If you've been trying to introduce social media and networking tools and create an online community centered around your company, products or services, there's a good chance that you've hit walls when it comes to explaining how exactly these new products can be monetized. While B2C has leveraged the power of social media and social networking with great success, B2B is still struggling to justify the investments required to develop, host, and manage social tools and communities on their websites.

In most companies, new product ideas are welcomed and products are developed when there is a clear path to ROI - if something isn't fiscally viable, it probably won't last long in many marketing departments. Since social media and networking is still relatively young, there isn't a vast repository of information that explains how social media usage can be measured, benchmarked, analyzed and monetized - especially in the realm of B2B.

This creates a catch-22 of sorts for many B2B marketers - all kinds of companies WANT to employ social media tactics in their marketing strategies, but no one has the cold, hard data proving that doing so will result in a positive ROI. Until someone takes the plunge (and reports on their findings) however, no one has the ammunition to prove the profitability of using social media as part of their marketing campaigns.

You can sense the impatience of some of the media industry's most influential players in this roundtable video produced by FOLIOMag. In this video, Creating Community media insiders discuss (and sometimes argue) why social media is so important, and how it can be monetized when partnered with existing lead generation efforts.

Some of the benefits of social media highlighted in the video include:

1. The ability to use social media to extend your content (by allowing users to create their own content, comment on existing content, and share your content via bookmarking/tagging tools), extend your reach (by breaking down your website's "walls" and connecting to users via widgits and sharing tools), and increase your site's stickiness (by giving users a reason to stick around and interact with your site's offerings).

2. The chance to give your customers what they want, all while gathering deeper information about your audience. This allows you to deliver content with greater relevance and selectively target users with the data they've openly provided.

3. The opportunity to grow your audience by attracting social-savvy users (and their friends), establishing deeper relationships with your users (by responding to their messages, comments and content), and moving away from the current "broadcast" method of communication (1-way communication from you to your users).

4. The competitive advantage of being able to deliver an increased level of depth, quantity, and quality with your leads based on the new kinds of information able to be gathered via the social tools.

5. The capability to reach new advertisers by offering social media as a product on its own merit, or as a part of an integrated marketing campaign.

If you're interested in learning more about how you can measure ROI and monetize social media as part of your overall marketing strategy, the resources below should help you get started.

Social Media ROI Resources from Constructing Social

Online Community ROI: Models and Reporting - Research Study Posted from Bill Johnston: Online Community Strategy

A Marketing Charts Study: Marketing Execs Must Realize and Learn to Use Power of Social Media

Frogloop's ROI Calculator: Is It Worth It? An ROI Calculator for Social Network Campaigns

The Online Marketing Blog post: Social Media Analysis and Tracking

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 12:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Social media and online communities have exploded over the past few years, but most B2B marketers still haven't figured out how social media can be implemented and monetized as part of their overall marketing strategies. With stable revenue sources already in place, insignificant budgets for developing and building new (and untested) marketing tools, and little data on the ROI of social media, B2B marketers are sticking with traditional online models (including lead generation and banner advertising) and resisting the inclusion of social media tools on their sites and in their campaigns.

If your company is already running a website that, through email marketing, SEO tactics, and organic traffic, attracts return visitors regularly and requires users to register to view content, than adding social media and networking tools is a logical next step for growing your business. By providing loyal users with a website focused on serving their needs and hearing their opinions, you build stickiness into your site, encourage increased engagement with your content, and gain priceless insight into what your members are researching, testing out, engaging with, and most of all - thinking about purchasing.

B2B marketers already know that the buying process is lengthy, especially when big businesses are making the purchases, and everyone from the development group to the CFO is involved in making the final decision. This process means that B2B buyers seek out content, share their findings with colleagues, engage with various kinds of research materials, and consume educational materials until a consensus is achieved and a purchase is made.

If marketers already know that the B2B buying process lasts anywhere from 3 - 18 months (depending on the size/revenue of the buyer & the costs involved), and that successfully navigating this process requires offering a range of content and content delivery methods that appeal to potential buyers, than creating a venue where users return regularly, engage with your content, and express their needs (via created content, forums/commenting, reviews, and content consumption) is an ideal way to identify and target users with appropriate and timely messages that ideally help shorten the sales cycle.

By implementing social tools on your site, the quantity, quality, and type of user data that can be collected and analyzed changes, and you gain access to previously unavailable information that can guide you in targeting, customizing and delivering content delivered to users right as they realize that what you've delivered is exactly what they need. While you may need to develop new ways of tracking and reporting how users interact with your site, your efforts will pay off in the form of new types of data that can be used for marketing purposes, included as part of your lead scoring efforts, or offered to clients in an effort to increase your overall cost-per-lead.

In these challenging economic times, vendors are looking for as much information about their prospects as possible, so they can leverage the data and reach out to niche markets, segment their leads according to their stage in the buying cycle, and arm themselves with a better understanding of each of their leads. Allowing users to express themselves via social media tools, self-submit personal information related to their buying needs, and engage with content on their own terms allows leads to fulfill their own research and education needs, and provides sales with a more complete picture of their prospect. Armed with this kind of full-bodied data, you can potentially remove yourself from having to nurture leads through parts of the buying process, and shorten the sales cycle.

Opening up B2B sites to social media has the potential to be a win-win situation: users benefit when they content more deeply, and engage with your content, and sales benefits when they are handed sales-ready leads who have nurtured themselves through the buying process by actively engaging and interacting with your marketing materials. People want their voices heard - and by offering social media on your site, you show users that you really are listening and responding to their needs.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 03:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

For those of us who keep an eye on trends in social media, it seems as if EVERYONE is jumping on the social media bandwagon. From Barack Obama and John McCain's use of the technologies in their campaigns, to major IT companies like IBM and SAP's social efforts, one might easily get the impression that social media is everywhere.

Social media isn't really everywhere - only 35% of B2B marketers participating in a Forrester Research teleconference currently use social media in their marketing efforts. With so few statistics available to those looking to learn more about social media's effectiveness, and no real way to test social media without investing time and money on pilot programs, B2B firms have little motivation to change how they do business and embrace potentially risky marketing methods.

In B2B Marketers Eye Social Media, Web 2.0 Tactics, , Forrester Research's Laura Ramos addresses the various difficulties faced by B2B marketers when considering whether or not they should incorporate social media tactics into traditional B2B marketing campaigns. Using data gathered from 300 B2B marketing professionals, Ramos outlines the 4 main components of social media that challenge B2B marketers and prevent them from embracing social media:

1. Social Media is still only emerging in the B2B marketing space.

2. B2B marketers don't know how to measure the success of social media.

3. Without an easy way to measure the impact of social media, B2B marketers are playing it safe and sticking with what they know.

4. B2B marketers don't understand how their customers are using social media, how their customers might want to use social media, or how to reach their customers and learn about their thoughts on social media.

Do you have these same issues in deciding whether to incorporate social media into your B2B marketing campaigns? Has your company embraced social media as an effective marketing tool? Have you determined how best to measure the impact of social media on your users, your ROI, your sales and conversions? Do you even know if your customers are already using social media in other areas of their lives, or if they would welcome the introduction of social media tools in their B2B decision making process?

It's certainly important to ask yourself these questions when thinking about how social media might fit into your marketing strategy. At the same time though, you may not be able to answer all of these questions until you take the leap and present your users with social media in your marketing efforts. When people are given the chance to participate in that which interests them, they seem to respond by getting involved.

Consider starting small - here are a few ways to get started with social media without completely overhauling your entire marketing strategy:

1. Add tagging or bookmarking capabilities to your website so users can tag, save and share your content.

2. Start a company blog and encourage user participation through comments.

3. Allows users to access your marketing content (new whitepapers, enewsletters) vis RSS feeds.

4. Create a presence on social networking sites and invite your users to add you to their networks.

5. Incorporate multimedia content (such as videos and podcasts) into your marketing efforts.

If you want to learn more about how companies are implementing social media into their marketing campaigns check out this Social Computing Magazine article, 130 Social Media Marketing Examples from Major Brands. You can also find useful information on social media marketing in SEOmoz's article Social Media Marketing Tactics, or in Marketing Pilgrim's Social Media Marketing Beginner's Guide.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 02:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The recently released the BtoB Online Lead Generation Guide 2008 provides a comprehensive overview of the B2B lead generation industry's recent innovations and upcoming trends, and is published in an interactive format that puts their own suggestions regarding content usage into action.

The interactive guide has a range of features that allow users to search, bookmark, customize, and generally manipulate their experience with the content within. To explain all of the features, the guide contains a narrated tutorial that points out and explains each of the features available.

The fact that BtoB Online published the guide as more an interactive tool than as a document is interesting, and could signify a change in how content is distributed online. In the past, most similar publications have been offered as PDFs, or made available via a website. In choosing to distribute this guide as a tool however, BtoB Online is signaling the need to produce and distribute content that users can tweak to meet their needs.

