November 25, 2014 In a previous post, I talked about why marketers need to embrace change to survive in today’s environment. Beyond just surviving, what do content professionals need to thrive and prosper? An agile learning mentality. As we adapt to new behaviors along the evolving buyers’ journey, content marketers have to prepare to draw on new insights and expertise …
November 11, 2014 How buyers buy has changed how we need to think and act as marketers. If you love uncertainty, then being a marketer today feels like being a kid on summer vacation – so many opportunities, ideas and inspiration. But apprehensive marketers are holding onto traditional practices. They think that if they ignore the disruption, they won’t have …
October 14,2014 The Content Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs released their annual research on the state of content marketing. B2B Content Marketing 2015 Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends – North America highlights how far we’ve come in the last 12 months as it relates to the adoption and sophistication of practice in content marketing. I won’t go into details about the research …
September 30, 2014 For all the change that’s taken place in how buyers buy, it’s no wonder that marketers feel uncertain. It’s not just about learning new skillsets and making sure teams are staffed and equipped with enough resources. It’s about realizing, understanding and then doing something about the new roles that we need to have as marketers and marketing …
September 16, 2014 Equipping B2B sales teams with the relevant content that helps them have long-term conversations with buyers is hard. Few marketers understand the strategy behind it and even fewer execute it well. It’s an area that’s vitally important to marketers and was the topic of a panel I moderated last week at Content Marketing World in Cleveland. I …
July 1, 2014 What’s better than sitting in a bland conference room, sun beating through the windows and fluorescent lights buzzing while your boss drones on about a brainstorming session? Probably everything. Brainstorming. It always begins with that cliché, “Remember, there are no bad ideas.” Which actually isn’t true. There are lots of bad ideas: The mullet. Parachute pants. New …
June 17, 2014 It’s hard to imagine a 2014 topic hotter than Jimmy Fallon right now. I mean, who would’ve imagined that lip syncing would have such a come back? But if there’s one, at least in the business world, it’s how to fix the chasm between sales and marketing so companies quit bleeding leads (qualified or not) and customers. Why …
March 31, 2014 There’s a belief that in order to be truly creative, marketers must unshackle themselves from anything that could hinder their process. Give them their creative freedom. Let them have no bounds. The sky’s the limit. FLY ICARUS, FLY! In other words, we want them to “think outside the box.” But marketers are like toddlers on Christmas morning; …
February 17, 2014 As a small-business owner who’s successfully grown my clientele during some of the toughest economic times (I launched my agency in June, 2001), people often ask me how I’ve done it. I tell them it’s about learning the art of asking. I came across this blog post from Jack Canfield, one of America’s top success coaches, who …
If content marketing is supposed to support the sales cycle, why are so many companies bad at it? Too many companies think the answer comes from the right marketing automation system or other technology that gets content in front of a customer or prospect. It’s not. It’s about sales and marketing not having walked the proverbial mile in each other’s …
September 24, 2013 “Let me tell you a story…” is one of the most powerful phrases you hear. Yet while people relish this from Hollywood movies and best-selling authors, they often shun it in the board room. They shouldn’t. Some companies are slowly starting to understand the power of storytelling. Cisco uses it to strengthen its brand through The Network …
August 6, 2013 At the Society for Marketing Professional Services annual conference a few weeks ago in Orlando, people who attended my session asked me how to get executive buy-in on storytelling. My response? Talk to them in their language: money. Successful organizations of all sizes (Fortune 100 to small and medium size) are drawing on storytelling to bring their brands to life …
“Great stories happen to those who can tell them.” – Ira Glass Last week Colorado Biz Magazine published an article I wrote about storytelling and why it always needs to start on the inside of a company, rather than through marketing to the outside audiences. I think as a writer, it’s conversations like the one that his article prompted, and others …
One of the biggest struggles between sales and marketing stems from understanding what sales needs to turn a prospect into a customer and what marketing has the bandwidth to produce. It’s a battle that repeats itself regardless of company size or industry focus. To help remove some of the animosity from the relationship, it helps to have everyone on the …
Last week I wrote a blog post for the Content Marketing Institute about Why Brand Storytelling Must Start With Human Resources. Based on the responses I’ve received, this definitely hit a chord. A colleague of mine is a CMO for a multi-billion dollar technology company, and we talked about the piece. Interestingly, with this of a global size firm, I assumed …
