B2B Marketing Mindset

Not this sh!t again. I swear this get’s asked every six months by the industry rags. Has the “Lean Start Up” model of fail fast and iterate made “strategy” obsolete? Bill Lowell and I answer the question once and for all in this weeks video podcast, The B2B Marketing Mindset – every Thursday at 11am.

Today I’m going to share some of the most pathetic sales attempts in history from folks on LinkedIn. Then, I’ll share a much better way. Lazy, untargeted, generic sales pitches DON’T WORK. Here are a few other things that don’t work: 1. Thirst traps – I don’t care what you look like and I can tell when an image has been faked. 2. Your first message is all about you – what YOU want, what YOU sell, blah blah blah. I don’t care about you. (and neither do your prospects.) 3. No message at all or worse, the default LinkedIn message on connection requests. 4. Complimenting me on how brilliant I am, how my work is astonishing and how badly you want to be friends. (See #1 above) 5. Doing ZERO due diligence to at least ACT like you did more than the absolute minimum.

There are many ways to set sales and/or marketing budgets. Arbitrary – Based on a number out of thin air Historical – Based on what was spent in the past Cash Flow – Budget based on how much money we have right now Data – Based on a deliberate process using Cost of Customer Acquisition and real world estimates. In this episode, I’ll show you the tool my firm uses to figure out a marketing budget that not too high and not too low. Unless you are doing the math, you are essentially guessing. Why is this important? You can spend too little for years and never see a Return on Investment because you don’t build up enough momentum in the market. Year after year of modest spending that produces no measurable impact is a very expensive mistake. Think of sales and marketing as a huge flywheel. It takes more energy to start the flywheel and much less energy the more it spins. You don’t want to overspend either – it’s crucial to find the right balance. The budget amount is based on very unique circumstances with your company and market. Using Cost of Customer Acquisition (CAC) to set a rough marketing budget is a better way than making educated guesses. Of course, there is more to it. Once you’ve set the rough budget – work backwards by getting pricing on the major initiatives and adjust according to what things actually cost. Your rough budget may change or your strategy may change – but that’s OK. This exercise can be run once a quarter to track performance and adjust to market conditions. Remember – nothing in marketing should be set in stone. A good strategy is flexible and adapts to rapidly changing markets. All of Clarity Marketing Support’s MASTER MARKETING offerings include running scenarios and determining the current CAC, average transaction, Customer Lifetime Value (LTV) to dial in a budget that is a perfect fit for your organization at this stage of its growth.

Bringing in an outside facilitator is often thought to be the domain of the Fortune 100/500 crowd, however many small and mid-sized businesses work with facilitators regularly in my experience. Having someone with specific skills in facilitation with added subject matter experience (for example a marketing facilitator) results in team collaborations that work. A skilled facilitator can deliver: 1. Improved team communication and collaboration: Helping team members communicate more effectively and collaborate better leads to better decision-making and more successful initiatives. 2. Increased productivity: A skilled facilitator can help teams stay on track and focus on their goals, leading to greater productivity and efficiency. 3. New perspectives and objectivity: Facilitators bring fresh ideas and objective perspectives to the table, helping teams to think outside the box and solve problems faster. 4. Enhanced problem-solving skills: A facilitator is in the problem solving business – helping identify and address problems and challenges systematically. 5. Improved morale and team dynamics: Working with a facilitator can help team members feel more engaged and valued, leading to a more positive and collaborative team dynamic. Bringing in an experienced facilitator is no longer just for the big guys. Clarity Marketing Support and Business Development Directives facilitate teams of all sizes to make better marketing decisions and executable plans.

What does “value” mean to you and your customers? Can you describe it? I think companies have flogged the word “value” to the point where we have practically lost track of what it actually means to develop, enhance, and deliver VALUE. It’s become a buzzword. Today we talk about the marketing mechanisms and methods to enhance value perception – how the market perceives your offering in terms of its value – however they define it. What is the difference between a $.25 Bic ballpoint pen and a $650 Montblanc? They both do exactly the same thing. How can there be such an insane price difference? Join Pete Monfre and Bill Lowell every Thursday at 11am CST for the B2B Marketing Mindset.

Today we are talking to Amy Erato of WE Benefits about the sometimes controversial Net Promoter Score (NPS) – what it is, how to use it and how she has leveraged it to improve the customer experience. The Net Promoter Score (NPS) measures satisfaction and loyalty by asking customers how likely they are to recommend your product or service to others on a sale of 0-10 – it’s quick, easy and has become somewhat controversial in terms of its value as a key performance indicator.

