Marketing Interactions

eBook: Tune Up Your Customer Focus

In my book, eMarketing Strategies for the Complex Sale, I talk about how B2B marketers need to really get to know their customers in order to improve their marketing effectiveness. One of the exercises presented in the book is The Customer Focus Tune-up. This eBook expands upon that exercise.

In the eBook, I present:

• A breakdown of the steps in the complex buying process.
• 4 Steps to improving your customer intelligence.
• How to apply those insights to content development.
• Applications for putting your customer focus to work.

Download the complementary eBook.

To learn more about creating contagious content that produces quantifiable eMarketing results, you can always buy the book...or at least go download 2 chapters

Dirty Little Secrets by Sharon Drew Morgen

There's a terrific, provocative and challenging book on the stands today — Dirty Little Secrets: Why buyers can't buy and sellers can't sell and what you can do about it. Sharon Drew Morgen's book unveils what lies beneath the buying decision process, layer by layer, until you finally get that Eureka moment that it's got nothing to do with the product.

We, as marketers and sellers, focus on identifying triggering events, needs or problems and begin addressing those as a way to build relationships and get our prospects to buy from us. As I was reading her book, I realized that we're actually a bit late to the party and trying to sneak in through a side door.

In Dirty Little Secrets, Sharon Drew shares a wealth of examples to help us understand what goes on behind the scenes. She puts clarity around status quo by showing that all "systems" have workarounds in place that keep things functioning, even if not optimally. Untangling those workarounds is often the barrier to making a sale.

“Any Identified Problem shows up as a functioning part of the system, since it is indeed functioning in some capacity. At the point that the system determines that it needs to be functioning better is the point at which buyers are ready to buy. And the systemic elements that have kept the Identified Problem in place will fight for their lives to continue doing what they are doing.” [emphasis mine]

"No decision to purchase will take place unless the people and policies included in the workarounds buy in to change and the elements are redistributed in a way the system approves."

The key is to help buyers manage their offline change issues prior to our attempts to focus them on solving the problem. When we don't do this, or our buyers can't do it on their own, the decision made is to do nothing at all. The system wins the battle to maintain status quo.

Sharon Drew points out that the issue is often that buyers have tunnel vision when it comes to dealing with issues. They're simply too close to them to see the entire spectrum they must address to get true resolution. Our job as marketers and sellers is to help them step back and take an objective stance that enables them to see the entirety of everything involved in solving the problem.

Dirty Little Secrets is all about showing you how to "facilitate the route through to the buy in process." Sharon Drew does a magnificent job of making this easy to understand. In fact, when I read it myself, I had a V-8, head-slapping moment. I believe a lot of us know this subject matter subconsciously, but I've never had a better way to articulate it and get to the root before I read Sharon Drew's book.

And, in case you think this is just a sales book, I warn you - the insights can help marketers who are earnestly trying to map content to buying stages reach even farther back to engage prospects earlier in the process in a more productive way.

Go Buy the Book!

If you do so by October 29th, you'll also get a slew of great gifts.

eBooks: Rolling Thunder and High-Tech Direct Marketing

As a Friday special, I'm sharing two eBooks that I think you'll agree provide valuable insights.

Rolling Thunder: Powering Momentous Launches

If you're still of the mindset that launching a company, new product or service culminates in one big bang announced by a press release, think again. Rebel Brown (@rebelbrown) makes a terrific case that dispels that myth in her new eBook. 

She says, "Successful launches leverage a series of interactions, laying the foundations for market success before the ‘announcement’ ever happens. Great launches build momentum over time to propel a product or company into the market, far above the noise and with sustainable credibility. Rolling Thunder launches increase in power over time..."

In case you need more motivation to download the eBook, consider that over 60% of executives say they are less than satisfied with their launch results. Wow. Sounds  like it's time for a change, doesn't it?

Rolling Thunder launches create momentum that propels you into the market. Rebel wouldn’t launch any other way. Once you let the thunder roll, her bet is you won’t either.

Download the eBook to change your perspective and gain better launch results measured by revenue generation.

The High-Tech Direct Marketing Handbook, by Howard Sewell (@HJSewell) provides more than 65 tips for B2B demand generation. Howard says the handbook is useful for marketers undertaking their first demand generation effort all the way up to software giants launching a new suite of procucts.

