B2B Archives - Page 4 of 20 - Creative Agency Secrets

Rush into eCommerce during Lockdown

2 April, 2020/0 Comments/in B2B, B2C, Marketing ideas, Recession /by Rebecca Caroe

Today’s first quick marketing tip is about Competitor analysis – find out what your competitors are doing to market at this time

Open a search window and type your brand name vs.

Wait and see what auto complete suggests.

Then do it again for the suggested name. I did the Warehouse vs and it suggested Kmart. Then I did Kmart vs…

Set up your online shop

Getting online for ecommerce is happening for many brands due to the lockdown.

Ensure that your proposal suits your current need, the speed you need to roll it out and the ability of your marketing team to execute.

The video explains why.

How to write a good Covid-19 email

30 March, 2020/0 Comments/in B2B, Digital media, Direct Marketing /by Rebecca Caroe

There are 3 types of message – two are a waste of time and effort.

Focus appropriately.
Give clear messages.
Understand the customer’s point of view.
Be practical.

Help others to stay within the Government’s Level 4 guidelines.

Subscribe to get these short update videos in YouTube or LinkedIn and please pass them to folks who need help.

Crisis Communications Rule of 3

27 March, 2020/0 Comments/in B2B, Email /by Rebecca Caroe

What can brands say to their customers now it’s clear that business as not-normal will continue?
– two content messaging ideas are in the video

3 rules for crisis communications

100% transparency
Write with compassion
Be clear, accurate and concise about tough decisions

Copywriting to shorten marketing messages

26 March, 2020/0 Comments/in B2B, Copywriting /by Rebecca Caroe

Our team brings you the news about our economy that requires intensive investigation, providing an important resource for Kiwis who want to make well-informed financial decisions. Your contribution fuels our capacity to provide independent reporting & analysis, while also keeping our site open for comments & community engagement.

A case study – the client supplied the text at the top.

It was from a popup on their website. But the display required the prospect to scroll to read it all.

I re-wrote the copy into two versions so they did not have the scroll bar appear and also to give a slightly different emphasis on the messaging.

Rewrite copy version 1

Our reputation is built on expert news reporting on the NZ economy. We are an important resource for Kiwis making well-

The chosen version published.

informed financial decisions. By paying to support us, you’re ensuring we continue to be an independent, powerful media site where our analysis and your commentary builds a robust community of interest.

Notes:

Shortening New Zealand to NZ is not my preferred way of writing, but suits this situation.
The focus on expert news is secondary to the informed financial decisions
Strong adjectives and a clear expectation of what the outcome will be

Rewrite copy version 2

We specialise in news about the NZ economy which takes intensive investigation and journalist resource. Our reputation is built on helping Kiwis make well-informed financial decisions. Your support means we can continue independent reporting, expert analysis, and enables moderated commenting on the website.

Notes:

The focus is on the quality of journalism comes first
The reader’s desire for decision-making secondary (at this time of Covid19 – most are reading news pages)
Many like the ability to comment. Many news sites have withdrawn this feature.

SEO for online retail

24 March, 2020/0 Comments/in B2B, SEO /by Rebecca Caroe

I’m doing quick updates on daily topics. Let me know what is helpful for you.

Business rules for ERP

A challenge for a retail website selling B2B. Where and how to update SEO – should it be in ERP or should it be on the site? How to set rules?

Sales and marketing CRM alignment

4 February, 2020/0 Comments/in B2B, Data, Sales /by Rebecca Caroe

The old chestnut about “sales-ready leads” versus “marketing qualified leads” never ends – it just mutates like a virus.

I went to a presentation of a sales research project last week and their survey and report were interesting.

If you work in marketing or new business development and are starting to use ABM, take a read – the link is at the bottom.

