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Archive for Content Marketing

12 Sources of Marketing Automation Content You’ve Already Written

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Wednesday, April 27th, 2011

Ed. Note - We are honored to have Matt Heinz provide this content for our Zephyr 47 Expert Blog Series.  Matt is a recognized leader, author, and speaker on demand generation and sales acceleration.

12 Sources of Marketing Automation Content You’ve Already Written

Matt Heinz with Heinz Marketing

No matter how you’re approaching marketing automation strategies, the single-biggest hurdle for most organizations isn’t the software or the process or the sorting of prospects.  It’s the content.

Effective marketing automation requires a constant stream of relevant, engaging and new content to work.  That content needs to speak to current and prospective customer needs, well beyond what you’re directly selling.

For most organizations, this hurdle keeps them from implementing marketing automation programs and reaping the benefits.  But I’d argue that those same organizations have already written most of the content they need to get started.

Below are 12 sources of content you already have.  I’m guessing there are far more in your unique organization, but these should get you started.

Speeches & Presentations

You probably have a ton of these.  Some may be primarily a set of slides, but there are (or were) talking points behind those.  Check the “notes” section of your PowerPoint decks for pre-written copy.  Avoid product-centric presentations and look instead of for places where you’ve shared a vision, or shared best practices and market expertise.

Customer Service Calls

Every day, you’re helping your customers become more successful.  Every day, your front-line reps are hearing not just specific requests but context – where the problem came from, what it’s solving, what else is affecting the customer’s day and decisions.  Much of this is ripe for translating into customer-centric marketing automation content.  If your customer service team is regularly logging customer service calls in a CRM system, that’s a gold mine for content.

Discussion Forum Topics & Contributors

There’s no rule that says your content needs to be completely self-generated.  If you regularly read or participate in customer discussion forums, find those who like to write the most and have the most to say.  Take snippets of their content and ask permission to use it in your marketing.  If positioned right, they’ll likely be excited you’ve chosen them and will help promote the republished content for you to other prospective customers.

Your Vendors & Suppliers

They’re addressing the same target audient and market, and many of them will have content as well.  Tell them you want to help promote their brand and services via your marketing channels, and all you need is some of their pre-written content.

Customer Blogs & Newsletters

Why not feature other customers directly?  Or even prospects?  Helping prospective customers get access to the insights and expertise of their peers is a great way to fill your marketing channels with quality content, most of which is pre-written and ready to go.  This is also a great way to build deeper relationships with those current customers, and potentially get access to their blogs, newsletters and channels to reach additional prospects down the road.

Trade Press

I don’t know about you, but I rarely have enough time to keep up with all of the trade publications I want to read.  If someone could do the reading for me, and feature the best, most relevant articles for me, I’d be grateful.  That’s your opportunity as well by publishing a regular “In The News” section as part of your marketing content.  Third-party news is also a great way to feature more relevant content in Twitter and other social channel feeds.

Written Responses to Customer Questions

Do you have a database of pre-written responses to customer questions?  Is your customer service team writing custom responses to customers on a daily basis?  Many of these are going to be tactical and not relevant to a wider audience, but you don’t need more than a couple good pieces a day to have a steady flow of great, already-written content that needs just some copyediting before it can be republished elsewhere.

Training Materials

How to use the product isn’t your best bet, but how often are you teaching your customers about broader themes and topics?  If you’re selling marketing automation software, for example, your training probably includes basic overviews of how marketing automation works.  Best practices from other clients.  How marketing automation fits into a broader sales pipeline strategy.  These topics and more are likely already written and packaged elsewhere in your organization.   Find them.

White Papers, Buying Guides & Other Lead Generation Assets

If you’ve been marketing your product or service for awhile, you probably have lead generation offer assets that aren’t active anymore.  White papers, presentations, buying guides – tools you perhaps don’t perform optimally from a response-rate standpoint but might be perfect to fill marketing automation content channels.

Sales Scripts

Your sales team has a ton of these.  Different customer types, different industries, different approaches.  These will likely need a bit more editing to be appropriate for a marketing channel, but the hard work of originating content will have already been done.

Case Studies

If your case-studies are written from a customer point of view, with your product or service as the enabler of a broader set of success achieved, these can be great.  They’re proof of concept for what you’re doing in the field.

What other sources of content have you found around your business, already written or near ready to go?

