Category Archives: Uncategorized

Social Media B2B Marketing: Case Study on DocuSign using LinkedIn InMail

See on Scoop.it – Social Media B2B Marketing

“Meagan Eisenberg, Vice President of Demand Generation, DocuSign, an e-signature transaction management company, faced a very typical marketing issue — bringing new leads into the top of the funnel, and then once those leads are generated, building a pipeline through to that final conversion.”

She said, “I think it is better if you’re able to build a relationship, and build a community of people coming to you for content.”

Eisenberg added, “The goal of this particular project was to build out a sales guru community of people engaging and talking about the pain that they were feeling, and working with others to deliver solutions to those pains.”

“A very typical marketing problem is generating leads and then creating a Marketing/Sales pipeline, and a common goal is looking to build a community to draw new leads in and keep them engaged through the pipeline.”

“If you think this is going to be a typical lead generation case study, think again, because Eisenberg and her team uncovered a very novel channel to execute this campaign.”

by David Kirkpatrick, Senior Reporter, marketingsherpa

Read more: http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article/case-study/b2b-linkedin-webinar-strategy

Ken Jondahl‘s insight:

It is refreshing to find a case study focused on a B2B company who used the resources of a social site to help fill the top of the funnel.

The tactics and strategies used are applicable to almost any B2B business. Providing you can find potential propsects based on title, geography, and company within LinkedIn.

What I like the most is LInkedIn’s "60 day lock on InMail usage by email". This prevents abuse of this unique capability providing they don’t change their mind to increase revenue in the future.

See on www.marketingsherpa.com

Social Media and StorySelling, Part 2: Back to the Future

See on Scoop.it – Story Selling

“In the insightful book Winning the Story Wars, Jonah Sachs  makes a compelling observation that with the emergence of social media, humans are going back to our storytelling roots.”

“The concept of “the survival of the fittest”  is important for marketers today.”

“During the oral tradition, if you told a compelling story, that’s the message that was shared. If your story sucked it didn’t live on.”

“In the broadcast era, it was the battle of the richest. If you spent enough dollars, you could get your message out to the masses regardless of the quality.”

“Anyone who has been involved in social media recognizes that we’re back to “survival of the fittest” era. The Twittersphere or Facebookers will decide whether it’s a compelling message.” by Cameron Uganec

Read more: http://blog.hootsuite.com/social-media-storytelling-2/

Ken Jondahl‘s insight:

In part 2 Camron expands on how the "fittest survive" discussing how quality content which is story based gets shared. This is content built, posted and tracked by HootSuite.

He trickles in the idea of using more time and resources to build content and less resources on media placement. Pointing out a paid component is critical, but more on this in an upcoming post.

Make sure to watch the HootSuite video "Social Media is Sweet". Anything which has received over 185,000 views must connect in some way out there in social land.

There is also a Ted video with Jonah Sachs discussing the movement from the broadcast era to the digitorial era. Which is definetly worth watching if you are in sales and marketing.

As Jonah points out very clearly, there is a fine line between "broadcasting" and telling a compelling story which resonates with your tribe on social media.

Watching the video it reminds me, if you want a very simple test before you post something on line. Prior to posting, ask this question. Who is the hero in the story? If it is your company, not the customer, start over.

See on blog.hootsuite.com

Social Media and Storytelling Part 1: Does Story Selling Work?

See on Scoop.it – Story Selling

“The game has changed. We no longer live in a broadcast era where marketers can simply buy people’s attention with a TV campaign. There are different rules now and we need to earn the attention of our audience.”

 

“From a marketer’s perspective, that means that we’re moving towards pull versus push approach, sometimes referred to as inbound marketing. We can no longer push our messages across, we need to pull customers in with engaging, useful content.” by Cameron Uganec

 

Read more: http://blog.hootsuite.com/social-media-storytelling-1/

Ken Jondahl‘s insight:

I like how Cameron discusses it is not businesses connecting with consumers in B2C. It is people connecting with people.

 

In B2B, Mike Bosworth coined the phrase H2H. To survey and thrive in todays economy as a sales person. We need to make sure our approaches are Human to Human. Make a connection first and focus on the customers needs by using the power of story.

