Optimise your b2b marketing for the changing digital environment

Sylvie Hall  00:00

Welcome to our webinar, the digital world is changing what b2b marketers need to know. And I want to say a big thank you for taking the time to join us today. And yeah, appreciating your lunch break with us. So b2b marketing is challenging in the best of times, but the past year has obviously really flipped a lot of business processes and sales cycles, and purchasing decisions on its head. And so the purpose of this webinar is not only to share some of the upcoming changes to the digital landscape that we're seeing, and new b2b trends for 2021. But we also really want to provide practical and tactical tips and advice that you can put into practice at your company. So firstly, allow me to introduce ourselves. I'm Sylvie. I'm your host, and I'm a Marketing Strategist here at Brand chemistry. And I'm joined today by Andrea Hoymann who is the Head of Strategy at Brand chemistry and has a wealth of knowledge when it comes to digital marketing for b2b. So as strategists for Brand chemistry, our focus as marketers is on b2b brands. And we work within a range of industries, from SaaS and construction, cybersecurity, to office supplies, and a lot more. And the pandemic has really presented some challenges for our clients and for us as the agency as well. But as digital marketers, we're very used to being agile in quite an unpredictable environment. And our strategies always have to change constantly to keep up with the ever-changing demand and just landscape of the world. So I'm now going to hand over to Andrea to introduce herself and what we'll be covering today.

Andrea Hoymann  01:55

Thanks, Sylvie, and welcome, guys. So in today's webinar, we're going to be discussing really four key things. The first one is the big changes in digital and how they're impacting us b2b marketers. And then the second one is really talking about the key marketing challenges for b2b and in 2021, and how you should approach those channels. The third one is what b2b buyers are expecting right now and how you can reach them. So we are shifting the attention to the target audience. And the last one is the key strategies for 2021 and beyond.

Sylvie Hall  02:36

Thank you, Andrea. And just before we get started, I'll mention a few housekeeping items so we can keep the session flowing, and make sure that you get what you need from it. So we're going to run this as a presentation format, and then there will be a chance for questions at the end. We have received some questions ahead of the webinar, so we'll aim to get through these as well as part of the Q&A. But if you do have a question as we move through, then there's a Q&A box that you can ask your questions in, and we'll try and answer them all at the end. But if we do run out of time, then we'll definitely follow up with you and ask us your question, perhaps afterwards. And I just want to note as well that the webinar is being recorded, so we'll send you a video of it all as well. Okay, so let's get started. What on earth is happening to digital marketing right now? Well, I think we can all agree that 2021 seems to be a new era in digital marketing. And there's heightened privacy concerns, and then government regulation, and it's all impacting the way in which marketers are going to be able to collect and use and store data. And then on top of this, we have this global economic environment, which in the aftermath of the pandemic, is still really uncertain. We have been really lucky here in Australia because we've obviously not suffered the same level of business shutdowns and lockdowns that are in other countries unless of course, you're from Melbourne. But you don't need me to tell you that it's been a tough year. I mean, it has for both businesses and also on a personal level. So now that JobKeeper has come to an end, and we wait with bated breath and see how this affects businesses and marketing budgets, there's kind of a lot of uncertainty in the air. But the good news is that we're looking like we're heading out of the recession and that the recovery has already begun. Another thing I want to touch on with the changing digital world is that if you're experiencing Zoom fatigue, then you're really not alone. A recent survey on Blind, which is an anonymous forum for professionals, found that 27% of people are reporting that they're trying to pay attention but are often zoning out during group Zoom meetings. So we hope that we can keep your attention throughout our 45 minutes together, don't we Andrea?

