Nancy Nardin over at SmartSellingTools.com wrote a great blog post last week, entitled ‘99% of Businesses are Being Stiffed! And You’re Probably One of Them’ that is highly relevant to sales and marketing tools for small to medium size business (SMBs).

The essence of the post is that most SMBs are either overpaying for the software they’re using or using software that is built for mid-to-large companies but that is crippled for SMBs. What is more telling, is that the companies selling it to us are saying their ‘primary’ market is larger business but that the software is applicable for smaller companies too.

How can this be true? How can your under 100 employee firm have the same support, feature needs, and budget as a 500+ employee company that has a marketing department and a sales team of 40? Or how you the same as 50 person hi-tech venture capital backed startup that lives and breathes social media?  All the features those companies will insist upon can become a burden for you to use (or not even be a good fit altogether), not to mention the manpower and support issues you will have trying to keep it running smoothly. It’s no wonder that a lot of software becomes ‘shelfware’ after the vendor has sold the customer on all the whiz bang features 6 months previously.

We haven’t even gotten to budget! Some vendors will discount their software to give you a ‘great deal’, without ensuring you are a ‘great fit’. Or sell a ‘lite’ version or give a free version so that you will invest your time on their platform, so they can upsell you later. Again, will it fit your company is not their primary concern. What you pay today may not be what you pay when you renew, or have taken into consideration implementation costs.

As Trish Bertuzzi (a well-known expert on sales strategies) comments on the post, ‘Our advice to all our clients, don’t talk to vendors or do any research on marketing automation until you have defined your requirements. Then, once you have defined them, sit back and take a long hard look at what it will cost you in time, effort and energy to implement.’

So don’t get stiffed. Don’t buy a tool that is built for large companies and get short changed later. Buy what you need  – you can always upgrade later (if you need to) if it’s a monthly software-as-a-service (SaaS) product which most are. Gone are the days of buying all you will ever need, because its no longer a one-time license purchase.

Most importantly, choose based on what your requirements are, not based on what some large companies requirements are. There’s many reasons why SAP and Oracle ERP software don’t fit SMBs, and Intuit accounting software doesn’t fit large companies.

Experience-based marketing is not a new concept, as it has been around for a while and many B2C companies have had a lot of success implementing it. The challenge is for B2B companies to use such techniques to advertise and market. Experience marketing gives the target audience a first hand experience by giving the audience the ability to touch, feel, see and know your offering or product.

Max Lenderman, the author of “Experience the Message“,  says engaging potential customers is more important than shoving advertisements into peoples’ faces. With an attention span of 8 seconds which is equal to that of a goldfish, it is really hard to reach the target audience minds with one or two or even 10 instances of our marketing campaigns. I like two examples that Max Lenderman gave at the Art of Marketing event.

Example 1: In India having a cell phone has become the fifth necessity after food, housing, clothes and electricity. Most of the people in rural places are not educated and their main preoccupation is with farming. Reaching such an audience to promote products is a difficult task. Billboards, TV, newspaper ads or online ads are all off limits. How do companies reach such audiences? The way marketing agencies do that is by implementing experience based marketing. They use pop ups in stores where they engage the audience via a street play, drama or musicals.

Example 2: Charmin, the maker of bathroom tissue, opened up a few free to use washrooms in one of the busy New York areas. People in New York’s Time Square area had resorted to washroom use in Starbucks or nearby restaurants. Now people are happy to see these public washrooms conveniently situated  that also provide an experience nothing like they have ever experienced before. In addition to providing a washroom facility, Charmin has richly decorated that place with fancy chairs, and a stage to dance and sing while waiting. Many people have left with pictures and most importantly praise and promise to use only Charmin from there on. View the video.

Takeaways for B2B marketers:
1.      It is more important to engage with the audience while marketing or showing off your product.

2.      Instead of spending thousands of dollars in billboards, banner ads and other expensive ads, make use of experience based marketing by giving away  free to use products and giving prospects a first hand experience.

