What Do B2B Marketers Do Now? is an ongoing email. Join the mailing list to be the first to receive these weekly insights!

What’s your Sunday night ritual? Many of us have them, and hopefully, yours isn’t just sitting at home feeling anxious about the upcoming work week!

Growing up, Sunday nights in my household were all about television – and Disney! I know much of my generation had the same experience – and developed a strong emotional connection to that brand.

The rest of the week the television would have spiderwebs on it – it’s hard to believe how limited screen time was growing up. But Sunday nights were special…

Give this song a listen and ‘no doubt’ you’ll see what the experts are saying this week!

The Power of Voice

I am a huge proponent of multi-touch sales and marketing motions – blending digital and human touches throughout the Buyer’s Journey. How do best-in-class organizations use the power of voice in their processes?

It’s all about building trust and relationships. Unlike emails or online ads, which often feel impersonal and are easily ignored, a phone call allows for real-time interaction between sales representatives and potential customers.

Where can a human voice add extra value in your sales and marketing activities?

Qualifying Prospects – In B2B marketing, identifying qualified leads is crucial for maximizing sales efforts and resources. Human touch plays a vital role in this process by allowing businesses to qualify prospects more effectively than other channels. This real-time, two-way conversation helps determine whether a lead is genuinely interested or just browsing. Interestingly, only a small number of web-generated leads are ever contacted by a real person – why is that?

Customer Feedback – By engaging in direct conversations with existing customers, businesses can gain valuable insights into their experiences, pain points, and suggestions for improvement. This feedback loop allows you to identify areas where you excel and areas requiring improvement or innovation – and is crucial for ensuring your business is meeting your target audience’s needs effectively.

If you think that you connect and the chemistry’s correct with your prospects, don’t just send out digital touches and presume they like what they hear… Get them on the phone! Have that two-way conversation! And if they don’t pick up, leave a message and call them back.

Lessons from The Voice

If you’re a fan of Gwen Stefani (or her band, No Doubt), then you’re probably familiar with the TV show The Voice.

If you’re not familiar, an aspiring singer will take the stage, and four superstars from the music industry (each from a different genre) will sit in chairs facing away. Each of them has a button, and they evaluate the performance on sound alone. If they’re impressed, they’ll hit their button, and their chair will spin around so they can face the performer. The goal is to form a team of student performers that will eventually compete against the teams of the other music industry stars.

So – what B2B lessons can we learn from this show?

• Be excellent – do your job well!
• Know your audience
• Remove biases
• Supplier power – (for those of us who are fans of Porter’s 5 Forces)
• Salesmanship

Shows like this can be a treasure trove of business cases and leadership lessons!

What do you think? Are you a fan of the show? If so, maybe you’ve gleaned some other lessons from it. I’d love to hear them!

As always, don’t hesitate to call me to brainstorm or just say hello. And if I don’t answer, just leave a message and I’ll call you back!

Looking forward,
Rick

Rick Endrulat, President | ricke@v-causeway.com | www.linkedin.com/in/rickendrulat

The post There’s Sales Strength in Voice appeared first on Virtual Causeway.

What Do B2B Marketers Do Now? is an ongoing email. Join the mailing list to be the first to receive these weekly insights!

Summer’s here!

Wow – can you believe we’re halfway through the year already? Feels like just yesterday we were working through our 2023 sales and marketing plans! Are you sailing into the summer with confidence, or are you constantly under pressure?

Give this song by Queen (and David Bowie) a listen as we hear what the experts are saying this week.

Stats/Trends – Knowing what this world is about

Q2 is almost wrapped. How are your sales and marketing activities trending?

As you know, I started this weekly email/blog during the pandemic to share stats, successes, and trends during turbulent times. I feel like it’s been too long since I’ve shared some actionable and tactical sales and marketing stats from my sources.

So here are some quick data points that you may find useful:

• The most effective channel for RDR (Revenue Development Rep) to engage a B2B buyer? Phone – 53%. Email – 36%. InMail, Social Media, and Website Chat all under 5%. Text (SMS) still under 1%.
• B2B buyer’s journey continues to stretch out. More than half of B2B purchases take longer than four months, and buyers engage in an average of 17 interaction types. Compared to just a year ago, 67% of B2B marketers say buyers are taking longer to commit to a purchase!
• Only 53% of sales professionals said that their organization’s sales tech stack aids productivity and positively impacts results. WOW! That’s a depressing statistic – with all the marketing and sales tech out there, how is this possible?