Results of 2020 sales leader survey

Key 2020 Sales takeaways

Three quarters of survey respondents use a CRM
39% of sales teams are using a different CRM from the rest of the firm
35% monitor website engagement
One thing the sales team thinks they can do better – Business Development

My interpretation of this is:

Absolutely stunning. Why are firms not using a CRM? FFS it’s 2020 folks! Even small firms can afford one.
Why is a CRM not deployed? Are you expecting the sales team to initiate this tech project – because they won’t.
Using a different CRM from the rest of the firm is astonishing. Do the IT department not check why the firm and the sales team are using different software? Siloed data is a giant challenge and this creates and reinforces this problem.
Glad that a third of sales people realise customers go to websites FIRST before contacting sales.
The “wait and see” for disruptive technology reinforces my view of the static nature of sales compared to marketing.
Take the lead, marketing folks, and draw the sales function along with you for the ride to integrating your work.
Business development is the interface between sales and marketing. If this is ONE thing your firm can do better – marketers initiate the project. Sales are gagging for it.
CRM and website marketing are not “disruptive technologies” any more. They are BAU. Get used to it.

Here’s the report – it is on page 10.

Sales funnel, B2B sales, B2B marketing expert

Tips for manufacturers to grow client base

13 January, 2020/0 Comments/in B2B, Lead Generation, Marketing, Sales, Strategy /by Rebecca Caroe

My company provides mechanical designs and manufacturers and supplies products to a few companies in both the US and Europe. How do I increase my customers?

This is a typical “opening” question that I get asked when starting a new engagement with clients. B2B marketing needs to be closely integrated with the new business and new client acquisition process to be effective.

For a public question and answer, I gave some straightforward answers. The detail of how to apply these, is where my expertise will help you get it right first time.

Planning B2B sales and marketing plan

Step one for B2B sales

Ask your existing client/s for referrals. If they were happy with the work that you did, they should be happy to help. If you feel the need, offer them a X%/$X discount on the next project for every client they refer. This is ‘win-win-win’ situation because you get more clients, they get a discount, and they use your services again.
Ask your existing clients for a written recommendation & permission to use their logo on your website. Publish them both on your website. This will help increase the conversion rate on your website. If you feel the need, you can offer them a link to their website which will be good for both of your SEO rankings – so another win-win.
Publish as much (relevant and quality) content as possible on your website (about the projects you’ve done, potential projects, your fields of expertise, etc. Obviously, you need to have a professional and trustworthy looking website. I can explain how the articles need to be done.
Create a free ‘get a quote tool’ – many customers check online to get an estimate of how much the project will cost. If you have an automatic online tool, this can attract a lot of customers. I have personally used such a tool and I was very impressed.
Partner with organisations/companies that work with your target clients – for example: I work with lots of entrepreneurs and many of them ask me for referrals to various types of service providers, including programming companies. These companies give me a small percentage of the profits they make from my referrals (of course I only refer to companies which I know and trust as my reputation is worth more than the referral fee).

Step 2 tactics for more sophisticated marketers

In Europe, there are a number of partnership sites for B2B. You could use these sites to post your offer or search for other offers and hopefully make a match.

Another approach is considering hiring local distributors who specialise in your industry. The advantage here is local distributors will already have a strong network to promote your products/services. Furthermore, local distributors would have thorough understanding of the local market, language, and business culture to close deals.

Go talk to your current customers. Ask them why they do business with you. They may, and most likely will, tell you something different than you’re saying to new prospects. Listen to what your current customers are saying and use their messaging to talk to the market. Ask them if they know other companies that could use what you have,

Go and join the professional trade bodies who represent the industries for your existing clients. Ask your existing clients what these are. Once you are a member, you will be able to see a membership list of other organisations who are also members
Plan outbound marketing to approach these companies and see if they want to also work with you.

Consider visiting the annual conferences and trade shows which these professional bodies run because you will then meet in person with prospects. Many people find it easier to sell their expertise face to face. You could consider doing a trade show stand as well where you can display your past work and the logos of your clients. This builds trust and can start discussions.,

B2B sales and marketing work together

In summary – you need to learn the process of B2B new business, you need a strategy for your new business development and then you need a regular tactical execution process to deliver the new business programme.