3.      B2B marketers can learn from these examples by letting their potential customers experience the product before making a decision like the 30 day free trial by ActiveConversion.

4.      Make it easier for them to use/try the product. It is easier to make people switch if you change the environment to making ease of use your priority.

To all you B2B marketers, can you bring the flavor of experience into your marketing?

We at ActiveConversion make use of various social media channels – with our presence in Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn groups, Slideshare, YouTube, Digg, StumbleUpon, Flickr and many more. Keeping track of all these social media channels and updating them on a regular basis is difficult and time demanding, but if we use them smartly they work very well to our advantage. With the advent of Internet and as the web 2.0 matures, the online community is an ever growing powerhouse, and it is quintessential to engage with our audience.

Broadcasting

Traditionally websites were developed as a brochure, with static content, one way communication. But as Web 2.0 matured, websites became more than just a brochure. It was necessary for companies to adapt to this ever changing World Wide Web where two- way communications was more than a necessity for any B2B type company. This communication can be in any form; blogs, forums, and online community etc. Similarly, social media channels started as a means of personal use. Twitter & Facebook mainly started as people to connect with their family and friends to let them know where they were or what they were doing or simply share activities and photos. Now B2B companies can also use Facebook and Twitter, but it is important to know the difference between using these channels to broadcast your message versus using them to engage with your targeted audience.

I recently attended “The Art of Marketing” event and found a very close connection in all the speeches that had a common theme of “Engaging”. It is important to understand that our users or customers, and our audiences are the most powerful and the biggest advocate for our products. For B2B companies, the new way of creating customer relationship is by engaging and knowing who their audience is and what are they talking about. Here are some of the speakers who talked about engaging with the audience:

Mitch Joel, the author of “Six degrees of separation” said the Internet is almost going to be as important and pervasive as the electricity”. In the social media world where B2B marketers are trying to connect with as many people as they can and create a solid followers base, it is important to understand that it is the basis of who is following you more important than how many followers you have.

Engaging

Gary Vaynerchuck, author of “Crush It!” cleverly stated that “Internet is just a baby and it still has to grow up and unleash its power”. Whether you are in B2C or B2B, Twitter, Facebook’s and similar social media accounts are a must have. If you don’t have either of these, it is not too late to jump on the bandwagon. Facebook credits are soon going to be precious currency and if we don’t use Facebook, and there is a big chance that companies might miss out on large opportunities in the future.  Social Media should be used intelligently in a way that we not only broadcast our messages and offers but to engage and be involved with our audience. Having a conversation with our audience, providing opinion, resolving issues on the go and engaging with our audience is a key.

Sally Hogshead, the author of “Fascinate” said, “Create messages for our network’s network”. Don’t ignore the larger network which is linked to our immediate network. Social media lets you connect to this web of networks that you simply can’t ignore.

So go ahead and start engaging in conversations!

Do all of these social media networks make you dizzy? Do you have the feeling that you are lost in a maze of blogs, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Buzz, Four Square etc? Posts are everywhere and sometimes they are repeating the same things. It may annoy your followers and friends and eventually you will get ignored. It doesn’t have to be this way when you know how to simplify and untangle the links that join social media networks together.

I’d like to show you one simple way to link the connections between your social media accounts so that you do less work and still spread your efforts to these social media channels.

1.    Blog – This is where you provide value to others by sharing your view point, expertise and experience.  Blogging is also a great way to get organic traffic from search engines and allows others to reference to your posts.

2.    Twitter – Twitter is the springboard and the broadcaster of your social media networks.  Connect your blog to your twitter accounts to make your blog automatically send messages to other social channels you have.

3.    LinkedIn – LinkedIn has partnered with Twitter. When you set your Twitter name in your LinkedIn account, your tweets will automatically update your LinkedIn status. You can also add your blog’s RSS feed to one of the link in your LinkedIn profile and add Blog Link app to your LinkedIn account to share your blog posts with your connections.