By selecting any number of navigation options from the top-of-page navigation bar, users can select exactly how they want to view and use the content. In addition to deciding how I want my pages to appear (thumbnails or full-size viewing, 1-or-2 pages visible), I can select the "Links" option and see a list of all of the URLs on the page or in the guide! The publication also contains a fairly in-depth search feature, the ability to bookmark pages and have the bookmarks appear in my browser bookmarks/favorites, and social networking functionalities.

The inclusion of a "Share" option in the navigation bar is a big step for the B2B crowd which has been slower than the consumer sect in the full adoption of social networking within the industry. By addressing social networking in the very make-up of this guide however, BtoB Online is acknowledging the momentum that social networking has gained in the past year, and invited the use of social networking across the industry.

The guide can be embedded into blogs as a custom widget, shared with friends via an easy-to-use message containing the URL, or submitted to social networking sites such as Stumbledupon, Newsvine, and digg, among others.

In addition to the new interactive format, the guide also contains a host of valuable information for anyone working in the B2B lead generation industry. From advice on lead scoring and lead nurturing to resources for those looking to find out more about lead management vendors or understand the industry through statistics, the guide is packed full of useful tools.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 10:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Have you seen or heard of tag clouds, yet never been too sure what they are or why they're on so many sites? Have you ever want to see what your website or blog would look like with a tag cloud? I was curious about tag clouds myself - so I did a little research and created a few tag clouds to share on this site.

According to Wikipedia, tag clouds are "...visual depictions of user-generated tags, or simply the word content of a site, used typically to describe the content of web sites." Flikr, the photo sharing site, was the first high-profile website to use tag clouds, while the origins of tag clouds can be traced back to Douglas Coupland's 1995 Microserfs.

The first site I found was TagCrowd. TagCrowd is a web service that allows you to use their technology to create a tag cloud for any website, grouping of text, or uploaded file. I went to the site and created a tag cloud for this website, and (after a little tweaking on my part to remove some irrelevant words such as "comes" and "permalink," was rewarded with this nifty visualization of the content on this site:

Tag Cloud Generator is a free site that lets you create and customize your own tag clouds by adding specific tags, changing the font/background color and the size and alignment of your tags. I like this site - it was easy to use, didn't require that I register, and created a visually appealing cloud tag for this site:

MakeCloud is another free service that lets you create a tag cloud from any RSS Feed or website.

tag cloud

The cloud created using MakeCloud doesn't have the same formatting as the Tag Crowd option, but it still expresses the site content visually, and, while there are fewer tags, I thought that most included were highly relevant to the content on this site.

I also made a really neat looking tag cloud using Wordle - you can view it in their gallery here. Wordle images are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license, and can be used for any purposes. Keep in mind that if you use a Wordle image on your website or blog however, you must attribute it to Creative Commons.

I found yet another cool site in ZoomClouds. After an easy sign-up process, I was able to create and customize a tag cloud for the Accelerating IT Sales RSS Feed. Unfortunately, I was unable to get the cloud to preview in this post after pasting in the code, so I'm unable to show you the ZoomCloud output, which was pretty cool. You can check it out on their website here.

If you're interested in learning more about all of the different kinds of tag clouds you can make, check out this highly information article from Smashing Magazine, Tag Clouds Gallery: Examples And Good Practices. I had no idea that so much went into tag clouds, or that there were so many kinds of tag clouds that one could choose to put on their site until I read this article.

Tag clouds are an interesting way to quickly scan a site to figure out if its content is relevant to your needs. You can use tag clouds to search for topical information without having to come up with specific search terms on your own. Personally, I find tag clouds to be helpful, especially when I'm doing research this this blog. Since I write about so many different topics (social media, lead generation, IT Sales, multimedia content, etc), I don't always know what I'm looking for when I set out to find ideas for new blog posts.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 06:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I received an email recently with a link to a YouTube video that, once I'd checked it out, made me think differently about how viral video can be used to market or promote just about anything, regardless of its connection to the video's content.

In this video titled, "Where the Hell is Matt? (2008)," a young man named Matt dances in 42 countries on 7 continents, and with adults and children, various animals and even fish. He doesn't advertise anything in the video, conveys no obvious marketing messages, and is seemingly unconnected to anything other than himself. At the end of the video however, there is a brief message thanking Stride Gum for making the whole thing possible.

Wanting to know more, I went to both Matt's site, Where the Hell is Matt?, and to the Stride Gum site to find out how this gum company is connected to this dancing guy. It turns out that Matt made an initial dancing video several years ago, which was passed around the internet by friends and was eventually viewed by someone over at Stride Gum. According to Matt's website, Stride contacted Matt and asked if he wanted to travel around the world on their dime and make another dancing video.

From what I can tell, Matt isn't chewing gum in his videos, he doesn't talk about gum, and there's no pitch for viewers to go out and buy Stride Gum. Instead, Matt and Stride Gum have produced and released a really cool video that, according to the counter on YouTube, has been viewed 3,250,510 times! Of those 3 million plus viewers, there's no doubt that some of them watched the video and wanted to know how this dancing American and this gum company were connected.

By sponsoring this kind of video, Stride Gum took a leap of faith that the video would take on a life of its own on the internet, and that (at least in some instances), the company would gain some brand recognition once viewers got to the end and saw Stride listed as the sponsor. I'd never heard of Stride Gum until I watched the video; now I know the name, know what the company makes, and will look for the brand the next time I go to buy some gum.

Instead of trying to build their brand by forcing Matt to wear a Stride Gum tee-shirt, by making him chew gum and dance, or by having him shout the company's slogan (The Ridiculously Long Lasting Gum) at the end of the video, Stride Gum let Matt make a message-free video, and counted on the fact that people would want to know more about their company once they'd finished watching. In this instance, less is actually more, and Stride Gum wins by leaving the corporate message out of the viral video.

Other companies might try similar tactics in using video to promote their products. While it may seem risky to leave your message out of your marketing content, it could also pay off. If you're considering using viral video as a marketing tool, think about Stride Gum's strategy, and consider creating content that builds brand by making great videos that everyone wants to watch.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 12:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

By now, you've probably seen and heard of widgets (like the ones above), but do you actually know what they are, how they're used, and how you can use them to attract site visitors and build your brand? As users demand more customizable and interactive online experiences, web-based businesses have to meet that challenge by developing sticky tools, such as widgets, that allow their users to take their online experiences to the next level.

According to Wikipedia, a widget is:

...an element of a graphical user interface (GUI) that displays information that is changeable by the user, such as a window or a text box. The defining characteristic of a widget is to provide a single interaction point for the direct manipulation of a given kind of data. Widgets are basic visual building blocks which, combined in an application, hold all the data processed by the application and the available interactions on this data.

More simply, a widget is an online tool that can be embedded into websites, blogs, and social networking profile pages to share information - such as the weather or news, stream music or movies, display photos, play games, or set up quizzes, countdowns and other time wasters. You can find widgets that allow you to create yourself as a Simpson's character (The Simpsomaker), make your own Zen Fish Tank Aquarium, and even create your own Cyber Pets to hang out on your site.

Organizations can also use widgets as part of their marketing and branding efforts; a well-designed, easy-to-use widget can be implemented all over the web, but tracked back to your site and made recognizable with your corporate branding. Social bookmarking sites such as Furl and Multiply have their own widgets that can be embedded in blogs, you can subscribe to various RSS feeds using their respective widgets, and you can link to popular social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace using their widgets.

By creating these sticky tools, you make it possible to increase your web presence without having to do much actual work. When users have the ability to add your site to their blog with your widget, your branding is on their site, and you benefit by gaining access to your users' networks. These little icons are a good way to get your logo on your users' mobile devices too - as people use widgets to organize their online experiences. When you build a widget that links people back to your site, you are never more than a click away from your users.

And by building widgets, you also build the potential to engage and re-engage your users as they navigate away from your site and back to your site using your widgets. According to a BusinessWeek article, Building a Brand with Widgets, widgets are potentially better from engaging users than are more traditional online ads such as banners. By providing a tool that is actually helpful to people, you give them a way to accomplish their objectives and connect back with your brand.

If you do develop widgets that lead back to your site, you have to acknowledge that you will not have any control over where those widgets live on the web. People might place your widgets on websites that you would not necessarily want to be associated with, but at the end of the day, the traffic from that site might find its way back to yours and increase your overall audience. Just remember that the more sites your widgets live on all over the web, the more your brand will be recognized and the more traffic you will drive to your site.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 05:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

According to iSuppli - an applied market intelligence firm - a revolution in technology is afoot!! In a June 4 article titled, Wireless Social Networking Revolution Poised to Reshape Tech Industry, iSuppli indicates that wireless social networking technologies are poised to generate $2.5 trillion over the next 12 years, and that those companies who jump aboard the wireless social wave now stand to "lead in the technology business," while others may fall behind or become irrelevant.