Andrea Hoymann  05:00

Yeah, that's right. We're definitely hoping that you're not zoning out right now, at least not yet. So anyway, I think we can all agree that the last 12 months have been really challenging for us marketers, so we are constantly shifting to the evolving needs of the business. So we really had to adapt our plans quite a lot, I think. But there are also lots of positives. For example, the pandemic has really accelerated the move for b2b marketers to adopt digital-first and digital-centric strategies. And one of the biggest shifts, I think we can all agree, has been this move away from offline events to online events. And in that realm, we're really seeing everything from multi-day events and virtual booths to a massive increase in webinars, like the one we're delivering here today. And I think on the plus side, it's been great to do things a little bit differently, and optimise efficiency and marketing spend. I think, like, especially those of you guys who do a lot of trade shows, you probably are aware of how much money that costs, right? You know, setting up a booth, the brand swag, the cost of travel, it's hugely expensive. But the thing is this: so online events are great for efficient and cost-effective information sharing and also lead generation, but I really think we still have to see a virtual event that does networking actually well. And let alone facilitate the kind of casual chat you might even have with someone just at lunch in the exhibition hall, which happens, you know a lot when you're at networking events. And I've actually had some personal experience manning some virtual booths over the past 12 months, and it has been absolutely awful. I think it's fair to say that we will see a lot more hybrid approaches to b2b events as the COVID restrictions are going to ease. And in this case, we're going to see that a lot of the content is going to be made available through live streaming. And many presenters may actually choose to deliver their session remotely like Sylvie and I are doing right now. But at the same time, I can't really see online events replacing in-person networking completely. So there has definitely been a big shift. But the other thing that we've been seeing and has been keeping a lot of marketers awake at night, is the turmoil we're seeing across some of the big tech companies. And we have on screen here some of the headlines that we had over the past few months, and there's no doubt you've all seen them. But in summary, all of these changes now coming, we see across Google and iOS 14, and Facebook also comes down to two macro trends. So the first one is that we are starting to give internet users much more control over their data in light of increasing privacy concerns. And I think as intended users ourselves, it's definitely something we all value. But as marketers, that might make us a little bit nervous. And then secondly, there are some attempts to limit the power, influence and increasing market monopolisation by the world's biggest tech companies. And that brings a sort of a shift to stricter regulation, which is no doubt going to impact us marketers. And we're going to talk in a lot more detail on how you can mitigate your risk, you know, given this trend. But to start with, Sylvie is actually going to take you through some really practical tips and how you can optimise your paid social ads in light of the iOS 14.5 update. And it's going to get a little bit tricky but bear with us.

Sylvie Hall  08:59

Yeah, so the iOS 14.5 update, which is the new Apple update, is actually rolling out this week. So this is quite good timing for the webinar to talk about this, especially because it's been an update that we have known for a while. And it's caused a lot of apprehension for marketers and business owners, because of how this update is going to impact data tracking permissions for Facebook ads, and therefore affect their performance and their cost. So a bit of background is that Facebook ads, for so long, have been working really well and at a low cost for businesses because they were able to target segments of the population and look at their user behaviour over lots of different websites and apps. So with iOS 14.5, you will now be asked whether or not you want to be tracked or not. And the collective fear is, most people when they have this kind of pop-up come up will say opt out because they have privacy concerns. Facebook's had a few scandals with privacy, so that is the fear that is what most people will choose to do. So now I'll expand a little on how Facebook ads works and how you actually need to adjust your Facebook Ads Manager for this update. So apologies if this is repeating knowledge that you already know. But I'll just give a foundation on Facebook ads and how it tracks user activity. And the way that Facebook ads works is that it tracks users across many different websites and apps through a Facebook pixel. And a Facebook pixel is basically a piece of code that is installed on a website and tells Facebook what you are doing as a user. So for example, clicking a piece of content, becoming a lead, or like visiting a landing page - all of these are actions that a pixel can notify Facebook on. So before this update, you were able to have as many pixel events as you wanted on every page. But now you're only going to be able to track eight pixel events for an entire domain. So the first step that you need to take is to actually verify your domain in the Facebook Events Manager. Even if you've been using Facebook ads for a long time, this is a step that you will have to do as part of this preparation for this update. And then once you have done that, you'll have to input which of the eight pixel events you want to track and place them in an order of importance. So that is from highest to lowest priority. And the other thing about this update is it will actually only allow you to track one conversion signal. So that will be your top priority event. So, for example, converting a lead, that will have to be in position one of the eight pixel events. You'll actually see a notification in your Facebook Ads Manager asking you to do these steps. So if you're like me, you'll see these things pop up and think, read it later - but definitely read this one, follow the instructions and make sure that your ad account is set up correctly. Now, obviously, this is quite worrying, and how it's going to affect your ads like all this tracking data that we used to have, we're now not going to readily have as much anymore. So the other step that we recommend is that you actually integrate more tracking processes for your website with server-side conversion tracking, and also through Google Analytics. And that is because we can see that there'll be a lot more kind of restrictions on cookie tracking, which will affect browsers. So that's why the server-side conversion tracking is a hot tip for future proofing your data. Another note is that Google Analytics has recently released Google Analytics 4 or GA4. And this is an update, which will give you more of an understanding of how your customers are using different devices and platforms. So GA4 has actually been designed to work alongside these more privacy-centric rules and this more privacy-centric world that we're living in. And so even as the industry changes, the idea is that GA4 will help you to close the gaps in the data that are inevitably going to be made from all of these new restrictions. And one thing I will say is that iOS 14.5 will actually only affect Apple mobile users. So remember, Android users aren't affected. And I understand that this is probably a bit of information overload. So if you're feeling stuck, then let us know after the webinar, and we'd be happy to give you some help. I also want to just quickly add that Facebook have announced this week that they are working on a range of new solutions for advertisers. And one of those is testing in-stream video topics. And this will let advertisers place ads against specific video topics with their machine learning. So what this means is that you'll be placing ads in content that is contextually relevant to the target consumer rather than on their user behaviour. And Facebook's pivot towards this kind of way of advertising is basically part of a wider industry trend, as marketers are looking for ways to target relevant audiences without relying on personal data collection. So we do think that this update is a bit of a wake-up call that we need to diversify the ways in which we do digital marketing. And Andrea is going to touch on this a bit more later in the webinar. But Facebook is just one social channel. So Andrea, why don't you share what you've been noticing on LinkedIn recently?