You may choose to hire an external advisor to help write the strategy, you could get an in-house salesperson to deliver the tactical execution as well, depending on the size of your contracts and how many you need to get in order to pay for their salary plus commission to make it worthwhile for the business.

Is B2B marketing yielding good returns?

11 December, 2019/0 Comments/in B2B, Data, Lead Generation, Marketing ideas, Public Speaking, Strategy /by Rebecca Caroe

Is the marketing you are doing giving you the yield you seek?

I am asking this question a LOT at the moment. I ask it to myself, for my own businesses, I ask clients, I ask prospects.

One answer came from a professional services marketer. It serves as a good example for in-house marketers to challenge their thinking, to up-skill and to get insight from beyond the internal team in the business.

This is what she wrote to answer

Hmmm… It’s hard to tell. I cannot know if a speaking engagement got someone interested enough to ask their consultant to investigate our solutions and eventually get in touch with us and 2 years later… we have a deal signed. It is a complex process to sell our service.

Is a long sales cycle a B2B marketing problem?

Yes, it certainly is. Tracking and managing a diverse set of marketing tactics and campaigns over time takes discipline and forethought.

But where I felt this marketing manager was failing her business colleagues was around integrating the content creation, the speech-giving with marketing analytics and tracking data.

I challenge the assertion that you “cannot know” if a speaking engagement has any effect.

How to track conference speeches for marketing impact

Let me make some suggestions:

Every conference – offer a free download of something valuable. Create a trackable URL. Cookie the browsers visiting that site.
ALSO offer the visitor something even more valuable (not a sales pitch) if they sign up to your database

Both of these create trackable events which (even if 2 years passes) can enable you to demonstrate results.

Any pass-on of URLs to second parties like consultants or colleagues is tracked too.

I use Google Campaign URL builder and also short link services like Bit.ly for this.

Upskill your internal marketing team

When did you last go and get training and invest in your internal marketing team? I fear many in-house teams do not get the attention they deserve. Hiring an agency or consultant is not necessarily going to improve the team skills – it delegates marketing activity to outsiders.

What could you do to invest better, to improve your team’s ability to run the strategy as well as the execution, to better understand what the agency / consultant is doing for you, so that they can brief better, to guide the marketing plan better, to adapt and adjust the marketing budget for new tech, for new market conditions (recession?) and above all, to stay in front of the competition?

So challenge yourself, is the marketing you are doing giving you the yield you seek?

Mid-Sized Business Marketing

7 November, 2019/0 Comments/in B2B, Strategy /by Rebecca Caroe

The power of New Zealand business as an engine for economic growth lies mainly in mid-sized businesses. These are under-recognised by many for the power they wield.

Grant Thornton has done a study of the sector which has some interesting findings.

Mid-sized firms are growing faster than large or small (absolute numbers).
Most are mature, in B2B industries
Job growth is much higher than in other corporations (large or small)
They suffer low productivity
Capital investment is low (obvs as GT specialises in this type of consultancy)
Suffer low international / export aspirations
Few get >10% of orders via online sources and most under-utilise digital opportunities

5 solutions for future growth

The recommendations made by GT are rather bland, probably reflecting the diversity of business types in the group and the fact that they want to be paid for custom recommendations.

Here’s what I would add as ways to get your own business started on its future path.

Bring on short-term contractors to assess opportunities and report to the Board
Add Board Members with specific expertise on a short term basis to guide the Board [and then leave] e.g. cyber-security, digital marketing, B2B procurement online
Budget for pilot projects [and be prepared to walk away]
Hire newly migrated kiwis who can bring overseas experience [leverage them for knowledge, implementation and then don’t worry if they leave]
New Zealand experience in employees is over-rated. Find people NOT like your current team. Use them to show you overseas methods / techniques / tools and input to 1 above.

Mid sized business recommendations

Download the report