In the article, iSuppli suggests that, as mobile devices become more embedded in our every day lives, their use as content delivery devices will skyrocket. At the same time, the availability of increased processing power, the expansion of wireless networks, and the ease and speed of wirelessly downloading content will turn the ever-present smart phones, PDAs and cell phones into our primary content viewing devices. And with so many people already turning to their iPhones to download videos from YouTube and following friends via Twitter and Pownce on their cell phones, it's no big leap to think that these devices will soon become central to downloading ALL of our electronic content.

According to iSuppli, the impact of wireless social networking will be felt across all areas of the industry - from semiconductors and processors to memory/storage capacities, devices and software. According to the article, as mobile devices are designed to better accommodate social networking needs, "...semiconductor companies will be compelled to deliver highly integrated processors that combine numerous high-performance, multi-threaded special purpose cores." This means that the expansion of social networking into the mainstream of society and business will generate new business opportunities as companies strive to meet the technological needs of this ever-evolving segment.

So how are businesses that haven't even integrated mobile content-delivery into their business models supposed to stay ahead of the curve when it comes to building wireless social networking into their organizations? The adoption of new technologies can be painstakingly slow, even among technologically-savvy industries; because of this, companies will have to develop a method that simultaneously incorporates mobile marketing and social networking into current business models.

In order to effectively implement wireless social networking, organizations that are currently dedicated to producing, managing and delivering online content need to take social media and social networking with the utmost seriousness. By ignoring the drumbeat of social networks, corporations signal a lack of understanding in regard to the future of technology. After all, social media and social networking are going to go away. The early adopters have already incorporated these technologies into their business models, and it's time for the rest of us to wake up and start letting our users connect to one another on their own terms and via whatever devices they so desire.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 12:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As the digital world changes to incorporate social communities, mobile devices, rich media, and user-generated content into the mainstream, marketers must evolve to meet the ever-changing needs of their users. While many B2B marketers have already heard this call and responded - consider how many podcasts, webinars, eSeminars and even Virtual Tradeshows exist that were unthinkable several years ago - there are advances that still need to be made, especially in how content is created and delivered.

1. Think Niche. Instead of reaching out to mammoth groups of users who may be interested in the topics you're presenting, give your users the change to sort themselves into small, category-specific groups that can be targeted with highly relevant content. Instead of letting users select from a few general categories related to your offerings, give them sub-choices within those categories. Once you know that a user is interested in learning about highly specific solutions within a larger category, they become highly qualified prospects when it's time to really promote your solutions. Users want to personalize their online experience, and offering them the option to define their interests in-depth allows them do this while giving you insight into their needs.

2. Mobile devices will as important as computers for content delivery. As it already stands, 64% of IT decision makers use their mobile devices to access electronic content. This number is only expected to go up as mobile networks become faster and are able to deliver content quickly and to a range of devices. If you're not already developing mobile versions of your website, landing page and marketing materials (enewsletters, email marketing messages), you need to start doing so now. When users try to access your website or open your enewsletter on their mobile devices, do you really want to lose them as a lead because their platform doesn't support your message?

3. Content needs to be convertible. Buzz Marketing (also known as word-of-mouth marketing or viral marketing) is how people are increasingly finding out about your content. People gather data from trusted sources, and their friends and co-workers fall into that category. Because of this, content needs to be packaged so it can be easily passed from person-to-person, regardless of the device they're using. While forwarding a white paper or emailing a URL that points to a video is easy, users will eventually need to be able to pass webinars, podcasts and product demos from device to device without considering that the file won't transfer. If you want your podcasts, webinars and other rich media to play, regardless of the device it's being accessed from, you need to develop these kinds of content with that goal in mind.

As a B2B marketer, one of your goals should be to make content as accessible to as many people, and with as little ease on their part as is humanly possible. This may mean re-tooling your product offerings to include mobile content delivery options, offering instant updates via micro-blog messages, or developing content that is accessible regardless of the device on which it's played. You may need to refine your focus when it comes to building eNewsletters, and consider sending more newsletters to fewer people so you get a smaller pool of more highly-qualified leads at the end of the day.

Developing new strategies for delivering content is challenging, but is essential to staying current in this evolving digital marketplace. When you do develop new products, you'll be better suited to meet your users needs and you may even attract new users when they see the cutting-edge content-delivery options that your company offers.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 06:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

With the introduction and widespread use of social media online, the digital landscape has changed from a one-way content stream (companies create and deliver content to users), to a two-way content stream (companies and consumers both create and deliver content). This two-way content stream has been good for companies; the more users engage with a company's marketing materials, the more connected they feel toward the company's brand. At the same time however, social media has opened companies to negative and potentially brand-damaging user interactions.

As more people user social media, and more companies incorporate social media tools into their sites, users have more ways to communicate their views with corporate entities, and corporations have less control over the messages going out with their names attached. If users decide that they are unhappy with a company's actions, they can use the company's own website and communications channels to express their dismay over the situation.

Once angry comments, or "buzz," start popping up on blogs or in user forums, companies no longer control their overall image and reputations can suffer. Rob Key, CEO of Converseon sums it up, "You no longer own your brand. Your brand is a conversation." Once conversations about your company turn negative, your hard-earned reputation can be sullied, and your company's earnings can even suffer.

Because user-participation online is not going away, companies need strategies to manage their online reputations without stifling the voices of their customers. It's clear that people want to participate in their online experiences, and by turning off the comment functionality on blogs, or disallowing user-generated content on websites, companies will only push their users further away and erode their reputation and their customer base.

To help companies keep abreast of the online "buzz" being generated in their name, companies can use "buzz monitoring" tools that track names, products and brands all over the web. In addition to the paid services that exist, companies can start tracking their online reputation with any of these 26 free buzz tracking tools. While you may not be able to control the conversations taking place about your company, you can monitor what people are saying, respond to negative posts, and reach out to people to limit the damage.

Learn more about how to monitor your company's reputation with the Free Online Reputation Management Beginner's Guide by Andy Beal of Marketing Pilgrim. Even though the guide was originally published in 2006, the tips and tools offered by Beal are relevant to everything that's going on today and deal with how to manage negative consumer generated media (CGM) before it ruins your corporate reputation. You can also learn more on The Forrester Blog for Interactive Marketing Professionals post by Peter Kim, Three Key Applications for Brand Monitoring.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 01:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

If you spend a lot of time moving around online, you've probably noticed an increase in the use of interactive tools on all kinds of websites. As people embrace the concept of interacting with online content, organizations are building more tools that engage users by encouraging their participation. In terms of usability, interactive tools pull users into an organization's offers and offer a kind of "stickiness" that is difficult to find otherwise. And from a marketing and lead generation standpoint, interactive tools have the potential to qualify users as high-level leads.

Users want control over their research and buying process, and it's crucial that their needs and behaviors are considered when designing marketing materials. Part of putting users in charge of this process is to provide interactive tools that spur user participation and help people feel engaged with your brand, your website and your offers.

In Redesigning Web Sites to Put Customers in Charge of Their Experience, from MarketingProfs, Jeannette Kocsis stresses the importance of designing websites with user behaviors as a guide. She lists the inclusion of intuitive and relevant tools as a key component to achieving a site that is based on user behaviors and needs. Interactive tools can also be used to convert users, and when implementing interactive tools, you have the ability to track deep, user-driven behaviors and use that data to qualify high-level leads.

Consumer marketers use interactive tools on all kinds of websites, and seem to have discovered the stickiness that comes when these kinds of tools are offered on their sites. MyShape is an online shopping site with a tool that lets users enter their physical dimensions in order to find out what "shape" they are and what clothes look best on that body type. They link their users to clothes that match their body types and allow them to shop right from there. FitDay, an online food journal site, is set up so users can enter the foods they consume and the exercise they do over the course of a day. Users can set weight loss goals, create reports based on the data they've entered, and write journal entries about their weight loss process.

What's key about these kinds of tools is that they keep the user coming back time and again. When women are shopping for clothes, they know they can find styles that match their body types on MyShape. For people trying to loose weight, FitDay gives them a place to enter their calories after each and every meal. From a marketing and lead generation perspective, this kind of stickiness is invaluable, and makes it easy to qualify and convert high-value leads. Tools that allow users to track their processes, calculate their needs, discover, compare and customize potential solutions are tools that will keep a user coming back to your site until they are ready to make a decision.