(Thanks to #forrb2bsummit and my awesome colleagues here at Virtual Causeway for sharing their data.)

Do these surprise you? What are you finding in your organization? Longer buying cycles, more buyer interactions, under-appreciated tech stacks… That’s a lot of pressure on people – how are you coping?

More Catalog Sales – Never rains but it pours

I’ve been closely following artists as they’ve sold their song catalogues over the past few years – seems like a way for many (aging?) artists to capitalize on the revenue potential of their songs as their touring and recording years dwindle.

Looks like Queen is in talks to sell their catalogue for the largest sum yet! As of now, Bruce Springsteen is the leader, having sold his song catalogue for around $500 million last year. If the rumours are true, Queen could sell their catalogue for over $1 billion!

Are these valuations getting ridiculous, or is there really that much value in their catalogues? In B2B, we see company valuations (especially in tech) that sometimes make us shake our heads, but if someone is willing to pay…

Many artists and bands might be feeling pressure pushin’ down to sell their catalogues. But with this price tag? Seems like a pretty easy choice!

Want to see the whole list of artists who have sold all or some of their catalogue? Here’s the running list compiled by fellow Canadian Alan Cross.

As always, don’t hesitate to call me to brainstorm or just say hello!

Looking forward,
Rick

Rick Endrulat, President | ricke@v-causeway.com | www.linkedin.com/in/rickendrulat

The post B2B Trends: When it Rains, it Pours! appeared first on Virtual Causeway.

What Do B2B Marketers Do Now? is an ongoing email. Join the mailing list to be the first to receive these weekly insights!

What’s your favourite song? Is there one that you hear and you immediately get nostalgic? For me there are some that really hit me – thinking of a place, an event, a person… sometimes it just takes that first chord to take me back.

Wouldn’t it be great to evoke those same emotions with your B2B clients?

Give that song by Big Wreck a listen with me as we see what the experts are saying this week…

Using Emotions in B2B Marketing

The shift to digital and online has been necessary in B2B but has also made human contact a rarity. And yet, it’s become clear that this human contact is vital to the buyer’s journey and customer experience in today’s environment! According to Forbes, emotions could be the new B2B marketing tool. Here are some ways you can leverage them:

• Develop thought leadership content
• Use social listening
• Incorporate empathy
• Maximize value
• Focus on a customer-centric mindset
• Conduct quantitative and qualitative research

Of course, the emotional play can be a bit of a tricky strategy. As marketers, we tend to want to keep our content light, to keep our prospects in a good mood. We don’t want to upset them… or do we?

Regardless of whether it’s an upbeat topic, Forbes says emotional appeal is still the most effective way to engage with your audience! When our emotions are sparked – that’s when we’re quick to respond. We tell a friend, share on social media, and scream at the top of our lungs (if only proverbially).

So if you’re looking to ensure engagement (let’s be honest, who isn’t?) and generate buzz around your brand, find a way to appeal to your audience’s emotions.

I really love that tune

Most people that know me understand my personal connection to Alzheimer’s research. A recent study from the University of Toronto shows that listening to personally meaningful music improves brain function in Alzheimer’s patients. As someone who lived with a family member suffering from this, I can personally attest to the importance of music in their life.

According to researchers:

Whether you’re a lifelong musician or have never even played an instrument, music is an access key to your memory, your pre-frontal cortex. It’s simple: keep listening to the music that you’ve loved all your life. Your all-time favourite songs, those pieces that are especially meaningful to you. Make that your brain gym.

Check out the Alzheimer Society Music Project – a way to reconnect people with the soundtrack of their lives by providing MP3 players loaded with personalized music to people living with dementia so they can crank that song.

Albums Turning 25 in 2022

Last week we discussed albums turning 50 this year. The following albums will turn 25 in 2022:

• Foo Fighters – The Colour and the Shape
• Radiohead – OK Computer
• Blur – Blur
• Oasis – Be Here Now
• Green Day – Nimrod
• Our Lady Peace – Clumsy
• Big Wreck – In Loving Memory Of…

Any of these revelations make you feel old? If so, I’m sorry… or maybe I’m not, if it’s getting an emotional response! Thanks for the tip, Forbes!

As always, don’t hesitate to call me to engage or just say hello.

Looking forward,
Rick

Rick Endrulat, President | ricke@v-causeway.com | www.linkedin.com/in/rickendrulat

The post The B2B Buyer’s Emotional Journey appeared first on Virtual Causeway.