Marketing Strategy

#7 Hidden Pothole – 7 things every CEO should know about marketing 

It is time to wrap up the “7 things every CEO should know about marketing” series with our final topic, #7 – the hidden pothole that I believe you as a CEO should avoid. What pothole am I talking about? It is the martech pothole (“martech” being the common term used in the industry for marketing & sales enablement technology solutions). Currently, there are over 8,000 martech solutions available (see Figure 1). That is overwhelming […]

2021-05-18T02:29:23+00:00March 17th, 2021|Marketing Strategy, Sales Enablement|

#6 Key Metrics – 7 things every CEO should know about marketing

This is probably the one thing that every CEO wants to know about marketing – what are the best key metrics to use for making marketing investment decisions and then to evaluate those marketing investments. I deliberately did not make this my #1 because the previous posts cover elements that, if not addressed, will greatly influence these key metrics. Now that I have covered those, let’s dive into the key metrics […]

#5 Marketing and Sales Alignment – 7 things every CEO should know about marketing

We have arrived at the #5 thing I believe every CEO should know about marketing. In case you are new to the series, you can find #1 – #4 (The “Ante”, Not all marketing is the same, B2B buyer journey, and B2B website purpose) in our blog.

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#5 is about alignment – specifically marketing and sales alignment around one specific definition. There are certainly many […]

#3: B2B Buyer Journey – 7 things every CEO should know about marketing

This third blog post of the “7 things a CEO needs to know about marketing” series focuses on the B2B buyer journey. You may believe your company sells stuff to the market – like your products or services, however, that is your seller view and not a buyer view. You indeed have products and services, and you definitely engage in activities that lead to sales but the truth is people are buying what they need […]

#2: Not all marketing is the same – 7 things every CEO should know about marketing

Many CEOs tell me about marketing companies that call or email them to sell automated nurture, or paid search, or SEO, or other services that they assure the CEO is what works. There are certainly some marketing tactics that one might consider fundamental to many business operations but the real truth is, and the #2 in my series of 7 things every CEO should know about marketing, tactics that work for […]

A Successful B2B Lead Generation Program – Key Commitments from Marketing & Sales

The goal of any B2B lead generation program is to ultimately generate as many actionable leads as possible for the sales team. There are certainly plenty of topics around an approach, but the one area I want to focus on now is the absolute commitments that marketing and sales must make to each other to create an environment that will produce success.

At the heart of any B2B lead generation program must be an ongoing cycle […]

Best Practices for Today’s Virtual Events

One very obvious phenomenon during the COVID-19 crisis has been the great increase in online live and recorded webinars and full-on virtual events (multi-session events). We have been directly involved in increasing the use of both and both creating and project managing these events. Here are some best practices for today’s virtual events to keep in mind:

Develop guidelines for the SMEs (Subject Matter Experts)

Some SMEs have done webinars, and some have not, but we’ve learned […]

Why not to cut marketing during the COVID-19 crisis?

Why not to cut marketing during the COVID-19 crisis?

As I work to provide marketing strategy and planning for customers during this COVID-19 crisis, I see many B2B businesses choosing to cut their marketing spend as part of their cost savings measures. I certainly understand their motives, but I strongly suggest that those businesses continue their marketing, and perhaps even increase their marketing spend and cut elsewhere. Why do I recommend this […]

Putting trade show dollars to work

Note: Be sure to check out the Trade Show Dollar Challenge at the end of this post.

Putting trade show dollars to work. Many companies are tightly squeezing their dollars right now, and that is understandable. One easy target is to pocket unspent or refunded trade show dollars as quick savings. This too is understandable. However, what if you can save a good portion of those 2020 trade show dollars while also investing today in a […]