About The Author

Matt Heinz is a national speaker and author, and his most recent book is Successful Selling. He is President of Heinz Marketing Inc, a Seattle area Marketing Agency focusing on Sales Acceleration. Matt’s career has focused on delivering measurable results for his employers and clients in the way of greater sales, revenue growth, product success and customer loyalty.

Categories : Content, Content Marketing, Demand Generation, Expert Guest Blog, Marketing Automation
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Content Marketing Strategy – Fuel for Marketing Automation Success

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Monday, April 11th, 2011
Ed. Note: The following content and nine additional tips for marketing automation success are available in our latest white paper.  You can download the paper here.

Content is often the most overlooked and underestimated ingredient for a successful marketing automation strategy. A well run marketing organization must have an annual campaign strategy and calendar, regardless of whether or not a marketing automation system is employed. Without a strategy and calendar, lead flow will be inconsistent and the content requirements will be unknown. Without content, the campaigns won’t get off the ground and the investment in marketing automation will be wasted.
Consider the content required to run campaigns for leads at various stages in the buying cycle. And from there additional content will be required to support nurturing campaigns that help prevent leakage in the marketing funnel. Depending on which industry in B2B marketing, there will be different individuals at a target company that will require content suited to their roles and influence. Develop the right content for the right audience to be delivered at the right time using a marketing automation platform.

Educational Content—Information designed to help prospective customers better understand the segment and solution. Well developed content that educates also establishes credibility. Industry reports, webinars, keynote event presentations, blogs, social media user groups, and white papers are excellent formats for educational content.

Awareness Content— As prospective customers become more educated on the segment and solutions they will evaluate how vendors address their needs. In addition to the formats used with educational content, customer evidence through case studies is fantastic in this area. Also, content that focuses on “how-to” or “best-practices” is a perfect fit in this area.

Affirmation Content— As leads are nurtured into opportunities for sales follow up, they need information that helps lead them to a confident purchase decision. This is the area where vendors can define the terms of an evaluation that competitors must follow. Develop an RFP model or template. Provide more case studies and best practices. ROI models are also valuable and help develop a business case. The goal here is to build confidence that YOU are the right one to work with.

Loyalty Content— The sale has been won but now is not the time for complacency. Develop the content and delivery channels that help your hard-earned customers squeeze every drop of value from your solution. The more value you provide with strong communications and content, the stronger the relationship and the less chance of a defection.

Not all content is created equally. Make sure the right content is provided to your customers and leads at the right time in their buying process. When done properly using marketing automation, you will build credibility, awareness, and set the standard your competition must react to in order to keep up. That’s a position of strength!

Categories : Content, Content Marketing, Content Publishing, Content Strategies, Marketing Automation
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White Paper – 10 Keys to Maximize your Investment in Marketing Automation

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Thursday, March 3rd, 2011

Zephyr 47 has published a new white paper to help organizations maximize their investment in marketing automation.

The white paper is FREE and you can DOWNLOAD HERE

Maximize Your Marketing Automation Investment

Don’t make the mistake of using a marketing automation platform purely as an expensive e-mail marketing system. Follow these ten keys outlined by the marketing automation experts from Zephyr 47 to get the most from your purchase to drive more revenue and be a strategic hero for your business.

10 keys to success are provided in this 2011 white paper, including:

  • Executive Sponsorship
  • Metrics that show impact to revenue
  • Training
  • Content marketing
  • Demand generation strategy
  • Data management and integrity
  • And more!

DOWNLOAD HERE


More Information on Zephyr 47′s Marketing Automation Services

Categories : Content Marketing, Content Publishing, Marketing Automation, Strategic Marketing
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Teamsource to Meet Content Marketing Challenge

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Monday, January 24th, 2011

Developing content for  for demand generation and marketing campaigns presents one of the largest challenges our clients face. Marketing automation platforms provide a shiny fast and luxurious jet to deliver powerful messages in style.  But without any fuel the jet can’t take off.

One of the more popular terms to emerge lately is “Crowdsourcing” which openly calls for a group of people to help meet a challenge and solve a problem.  In the past these tasks and objectives may have been limited to employees. Crowdsourcing is an excellent approach to developing content for demand generation and customer engagement programs.  Especially when employing a marketing automation platform.  (Without getting into semantic debates, Crowdsourcing almost has chaotic connotations, especially when developing high value content for demand generation and customer engagement campaigns. Teamsourcing seems better coordinated!)