This handbook, now in its 4th edition, is a compilation of the many tips, techniques and strategies shared over 14+ years on our blog and in the enewsletter that preceded it. It includes recommendations to help you:

• develop a more effective campaign strategy
• choose media most likely to match your ideal audience
• create a powerful, compelling offer
• build creative that gets the reader to act now

Download the eBook here with a pretty painless registration page. It's worth the effort.

Why Storytelling is Critical for Business

Kathy Hansen of A Storied Career has compiled her interviews with 40 storytelling practitioners (me included) into a topical eBook that's a must read for businesses trying to raise their level of  personalization and develop relevant dialogues with customers, prospects and employees.

The contributors share examples, experiences and insights about what stories are, why they work and how they work in best in a variety of situations—including marketing, sales and branding.

Below are a few brief snips of what you'll find in the eBook:

"The implications of Web 2.0 and technological innovation on humankind are staggering. As I like to describe it, “the means of story production have become democratized”. … In a complex, interdependent world where worldviews and value systems collide, we naturally turn to storytelling as our most basic coping mechanism for making sense and meaning of everything around us." — Michael Margolis

"Savvy media gurus have come to realize that storytelling is the quickest and most relevant way to share information… everything is speeding up… In today’s faster paced time, storytelling is essential because [it] captures the listener." — Annie Hart

"In our world of 24/7 news feeds, social media, etc., we are trying to drink from a firehose of information, and we’re finding ourselves bowled over yet still thirsty. … The storytelling movement is about restoring — “re-story-ing” if you will — a more authentic means of learning from each other and drawing meaning from our own experiences." — Sarah White

"Leaders are looking for new ways to understand what’s really happening in their organization. They are looking for better ways to engage and better ways motivate people. Stories are integral to the new ways of working in complex environments." — Shawn Callahan

"Mostly I think the reason is the control people are exercising over selecting what information they spend their time with. There are more choices than ever before, people are busier with limited time, so why would they choose to spend that time on things that don’t meet their needs? The more personalized and relevant information is to the person presented with it, the more engagement is possible. Storytelling is in our genes." — Ardath Albee

There's a wealth of information and insight in this eBook that can help you see how and why your B2B marketing and sales content and conversations can shift to more effectively engage people based on providing valuable information in more accessible ways. When people can actually visualize what it would be like to do business with you, engagement follows.

Go download the eBook today and pass it on to others.

The Truth About Trust in Business

With social media and digital marketing come the challenge of creating trust without the usual face-to-face interactions. Trust is one of those words that business people bandy around like it just happens. The adage of "People buy from people they know and trust" is one used a lot to try and point out that companies need to humanize themselves to relate to their customers.

But, just what is trust? If someone asked you, could you tell them? Not to worry. According to Vanessa, "about 90 percent had some difficulty describing just exactly what trust is."

Vanessa Hall's new book, The Truth About Trust in Business: How to Enrich the Bottom Line, Improve Retention and Build Valuable Relationships for Success, is just the book to simplify the intricacies of the concept.

She writes in an engaging and conversational way that kept me turning the pages until I had read the entire book in two sittings. Vanessa makes the concept of trust easier to understand through telling stories (one of my favorite things!). But, she also demonstrates how new needs are introduced which can erode trust levels companies thought they had firmly established. Incidentally, this is also where assumptions cause trouble.

In the book, the establishment of trust is based upon the infrastructure of expectations, needs and promises. She uses a brick wall to show how the removal of certain elements can cause trust to break (the wall to topple).

Although this book mainly focuses on consumer stories, rather than B2B applications, she's provided ample clarity for marketers to easily extrapolate the circumstances onto their situations.

Here are a few nuggets of insight from the book:

"We will always seek out ways to satisfy a combination of needs first before we choose to compromise."

"The greater the need, the quicker trust can be built and even rebuilt."

"In any given relationship or situation, our ENP (Expectations, Needs, Promises) wall changes over time...the outcome we want changes over time as well!"

One of the things that really resonated with me, as a marketer, was the simple way Hall explains what makes people decide to switch brands. Yes, a new product that raises the bar from what my old product can meet is one influence. But, the interesting one for me is the product (or feature) that makes a new promise about a need the person was previously unaware they had and causes them to choose to expand their definition of need.

This is how innovations take hold of market share. But, the way Vanessa Hall explains it had me thinking of a lot of ways companies can take what they have and make it new again by presenting the ideas around their products differently. And yes, once again it's about expectations, needs and promises. I absolutely agree. 