Andrea Hoymann  14:58

Yeah, LinkedIn is obviously the most important one for us b2b marketers. And it's changing quite a lot. Is that something that you've been noticing? I'd love to hear it actually, if you want to share it in the QA section, some of the changes in things on LinkedIn would be great. But yeah, it's a trend on LinkedIn, that has been happening gradually. But it seems that something has really sped up over the course of the pandemic. And we here at Brand chemistry have been noticing five key things that are really going to impact how you use LinkedIn as part of your content and distribution strategy. So the first thing I want to talk about is that the platform is becoming a lot more social. So what you now see a lot more is that people are posting longer updates on their personal LinkedIn account. It's also something you can see here on the slide. And it's often asking people directly to contribute and share their own experiences. And that can be something that relates directly to their role, workplace culture, or even the job-hunting process. And you know, there's been a lot of that happening recently. So these types of posts tend to get a lot of engagement, and really help build followers for that particular personal account. And that in turn, again, has a halo effect on the LinkedIn company page that that person is associated with. So that really makes it a really effective branding and distribution channel. The second thing we're noticing is that the lines between the personal and the professional are actually becoming quite blurred. So people are starting to be a lot more vocal about their personal lives on LinkedIn. And as you can see, also in this example, here, it's actually a repost from TikTok. And I think like even three years ago, like thinking that you would repost something, you know, TikTok wasn't around then, but Instagram, on LinkedIn would have been probably unthinkable. And in this context, you often see people speaking out about the importance of things like work-life balance, getting real about failures, and even talk about more political things. You know, for example, the Black Lives Matter movement was a really big issue last year, or the impact of border closures on the international education sector, particularly here in Australia. And what we've seen is that this trend has been really accelerated during COVID. And it's something we expect to see much more frequently on the brand level as well. And it's, you know, previously been really good practice and policy for brands to stay clear of anything that could just be remotely controversial. But what we have to keep in mind is that millennials are now decision-makers. And they're also going to demand from their brands that they're going to take a stance. And we actually love that because it gives us marketers, or actually us businesses the opportunity to work through, how are we ever to make a positive contribution as a business in our local community. So the first thing that's happening on LinkedIn is that pure link posting is becoming less and less effective. And that is true for both the company page and the personal profiles. So there's obviously still a case to be made for links to your blogs to be included as part of your LinkedIn posting strategy. But it's becoming more and more important for your LinkedIn content to actually stand on its own within that platform. And that's because LinkedIn, the algorithm of LinkedIn actually favours the content that keeps users on the platform. So rather than directing them away to your website, and I think in that way, all tech companies are really the same. They all want a piece of the pie in the attention economy. And another thing we are seeing and in relation to those algorithm changes in the trenches, seeing everyone you know, stay in the platform, is to move to more video and long-form updates to build thought leadership. So this is the result of the move towards more personal engagement and brand building on the platform. And with things like LinkedIn Live, which is basically live streaming on LinkedIn, and people cross-posting more between different social platforms, you will also notice that there's a trend towards less polished content. So people are just showing up as they are and it's paying off for their businesses. So if that's something that you want to capitalise on, while spreading your risk, because you obviously don't want one person in the company to become the face of the brand unless you're a startup and they're the company founder. We recommend to really select a few key people in your business and making them thought