By taking a page from B2C marketing, B2B marketers can build tools that provide a deep level self-submitted user behaviors. These behaviors can be used to nurture users through their buying process and present them with relevant materials at appropriate times. Instead of responding to your marketing messages, users are now able to submit their own lead data (in their own timeframe) when they make the decision to work with your interactive tools.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 03:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Presidential candidates seem to have adopted the same marketing techniques used by online marketers, specifically B2B marketers. As strange as it sounds, it's possible to compare the Presidential electoral cycle to the complex sales cycle.

While the Presidential election is a high-stakes race for control of this country's government, candidates still have to rely on marketing techniques to get their voices heard and their faces in front of the masses. The Presidential campaigns are lengthy - lasting from 6-18 months - are education-intensive, and involve long-term nurturing of their target audience (voters). With so many people tuning into the race this year, B2B marketers may want to pay attention to how candidates have attracted, retained and nurtured their supporters, and how they plan on keeping them engaged from now until November.

Branding
To be a viable Presidential candidate, contenders have to create recognizable brands that appeal to potential supporters all over the country. In building their brands, candidates have a limited period of time to introduce themselves, educate the public on their policies, and prove that they can be trusted. By reaching out to voters with consistent messaging (signs, literature, buttons, commercials), providing a steady stream of high-quality educational materials (issue statements, press releases, online content, literature), and repeating their campaign's key themes at every opportunity(Change You Can Believe In; Straight Talk Express, Making History Together), the candidates have effectively created recognizable brands that seem to appeal to voters.

Building recognizable brands is also an essential component to running a successful B2B marketing campaign. When sending out marketing materials, B2B marketers work to establish themselves as trusted advisers that can be relied upon and turned to over the course of the buying cycle. To do this, marketers reach out to prospects with educational materials that are meant to facilitate the research phase of the buying cycle. By sending these kinds of materials early in the buying process, marketers build brand awareness, provide valuable research materials and hopefully establish themselves as trusted advisers.

Research & Education
With so much riding on the outcome of the Presidential Election, voters are increasingly educating themselves on the policies, backgrounds and beliefs of the Presidential candidates. To help voters learn about their issues, candidates have developed content that outlines their policies, highlights their voting records, and explains how they plan to proceed if elected. Voters can download issue statements, read press releases, watch videos and study the text of speeches on candidate websites. Campaigns also send out eNewsletters and text message updates to blast their supporters with information about the candidates.

With lengthy sales cycles involving expensive, and often highly technical products, B2B marketers have to provide a stream of educational materials to their prospects that will answer their questions as they progress through the buying process. And because different prospects have different requirements (the technical decision maker vs. the financial decision maker, for example), marketers need to develop content that will reach each kind of buyer at the appropriate point in their buying process. To do this, B2B marketers create white papers, case studies, webinars, product demos and podcasts that users can acces with ease when they're ready.

Nurturing
With an election cycle that started in early 2007 and will end in November of this year, Presidential campaigns have to nurture voters throughout the entire process. By reaching out to users with eNewsletters, text messages, events, and editorial content, Presidential candidates continuously strive to connect with and engage voters. Adding to this difficulty is the need for candidates to raise money from their supporters and motivate their base to volunteer their time, organize events and make phone calls on their behalf. So while candidates nurture voters through the process, they also have to engage people with Calls to Action.

Research on lead nurturing shows us that prospects are most likely to respond to your marketing message after you've engaged them with multiple touches (email messages, phone calls, eNewsletters, etc), and that 95% of initial leads are "green bananas" that need to be nurtured and ripened over time (with thanks to Brian Carroll). Because of this B2B marketers engage in "drip marketing" techniques that allow them to engage and re-engage prospects by reaching out to them over time and building their brand and their image as a trusted adviser. B2B marketers continuously reach out to prospects with eNewsletters, email marketing messages, engaging content and Calls to Action - though these Calls to Action generally invite users to participate in events, download trial versions of their products or watch multimedia content.

Content
Both Presidential campaigns and B2B marketing campaigns lean heavily on the use of content to get their views across- specifically audio, video and informational articles. There seems to be an overall recognition that eNewsletters and email marketing messages are effective tools for getting a message across to large numbers of people at once. And while B2B marketers are still somewhat lagging in their use of social media, Presidential campaigns seem to understand that the way to engage users is to let them participate in the process, and have widely implemented blogs, social communities, and user-generated content.

By comparing Presidential campaigns and B2B marketing campaigns, we can see how large, well-funded organizations are using the same tools to achieve very different goals. In looking at the similarities of the processes required to attain their goals however, it's clear that we can all learn from each other, and consider how some of the candidates' tactics could work in the B2B arena.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 10:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you want to shake up IT marketing, consider taking a page from online news sites such as the Washington Post or the New York Times and expanding your use of graphics, interactive tools and customizable options when presenting your marketing materials. Instead of designing landing pages and research libraries simply as repositories for digital assets, consider how you can use these spaces to grab users and engage them in a meaningful online experience.

Take for example this Washington Post multimedia module called Forced Out. This investigative piece examines the DC real estate boom, and how it's given landlords the perfect opportunity to force poor tenants out of their homes in order to make way for expensive condos. The Washington Post effectively employs rich media, including a narrated slide show, videos, an interactive map and tabs that take the reader through the Post's 3-day investigation. Social media is also used in telling this story, and the Post provides a forum for readers to discuss the articles and share their feelings with one another. This cross-pollination of audio, video, photography, the written word and interactive tools allows the Post to engage several of the reader's senses when telling their story, and encourages them to get further involved with what they've learned.

When you are able to tell the story of your product or service, you are more likely to convince people to pay attention to your message, regardless of what you're trying to sell. Marketing technology may not be as sexy or glamorous as marketing couture or alcohol, but it doesn't have to be boring either. With the increased access to rich media tools, such as videos, interactive graphics, and audio, you can develop a variety of resources that appeal to all kinds of users. At the same time, you can position those resources in a way that while their messages overlap, they also each tell your story in different ways.

While many IT marketers are already developing content using a variety of media types, their assets are often segmented by type when you visit the company websites. Even when you have the ability to search for solutions or products, the supporting assets are generally presented as a list, and not as a cohesive unit. Landing pages and Microsites are more likely to group assets by product or topic, but even they lack the storytelling effect that you find when reading online news sites.

Social media plays a role in this new kind of storytelling too, as users want to know not only what a product's story is, but also what their peers think about the story. By adding user forums, reviews and comments to your marketing zones, you express an overall confidence in your product by allowing unsanctioned voices to contribute to its story. While a landing zone, Microsite or product page on your website may not seem like the best place to allow user-generated commentary, plenty of well-known businesses are already effectively employing these techniques.

Check out news sites around the web and think about how they generate interest in their stories. And remember, even though most newspapers are designed primarily to deliver the news, most of them are probably in the lead generation business too. We can learn from each other, and learning how the media employs rich media and social media practices in their business is a good place to start.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 01:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Senator Barack Obama is considered to be the most plugged-in of the candidates when it comes to using the internet as a campaign tool. In the Rolling Stone article, The Machinery of Hope, the author discusses how Obama followed in Governor Howard Dean's footsteps when it came to using the Internet, and how initially, that was considered a risky thing to do (given Dean's political spin out in the 2000 Presidential election). With that said, Obama was wise to stick with his online strategy, and his wisdom has paid off in the guise of a robust website that's packed with social media tools.

Obama's homepage grabs the users and asks them to take action right away. Site visitors are greeted with a dynamic window that flashes new content every few seconds; each window asks visitors to take a different action - from downloading his "Plan for America," to donating money after looking at the map of committed delegates. This kind of instant engagement is good for getting people involved as soon as they land on his site, and offers the kind of education voters seek when looking to elect a leader.

Education seems to be a key to the Obama campaign, and the first tab in the site's navigation is "Learn." From this link, users can find all kinds of information about the Senator from Illinois, and even check facts to find out if what they're hearing in the news (or from other candidates) is true. In his "Issues" section, Obama even offers his 64-page "Blueprint for Change," a document that outlines his plan for the country if elected President.

Obama's campaign seems to rely on getting people involved in the process - not unlike Clinton's strategy. From the "People" link where Obama addresses Americans of all different races, ethnicities and backgrounds, to the "Action Center" where he reaches out to voters and asks them to donate money, organize events and volunteer their time, people are at the heart of this campaign. Voters can also sign up for an account on MyBarackObama.com, a personalized online community of Obama supporters, and create their own groups in support of the candidate.

The Obama campaign also has a blog, offers eNewsletter updates, mobile/text updates, ring tones and wallpaper for cell phones and a variety of interactive tools that let voters see how many voters are needed to secure the nomination, and when primary elections are scheduled around the country. Voters can also download all kinds of Obama imagery, and the image above was downloaded right from his site and dropped into this post with little editing.