One other thing - do you know all the promises your company is making? Is your messaging in every channel, through every means of distribution, aligned? Most importantly, are you delivering on every promise you've put out there? Without follow-through, your trust level could be eroding...fast.

Anyone working to build the trust and credibility of their companies to a competitive level in today's swiftly moving business environment should read this book. The case studies are fantastic and what you learn can be immediately applied to your go-to-market approach and your customer loyalty and retention strategies.

Professional Services Marketing Hot of the Presses

Marketing a professional services firm takes a bit of a different mindset than marketing a product and solutions company. One of the major differences is that the partners of the firm are doing the selling.

Marketing has often been an after-thought or undervalued resource for service providers. However, the need to master engagement in the changing customer environment gives marketers the opportunity to become a critical component of a firm's ongoing success. Where services companies used to be able to rely on referrals and recommendation for their business development needs, that's no longer enough.

In Professional Services Marketing, Mike Schultz and John Doerr—co-founders of Wellesley Group— provide a comprehensive guide from soup-to-nuts for marketing professional services firms [attorneys, accountants, consultants, engineers and other types of professional services providers]. But, what makes this book very compelling is that it's not just supposition. The book is based on—and shares—scientific research [Rain Today], field-tested expertise and industry case studies that walk the talk.

The book covers five key areas that are critical for firms that want to grow their revenues and themselves—

1. Creating a marketing and growth strategy
2. Establishing a brand and reputation
3. Implementing a marketing communications program
4. Lead generation strategies
5. Developing business by winning new clients

Buy the Book and Get Special Bonuses:
If you buy the book on either August 3rd or 4th, you’ll get bonus materials from Wellesley Hills Group, RainToday.com and industry experts including:

• RainToday webinar, How to Turn Your Firm into a Marketing and Business Development Powerhouse, with Mike Schultz
• Ardath Albee, Tune Up Your Client Focus, Ebook
• Larry Bodine, Thinking Like a Rainmaker—Crafting Your Personal Marketing Plan
• Brian Carroll, Chapter 8: The Phone, from Lead Generation for the Complex Sale
• Jill Konrath, Developing Strong Value Propositions, Ebook
• Michael W. McLaughlin, Consult This! 67 Tips for Consulting Success
• Michael Stelzner, Writer Industry Report, White Paper
• Vickie Sullivan, Speaking of 2009: Top Ten Changes that Shape the New High-Fee Speech Circuit
• Jeanne Urich, Killer Services Marketing, White Paper

After purchasing, visit the book website page and enter your confirmation number to download these valuable resources.

Want a preview? You can download a sample chapter to see for yourself that buying the book is definitely worth the investment. Well, and there are all those bonuses...

Buy the book now.
Don't forget that the bonus offer expires in a few days.

Stories that Sell - An Interview with Casey Hibbard

As most of you know, I've long been a proponent of storytelling for marketing and sales. Customer stories are one of the most valuable ways B2B companies can share their compelling value. They have the ability to simplify the complexity of considered purchases, validate that what you promise is true, and mitigate risk by proving the business case.


Casey Hibbard, and her book Stories that Sell, provides a wealth of information about how to plan for, research and create customer success stories that help you sell more—and do so with ease. And, she ought to know. She's written over 450 of them over the last 10 years for companies such as, Macrovision, Jobfox, USA.NET, IHS, and Vocus.

In the interview below, Casey shares the answers to 7 questions to show you just how valuable your customers stories can be for validating your company's compelling value:

1. What’s the biggest mistake you see B2B marketers make when developing customer success stories?

Marketers are simply not using their customer success stories enough. A story documenting a specific customer’s success with your product or service is one of the most powerful pieces of marketing and sales content you can have. Too often, companies just throw that story up on their web sites and don’t take it further than that.

I’ve seen companies make customer stories the very center of all their communications efforts and it really paying off. That means telling that story every chance that you get – in webinars for lead-gen, at events, live sales conversations, on your blog, on Twitter, in pitches to key media, in training your sales team and all new employees, in awards submissions, in white papers, and the list goes on. If you’re going to invest in capturing a story, tell it every chance you get.

2. Can you share some factors that motivate a prospect to seek out a customer success story?

As marketers, we make a lot of promises. Buyers are wary of solutions that haven’t performed as promised. If someone is going to invest in a product or service – especially a big, high-risk investment – they have to have confidence that it will pay off.