4.    Facebook – I don’t think I need to explain much about Facebook. For me, it’s primarily for my personal network of family, relatives and close friends. By connecting your Twitter announcements to Facebook, it can automatically add your twitter to your Facebook status.

5.    Google Buzz is the newcomer but not many people understand it yet. To make it work, you’ll want to create your own Google Profile. You then connect your Twitter account to your Google profile and Google Buzz to broadcast your status to your Buzz connection. The Buzz network usually consists of family and friends who use Gmail as their personal email platform. One feature of Google Buzz is that it allows you to share the items from your Google Reader and Blogger account through Buzz network.

Following are the tools that you can use to make the job of untangling your social media network easier:

HootSuite is a powerful tool to manage all your social media accounts. It can post messages to  multiple Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Four Square accounts. It also can connect with your WordPress and RSS.

DISQUS Comments: When you install DISQUS Comments on your blog, it replaces your regular comment forms. Your visitors can then use one of the social media accounts they already have to post comments. It will authenticate their identity to ensure quality comments. It will prevent opening up the blog to spam.

WordPress to Twitter plugins: There are a number of plugins to allow you to connect and broadcast your blog to your Twitter account. Most of them will also allow you to connect to shorten URL app and properly layout your tweets.

Everyone is talking about how to leverage and harness the power of social media but it can appear quite overwhelming. By taking simple steps to ensure the proper linkage of the connections, you can do less AND reap the benefits of the social media networks.  Download our whitepaper on implementing a B2B Social Media Marketing plan for your business.

The 2010 mediaFresh awards hosted by Digital Alberta are dedicated to the recognition of those Alberta Digital Media Professionals and Post-Secondary students who have created outstanding project and programs between September 2008 and November 2009.

Category: Best Entrepreneur Award for creative/business/technology entries will be judged on

• 40% Marketing Strategy
• 30% Commercial viability
• 30% Uniqueness of technology

Winning entries will be featured in a full color catalogue that will be published and distributed following the awards ceremony. Each winner will receive a complimentary copy of the catalogue for their portfolio. Additional copies of the mediaFresh 2010 will be distributed to promote digital media production in Alberta and around the world.

Fred Yee, CEO of Foundpages/ActiveConversion, is one of the nominees. We think Fred and the product / services fit the ranking criteria very well.

Whenever the oil and gas industry is mentioned most consumers think of gas bars and service stations, typically operated by a few multinational brands like Exxon, Shell and Chevron.  Gas bars and service stations are actually the tip of the energy industry iceberg, representing so-called downstream activity.  Further upstream there are many thousands of companies involved in exploration and production with their own particular role in the search for hydrocarbon deposits.  Many of these operators such as geophysical and drilling contractors are service providers who in turn contract with other service providers to perform specialized functions within their field.

The relationships between these companies is obviously business to business (B2B) and often well defined so why bother with a marketing automation solution or sales intelligence if you are a energy services provider?  The main reason is probably timing.  Exploration activity is project oriented and the decision to drill is at the core. Wouldn’t it be useful to know exactly when a new or existing customer is looking to buy something you provide?

Industry insiders pride themselves on what’s going on in the oil patch.  They seem to know where the deals are and when they’re sales-ready.  An advanced marketing automation solution will enhance their ability to strike, by providing automatic alerts.  A Sales 2.0 solution will not only identify which companies are sales-ready but will also indicate the ideal time to call in the sales cycle.

Sales reps for these leading companies retain a competitive advantage by being notified when a desired prospect has downloaded a particular specification, watched a video, or visited a certain page like pricing on their corporate website.  Or when they have a proposal out, and are waiting for indication that they are being considered for the ‘short list’. When this information is delivered in real-time, sales reps stand a much higher chance of winning these multi-million dollar bids.

Another advantage is intelligence.  Just knowing which companies are researching your offering is often worthwhile. Some companies may not have been on the radar, and can often lead to new business.

And with an advanced marketing automation solution , marketing personnel can track the results of trade shows, mail, email and other campaigns, in addition to being able to build and send emails to keep their brand top of mind.