 

HootSuite has definetly adopted the power of story. Watch the short video which explains in a visual story how "Social Media Saves the Holidays".

 

Another great video on the page is the introduction of Apple back in 1984. And to think, many people believe traditional marketing never used story. Most of the best examples of tactics and strategies from the best in class companies start with story.

 

Content marketing is not about filling pages with boring stuff. Make it come alive by using the power of story. Especially in social media B2B marketing where people are looking for information which resonates with them, not you as the author.

 

 

See on blog.hootsuite.com

A B2B social media case study on Facebook

See on Scoop.it – Social Media B2B Marketing

“I recently came across an extraordinary presentation on the topic of B2B social media from Social Media Week Copenhagen. The presenter was Jonathan Wichmann, social media manager for Maersk Line.”

 

“You may or may not be familiar with Maersk Line. They are the largest container shipping company in the world, which while impressive is probably less interesting than many superstar companies of social media.”

 

“What I appreciate about Jonathan and his team at Maersk Line is their transparency. In his talk he laid out a lot of their process and philosophy on B2B social media that many businesses might guard as proprietary. For a company in such a competitive environment to be so forthcoming is pretty special. I recommend listening to his talk and understanding their best practices for yourself.” by Jim Dougherty

 

Read more: http://leaderswest.com/2013/04/01/a-case-study-in-best-in-class-b2b-social-media/

Ken Jondahl‘s insight:

This is a worthwhile article to read if you come from a heavy industry and are wondering, "how the heck would we use social media?".

 

One of the strategies used by Jonathan and his team is to make sure they are not "selling" on Facebook. They want to develop their employees as thought leaders in their fields. Building personal connections with prospects and customers to encourage them to reach to out to Maresk when a business need in their company develops.

 

Another interesting point is around customer care. "Jonathan commented  that many customer service issues are answered by fans before the customer care team can intervene."

 

See on leaderswest.com

Social Media B2B Marketing | 3 Success Stories

See on Scoop.it – Social Media B2B Marketing

“Social media is often undervalued in the world of business to business marketing. Learn how three companies bucked this trend and reaped the rewards – and why you should be doing the same”

 

“Let’s take a look at three different B2B organizations which have made successful use of social media.” by Julie Barsamian

 

Read more: http://www.bluefountainmedia.com/blog/3-ways-social-media-empowers-b2b-marketing/

Ken Jondahl‘s insight:

The 3 companies discussed in the article are:

 

UPS – On Facebook and Twitter

Maersk Line – Facebook

SAP – Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn

 

Both UPS and SAP integrated social media with their traditional marketing activies providing a common look and feel across all platforms. In addition, utilizing all of the media created many times over.

 

One example is the TV ads were converted to video’s and posted appropriately on various sites. Allowing them to capture more exposure and greatly extend the life of each piece created.

 

The other thing both companies did was to use "verbs", not "nouns" to discuss their offerings in a story format. The content created was not "about it", it was "about what can be accomplished". The use of a story format around business needs resonates much more with prospects and customers.

 

Not every company can spend the type of money used on either of the above campaigns. Learn from and utilize those pieces of the programs which make sense in your own social media B2B marketing.

See on www.bluefountainmedia.com

Marketo’s Jason Miller | Social Media B2B Marketing on Facebook | Always be Helping

See on Scoop.it – Social Media B2B Marketing

We caught up with Jason Miller, Marketo’s social media strategist, at the Marketo Summit Conference to talk Facebook business-to-business marketing and spill his best tips to drive leads.

 

Yu: Jason, think fast – name five purple things.

Miller: Barney, Grimace, crayons, eggplant, and Jon Miller’s shoes.

Yu: Awesome. How important is a sense of humor in social marketing?

 

Miller: I believe it’s vital. On Facebook, you have to showcase your personality by having a comedian on your marketing team. Then, you’re golden. He comes up with clever and catchy jokes to post, and he ties them back to a business offer with your company. And Dennis, believe me when I say we’ve seen dramatic success with that approach.

 

Yu: I believe you, but most folks say they’re not so  sure. (Interview by Dennis Yu, CEO BlitzMetrics)

 

Read more: http://allfacebook.com/marketos-jason-miller-on-facebook-for-b2b-why-so-serious_b117197

Ken Jondahl‘s insight:

Marketo continues to hit it out of the park in terms of being one of the fastest growing small companies. Plus, they are successful in social media.