In the age of authenticity, with eBay feedback and Amazon reviews, there’s nothing like a happy customer vouching for you. Customer success stories and case studies document the success of a specific customer, giving buyers the details and evidence they need to justify a purchase.

3. In the book you present the concept of a story needs assessment. Can you talk about why this is important and the types of things companies can learn when they assess their story needs?

So many B2B marketers don’t approach success stories with a plan or vision. So often it’s a matter of, “We have a happy customer, so let’s do a story.” That success story or case study may or may not support your current sales and marketing efforts.

Effective customer stories are very closely tied to your targets. You need to identify your key targets and create a success story wish list from there. What industries are they in? What’s their size? What’s their geographic location? What are their current challenges? What position is the reader in – technical or business? Then decide what stories you need so that, no matter what type of prospect is evaluating your solutions, you have a success story to match.

4. You share a number of ways in which customer success stories can be used in the book. Can you highlight some differences in how success stories are best used in marketing versus sales activities?

Traditionally, there’s been a misconception that customer stories, in the form of case studies, were really only valuable in the latter stages of the sales cycle, when prospects are validating a solution. But many organizations have found customer stories to be equally important throughout the complete customer lifecycle, from lead generation to sales to selling more to existing customers.

The differences between usage in marketing and sales are usually in the amount of information you give people. You offer more details as prospects get further into the sales cycle. In marketing, you might have a summary of a customer’s story or a video story/testimonial on your web site or on your blog. Or, you might feature a customer on a free webinar that folks sign up for. You get someone interested enough to learn more about your solution.

At some point they have the option to read, hear or view a more complete customer case study, or a sales rep walks them through that. The really detailed customer stories, case studies with return on investment data, are most valuable for closing sales. At that point, people want more than a general overview. They want numbers.

5. Testimonials have long been attributed to increased credibility but, at the same time, we all know a company isn’t going to publish anything that doesn’t make them—or their customers—look good.

Have you seen a shift in what constitutes a believable testimonial in a customer success story—especially given the rise in social media? And, is there a tip you can share with us about eliciting effective testimonials?

My #1 tip: always get testimonials from the actual customer! People are definitely skeptical of the “PR” testimonial, a glowing statement that sounds like it’s been written by a PR person (and probably has). If we want to keep testimonials believable, then they need to be from customers. The customer will  always give you a more authentic-sounding quote, with more personality. That’s not to say that you can’t do a little smoothing out, in collaboration with the customer, but try to maintain as much character and authenticity as you can.

The best testimonials emerge when you can really get a customer talking, and usually on the phone. Gathering testimonials by email doesn’t allow you to dig for more detail and elaboration. You start with open-ended questions and keep asking until you get your answer – or before you start annoying the customer.

6. Your book showcases 7 story formats. Which one is your favorite to write, and why?

Good question. My favorite is the feature-story format with call-out sections.  I enjoy storytelling and this format provides the best opportunity to tell an engaging story. It also seems to be the way that case studies and success stories are headed. You have the chance to really kick off with an interesting lead paragraph, punctuate the story with powerful quotes and use descriptive subheads. It’s interesting to those who read the body of the story but also to those who skim only. If you’re pitching your story to editors, they tend to prefer this type of presentation as well.

7. What’s the most surprising thing that’s happened to you as a result of writing Stories that Sell?

The amazing connections I’ve made. I’ve met and collaborated with some really interesting thought leaders on blogs, articles and webinars. I sought out these types of experts while researching and writing the book but it took the book’s release before our paths crossed. It would have been better to know them during the book process, and integrate some of their input in Stories that Sell. Instead, I’m using more dynamic venues like my blog, teleclasses and webinars to share new information on my topic.

Now, do yourself a favor and go buy the book. It's truly a hands-on guide for creating Stories that Sell. Plus, you get two free bonuses. Go check it out!

If you're not reading her blog already, Casey continues to share tips and insights that expand what you'll learn in her book.

E-Book: It's Not About You Anymore

Given what buyers can learn about your company and products without ever speaking directly to you, B2B positioning is more important than ever. The problem is that many companies look around them at their competition and model themselves after the company they want to emulate. But that's "me too" stuff that doesn't differentiate your company.