Having sold to the ‘oil patch’ for many years, I can see why ActiveConversion is used by many energy industry manufacturers and service providers, to auto-nurture prospects and to optimize their sales time.

Marketers are shifting to digital for a variety of reasons, chief among them are the results.  While social media gets all the hype, it’s two tried and true workhorses, email and search marketing, that come out on top of effectiveness.  From a post over at Marketing Profs:

Most marketing executives cite email or search marketing as their company’s top-performing advertising channel in 2009—39.4% and 23.6%, respectively—and over nine in ten (93.6%) say they plan to increase their budget allocation to digital marketing in the next five years, according to the Fourth Annual Marketing and Media Survey from Datran Media.

Just 9.4% of marketers cited offline channels as their most effective response channel last year. Another 4.7% cited social media, while mobile marketing, still in its early stages, was cited by 0.8% of marketers.

Crucially I’d argue that all these pieces need to work together.  Search so they find you, content to convert them, email to nurture them.

This is the fifth in the series of ActiveConversion’s very popular “eHow To” guides. This one deals with aligning a company’s marketing and sales departments so that they can work together seamlessly. From the guide:

B2B marketing is about driving sales, yet a common complaint from the sales department is that “Marketing throws leads over the fence!” Too often experience has shown sales that few leads from marketing are qualified and even if they are; the timing is too early in the cycle. Meanwhile the marketing department is constantly dismayed that so few leads are actually followed up by the sales department.

According to the 2008 Miller Heiman Sales Best Practices Study, only 37% of respondents agreed that their sales and marketing organizations are aligned in what their customers want and need [source]. Since sales teams want to prioritize on the buyers that have a better chance of closing, it makes sense to use to:

• give marketing more of a role in the targeting and qualifying of prospects
• use marketing automation to nurture prospects that are not yet qualified for hand-off to sales
• give marketing the ability to auto-communicate to sales a lead’s activities and engagement level
• prioritize for sales a large volume of leads based on qualifiers like company size and engagement

To download this eHow To Guide on why marketing automation can get your Sales and Marketing teams aligned, click here or on the image!

Wondering if you’re wasting sales time or marketing budget? Or likely, both?!

In this free companion webinar to the eHow To Guide A Marketing Automation Guide to Lead Scoring, join Paul Uppal, Senior Account Executive at ActiveConversion, as he speaks with  his customer, Tim Lawler – Lead and Demand Generation Consultant at LMG Consulting, on how Tim successfully implemented closed-looped lead scoring systems with Active Conversion for his clients.

“The key is getting the user to click through the email to a landing page with the Active Conversion code.  That starts the lead scoring process (a download is not necessary).  After the first landing page visit, the user web activity is tracked  and scored going forward.”

Tim Lawler

Click to access the recorded webinar

Learn best practices on how to implement a lead scoring process, automatically manage leads, and focus your time on the best prospects to increase ROI by 30% or more.

Not all leads are created equally. A lead scoring system acknowledges this by assigning values to leads based on objective criteria. The lead score determines the appropriate action for that lead.

See real world tools and examples to help you shorten your sales cycle and make intelligent sales and marketing decisions.

This is the fourth of ActiveConversion’s very popular “eHow To” guides.  This one deals with using Marketing Automation to score the behavior of website visitors, and those who click through on emails, so that they can be automatically sorted for prioritization.  From the summary:

Identify online behaviors that indicate interest or sales-readiness

Not all leads are created equally. A lead scoring system acknowledges this by assigning values to leads based on objective criteria. The lead score determines the appropriate action for that lead.

In establishing your system you should;

• Identify online behaviors that indicate interest or sales-readiness
• Assign point values to each of those behaviors
• Establish a score that defines “Sales-Ready”

With a contemporary marketing automation solution like ActiveConversion, today’s B2B marketers can reduce costs and increase revenue through prioritization with lead scoring.

To download this eHow To Guide on why, when, and how to implement an automatic lead scoring plan for your business, click on the image!