We recommend a Teamsource Approach for developing content.  Their are two areas marketing managers and marketing operations experts can source content.  Inter-sources and Intra-sources.

The bottom line is marketing departments are slimmer with fewer personnel.  Yet the demands are higher than ever before to produce a high quality lead flow through the funnel. (versus high quantity) Where can these marketing managers develop and marketing the content required to launch their marketing campaigns?

Content is The Fuel for Your Marketing Campaigns

Jet Fuel Depot #1: Intra-Teamsource

  • Internal subject experts such as product marketing and product managers
  • CxO and VP executives (no ivory tower mentality allowed with the big shots. They SHOULD contribute content.)
  • Product support and engineering

Jet Fuel Depot #2: Inter-Teamsource

  • Channel partners – many B2B companies have channel, VAR and distribution partners.  These firms are staffed and run by subject experts in their particular industry or segment.  These experts are ripe sources for providing high value content from papers, presentations, case studies, deployment guides, podcasts, and more.  The channel partners benefit from the exposure and credibility.
  • Customers - The power of strong relationships with customers provide opportunities for sources of high value content.  Customers can provide testimonials, presentations, case studies, white papers, interviews, and more.  Get creative!

The days of a single marketing communications writer or manager producing all content for an organization are over.  Teams from inside and outside an organization must all contribute high value content to help connect with customers.

Categories : Content Marketing, Content Publishing, Content Strategies, Crowdsource, Demand Generation, Teamsource
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Q4 Funnel Fiber – 4 Steps to Accelerate End of Year Revenue

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Friday, November 12th, 2010

The fourth quarter of a fiscal year for any organization is commonly the best performing in terms of sales and revenue generation.  It doesn’t matter if the fiscal year follows a calendar year or a variation like Microsoft’s that ends in June.

The challenge for marketing and sales is filling and clearing the funnel with the most qualified opportunities to meet sales expectations.  If managed properly, this process should begin proactively early in the annual planning process with a campaign schedule.  Sadly, too many organizations still operate with a sense of panic in the last fiscal quarter, when a sense of focused urgency is better.

So how can an organization work to nurture the best opportunities in the shortest period of time and clear the funnel for end of year success?  Here are four ideas to consider.

1. Focus on Accelerating Evaluation Cycles and Validating Purchase Decisions

Well designed demand generation strategies should include ongoing lead nurturing campaigns.  Statistically however prospects in the early awareness stage may not bring the accelerated sales for some B2B organizations in the fourth quarter.  Of course this depends on the length of the buying/sales cycle.  The demand generation team should collaborate with the sales teams to focus efforts on the leads that are further into the sales funnel where an evaluation is fully underway and a purchase decision is pending.  The tipping point for these opportunities may be high value content that helps conclude an evaluation and validates the purchase decision as the right one.  This leads to the second point….

2. Re-purpose & Re-use Existing Content

Q4 may not always be the best time to kick off major content development projects such as white papers, new development of flash demos, etc.  However there may be existing high value content that can easily be re-purposed and re-used in multiple formats.  For example, re-purpose, edit and reformat white paper content into blog posts, webinar, podcasts, simple YouTube videos or Slideshare presentations.  This content can be targeted to the leads further in an evaluation stage or a purchase validation stage.  Don’t reinvent the wheel or kick off major content projects if the time, people, and money don’t allow for it.

3. Reporting and Analysis

The saying “if you can’t measure, you can’t manage” applies here.  Proper reporting should be an ongoing practice but it is especially important in the fourth quarter.  Demand generation teams and sales management can both benefit from increased reporting frequency in the fourth quarter.  Reports from marketing automation and CRM systems can identify bottlenecks in forecasts and funnels.  Additionally, reporting can highlight performance issues with individual sales representatives and channel partners.  (I do not mean to imply Big Brother monitoring. Reporting can identify positive opportunities for performance coaching and improvement.) Focus on the right data.  Click-throughs and impressions are meaningless unless presented with an explicit direct correlation to how they impact revenue.