Rebel Brown [my great friend and colleague] has written a terrific E-Book about positioning that will help you begin to spin your own story in ways that are uniquely yours. She says,

"Anyone who says there's a one-size-fits-all approach to strategy and positioning simply doesn't get it. Great positioning is as unique as each situation. Strategic positioning is as much an art as it is a science. And each and every situation offers a blank canvas."

In It's Not About You Anymore Rebel shares her positioning matrix to be used as a foundation. She discusses how you can evaluate your market, company and solutions in order to create a clear, relevant message for each one. And then she shows you how they can all work together to differentiate your company from any other.

When Rebel and I work together, her ability to create a compelling positioning platform sets me up perfectly to develop e-marketing strategies and nurturing programs that do what they're supposed to — generate demand and sales-ready buyers.

Why? Because everything works together in a consistent way based on the insights and nuances she's helped the company uncover and then woven into their go-to-market approach. She also ensures that the positioning platform is an organic foundation with plenty of room for flexibility as your markets evolve in real time.

Go download the E-Book and see for yourselves. Your company may look very different to you after you read it.

Social Media should be like Smile & Move

There are countless guides on how to get a gazillion followers on Twitter, how to optimize your personal brand on LinkedIn, how to blog with the best of them, etc. But, I'm constantly amazed that many folks employing these social media tactics have truly forgotten the meaning and purpose of a conversation.

Somewhere along the line, it feels like we've forgotten how to just be present. We've lost touch with the idea of giving as a path to reaping rewards.

It's really not all that difficult to jolt yourself back into what a marketing or sales conversation should be all about. I've found the perfect way to show you.

If you haven't heard about Smile & Move, now's the time. If you want a guide for etiquette in the social media environment, here you go.

Watch the video and tell me that you're not inspired to approach social media with the idea of serving, sharing and a commitment to providing value.

Smile & Move works like this:

Smile =

• Wake up 
• Be thankful 
• Be approachable
• Complain Less
• Smile. Really.

Move =

• Start early & go long
• Exceed expectations
• Have a sense of urgency
• Be resourceful & resilient

Sounds like a recipe for social media engagement to me...

Oh, and there's a book, too!

E-Book: Sales Management 2.0 by CSO Insights

CSO Insights has graciously allowed me to offer their new E-Book, Sales Management 2.0, to all of you.

Sales Management 2.0 is an eBook that grew out of the answers sales executives gave when asked about their top 3 objectives for the next 12 months. What's interesting is that you'll see a lot of dependencies in their answers.

For example:

#1 is increase revenues - but that can also mean increasing market share, improving margins, shortening sales cycles, improving channel sales and decreasing discounts.

#2 is increase sales effectiveness - which can also mean optimize lead generation, improve customer loyalty/retention, improve team selling and decrease the cost of sales.

To me, #2 is a clear indication of where marketers need to step up to help sales achieve their objectives. Just think what might happen if marketers aligned their objectives with these...

Instead of leaving us with statistics and a chart, CSO Insights wondered,

"...what exactly does “better” look like? What changes do our field sales;telesales; sales support; sales operations; and sales management teams need to make in order to optimize their performance to help achieve key objectives? And what help should they be looking for from the rest of the enterprise?"

So they asked 6 seasoned sales executives' and visionaries to share their insights.

Here's an overview of what you'll find in this meaty 71 page eBook:

• How to use what you have in new ways to create "net new" value and tangible results for their clients.


• How to manage and leverage the sales intelligence that lives inside your companies—usually as unwritten tribal knowledge.


• The differences made by optimizing incentive management with a sales analytics system—instead of manual spreadsheets.


• Ideas about how to shift your sales process to the way customers buy.


• Getting the most out of supporting sales with web collaboration and virtual sales meetings.


• Some ideas straight from Harvard about how we're managing our major accounts and the future of pricing. [goes to internal status quo]

I have to tell you that this E-Book really made me stop and think. If you're a marketer wondering how you can proactively take action to better align marketing with sales, there's great information in here.

If you want to know how seasoned sales executives think and learn more about how they approach the challenges they're facing, you'll find that here, as well.

And, maybe some of you are actually grappling with the issues discussed in the eBook.

Well, now's your chance to learn more from some excellent, real world, insights.

Download the Sales Management 2.0 E-Book (right here - no registration)

Please come back and leave a comment for CSO Insights about what you found valuable and even what topics would really resonate for you in future eBooks they produce.