 

As Jason says, "Folks often say I market to marketers, and that’s not quite B2B. But, trust me, this is coming from the trenches. It’s coming from a lot of trial and error. I know what tactics and strategies work."

 

His advice, use what is successfull with others on Facebook. Start with case studies and don’t be afraid to try new things. Such as being fun and engaging.

 

Their audience is engaged with visual lighthearted posts. They have a calendar they post to, which is daily.

 

Their objective is "not" to qualify the suspect as a sales lead. Their primary objective is to make a connection, get the suspect to sign up for a newsletter and begin nurturing the suspect with appropriate content for the top of the funnel. The nurturing content is fed by newsletter signup, not via Facebook.

 

Marketo believes the marketing lead will turn themselves into a sales lead if nurtured properly. If not, they continue to nurture them until the time is right on the prospects side of the buy-sell cycle, not on Marketo’s timing.

 

Many companies have tossed out the old Always Be Closely style of sales. At Marketo, they walk the talk of "Always Be Helping".

 

Recommendation, review what Marketo is doing on their social sites and determine if any of the tactics and strategies will work for your company. Plus, Jason named a number of social media B2B marketing people to consider following in the article.

 

 

 

 

See on allfacebook.com

Can Social B2B Marketing Help Improve the Customer Experience?

See on Scoop.it – Social Media B2B Marketing

“The days when you can control your brand through your website are long gone. Customers are getting information about your brand and products through a number of different channels and if you aren’t listening and engaging these channels, you won’t only miss new business opportunities, but will quickly see the competition pass you by.”

 

“While some form of social in any enterprise setting is now commonplace, just because you add a social feature to your application doesn’t mean that you have transformed into a social business and are succeeding in using social to improve the customer experience.”

 

“Doing social for social sake won’t get you anywhere. Organizations must move beyond a social checklist and truly understand how to connect, collaborate and improve customer experiences and then act.” By John Newton, (@johnnewton)

 

Read more: http://www.cmswire.com/cms/social-business/the-customer-centric-social-business-is-going-to-happen-021346.php

See on news.google.com

For Sales: Learn How Nursing Uses Storytelling

See on Scoop.it – Story Selling

“There’s a lot of buzz around the action of “storytelling.” It’s a trendy term.

 

“Some marketers hijack storytelling as the art nouveau of their work. I suppose that’s fine, but it still rings generic.”

 

“Nurses, we live storytelling. Our work is storytelling. The intimacy in the care we provide is like a Bob Dylan song because storytelling doesn’t have to be the feel-good, inspire-the-world marketing scheme. It’s a lived life.”

 

“Storytelling—good storytelling—encompasses the grit and the grime. It is the real, and yes, sometimes it is happy, but sometimes it’s about suffering and pain and a mixture of all those things.”

 

[The Storyteller, photo by Steve Evans]

See on centerforhealthmediapolicy.com

A New Way to Sell Through Stories | Mike Bosworth

See on Scoop.it – Story Selling

“I usually don’t get a lot of hands but, how many of your mothers wanted you to be salespeople when you grew up?” asked Mike Bosworth. After a few seconds and a raised hand, he went into his story of when he was a child and talked about how he didn’t want to go into sales.

 

“He has incorporated storytelling into selling products – with enviable results.”

 

“People buy things because they are in control and want to satisfy a need.”  by Beth Pickerill

See on www.indstate.edu

A Positive Customer Experience Requires Listening to Their Needs | Story Selling

See on Scoop.it – Story Selling

“There are two components to listening to needs:”

 

1 – The skills of listening

2 – The importance of understanding people’s needs

 

“Listening and hearing are not the same thing. Most people are born with the ability to hear; but few of us are truly good listeners.”

 

“Well-developed listening skills that include asking good questions, combined with striving to satisfy needs will create long-lasting, trusting relationships with team members, internal colleagues and client/customers.” by Caroline Rowan

 

Read more: http://www.tac-focus.com/article/listening-needs#.UWfwAfMo603

See on www.tac-focus.com