4. Chicago ‘Voting Style’ Communication – Early and Often

One of the single biggest causes of collaboration and relationship breakdown between sales and marketing teams is poor communication.  The marketing and demand generation teams should always prepare sales for upcoming promotions, campaigns, supporting content and tools.  The communication should reflect up to minute reporting and analysis of funnel flow should be reported frequently as well as the sales forecast.  Don’t rely exclusively on email or portals for these communication sessions.  With the right frequency, these session can be brief and (ideally) should be in person or on conference calls.  (And sales managers, don’t blow off these meetings without notice.  Sorry to typecast, but I have to call that out because it happens a lot.) With the proper focus on influential and purchase-validating content, the funnel and forecast should reflect progression.

Let us know your thoughts on these 4 Steps to Accelerate End of Year Revenue.  What practices does your organization use? What are your lessons learned?

Categories : Content Marketing, Content Strategies, Demand Generation, Lead Nurturing, Lead Scoring, Marketing Automation, Metrics
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Evolve or Die: 5 Ways Communications Pros Must Adapt (Guest Blog from Eloqua)

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Monday, August 30th, 2010

(Intro-Note: Zephyr 47 is proud and honored to post this guest blog from Joe Chernov who is Eloqua’s Director of Content.  Joe is pioneering new methods to develop and deliver content in ways that connect businesses with customers. An example of his efforts is the brilliant Eloqua Content Grid infographic he developed with JESS3.  We look forward to your comments and feedback on this post! -BH)

Evolve or Die: 5 Ways Communications Pros Must Adapt

By Joe Chernov, Director of Content, Eloqua

Joe Chernov - Eloqua's Director of Content

The publishing industry is like a keystone species: It has a disproportionate impact on its ecosystem.  As magazines and newspapers find themselves on the endangered list, the survival of surrounding industries – most notably corporate communications – relies on their ability to adapt.  Without newspapers and magazines through which to tell their employers’ stories, PR professionals have migrated to the social Web (thus the staggering numbers of self-described social media experts).  But to focus solely on social media is to miss the larger impact that publishing’s decline is having on the marketing ecosystem.  Following are five ways the communications industry must adapt if it’s to survive.

1. Aesthetics. Ironically, the demise of print publishing has given rise to more channels than ever before.  In fact, every marketer has the potential become his own distribution outlet.  This surge in channels has, predictably, created a white noise effect: the more people are talking, the less they are listening.  Rather than “talking” louder (e.g., issuing more press releases), communications professionals should learn a new language:  design.  The way content looks correlates positively to its perceived value, which in turn, causes spread.  PR pros should refashion themselves as “’aestheticizers’ of content” if they are going to be heard in the crowded auditorium.

2. Celebrity. Traditional advertising has corroded trust.  Ads have lied to consumers for too long.  The next era of communications gives companies a fresh opportunity to repair this relationship.  But businesses can only do so by becoming more “human” themselves, and the most direct path is to catapult select staffers to celebrity status.  Ford Motors has a market cap of nearly $40 billion, yet hundreds of thousands of people trust the company just a little more because of one guy: Scott Monty.  The idea that an everyday employee could have a tangible impact on the trustworthiness of a brand was inconceivable just a couple years ago.  Ford understands that people trust people much more than they trust logos.

3. Question. Traditionally, the role of the PR person was to answer questions, sometimes sensitive questions that were not in the best interest of senior executives to answer (thereby earning the nickname “flack”).  But the next generation communicator must also be proficient at asking questions. Posing public questions to customers, influencers and even competitors is a trigger to get other people talking about the brand. It’s fire-starting in its most basic form.

4. Links. The “clip book” – a binder containing all of the articles secured on the PR person’s watch – has become so obsolete that the words alone look anachronistic.  But that doesn’t mean communications leaders shouldn’t keep score.  There is simply a new point system: links.  One of the new and varied responsibilities of the PR pro is to create and inspire others to create inbound links, anchored off of a company’s most vital terms, throughout the Web.  Think of it as the clip book 2.0.

5. Support. Customer support and corporate communications once represented opposite points on a string: the former consisted of a specific message delivered to an individual, whereas the latter employed a broad message broadcast to many. Social media has bent that string, bringing those points together.  Because support now takes place in public, it has become its own form of marketing.  Marketers need to align with support staff, because they are the same team.  PR agencies should develop a service that caters specifically to their clients’ support departments.

Evolve or die.  It’s not only the law of nature, but also the law of business.  My question to marketing and communications professionals is this: As print publishing nears extinction, how are you planning to adapt?