Overall it seems that the Obama campaign has really stressed the importance of educating voters by providing a tremendous amount of content (multimedia and text) that they can turn to throughout the electoral process. Once voters are educated as to the facts, the website is set up to allow people to form their own alliances in support of Obama and to participate at their own pace.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 01:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Senator John McCain may be slightly older than his competition, his campaign strategy includes plenty of social media tools that are meant to attract younger voters and reach out to tech-savvy supporters of all ages.

Voters have all kinds of options for getting involved with the McCain campaign when they visit his website, and his site navigation promotes participation. The second tab on his homepage is the "Get Involved" tab, and from that link, voters can engage with the campaign in a variety of ways.

The staff of the McCain campaign clearly understand the need to brand their candidate, and they provide free downloads of McCain web banners, Google icons, cell phone wallpaper, Facebook photos and buddy icons for instant message clients. By giving voters easy access to McCain's image, they are asking supporters to assist in their branding of the candidate and show the world that they support McCain. Consider this - I grabbed the URL for the image above right off of the McCain website and didn't have to resize it or edit it at all to work on my blog!

Senator McCain has also embraced the value of offering a range of multimedia content that can be downloaded and saved for future reference. Voters can find McCain videos, speeches, advertisements, and policy statements on his website, and his Multimedia page has a YouTube logo and videos prominently placed at the top of the page. McCain also gives voice to his supporters and his website has a space for videos created by average Americans in support of his campaign.

Like the other candidates, McCain has communities on Facebook, MySpace, and YouTube, but he's also created "McCain Space," where voters can create an account and be a part of his campaign's community. McCain's campaign blog is written by campaign staffers, includes embedded video, and has some posts that have drawn over 1000 comments - not bad! And unlike the other candidates, McCain seems to use RSS Feeds effectively and has "top feeds" set up on his blog homepage that are easy to access.

McCain's use of social media on his site appears to really promote his brand and engage users to get involved in the campaign. By offering photographs and videos that really show McCain in action on the campaign trail, McCain reinforces his image and builds brand awareness. His site is less focused on user-generated content than those of Clinton or Obama, but in his case, branding may be the best way to attract voters right now.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 01:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Much like Senator Obama and McCain's campaigns, Hillary Clinton's campaign has embraced social media as a tool for reaching out to voters and encouraging them to get involved in the political process. Clinton's campaign seems to understand the importance of getting voters involved in the process, and her website includes many areas where voters can get involved and become a part of history.

Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY)
When visiting the Hillary Clinton website, you're greeted with a dynamic selection of comments that people have posted to BlogHillary, the campaign's official blog. Written by members of the Hillary Clinton for President (the campaign's official name) staff, prominent Clinton supporters and citizen-bloggers, BlogHillary addresses the issues, chronicles campaign events, and invites Clinton supporters to get involved by organizing events, signing petitions and adding their comments to the blog.

Clinton encourages voters to get involved by joining one of the Clinton communities on social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook, by following the candidate's Tweets, or by watching Hillary videos on YouTube. Voters are also invited to start their own Hillary-related blogs, sign up for campaign updates via text messages or subscribe to HillaryHub (a site that tracks Clinton-related news) RSS feeds. From the website supporters can also donate money, volunteer their time, or sign up to host their own events.

The Clinton campaign appears to understand the need to engage and nurture voters over the course of the lengthy election cycle, and provides ample content to achieve this goal. From speeches and press releases to videos, photos, articles and issue statements, voters can find a comprehensive array of information on Hillary's beliefs, voting history, background, and policy initiatives. As this information is always available (and constantly expanded), voters can research the candidate on their own schedule, and with a range of educational tools.

In examining the Hillary Clinton for President website, it looks as if the campaign understands the importance of generating leads (i.e. voters), and nurturing those leads through a lengthy decision making process. Much like the B2B buying process - which involves long-term lead generation and nurturing - the electoral cycle requires candidates to attract voters early on (before their state primaries), and retain them through the national election. During this time (from 6 to 18 months), candidates rely on voters to participate in their campaigns by donating money, organizing events and volunteering their time.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 12:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Regardless of how you plan to vote in the upcoming Presidential election, you have to admit that the 3 mainstream candidates for the Presidency have effectively implemented social media strategies and engagement marketing into their online campaigns. And while Senator Barack Obama's is generally considered the first to have embraced social media as a cornerstone of his campaign (see this Rolling Stone article - The Machinery of Hope), Senators Hillary Clinton and John McCain both have developed campaigns that rely heavily on social media to engage voters.

With the need to reach as many voters as possible before November, the campaigns have developed marketing strategies that recognize the value of user participation, social networking, real-time updates, and the availability of multimedia and text-based content. Instead of delivering static messages to voters, candidates have opened up their campaigns to their supporters and asked them to participate in the process by blogging, joining online communities, organizing events, and reaching out to other voters.

By incorporating social media into their campaigns, the Presidential contenders have introduced the concept of online user-participation to mainstream America, and opened the door to widespread use of social media in other segments of society. With so many people discovering social media tools, it’s possible that people may begin to expect social media options when making other serious decisions.

While some B2B marketers have already developed excellent social media strategies and use blogs, multimedia, user-generated content and personalization to engage their users over the course of their buying processes, there are still plenty of B2B marketing campaigns that lack social media tools. In looking at the Presidential candidates' websites, it's interesting to understand how social media is being used to engage, educate and nurture people through lengthy decision-making processes, and how those techniques can be applied when developing other kinds of marketing campaigns.

I've examined Hillary Clinton, John McCain and Barack Obama's websites in an attempt to understand how they have leveraged social media tools to generate interest in their campaigns, invite voter participation, engage and re-engage voters over a lengthy election cycle, convince voters to donate money, and motivate supporters to cast their votes in November. Over the next several posts, I will dissect the social media strategies employed by each of the candidates and try to discover how B2B marketers can use similar strategies to achieve their own goals.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 04:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Micro-blogging is a growing phenomenon and may be one of the waves of the future when it comes to reaching out and connecting with plugged-in website subscribers, members and users. Because of the ability to send short, highly targeted messages to users via their cell phones, IM clients or desktops, micro-blogging may be the next best way to deliver content quickly.

According to Wikipedia,

Micro-blogging is a form of blogging that allows users to write brief text updates (usually less than 200 characters) and publish them, either to be viewed by anyone or by a restricted group which can be chosen by the user. These messages can be submitted by a variety of means, including text messaging, instant messaging, email, MP3 or the web.

The most popular of the micro-blogging platforms is Twitter - the social networking service that allows users to send brief messages (140 characters maximum) to their network of "friends." When you use Twitter, you have the ability to let your network in on what you're doing at any given time, and follow what your friends are doing as well. Twitter has gained a large and loyal following of people who constantly answer Twitter's defining question, "What are you doing?"

Pownce is another micro-blogging platform, but this one allows people to send messages, links, files and event invitations to their network of friends. Pownce has developed a range of tools and applications that allow you to send and receive messages on your cell phone, IM client, and even as notes sent straight to your desktop.

Other micro-blogging platforms include Jaiku, Dodgeball and Loopnote.

Micro-blogging's potential as a marketing tool comes from the potential to sign users up for niche-content updates, and send links (to white papers, case studies, podcasts) using a micro-blogging platform. Instead of relying on a general topic eNewsletter when sending out a white paper, you can send a micro-blog message to a self-selected group of highly targeted users. The New York Times, the BBC and Al Jazeera are already using micro-blogging to send headlines and links to stories.

While setting up micro-blog updates for your content may not be at the top of your priority list right now, it's important to start considering where technology is taking online marketing. We already know that 64% of IT decision makers are reading your eNewsletters on their mobile devices. Of these people, how many are already using micro-blogs, and would they be interested in skipping eNewsletters altogether and moving on to white papers delivered via micro-blogs?

For more information about Micro-blogging, check out Mark Glaser's MediaShift post Your Guide to Micro-Blogging and Twitter, Melissa Chang's 16th Letter post, What is Twitter, or this highly informative article, Why We Twitter: Understanding Microblogging Usage and Communities.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 10:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

A recent Buzz Marketing for Technology blog post by Paul Dunay asks a simple question: Is Social Media More Difficult in B2B than B2C? I've been trying to come to terms with this concept in posts I've authored recently, and am struck by the points Dunay raises about building B2B brand identity, brand loyalty, and B2B social media usage.

Dunay explains that when you hear "Ralph Lauren," or "The Gap," you can easily envision the people who wear those brands - and from there, you can create a marketing platform that might appeal to the people who wear those brands, and engage those brand loyalists as such. When you mention big IT companies however, it's harder to associate any one group of people with the brands that dominate among those companies. There is no typical Microsoft user; there is no easily identifiable group of IBM devotees or Dell disciples that you can visualize and grasp onto for marketing purposes.

