Marketing Interactions

Web Metrics vs. Lead Metrics

Marketing metrics are getting a whole lot of attention lately. And for good reason. There's a growing demand for marketers to prove the value they add to enabling the company to meet business objectives. And, it needs to be provable, quantifiable evidence - not, vague, nonspecific statistics that can't be equated to impact.

To give you an idea about what this means, take a look at your web analytics. You may have 200 clicks to a particular page, but how many of them are from leads? And how many are just anonymous website visitors?

Does the new vs. returning visitor number mean anything if you don't know who they are, how many times they've returned, or what they were interested in each time? Can you look at the pattern of behavior and glean any insights about how you can strengthen your connection to them--build a relationship?

Lead specific visibility is a big deal. Being able to sort and shift the information to segment thin slices grouped around problems, interests and issues is critical to your ability to consistently provide value. Behavior and indication of interest can help guide your communications & content strategy to deliver more information your leads find valuable and help nudge them farther through their buying process.

Web metrics look at everyone who shows up. Lead metrics should look at individual statistics, segment metrics and assess overall impact with those you want to do business with. And, who want to do business with you.

Marketing can demonstrate impact to strategic objectives when they can measure their effectiveness from the beginning of the cycle to the downstream revenues realized at the end of the buying process. How long does it take for you to move a lead from awareness to sales ready?

Then look at the time it takes to transition your prospective buyer from sales ready to customer. How much have you impacted sales productivity? Because, let's face it, if you're giving sales qualified leads that are ready for sales activities, they should be closing faster. If they aren't, figure out what can you do to facilitate a smoother transition. Sales and marketing are not mutually exclusive activities--regardless of all that "great divide" talk.

If you were to forecast it now, what level of impact do you project your marketing strategy could drive by the end of the year?

What specific metrics can you put in place to truly measure your progress and impact? Evidence will play a big role in getting recognition for added value. But beyond that, putting stakes in the ground around specific measurements will keep you on track. Just make sure they're focused on your targeted buyers, not everyone.

Reputation Management in 2008

I was reading the NYSE third annual CEO research report, conducted by Opinion Research Corporation, and found some conflicts in the results.

The first theme that emerged was that "there is renewed vigor around the customer." However, another theme was reputation management. Most [81%] CEOs think they take enough action to "protect" their reputations. The report goes on to state, "The most commonly-used ways to monitor company reputation include informal discussions, analysis of media coverage and employee surveys or discussions."

Does anyone see "customer" included in reputation management? If CEOs are focused on growing their companies and they think the best way to do that is to finally focus on the customer, doesn't it follow that what the customer thinks of them is of critical importance?

Perhaps they should consider that how the customer perceives them plays a large part in whether or not they choose to do business with them. Reputation has a high influence on whether or not the customer thinks the company can deliver on promises, which will determine how they gauge the potential for success (or failure) of a business initiative.

If you back it up even farther, how potential buyers respond to your marketing communications has a lot to do with your company's reputation - don't you think?

Then again, only 37% of CEOs think Advertising/Marketing is having more impact on revenue growth [down from 39% in 2006]. Although strength of brand came in #3 at 61% - which makes me want to ask them how they think that happened? [#1 was management team and #2 was technology, in case you're wondering]

That CEOs hold marketing in such low esteem is indicative that marketing needs to get serious about analyzing their initiatives and generating quantitative results that can be tied to downstream revenues. It's been said for a long time that marketing needs to get rid of the "fluff" reputation and create a reason for inclusion at the executive table. If marketing is going to be recognized for driving customer acquisition and retention efforts, then we need to step up and produce documented results.

The upside is that most CEOs think their survival is dependent upon sustainable growth - which is a primary marketing focus. We need to start showing them that we can deliver impact against business objectives.

There's never been a better time for metrics that matter.

You can get the report and some other insights from Frank Capek's post at Customer Innovations. There's also an interesting post about all the false starts The Year of the Customer has had over on Ron Shevlin's Marketing Whims.

8 Random Things Meme tag

Jonathan Burg over at Future Visions tagged me to share 8 random things about myself. I had a tough time during the last one, but I'll try for engaging and pithy anyway.