Z47 Editor’s Note: Joe can be followed on Twitter @jchernov

Categories : Communications, Content Marketing, Content Publishing, Content Strategies, Eloqua, Expert Guest Blog
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The Content Grid from Eloqua/JESS3 – A Brilliant Model

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Sunday, June 20th, 2010
The swirl and excitement around social media, social networking, and social media marketing (they are each unique) creates many new opportunities to engage customers, partners, families, friends, and ‘communities.  There are many great stories of how organizations are using different channels of social media to network and engage their constituents.  Yet with nearly every SM event or discussion I participate in I always hear the question on who OWNS social media in an organization.  Answers come up that the communications team, PR, or marketing should OWN all social media.  All of these answers are WRONG.

Eloqua has developed a brilliant Content Grid with superior illustration from JESS3.  The Content Grid very clearly illustrates an organizational content framework including the different types of content, the channels, the ownership, and the audience.  In my opinion the Eloqua Grid is equal to Geoffrey Moore’s model from “Crossing the Chasm” in both brilliance and clarity.  I want to write about it here to help proliferate the model and also help my SM and marketing colleagues envision how they can use this model to work with their organizations and clients.  I have the grid posted below and it also available from Eloqua’s blog site written by their director of content marketing, Joe Chernov.

Here why I like this model and why it is valuable:

1.  Social Media is a functional component of an overall marketing and business strategy.

2.  Content is a macro-organizational responsibility.  No single group owns ALL of the content or CHANNELS.  Content delivery involves both centralized and decentralized channels with different objectives.

3. Content comes in different flavors with different audiences and different functions.  The content that build awareness is unique from the content that helps a customer support their buying decision.  Additionally, existing customers will have different content needs than prospects in the awareness stage.

4. Hyper-Focus on ROI is minimized or eliminated.  We have all struggled with the ROI Question related to content strategies and social media engagements.  The Eloqua Content Grid illustrates to business managers and executives where content fits into the overall business and marketing strategy.  If executives still need to focus on ROI, ask how they measure the ROI of email.  A better discussion is the opportunity cost of NOT developing and implementing a content strategy.

Major kudos to the Eloqua team for publishing this grid.  In this case a picture is worth a million words.  Let me know your thoughts.

Cheers,

Brian Hansford

President

Zephyr 47

Categories : Content Marketing, Content Strategies, Social Media, Strategic Marketing
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Using Facebook as Your Newswire – Some Great Examples

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Monday, April 12th, 2010

Businesses struggle to understand social media channels and whether to use them for marketing, communications, or community support – or a combination of the three.  There are so many “gurus” and “experts” with tulip-bubble hype that it’s easy to understand the confusion.  The principles of strong planning and with objectives are still required when using these channels.

Facebook often generates the most hype.  I find I am using Facebook more and more for a newswire that keeps me connected with groups or businesses I care about.  Businesses, non-profits, clubs, television shows, journalists, politicians and agencies of all types use Facebook in some way to communicate with, support and market to their intended audience.  I want to briefly profile four organizations that successfully use Facebook as a newswire to connect with their intended audience – in this case, ME!  These groups each do the following well to keep me engaged:

  1. Consistent and Compelling Content Updates
  2. Opportunities for Comments
  3. Integrated Entry Point for More Information and Action

National Public Radio

  • http://www.NPR.org
  • 750,000+ “Facebook Fans”

NPR is a non-commercial provider of some of the best news reporting, commentary and even entertainment of any media channel in the world.  I listen to NPR news on weekday mornings usually to catch headlines for the day. When I check my Facebook account I see frequent updates of some of their more interesting and unique reports.  I don’t always click through but I find NPR’s use of Facebook helps keep me connected to them.  Often I will tune into their webcast to catch a special report as a result of how NPR uses Facebook as a newswire.

Boy Scouts of America

  • http://www.Scouting.org
  • 61,000+ Facebook Fans

Boy Scouts is a fantastic organization for boys all over the world and I am proud to support them in my community.  The BSA effectively uses Facebook as a newswire and communication channel for everything on events, outings, merit badges, profiles on successful scouts and details on the 100th anniversary of Scouting.  The frequent newswire updates help keep me engaged with the BSA on a macro level and I often point out news to my family based on what I read from Facebook.  From these updates, I can take action to visit the Scouting site to gather more detailed information.