Building a B2C brand, and subsequent loyalty among B2C consumers, is generally considered to be easier than building a B2B brand. Because of the passion people tend to feel for consumer purchases (consider the buzz generated when the iPhone was released), taking the next step and getting people to actually identify with their favorite consumer products (and therefore, their favorite brands) is that much easier. After all, how many people do you know who are willing to in line to purchase new virtuzlization technology or disk-to-disk backup systems for their businesses?

The market segment you need to reach when marketing B2B technology is vast, unstructured and not easily pigeon-holed. We can identify the titles of key decision makers in the B2B buying process, but we can't as easily pinpoint what brands they wear, where they buy their coffee, or what kinds of cars they like to drive. In lacking this ability, it becomes more difficult to build identifiable brand loyalty, and create meaningful social media outlets where influential B2B decision makers will feel comfortable hanging out and engaging and interacting with other B2B buyers and their content.

And while B2B marketers do have the good fortune of dealing with a relatively well-established group of B2B buyers and decision makers, B2B buying doesn't tend to excite passion the way that clothing, car or coffee brands tend to. Creating brand loyalty is an excellent way to promote unity, passion and excitement around any product - and when you're able to do these things, it becomes easier to incite your users to interact and engage with whatever media you present to them.

So what matters in B2B branding? How do you implore users to identify with your corporation, your products, philosophies and your brand - especially if you want to use that branding to instill a sense of loyalty and passion and ignite user-interaction via social media tools? Let me know your thoughts on the matter - the verdict is, after all, still out on the best way to reach this influential, tech-savvy group of decision makers who make the IT marketing world go-round.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 11:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you are a content creator, there's a good chance that you spend plenty of time trolling the Web looking for information to use when writing articles and blogs. While you can do Google searches to find information that suits your research needs, the results can be overly broad if you haven't mastered the art of keyword searching. Blogs are great places to look when doing research too, but sometimes the abundance of blog posts on whatever topics you're looking for can be overwhelming. With so many online search and research tools, it can be tough to find what you're looking for by virtue of there being so much that matches your research needs!

There is a new trend however, that may offer some research help - niche search communities that gather contextual information from around the web and present it in a single location. Junta 42 is a content marketing search community that is set up so content is gathered by Junta 42 community and staff members who search the web and submit the content to the site. In order to maintain a standard, Junta 42 staff members filter submitted content and ensure that community members are not simply posting anything to the site.

There are plenty of niche search engines in existence on the Web, but what sets Junta 42 apart from most of the others I found is that it is dedicated to provided content about how best to market content - and therefore best meets my own research needs. In terms of writing about marketing, it's always helpful to find tools that are designed to help me do my job - and this one does.

As the Web continues to grow, it's interesting to watch how our need to segment, filter and funnel data into smaller and smaller chunks increases. The organization of information online is challenged by the size and (lack of) overall management of the Internet. Niche search engines are invaluable to the organization of online information, as they centrally distribute very specific content, and decrease time spent searching the web. The interactive component of niche search engines like these encourages user participation in tracking down and sharing content with others, and increases the likelihood of connecting with the people with whom you share a niche industry.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 10:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

With so many social networking Websites and interactive options available across the Web, it's easy to lose track of the sites you're participated in or joined over the past few years. The use of social media provides so many opportunities to express yourself, introduce yourself, and generally get yourself known online, that you may need to consider what kind of online reputation you've been building over time - either intentionally or accidentally.

Without even meaning to, your participation in various online sites could have created a trail of misleading, incorrect, or less-than-flattering profiles scattered about the web. Search tools like Google Alerts or Yahoo Alerts allow people to find every instance of your name and profile online, and if you have incorrect information out there - you need to consider the impact of that information popping up when a prospective employer Googles your name, or a potential client stumbles across an out-of-date LinkedIn profile.

Think about profiles you've created over the past 5 years and ask yourself the following questions:

Since creating your online profiles have you...

• moved, gotten a new phone number or changed your email address?
• gotten married, divorced or had children?
• gotten a new job/left an old job?
• graduated from school?
• updated any training or certifications?
• won awards, joined professional organizations or community groups?
• changed industries?
• gotten a new title or changed job responsibilities?
• started or closed a company?
• expanded your online presence with a website or blog?
• changed industries or left the job market altogether?

If you answered yes to any of these, and have not updated your online profiles recently, you might consider doing a Google search on your own name and seeing what comes up. While you may think that managing your online reputation isn't all that important, if you're not engaged in a job search or looking to expand your network, you need to consider that it's better to be proactive and manage this information before you need a new job than wait and try to do it all once it's time to get back out there and make new connections.

It's already clear how important online reputations can be on eAuction sites like eBay and Amazon, where users post positive and negative feedback about their interactions with other buyers and sellers. A bad eBay reputation can get a seller blacklisted, and make participation in the site difficult. With so much in our lives being accessed online, it's starting to matter more and more what you have on your MySpace and Facebook profiles that you stopped checking 2 years ago, as well as what's on your updated LinkedIn page.

Check out these resources to learn more about how you can manage your reputation and control what others learn when they search for you online.

Reputation Repair is Mission Critical from Brand Titan

Online Reputation Monitoring Beginners Guide by Andy Beal of Marketing Pilgrim

34 Online Reputation Management Tools by Duct Tape Marketing

Remember, these are basic tips for starting the process of managing your online reputation management. I will address more in-depth steps you can take to control your image online in another post.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 01:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Ziff Davis Enterprise Virtual Tradeshows are 1-2 day live events that bring analysts, consultants, research firms, business decision-makers and vendors together in a virtual environment where they can learn about and discuss enterprise technology. In addition to expert speakers, live presentations and virtual "booths" staffed with vendor representatives, attendees have access to a full-service virtual environment packed with social networking and research tools.

Part of what makes these events so compelling - for both vendors and IT buyers - is the interactive nature of Virtual Tradeshows. When signing up for a show, you can create a personalized profile, upload an avatar and have your data transfered to a "Vcard" (a virtual business card). Once inside the event, you can reach out to vendors through their booths, network with other attendees in the Virtual Lounge, and chat with Ziff Davis Enterprise representatives at the Help Desk.

Each VTS is packed with resources to help you learn more about the specific topics being presented. You can add research materials to your virtual Briefcase, view live or archived webinars, or watch keynote addresses by industry experts. Because the focus of these events is on educating users, there are links to vendor websites and forums where you can further discuss the technologies being presented.

By presenting so much information via this virtual platform, Ziff Davis Enterprise has placed the user at the center of an educational, interactive experience. And with so many ways to reach out to vendors, industry experts and other interested users, you are given a chance to truly investigate new technologies in these pressure-free, collaborative learning environments.

To see the full list of Ziff Davis Enterprise Virtual Tradeshows, click here.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 10:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Behavioral targeting has a bad reputation - there is a common perception that once marketers have your personal information, they know everything there is to know about you, and will use it to intrude upon your privacy. For reputable online marketers however, the use of personal data for marketing purposes is much more focused, and, when applied correctly, actually respects user privacy by only sending messages targeted to their needs.

By signing up for or subscribing to an eNewsletter or website, users "opt-in" to receive marketing materials and thereby give marketers permission to send communications directly to their inboxes. When marketers take this data a step further, and analyze their users' engagement with their content, they are looking at information to which they already have access. Once user behaviors have been analyzed, marketers are able to send targeted messages to those users who have expressed an interest in very specific topics, instead of marketing the same materials to their entire subscriber lists.

When marketers have the capability to track how, and how often, their users are engaging with their content, they can use that data to segment, and further segment their users into niche groups. This kind of data - how often a user has downloaded a white paper, whether they've participated in an online forum, or the fact that they only watch the first 20 minutes of webinars - is useless when taken out of context. But by examining this kind of data to anticipate their users' needs, it becomes a powerful tool in determining which materials will help users move through their buying processes quickly.

According to Phil Leggiere's post, BT and Lead Generation, in the MediaPost's Behavioral Insider blog, this kind of targeting can bring real value to users. He cites the Amazon and Netflix implementation of behavior targeting as examples of behavioral targeting done well. When looked at from this perspective, it seems logical to think that when marketers start paying attention to their users' movements online, they are better able to respond to their users' needs in real-time and give their users what they want.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 10:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As promised in How IT Companies Have Leveraged Social Media, I investigated some smaller technology companies to learn where they are spending their social media dollars, and how social media is playing a role on their websites and in their customers' experiences. I found it interesting, though not too surprising, that most of the smaller tech companies have not implemented fancy social media tools, and have instead chosen to focus more heavily on using traditional rich media practices (the use of white papers, case studies, videos, podcasts & webinars) to educate their users on their products and services.