1. I always give my dogs nicknames. Sierra was affectionately called Moo Head, Paisano is still known as Pie Face, which embarrasses her, although Sierra seemed to be proud of the Moo thing...I miss her. I could go on, but you get it.
2. I rarely use my husband's first name. I call him "babe" or "honey" but rarely his given name. Why is that? Could go to #1 above...hmm.
3. I hate shopping. No, I really hate it. I'm one of those who makes a list, goes into the store on a mission to search, find and buy and then get the heck out. Thank God for online buying. But, if I have to click more than 3 times, forget it. You've lost me.
4. I love books. I read voraciously - like six to eight every month. And, I want to hold them in my hand - not read them on some microdevice that takes away the experience of the real book, the paper, the way the words look on the page. So, sue me.
5. I'm a terrible bowler. Maybe because I never got the point. And the shoes...let's just stop there...
6. I bought a new car[SUV actually] for the first time in 14 years, in November. The technology is incredible. Who knew? Well, you should have told me!
7. I love airports. The people watching, which I have so much more time for now that I have to be there so much longer before my flight leaves. You can learn a lot about people by watching them in airports.
8. Like Jonathan I was on my high school speech team. Not debate, speech. Extemp speaking mostly. No one interrupted me during those.

I'm tempted to let everyone I know off the hook, but there are a few of you I'd like to know more about. Seems only fair, afterall...so I'm tagging:

Joe Pulizzi - Joe started Junta 42 last year, a great resource for everything you need and want to know about marketing content. My posts also show up out there when I remember to go post them...but there are some really inspiring articles by others and Joe is doing a fantastic job of keeping the project rolling forward.

Hans De Keulenaer - of the Web Business Marketing Blog

Jerry Bowles - who helped start MyVenturePad - an online community for owners and managers of businesses with fewer than 500 employees. They also feature my blog posts, so go visit, and they recently hosted a great webinar with Seth Godin speaking about his new book Meatball Sundae. Loved the book - thanks guys.

Paul Barsch of the Marketing and Technology Blog

I think that's enough for now. And, I'm not sure who else has been tagged, but I love to pull new faces into the mix, so get to know them, branch out, read new things.

Value is Perception

I've been doing a lot of thinking about what's truly "valuable," lately. In doing so, I've been looking at how B2B companies are positioning themselves with their content and wondering if what they profess to be valuable benefits are really seen that way by customers and potential buyers.

If you take a look at almost any B2B website, you'll find laundry lists of benefits. Kind of a "something for everyone" list of what their products or services deliver. But, what if one benefit, highly valuable to one customer, would actually be considered disappointing by another?

A recent study of 250 Fortune 1000 companies by Kellogg School of Business found that only 30% of them are using technology to track customer and lead interactions with their firm and marketing campaigns. Unless you are gathering intelligence and profiles about your customers' and leads' behavior, preferences and interests, how do you even begin to guess what's "valuable" to them?

Value is based on perception, which means that executing a marketing strategy without insights is like a crap shoot. You'll likely get some response, but you'll also likely leave a lot of potential interest on the table.

If you want to get more attention, build better relationships and transition "sales ready" leads to your sales force, then you need to be able to align value to your leads' perception of what that truly means. This is one reason why thinner slices or segmentation is being used more often. Smaller segments allow marketers to tighten focus and hone in on a topic that has a greater propensity to provide something "valuable" to a specific group of people.

One communication may get a lead to put a stake in the ground defining a valid interest, but it's the follow-on nurturing communications that have a higher opportunity of providing mutual value. That means sustainable interest because you've aligned the value you deliver with the outcome they want, made possible because you know what they're responding to and because, by their actions, they're giving you increasing permission to communicate with them.

In his book, Meatball Sundae, Seth Godin talks about a permission asset as "the privilege of delivering anticipated, personal and relevant ads[information] to the people who want to get them." He emphasizes how New Marketing is about reaching the reachable, not the masses. And, he stresses the need to focus on finding products that fit your customers' needs, rather than the traditional manner of finding customers for your products.

Is Your B2B Website's Backside Droopy?

Go to a search engine and type in your company name or product or a keyword and take a look at the search results. Notice anything?

Most likely, only one of the links takes people to the home page of your website.

All the others invite visitors to enter your world through a back door.

Click on some of the search results links, wipe your mind blank [I know, it's a challenge], and ask yourself if you arrived on that page by chance, what kind of impression would the website leave with you?

Can you pick up your company's story in mid-stride? Do you understand where you are in the scheme of things and is there a clear path to either take a few steps back to catch up or easily move forward on your exploration of the topic?

In other words - how engaging is your website if entered from the backside?

A few things you may want to check and adjust to make sure your backside isn't droopy:

• Start with the search results.
  
