Alvaro Reyes on Unsplash ">

Martech and process mapping

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Martech – it’s great as long as all the parts connect.
I’m assessing a couple of new options to inject into a client’s martech stack. And I have long been a fan of reverse IP lookup services.

Knowing who’s looking at your website is powerful.

The way to get the most from a new component involves re-mapping your sales and marketing processes so that you can ensure no dead ends and the “loop” for prospects is fully integrated across both marketing and sales.

What we’ve found is that there are new skills needed to work certain stages of the loop. Especially important as you bed down the tool and work out how your prospective clients uniquely flow around your sales funnel.

Losing sales leads

One of the benefits of checking your processes is that it’s too easy for sales leads to drop through a crack which came about when you added your new software into the sales and marketing team’s activities. I hate losing sales opportunities.

With one client, we found a critical sales outbound skill was needed to close one of these gaps and so training and upskilling had to happen before we got the full benefit of the new tech.

I have always loved designing and writing process maps. Tie that into a shiny new software tool and I’m in a happy place.

Image credit: Alvaro Reyes on Unsplash

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Agentic AI is a joy-killer for NBD

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A “cold call battle”

I love a contest as much as any athlete… but this makes my blood run cold.

It’s an advert to promote agentic AI compeing alongside CSRs to book appointments.

You may not know this, but I’m a demon cold caller. It’s a service I provide as part of B2B Marketing – yet the underlying premise of this service is going to drive enshi*tification into yet another part of business marketing.

I know I can spot many online fakes, bots and robo-voices.

Soon we won’t be able to do this.

Agentic AI cold calling bot service

It will be ‘fun’ to try to get the automatic agents off the line quickly – but where’s the joy in beating a machine? It’s man-to-man mortal combat that gets my adrenaline surging.

That’s only a sorta-joke. I do like a competition. I do like to pit my skills and my wits against another person. But only in a fair fight.

I’m sure that these services will shortly be incorporating human-like aspects of speech and language to persuade the listener that they’re not talking to a bot.

Yet again – where’s the fun in that.

Does agentic AI risk taking all the fun out of doing business? Your thoughts….

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Old clothes and porridge

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Old clothes and porridge

I got back from holiday recently and apart from the hideous time zone dislocation I definitely know that I achieved some of my goals – rest, a change of scene and the opportunity to do some quiet thinking without interruption.

Settling back into the work routine comes easily yet I find the best outcomes from this time are to start making changes.

Ideas, plans and thoughts which I have captured while travelling are always freshest and best implemented when energy levels are high.

Going back to your old routine feels as comfortable as familiar old clothes, but I believe it’s worth resisting and taking risks with new ideas and new plans.

And anyway, I like porridge!

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Corporate phone numbers

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Are these a thing of the past? Or are they still a useful marketing tool.

Remember when having a round number (ending in 000 or 5555) was a really important part of your business marketing positioning? We slaved to get the same 4 digits for all our regional offices back in the day.

Today, I’m calling Harcourts Real Estate in Brisbane – head office for a kinda large real estate business. Their switchboard has a voicemail. I left a message on 18th March – called again today – still on voicemail.

What message does that send?

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YOuTube still of Air NZ safety video with Stephen Adams

Airline safety videos are a great messaging platform

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I read an article about airline spend on glossy safety videos and found some great marketing reasons for investing in high production values.

YOuTube still of Air NZ safety video with Stephen Adams

4.8 million views and counting

First – aligning cultural values with education. Air New Zealand partnered with the Department of Conservation (DOC) to promote the importance of wildlife protection. That was after they did a movie hook up from Men in Black featuring the All Black rugby stars.

The baton was picked up by United whose $1m spend and 160 crew on their current Safety in Motion video boggles – but apparently viewers love it.

Qantas uses a true customer romance story (with actors and the actual people in the credits – no they don’t look alike at all), British Airways features home grown “national treasures” like Gordon Ramsay. So far so good – but did you know some of these get millions of YouTube watches? Sounds like a new revenue stream from people who won’t even be paying to fly with you.

In these straitened times, does this make the cost of production a worthwhile marketing investment?

Sources:

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New ideas often receive pushback

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New ideas often receive pushback.

That’s because they’re new, they represent change and that can be threatening to jobs, budgets and ‘the way we work round here’.

It doesn’t mean they are necessarily a bad idea. I find that frequently it takes a couple of goes to overcome the pushback and also it takes some time – maybe a year or more.

There’s nothing more powerful than “an idea whose time has come”. But that doesn’t just happen. The marketing communications outreach that builds the comprehension, that challenges the status quo, that offers alternative pathways is where us B2B marketers can prepare the ground so that you overcome the pushback, get acceptance for a pilot or a trial and then move towards adoption.

Here’s a case study.

I’m the MC for a B2B marketing careers event at the Marketing Association which I first proposed as an un-conference a year ago. Now the event is re-framed and is happening next week.

Let’s talk?

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Not everything is enhanced with AI.

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Use your experience of life, of human communication and decision making to work out times in the customer journey when personal, individual, manual actions will have greater effect.

I love using letters, phone calls, SMS – all great tools for use cases when you need cut through and to effect human-to-human contact as a context for making a sale.

PM me and I’ll tell you one use case I’m doing right now with a CV for a job application.

No it won’t do the whole job for you, yes you will use your human insight and creativity to frame up the AI supplied text. It’s so satisfying.

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Getting a “no” is a good result for the sales pipeline

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The inexperienced new business development marketer will disagree with that statement. Why wouldn’t you want more prospects in your pipeline?

The customer doesn’t owe you their business – but they do owe you an answer.

Creating marketing tactics that provoke the prospect to answer “no” is a good thing. Sales know not to pursue them and can focus their efforts elsewhere.

And remember, no is just for now.

95% of B2B prospects aren’t ready to buy at any one time. So going back to them later, may mean they’re ready to hear your brand message and review their plans.

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Academy for Women Entrepreneurs, Pacific Women in Business

AWE Pacific Summit 2023

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I am a panelist at the Academy for Women Entrepreneurs summit talking about Social Media, Marketing and communications.

Three talking points and answers

From your experience in B2B Marketing, what do you think our Pacific & Maori business women who target businesses as customers should focus on for their marketing activities?

  • Understand the customer – walk in their shoes
  • Keep good records – CRM
  • Businesses may look daunting as sales targets but they are made up of people – befriend them.
  • Use LinkedIn – buy a Premium membership and Sales Navigator
  • Build your email list from day one
  • Don’t build your house on rented land
  • Focus on local marketing first

Can you give some examples of SME women led businesses you have supported with your digital marketing insights expertise?  

  • Sue Skeet – Notice Match
  • Climber Property – Grace Hu
  • Equal Exes – Bridgette Jackson
  • PICMI – Genevieve Griffin-George
  • Catherine Stewart  Barrister
  • Method Recycling – India Korner

What are some tips you can give our Pacific & Maori business women for their digital marketing activities & campaigns? 

  • Buy expertise if you don’t have it yourself. Fiverr, Upwork
  • Learn how to brief
  • Find your tribe…. start very very narrow for your audience
  • Keep your owned digital assets at the core of your strategy.
  • Stay in touch regularly
  • Build community
  • Join the Marketing Association B2B SIG

Happy to give guidance to anyone who needs more detail on these topics.

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