For these smaller companies, the most popular use of social media seems to occur when developers are invited to collaborate on further developing the products, and have a need for a forum where they can discuss their ideas. Red Hat, Juniper Networks and F5 all have these kinds of communities on their sites. Otherwise, these smaller companies are using blogs, wikis, and customer stories told via videos to engage their users and create a feeling of community and collaboration on their sites. Comprised of various companies from the CNNMoney list of the 100 Fastest-growing Technology Companies, the list below is a sampling of IT hardware, software and service companies that aren't quite as large as IBM or Microsoft, but who use social media to create communities and engage their customers.

1. Akamai is the leading global service provider for accelerating content and business processes online. Akamai places a high priority on the customer experience, and has created a page full of videos in which their customers talk about their experiences with Akamai. And because Akamai has so many high-profile clients, including the NBA, Fox Interactive and MySpace, their video presentations are a great way of letting people know the heavy-hitters that use their products. Users can also tour the Network Operations Command Center online and watch the Akamai Real-Time Web Monitor. While there in no user forum or online community through the Akamai site, the company's use of multimedia tools and customer stories gives the impression that they want their customers to share their stories feel as if they are part of a greater Akamai experience.

2. Epicor is a global leader dedicated to providing business software solutions to companies around the globe. In terms of their social media strategy, Epicor offers standard live and archived webinars that are designed to introduce and educate their users about their products and technology. The Epicor site also has a Customer Portal, where users can join discussions and access reference materials from one location. And while Epicor is still relying more on in-person events than on online events, they do have a User Conference page where users can access videos, customer testimonials and opportunities to provide feedback about what they'd like to see at future events. Epicor customers can also chat with live company representatives and subscribe to company alerts.

3. F5 Networks, a leader in Application Delivery Networking, provides solutions that ensure business applications are always secure, fast, and available. The most prominent aspect of F5's social media integration is their F5 DevCentral site - a community driven portal that provides links to blogs, forums, videos, wikis and other resources. F5 Networks has combined all kinds of user-created content - from blogs to wikis - in one location, so their customers can find information on their products and services quickly and easily. They also provide access to the F5 "Labs" - a place where users can present ideas for new products, product upgrades and other development-related concepts. Tags decorate the right-hand side of the page too, so users can see what other community members are interested in, and find related resources.

4. The Juniper Networks high-performance network infrastructure helps businesses create a responsive and trusted environment for accelerating the deployment of services and applications over a single network. One of the first places I visited on the Juniper Networks site was the J-Net Communities, an online portal that connects users and lets them share and discuss their use of Juniper products and services. The J-Net Community lets users see information about who's logged-in to the site, the most popular forums and user-based information. Juniper also has links to their official blog, Got the NAC, and provides a range of rich media tools to promote their products and services.

5. NetScout Systems, a leading provider of integrated network and application performance management solutions, offers the NetScout User Forum (an independent user group), where
NetScout customers can come together to share their experiences with NetScout products. NetScout users can also read the NUFBlog, however they must first register with the NUF community to do so. Another area where NetScout users can participate more fully in the company is the Online Training Center, a resource portal that contains educational materials, interactive Flash presentations, and audio/video training modules. By engaging their users to learn about their products and participate in customer forums, NetScout has successfully employed social media tools that highlight user needs and experiences.

Continue reading "How Smaller IT Companies Leverage Social Media " »

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 12:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

How are technology companies incorporating social media into their corporate marketing campaigns? We all know that most tech companies already use podcasts, webcasts and video to market their products and services, but what other tools are being employed by IT companies both large and small? By reaching out to users with interactive tools, technology companies are finding that there is a place for social media in their marketing departments.

I visited websites of 10 large technology companies to learn more about how organizations have implemented social media into their corporate websites. Each of the companies I researched is using social media in some form - check out what I found below:

Cisco Systems
When visiting the Cisco site you can easily navigate to their "Human Network" - a place where users can log in to watch videos, read and share stories about their experiences with Cisco technology, and communicate with their network members. In their blog, Cisco touts the success they have had with collaboration tools such as wikis, forums and other interactive technologies - and from looking at the site, you get the impression that they know what they're talking about.

Dell
There is a prominent link at the bottom of the homepage on the Dell website. By clicking the link, users are directed to the Dell Online Community. On this site, Dell offers a portal filled with user-generated content (reviews, conversations, suggestions), rich media (podcasts, videos), and other social media tools including a Dell Wiki, a link to Dell on Second Life, and Member Spotlights (profiles of Dell Community members).

Hewlett-Packard
HP has jumped full-force into blogging, and publishes blogs on a range of categories - from Innovation to Mobility & Wireless. When you're on the HP Blog site, you have options to view other rich media (podcasts, videos, webcasts), but there is no robust HP online community. And while you can read about Customer Stories, the stories are actually more like case studies, and users are unable to contribute their own. One unique feature of the HP site is their Online Classes - where users can log-in, register for a class, and learn about different topics online.

IBM
IBM has developed an Executive Innovation Channel that works as a forum for users to investigate specific technology topics, find resources related to those topics, and connect with IBM employees about the topics. While there is no user-to-user interaction, IBM has clustered rich media content (including Flash videos and audio files) that relate to the topics, for easy access, and they also track your interactions with their content as you move from topic to topic.

Nokia
Nokia's slogan is "Connecting People," and they make that possible in their "Forum Nokia," an online community site where users can learn about Nokia products, visit the Nokia blogs, contribute to the Nokia wikis or join the discussion boards. Nokia has implemented popular tagging searches on their blogging site, and users can search their blog posts by keywords. When you view the Nokia product pages, there are RSS feeds to user blogs, videos and news. You can also visit the Nokia Workshop, where users write about their experiences with Nokia technology.

Continue reading "How IT Companies Have Leveraged Social Media " »

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 08:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

With the recent surge in the use and interest of social media as a B2B marketing tool, now is a good time to address the coming changes to how this industry does business. By incorporating new social media technologies into lead generation and marketing efforts, B2B marketers may have to reconsider how view their customers and their clients.

In Buzz Marketing for Technology, Paul Dunay makes an excellent point regarding the possible demise of the traditional "campaign" due to social media's impact on marketing. In his post, There is No "Campaign" in Social Media, Dunay defines traditional marketing campaigns as such:

When marketers use the word “campaign,” it tends to suggest an initiative to get a message out to a targeted group of constituents. It also implies there will be a beginning and, somewhere down the road, an ending.

With social media playing a larger and larger role in the B2B marketing industry however, "campaigns" become outdated. According to Dunay, marketing via social media modes (blogs, podcast series, virtual communities) requires long-term user participation. Because users have to get involved in order for social media to really work, you have to continue reaching out, engaging your prospects and asking them to join the conversation.

By relying on the user to respond to our offerings, it's possible that we will have to cultivate, nurture and score leads in a completely different manner. "Campaign" time frames may lengthen, and the way leads are valued may change. Lead scoring, and the management of leads over time, may become the most important part of lead generation, especially if companies discard time frames for lead guarantees and concentrate on lead quality instead.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 09:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

With the growing popularity of blogs - over 12 million Americans currently maintain blogs and 57 million Americans read blogs according to the BlogWorld & New Media Expo website - now may be a good time to examine the benefits of adding a blog to your organization's marketing toolkit. There are a multitude of benefits to corporate blogging, and I've listed a few below to shine some light on the benefits of jumping into the blogosphere.

Build Brand Awareness
Blogs are good tools for building brand awareness, educating users about your company and its offerings, and establishing your place online and in the marketplace. If a website was the must-have corporate marketing vehicle of the past 10-years, a blog is the must-have tool today. By tagging your posts, images and blog with search engine optimized keywords, you can drive traffic to your blog and increase your organization's overall audience. And while websites can also be optimized for search (and should be), the dynamic nature of blog publishing increases the number of tags you can use, and the frequency with with you are attaching your organization to new tags. In the article, Branding and Advertising: Using your Blog to Build your Brand, Angela Booth of Blogging for Dollars writes that the longer a blog is online and the more content is contained within, "the more useful it becomes for organic search for more terms." Once your blog is discovered - even unintentionally via searches - the more likely you are to drive traffic to your blog and to your organization.

Become Recognized as a Thought Leader
When writing a blog, you have the chance to share your knowledge with the world and become an expert in your field. Brian Carroll, of InTouch and author of B2B Lead Generation Blog, is an excellent example of a marketing blogger who has used his knowledge and his blog to become a thought leader in his field. Carroll started writing his blog in order to help other marketers by sharing his knowledge. According to Carroll in the recent Marketo article - Lead Nurturing with Brian Carroll - his speaking events and blogging led a publisher to him, and from there he wrote "Lead Generation for the Complex Sale."

Interact with Your Current & Potential Customers
When you publish a blog, subscribers and visitors have the opportunity to provide feedback, share their opinions and generally interact with you (and therefore with your organization) easily and with little commitment on their part. Instead of forcing site users to fill out a web-based form that includes all of their contact information, send you an email or pick up the phone and call your company, a blog lets people leave quick comments about any of your posts. Once published, other users can join the conversation and respond to what people are saying about your blog and about your company. By providing an open forum for discussion, you have an opportunity to see what your users are thinking, learn how your views and ideas match up with their expectations, and publicly respond. Suddenly, your interactions with your users are on view for all to read, and your company is viewed as being accessible and open to the views of your users.

