional information I could share with the team and he told me to expect an email with the requested documents. So far, the only email I’ve received from Dave was completely unexpected: an invitation to join his LinkedIn network.
Maybe I’m being a bit sensitive – something I’ve never been accused of – but I don’t think a 60 minute sales call entitles Dave to ask me to become linked. After all, I hardly know him. My personal practice is to reserve links for those I know, trust and admire. so accepting Dave’s invitation would, in my mind, be the functional equivalent of exchanging business cards. That’s what V-cards are for. I’ve spent several years building my network on LinkedIn. And while it’s true I don’t communicate regularly with every one of my contacts, each of them is a contact for a reason.
I will not be accepting Dave’s invitation – at least not now.
How do you manage your LinkedIn contacts? Are you particular about who you invite or whose invitation you accept?
Wondering Out Loud 