The Officer Down Memorial Page

  • http://www.ODMP.org
  • 110,000+ “Facebook Fans”

The Officer Down Memorial Page, Inc., (ODMP) is a non-profit organization dedicated to honoring America’s fallen law enforcement heroes.  Receiving updates from this group keeps me connected to the sacrifices our police make to protect our communities.  This is deeply personal to me as a lifelong friend who is a police officer was shot and seriously wounded last year.  Washington State has had a very sad year with too many police officers being shot and killed.  Whenever I feel like I’m having a bad day and see an update from this page, my perspective changes.  This organization also provides information on how to take action to support families who have lost their loved ones.

Cannon Beach Surf

Cannon Beach, Oregon is a very special town best recognized as the home of the iconic Haystack Rock.  This a an annual vacation destination for my family and we always make a point to visit Cannon Beach Surf to stock up on new surf clothing and gear.  The owner is a fantastic guy with an awesome sense of humor and incredible customer and community focus.  For their newswire use of Facebook, I especially enjoy the daily beach photos which keeps me emotionally connected to the shop and the town.  While CBS may not have thousands of “Facebook Fans” they do a great job with their content updates and entertaining commentary.


Newswire Connections

Facebook group/fan pages aren’t for every organization but they can provide powerful ways to deliver content and make newswire connections.  Facebook is littered with tons of the carcasses of group/fan pages that aren’t maintained or updated with compelling content.  Those organizations would be better served to not even put a page up if they can’t maintain them.

Find how you can integrated this into an overall customer communications and marketing strategy.  What are the desired outcomes and objectives?  What is the content maintenance plan?  Who will manage this?  Do your customers care?   Build the business case and then determine what is right for your organization.

Categories : Facebook, Marketing Communications, Social Media
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Are You Listening to Me?

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Wednesday, March 31st, 2010

When was your last really great experience you had as a customer?  Were your expectations EXCEEDED?  When was the last disappointing experience?  What are the ratio of great experiences to disappointments?  How much of your great experience was based on understanding your needs thanks to great listening or even you yourself listening to a satisfied customer?

In the latest bubble fad with social media, I experience more broadcast messages and not as much listening.  I see lots of “me too” chatter that pushes content for the sake of, well, pushing content.  Companies are eager to “tell their story” over and over and over and over…yet, are they really listening to the customer in return?  Or, are they even letting customers talk to each other to share knowledge and experience?  Most often I see how companies want to publish tons of content in order to help prospects make a buying decision or to get existing customers to buy more.  There is certainly a place for this.  But in many ways this is like the new era of publishing brochureware.  Remember the days when marketing departments measured success on the amount of collateral or PR sent to the wire?  (See my previous post “Smarter, Faster, Stronger with Marketing Automation”)  Companies that don’t have a well planned customer marketing strategy that focuses on the right balance of broadcasting and listening will win.  Those that simply broadcast will die.

Amazon.com Gets It

I am a loyal customer to Amazon.com.  I have purchased a vast array of products from them for 13 years.  One of the most valuable services they provide are customer reviews and ratings.  I have caught myself many times when I was ready to purchase based on some manufacturer’s broadcast hype and then I read multiple customer reviews that provided sobering reality.  Even though Amazon isn’t the manufacturer, they open the kimono and sit in silent neutrality when customers want to share information – good or bad.  Amazon’s fellow customers help me be an Amazon customer.

Before getting into the classic marketing cycle of broadcasting messages and storytelling, remember that half of the conversation is listening.

  • Provide easy avenues for feedback.
  • Let your customers talk to each other.
  • Respond rapidly with inquiries.
  • Confirm that the right information was provided.
  • Admit when mistakes are made.
  • Fix the mistakes.
  • Let your customers sell to your customers.  BINGO!

The organizations that do marketing the best are the ones who understand when to be quiet and listen and let other customers sell for them.

Quiet please.  Time to listen.

Categories : Content Marketing, Customer Marketing
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Extend Your Marketing Campaigns with Social Media

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Tuesday, March 30th, 2010

I work with marketing colleagues every week in businesses of all shapes and sizes who try to distinguish the hype from the reality when using social media with customer marketing campaigns.  Sadly the marketing ethos is loaded with “social media gurus” and “experts” who offer little more than gimmicks for MLM marketing and Google adwords campaigns while professing the need to “tell stories” in order to engage customers.  (Insert gag reflex here)  Typically these self-described experts don’t work to understand the voice of the customer or identify the objectives and goals and the strategy to achieve them. Don’t abandon sound planning by randomly throw spaghetti on the wall to see what sticks! (I recently wrote about Desired Outcomes and the SOSTAC method for effective planning and execution.)

