Six Marketing Intentions for 2010 (by Christopher Ryan)
December 28, 2009
You are probably in the process of planning your marketing strategies for the year 2010 including what many term “resolutions.” However, notice that I used the word “intentions” and not “resolutions” in the title. When you resolve to do something, it means you do the best you can. But as Winston Churchill said, “It’s not enough that we do our best, sometimes we have to do what is required.” In the spirit of doing what is required, here is what we at Fusion Marketing Partners intend to do in 2010. Read more
Building Your Social Media Strategy Map – by John Leavy
December 23, 2009
How would we develop and execute a Social Networking Strategy Map? What might the media components be and how would we implement them and measure success or failure?
Some people may say there are seven steps to the media strategy while others would say there are ten steps. For instance, a person might list corporate acceptance of the media strategy as a step … we’ve assumed the corporate guys are on the Social Media bandwagon. For this discussion let’s use twelve steps. If you want to break the plan down to more granular stages; have at it.
Let’s get started outlining our media strategy; here are the steps:
1. What’s the point of our Social Media Strategy?
2. Why Social Media in the first place?
3. What people-types do we want to engage in conversation?
4. What Social Media Channels will we use?
5. What are the channel participants talking about today?
6. How can we add to the conversations already underway without being over promotional?
7. How will we involve people?
8. Who will maintain our Social Media presence?
9. What is the length of our commitment?
10. Can our company culture adapt to the demands of Social Networking?
11. How does Social Media fit into our overall Marketing/Communication Plan?
12. How will we measure success? Failure? Read more
Make it Easy for People to Buy (by Christopher Ryan)
December 21, 2009
Laura McGuire, a good friend and former colleague (now CEO of SmartTracks (www.smarttracks.com) had an interesting observation the other day. She said that most of the B2B marketers that she knows can describe their own marketing and sales process in great detail but could not do the same for the buying process of their prospects. After reflection, I concur with this statement. We tend to think that people want to buy in the same way that we like to sell. However, is this really the case, or is it just our desire to validate a way of doing business in which we have invested so much time, energy and money? Read more
What is Social Media Marketing? – by Bill Petro
December 16, 2009
Social Media Marketing
SMM, or Social Media Marketing is a relatively recent category of Internet Marketing where social media and social networking sites are used as marketing tools.
How is it related to the more familiar SEO, Search Engine Optimization? SEO is a more mature discipline that focuses more on web page visibility to search engines, and how to optimize their visibility and improve ranking through various arts and analytical sciences. SMM on the other hand, faces two different challenges: Read more
Knowing Where Your “Ideal” Prospect Hangs Out on the Internet Saves Marketing Dollars – by John Leavy
December 15, 2009
Everyone on the Internet tends to congregate in certain spots. Financial people like reading blogs about making dough and investing other people’s money. Fly fishing enthusiasts hang out at fishing forums where they can lie to each other about the last “big one” that got away.
As the above illustration shows, there are plenty of places where a company’s “ideal” prospect might gather. It’s our job to find out where our prospects congregate and develop strategies to have visibility in those venues. Read more
In B2B Marketing, Your Brand is Everything (by Christopher Ryan)
December 9, 2009
I just read an interesting article by Jane Adamson titled Have the Courage to Create a Brand. This article reminded me that I have been meaning to write a post about the importance of having a clear, compelling and differentiated brand. So what do I mean by “brand?” Simply this: Your brand is the place you occupy in a prospect’s or customer’s mind when he or she thinks about you. Note that I am not referring to how you see yourself, or how you want others to see you, but rather how you are actually perceived. Read more
Shortening the B2B Sales Cycle (by Christopher Ryan)
December 2, 2009
I participated in an interesting LinkedIn discussion exchange today, started by Jeff Blackwell, titled: What Can You Do to Shorten the Sales Cycle? Naturally, this got a bunch of comments, including from your’s truly. Several people remarked on the importance of asking for the order. You’d be surprised how often salespeople neglect to do this. A guy named Dan Boehm talked about making sure you understood all the bying influences in the account. But my favorite comments were from Brock Butler (The Digital Sales Doctor). Brock claimed that there are two probable causes: Read more