Continually Engage with Your Customers & Potential Customers
Every time you publish a new blog post, you have a chance to put your message in front of your users - automatically. By prompting readers to sign up for your blog's RSS feed, you can deliver new posts directly to your target audience whenever you publish. Each time your users read your blog, you have the chance to remind them of your message and encourage their participation with your company.

Continue reading "Become a Blogger Today" »

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 09:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

With the popularity of social media sites like Twitter and Flickr, it's no surprise that B2B marketers are starting to reconsider social media tools for their marketing strategies. Overall, B2B marketers have not fully jumped on the social media bandwagon, it seems however, that the tide may be about to change.

Back in June, Jon Miller of Marketo published What's Wrong with Social Media for B2B Marketing on SearchEngineLand. com. In his article, Miller argues that to effectively use social media, you need to be marketing trendy or popular products or concepts that will motivate users to interact with your site. And while B2B marketing can incorporate some social media practices - especially for traffic generation, brand awareness, and direct selling - the relative straight-forward nature of B2B marketing topics limits user interaction.

Lately however, it seems that more and more B2B marketers are realizing the benefits of using social media and are trying to implement social media on their websites and in their marketing campaigns. Enterprise marketers are starting to offer more live and virtual events, bookmarking and tagging options, and Web 2.0 applications that let their users respond to, comment on, and sometimes even create their own content.

Have you begun implementing social media in your marketing practices? Are you interested in learning more about how you can use social media to enhance your B2B marketing campaigns? I've found a few resources that may help you get started. Feel free to start participating yourself and leave a comment - after all, we can only make social media a B2B marketing reality if we're all ready to take action and interact with marketing campaigns.

Social Media: Where Should BtoB Marketers Start?, is a free archived webinar that features Vice President, Principal Analyst Laura Ramos of Forrester Research and Rob Solomon, CEO and Founder of Bulldog Solutions.

Deciphering Social Media is a free TeleBriefing in which Anil Dash, chief evangelist of Six Apart, and Chris Howard, VP and Service Director of Burton Group's Executive Advisory Program, join Principal Analyst Mike Gotta for a lively discussion on the challenges and benefits social media presents to the enterprise.

You can also check out Koka Sexton's Super List of 50 Social Media Links if you want to learn more about social media in general.

-BH

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 11:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Are you concerned about the current state of the US economy and how an economic downturn will affect your business? Have you wondered what will happen if businesses across the country scale back or cancel big-ticket IT purchases because they fear an impending recession? With the Federal Reserve Bank's recent rate cuts, the continual decline of the NYSE and NASDAQ, it's easy to see why so many people are concerned about entering a recession. At the same time, it's important to stay positive, hope for the best, but as always, plan for the worst.

While business remains strong in this first quarter of 2008, it is clear that more and more IT marketers are concerned about the effects of a recession on the overall industry. In reading through my weekly line-up of marketing Websites and blogs, I stumbled upon a few resources that address the economy and its impact on IT marketing and thought it might be useful to present them here.

In his February 6 white paper, Strategies For Interactive Marketing In A Recession, Forrester Research's Josh Bernoff addresses the impact of an economic downturn on interactive marketing initiatives. According to Bernoff, the inherent nature of interactive marketing makes it a relatively safe place to invest, even with a looming recession. Interactive marketing applications tend to be inexpensive to build and maintain, and traffic is driven via user interaction and word-of-mouth. These unique aspects of interactive marketing programs make them affordable to build, implement and maintain, and they provide a high return-on-investment. Read Bernoff's paper here and find out if including more social media and interactive marketing strategies in your 2008 marketing campaigns could actually be the more cost-effective way of doing business.

In this free podcast, The Economy and IT Initiatives, the Burton Group outlines what enterprises learned through strategic planning during the last economic down-turn in the scope of data center management, security initiatives, and identity management projects. If you are concerned about the economic impact of a recession on IT buying in the enterprise, listen to this informed account of how organizations respond to down-turns. This podcast is available on the Burton Group site through February 28.

BtoB Online is also offering free webinar titled How Marketers are Planning & Budgeting for 2008. Scheduled to air on February 28, this webinar will address the following:

• How marketers are measuring success in 2008;
• Where marketers are spending their online budgets; and
• What marketers think about current economic conditions, and how these are affecting their plans and budget.

The good news, according to the 2008 Marketing Priorities and Plans survey (BtoB Online), is that in 2008, B2B marketers plan to increase their overall marketing budgets.

-BH

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 10:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

According to Wikipedia, Engagement Marketing campaigns elicit consumer participation in the evolution of a brand, and stimulate users to be actively involved in the production and co-creation of marketing programs. By encouraging the consumer to act and comment on your blog, submit a product review to your site, chat with your online sales team or join your web-based community, you stimulate the consumer's desire to participate in your marketing programs.

Once your consumers are participating in your marketing programs, they begin to feel more connected to your company and often remain loyally involved with your brand. A great example of engagement marketing can be seen in the popular Fox TV show American Idol. By asking audience members and at-home viewers to vote each week for their favorite contestants, the show has created an engaged audience that feels connected to the contestants and keeps tuning in to find out if "their" contestants are going to win.

Online social networks such as MySpace, Facebook and LinkedIn also illustrate successful engagement marketing initiatives. In order to be a part of these networks, users must take the initiative to sign-up, create detailed profiles, and connect with friends, co-workers or other like-minded individuals. Once a user is part of these communities, they have opportunities to write blogs, upload photos, join niche-communities, share recommendations, and keep building their networks. And while social networking communities differ from traditional marketing ventures (in that users tend to join for networking or entertainment purposes as opposed to joining for educational reasons like they do with sites such as the Web Buyer's Guide), they still receive and respond to marketing messages while engaged with the sites.

In order to attract and retain customers, IT marketers need to reach out and offer more ways for their users to actively participate in their marketing efforts. While not all IT marketing efforts need to include Engagement Marketing strategies to be successful, there is a need to create more options that allow users to meaningfully connect with your brand, and engage with your message while they educate themselves about your products and services.

Check out what IBM is doing to engage their users on their "Executive Interaction Channel" that is part of the widely publicized IBM Innovation campaign.

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 01:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

For the B2B technology sector, the implementation of Web 2.0 tools and features on your websites seems ideal. With a long buying cycle, multiple parties involved in making purchasing decisions, and the need to do enough research on purchases to understand the technical aspects and be able to justify the expense, any tools that allow the users to take control over their process should be welcomed with open arms.

By opening up your website and allowing users to interact with your offerings, you essentially allow your users to nurture themselves through their own buying process. Tools and site features that let users tag and bookmark content, create profiles and personalized pages (think MySpace for technology buyers), and build their own research libraries are all excellent ways to entice users to return to your site without being promoted via eNewsletters or other marketing materials.

Once you give users a reason to organically return to your site, you can track their behaviors over the course of their buying cycle and use that information to qualify their lead status. When users take control over their buying process, their interactions with your content become more meaningful - when the user reaches for an asset saved to their "favorites," they have made an independent decision to view that material. So even if it's been several weeks since you originally promoted that content and captured the user's lead data, the fact that the user has returned to your site and re-engaged with the asset on their own schedule makes them a more valuable lead.

While landing pages allow IT marketers to capture similar information, most traffic to such pages tends to be driven by the marketing department - through eNewsletter or email promotions - through lead nurturing efforts, or through organic searches. Convincing users to "hang out" on an enterprise technology website is tricky - but adding Web 2.0 tools might just be a good way to keeping coming back to your site.

-BH

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 07:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I’m pleased to announce that we have a new partner at the Web Buyer's Guide. In the past few months, the Web Buyer’s Guide's parent company – Ziff Davis Media, sold its enterprise group – consisting of the WBG, eWEEK, Baseline, and other enterprise publications to Insight Venture Partners. In doing so, we established a new organization called Ziff Davis Enterprise. The sale was finalized on August 1.

Our new business venture is an exciting and positive change for the Web Buyer’s Guide. We keep our enterprise partners at Ziff Davis, while gaining the resources (and potential new partners) who are aligned with Insight Venture Partners.

In addition to all of the organizational changes, Q3 and Q4 are gearing up to be our most dynamic quarters to date. Our Lead Generation programs have expanded, and the we now offer Video and Content Syndication programs in addition to our well-established Branded Landing Zone and Microsite promotions. And as usual, the Web Buyer’s Guide has other new programs in the pipeline –stay tuned for more information on our upcoming plans.

-BH

Posted by Barry Harrigan at 03:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)