A Model Worth Trying – Using Social Media to Support Marketing Campaigns

I recently implemented a high performing B2B social media and web campaign strategy for a B2B technology company which effectively extended e-mail campaigns and a newly branded web site.  These campaigns were automated and integrated with a CRM system and metrics were captured using a BI tool and Google Analytics.

The objectives were to re-connect with a large and passionate global community of customers and partners.  The supporting goals were to increase overall organic search performance, web site traffic, and lead conversion rates for annual campaigns and nurturing programs.  The expectations were high but achievable.  A critical strategic component of the overall plan was extending the web site site with focused and manageable social media channels which included a Facebook Group, Twitter page, YouTube channel and a blog that provided high value content for a specific customer segment.

Following the strategic campaign calendar, we structured the social media channels to support campaigns in this manner:

1.  Campaign Landing Pages: Campaign Theme and Content Toolkit that provided free downloads for basic content or required forms for higher value content.

2. Website: The homepage had a specific section dedicated to promoted the latest campaign with compelling content and a call to action.

3. Blog: Provided high-value content that described a real world application of the technology solution which may include best practices or a customer case study.  We ALWAYS had a call to action at the end of the blog to encourage commentary or to “learn more, download our podcast/white paper/assessmeent tool, etc.

4. Twitter: Promote the latest blog entry or case study or other high value content using targeted hashtags and bit.ly links.  Bit.ly links provide a high level method for measuring click through rates.

5. Facebook Group: This was used to promote the latest content or events with direct links back to the web site or blog in order to encourage conversions and engagement.

6. YouTube Channel: For each campaign we promoted supporting content on our YouTube channel.  This was designed as high value informative content which included a call to action to visit the web site or campaign landing page.

7. Marketing Automation: The cohesive component that tied each of these channels together was the use of a marketing automation system.  We were able to measure the conversion rates on every channel from the initial email, the landing pages, blogs, web site.

We found these extra channels extended our campaign reach beyond our standard in-house and 3rd party email lists and significantly increased conversion rates.  There were a number of reasons for this:

1. Improved organic search performance. On specific keyword searches, we had more content available from multiple channels which displaced competitors deeper into search results.  More content was made available and was easier to find.
2. Contacts had more options to experience content at their pace. When they were ready to engage more directly, they would complete simple forms to reveal their identities.  Our prospects were better informed and more highly qualified when they engaged with sales.
3. More engagement based on problem solving inquiries and information sharing. Our customers, prospects, and partners engaged in different ways taking advantage of new forums and channels.  Prospects found ways to connect with us instead of only talking with a sales representative.  Our partners provided valuable information and commentary on best practices or product information.

This is basic model that can deliver results with proper planning and implementation and high value content.  I would like to hear how you extend your campaigns with social media channels.

Categories : Customer Marketing, Marketing Campaigns, Marketing Communications, Social Media, Social Media Marketing
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“Here at Isilon, we have a growing dependence upon and sophistication with our marketing automation solution and its integration with CRM to support global marketing campaigns. Zephyr47 has provided us with high quality, timely and affordable program support, enabling us to expand both the type and number of digital marketing programs launched concurrently.”
~ Michael Korch, Sr. Marketing Operations Manager, Isilon Systems a division of EMC

“Zephyr 47 is a great resource to augment our in-house marketing staff. They have developed concise messaging, targeted outreach programs and professional marketing material. I would highly recommend Zephyr 47 based on their commitment to produce deliverables on time and budget and the quality of their work.”

~ John A. Novell, SVP, Safeharbor Knowledge Solutions

RSSTwitter: Zephyr47

Integrated Demand Generation

Accelerate your revenue with marketing campaigns that use the right combination of content, social media, and marketing automation. Reach the right audience at the right time in their buying cycle.

Marketing Automation

Automation services enable marketing organizations to work smarter, faster, and stronger. Increase customer conversions and deliver more highly qualified leads to your sales organization.

Strategic Social Media

Develop a social media strategy to integrates the right channels for listening and engaging with your customers. Extend your reach and establish trusted relationships.
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