  • Are the pages that returned for your website responsive to the search term entered?
  • Are there some better choices for keyword optimization? Does the content deliver on the promise it made by returning on the keyword the user searched with?
• Now look at the page the search return links to:
  • When was it last updated? Will the information still be considered current and be of high interest?
  • How does it invite people into your company's story?
  • Assess the options for your visitor - where can they go next? Where might they rather go?
  • Are there clear choices related to the subject matter or topic that motivated them to visit your website?
  • Can you improve their response by freshening the content? Adding links that extend the story they've stepped into the middle of?
  • Is it obvious how they can interact with you?

Yes, this takes some effort. I suggest you start with your most highly visited pages and work your way down the list.

Most people will visit your website or learn of your company for the first time because of a search result that directs them to an internal page. That's the beauty of search, and for savvy folks who've figured out how to reduce the shoveling they have to do to get the information they want.

Take a look at your bounce rates for specific pages. Are they higher than they should be? The object is to pull your website visitors into your world, so high bounce rates on key pages are indicators that change is in order. You not only want them to stay, you want them to invest time in learning more about how you can help them answer their needs. Right?

Depending on the topic or search, they will want proof that validates the assertions your content makes and potentially more information about the subject that motivated their visit. And, please tell me the content is not all about you.

Everyone spends a lot of time making sure the homepage looks great. With the advances in search technology every page needs to pass that test. Start hoisting that backside and get it in shape to engage visitors and deliver the outcomes you want.

Uncover Your Inside Advantage

Over the holidays, I read Robert Bloom and Dave Conti's The Inside Advantage: The Strategy That Unlocks the Hidden Growth in Your Business. First, let me say that Bloom has simplified the process that every company—especially B2B—should go through to make the shift from product selling to customer-centric selling & marketing.

He's boiled down the process to what he calls the Growth Discovery Process, which has 4 key ingredients:

1. WHO - this is your core customer. Not everyone you could possibly sell to, but a specific and targeted audience "who are most likely to buy your product or service in the quantity required for optimal profit." (Hint: take this way beyond a statistic you can't get to know to a group/segment you can get very personal with)


2. WHAT - this is your "uncommon" offering, the hidden juju in your company that answers a customer need (which would be the need of your WHO). "Right now-somewhere inside your business-there are growth generating customer benefits waiting to ignite your enterprise." Uncommon is stressed because, according to Bloom, "...it is vitally important that your offering by 'experienced' by the customer as neither ordinary nor unique." Ordinary means that your competitors can easily offer it and unique has a problem with credibility, so think "uncommon."


3. HOW - this is the persuasive strategy that will sell your WHAT to your WHO. "[It] will enable you to convince your core customer to buy your uncommon offering instead of all other competitor's offerings." For maximum performance, you must be sure that your HOW is credible, authentic and easily understood by your core customer.


4. OWN IT! - the imaginative acts that make your uncommon offering known to your core customer and deliver on your HOW. "People are intrigued and motivated by imaginative acts because they highlight and dramatize the Inside Advantage of businesses and brands. He defines ubiquitous acts and explosive acts and presents ideas that can be implemented with very little money to major events with highly visible impact. There's truly something for every size company in his examples.

As I was reading The Inside Advantage, I kept thinking that Bloom has done an excellent job of explaining the process. One thing this book gets really right is the "showing" of how his strategy works through the many case stories, examples and insights to consulting sessions Bloom has performed working with a variety of companies. Although the majority of companies in the book are not B2B companies, the clarity of his examples makes it easy to extrapolate the ideas and integrate them with a B2B strategy. His focus on ensuring that you can actually DO the work, not just think about it, sets The Inside Advantage apart from other strategy books.

The other really important point is that of getting out of the mindset of commodity. "Offering a highly valued service insulates a company from having to compete exclusively on price. The service enhances the potential for an enduring customer relationship because the customer wants to continue to receive the service and may come to rely on it." Which is exactly what you want [need] to have happen.

Toward the end of the book, Bloom actually shows you how you can hold a one-day growth discovery process within your own company, including a sample agenda and methods for bringing out the group participation necessary to get to the heart of your Inside Advantage.

Finally, don't forget this important point: "It's essential to get your head of sales to agree to HOW because he or she is probably the best person in the room to judge whether your persuasive strategy will resonate with your customers."

If you're trying to determine how to create compelling conversations with your potential and current customers that add value to their ability to generate successful outcomes, then you should go read this book. The ideas inside will give you an advantage in defining how you launch new products, choose your optimal customers and execute your persuasive strategy.