leaders who speak on behalf of the brand. So and then at the same time you can obviously encourage the wider business to become more actively involved on the platform. And then there's the fifth point. So it's a really long section on LinkedIn. But there's a lot going on. So the last point I want to make about LinkedIn is that some organisations have experienced a higher cost per lead, through sponsored updates compared to pre-COVID levels. And the height of COVID, that's really something we've seen almost across the board, there was just a bit of fluctuation. But right now, at least in Australia and New Zealand, we actually don't think that the platform is at fault. So rather, what we notice is that there has been, there's no gap between your brand value proposition and the changing needs of the market. So the changes in the macro environment mean that there has also been a shift in demand for products as well. So that's why we've seen, for example, companies like Zoom or Slack, the valuation has gone through the roof, while businesses who are selling products from a physical office may actually struggle a little bit. So there's just a natural kind of change we're seeing there. And let's move on from LinkedIn into something else, more kind of general brand awareness. So the next thing that has really changed over the last 12 months is that b2b buyers are expecting your information and content to reflect the current environment. And as a German, I feel like I've waited my whole life to finally use that in a presentation. You can see some really good examples of this at work on this slide. But for your content schedule, that means that you also need to be a lot more agile and respond to headlines that may be relevant to your target audience super quickly, and with a lot of empathy. And again, that has implications on your approval processes. So you can react and adapt to fast-changing news. And then really aim to provide genuine help. And it's another trend that we really love because it can help your brand to stay relevant and adapt to the changing demands of your audience. And how you actually know what your audience demand is, Sylvie is going to kind of talk us through that in a little bit more detail right now.

Sylvie Hall  22:28

Yeah, so the pandemic obviously affected every industry and business. It's not just you, it's everyone. And it's especially in the b2b space. So we've got a pretty bold claim here. And that is that your historical customer insights are irrelevant now. And what I mean by that is that your Google Analytics data from 2019, is not something you can really rely on or to compare your performance with now. And that's basically because we live in a completely different world. Buyer behaviour has changed, and a lot of it is down to all of this uncertainty. So what do you do if you can't use your Google Analytics data and historical insights? Well, now is actually the time to have a lot of regular meetings with your sales team, and customers and implement a voice of the customer programme. And what you want to be finding out is, why your customers need you and what you can do to help your customers, what your customers are looking for, and what their interests and behavioural patterns are, and really emphasising the kind of need to look at the behaviours and what's driving them, like what is the motivation. And the thing is, as well as this might actually change every three months, and it's not a set and forget programme that you can do one time with the sales team and then you know, never look at it again. We actually recommend doing this quite frequently and having regular calls with your customers as well. So I've actually got two book recommendations that I think will really help you to nail your customer interview and research technique. And both of these will equip you with the know-how on conducting surveys and basically get you the answers that you need, rather than people-pleasing responses. Because people are always hypothetically better when they're talking about their future selves than they are about talking about what they actually do and what their actual behaviours are. So the two books are The Mom Test, and that is by Rob Fitzpatrick. And then Lean Customer Development by Cindy Alvarez. And I will actually just caveat this and say that these books sometimes come from a bit of a product angle, but there's actually a lot that you can learn from them as marketers and basically giving you the skills to find out what the root problems are that people are facing and how you can tackle them with your messaging, which is obviously very important.