In this ‘cast Bill Lowell and I discuss one of the biggest challenges in Business-to-Business marketing: Messaging.  Many companies struggle with communicating their true greatness to the market, and developing a clear message is crucial to successful marketing. You’d think after so many years in the business, that developing a solid message for a given company would be easy, but frankly, it isn’t.  The main three boxes to check for a solid message is:  Be different from competitors Be super-relevant to customers pain Be authentic to the value proposition Different from what exactly?  Simple answer: your competition.  When was the last time you visited your competition’s website? If it’s been more than two years (or never) how can you be sure what you are saying is truly different? Keep in mind the competition doesn’t always come in the same form as your business, platform, or software. Like it or not, whatever you offer, an alternative to it exists. There’s also the “invisible competitor,” in which potential customers simply don’t do anything and probably new competitors who are emerging under your radar. This brings us to the second point: “be super-relevant to customers’ pain.” The best way to really understand what might be relevant to customers is to ask them. Customer research is one of the keys to developing or refining a message that inspires and motivates customers.  Being “authentic to the value proposition” is a fancy way of saying, “Whatever you are claiming, it has to be true.” You can’t fake your message. In fact, you need to tick all three of these crucial boxes to have an effective message.  In this week’s podcast we talk about how the human brain makes decisions and how you can unlock how to stand out from the great blue ocean of noise that is the modern B2B market.  Scope out our webinar series here: https://www.eventbrite.com/o/clarity-marketing-support-inc-7831936458

This week’s podcast shares how to properly leverage subject matter experts or “consultants”. Too often clients unknowingly sabotage themselves with regard to deriving value from the work of the consultant, advisor or expert. They don’t know how to USE that third party expertise and apply it to their business in tangible ways. Much of this disconnect is how “consultants” are perceived by many people in the business world due to the poor practices of a few. I can say with confidence that the industry is not inherently shady. The consulting skill set can be used for good or for evil. • You can build an accurate model or a misleading model. • You can wordsmith your way through a meeting or you can have a real conversation. • You can manipulate data or you can analyze it objectively. The vast majority of professional consultants I know (and I know a lot of them) work hard for their clients, care deeply about their success and hold themselves to a very high standard of ethics. Could it be that many clients don’t know how to work with the consultant? (although one could argue that a good consultant will help his/her client get the most from the engagement.) At the same time we have all heard these cliches stated as indisputable fact: “Consultants steal your watch and then bill you to tell you what time it is.” “Consultants just tell you what you already know.” “A consultant is another word for “unemployed middle management.” “Consultants are wildly expensive and only for big companies.” What’s the truth? Join us as we share exactly that and nothing but. We’ll share how to spot a phony BEFORE you hire them and how to really leverage the client/consultant relationship to return multiples on your investment in expertise.

66% of CEO’s report they struggle with imposter syndrome. In this podcast, we discuss the intersection of thought leadership and it’s natural kryptonite “imposter syndrome”. I’ll take an imposter syndrome test live on-air and we’ll share insight from our combined 60 years as thought leaders. If you sell expertise and are working as a thought leader or implementing a thought leadership strategy, you’ll want to join the discussion. Have you felt like an imposter in your professional life? Do you worry about people finding out you “aren’t good enough?” Do you often feel like you don’t deserve the success you have earned? It’s time to tell the truth about marketing.

Today Bill Lowell and I discuss Relationship Marketing. I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard somebody say, “Marketing doesn’t work for us. Our business is all relationship driven.”And I think to myself, “How unfortunate, this otherwise intelligent person has no idea about the potential of using marketing approaches to drive more referrals and maintain longer, more profitable relationships…” Then I realize my mic is hot. But my point still stands.What is marketing but your relationship with the customer? Good marketing strategy starts, nurtures and strengthens relationships – at a tiny fraction of the “cost per touch” of throwing a bunch of sales people at the problem.How many conversations can a salesperson have over the course of a month? 20? 50? 100? How much does that salesperson cost? Six figures? Easy.Let’s say a successful salesperson’s total cost of ownership is around $180k 180K/50 conversations = $3,600 per conversation.Marketing tactics like email, social media, video, websites, PR, community relations et. al can have those conversations with tens of thousands in an instant. Ask a 20-something Instagram influencer. (BTW I also was attractive and skinny when I was in my early 20’s. All you Instafluencers should keep that in mind.)