Andrea Hoymann  25:06

Awesome, that sounds like a really great recommendation, Sylvie. Surveys are super tricky to get right. So yes, as we already mentioned, the changes in the macro environment, we've seen, are likely to also have impacted the effectiveness of some of your marketing acquisition channels. And we find that really comes down to one of three reasons or a combination of them. So the first one is that you may have seen a shift in demand for your product and service due to the changing environment. The second might be that you have some changing persona needs and a messaging misalignment. And then the third or last one is that the value messages need to change as companies and buyer needs change. So these are really interrelated issues. But the last issue, in particular, is something that we had Brand chemistry actually seeing quite a lot at the moment. So there has been a really big uptick in the demand for brand positioning because businesses need to adapt to this new reality. So a lot has changed. Big tech is going to make some big changes, we have a move towards stricter privacy and antitrust regulation. So in that context, it really pays for us marketers to take a closer look at where we are delivering our marketing message. And if you're maybe relying too heavily on just the one channel to deliver results. Because the fact of the matter is that the only digital challenge channel that you really have 100% control over is your website, blog and landing pages because that's what you fully own. But we need to think about what's actually driving traffic to these assets. Is that mostly LinkedIn or Facebook? Or are you maybe hoping to shore it up on Google searches? And what if Google pulls out of Australia, which was an actual conversation this year, which, you know, I don't think any of us thought would ever happen? Or what happens if LinkedIn changes the algorithm to further deprioritise outbound links? So where does that leave your customer acquisition? So there's some pretty big questions. So keep that in mind as we're going through. So with all this in mind, what are the key strategies for 2021? So we here at Brand chemistry have identified actually three priority areas that we're working through with our clients. And we're going to dive a little bit deeper into each of them in the following slides. But in summary, the three areas are channel diversification. So 2021 is really the year when you need to rethink your dependence on certain channels to mitigate your risk. The second one is buyer enablement. And that's been a buzzword that's been floating around for some time, and Sylvie is going to cover in a lot more detail. And the third one is that we need to have a bit more of a concerted effort to implement ABM. It's been something we've been talking about for a long time. But I think we're finally seeing some traction, both on the implementation side and also actually some tech companies coming up with some really cool solutions that help us in the process. So let's start with our first point, channel diversification. What does that mean? So in essence, we are looking for new ways to drive relevant traffic to your website and generate leads. So there's some areas you could explore here that we have on the slide. So the first one is podcasts. I think podcasts are a really great opportunity for b2b, both in terms of paid advertising, appearing as a guest speaker, or becoming a host sponsor. There are quite a few different ways you can get involved in. The second one is online forums. So Quora has been around for quite some time, as a kind of question, answer forum. Stack Overflow is a really great one if you run a tech company or are more development focused. And one of the techniques you could use here is answering relevant questions to your industry. Or you could even do some paid advertising. So in Quora, for example, you have the option to sponsor answers to certain questions to get that really in front of people when they're trying to solve a particular problem. Then the other one is sponsorship opportunities for both on and offline events. And we're actually starting to see a lot more options becoming available as you know, we are experiencing this shift to more hybrid models of event delivery. And then industry publications and associations are also really great channels. And they're especially important if you're spent selling to a really specific industry. And it's not just because we want to drive traffic, but also it's actually showing a really great commitment to that particular industry, by your brand. And that long-term is going to boost brand awareness in this sector. And especially if you can back that up with some really great work. But in the meantime, Sylvie, why don't you share with us what we mean when we talk about buyer enablement?

Sylvie Hall  30:27

Yes, of course. So you're probably thinking what on earth is buyer enablement? It kind of sounds like sales enablement? Is this a new buzzword? What do we need a new buzzword for? I promise. So, buyer enablement basically means that you're easily providing all the information that helps your prospects to complete every critical step that they need to make in order to purchase from you or sign up with you and for your products and services. So it's better explained in practical terms and examples. So an example is helping your customer to get all of the right information quickly, like having prices instantly available on the website. It could also mean that you meet your customers on their terms, and that you offer them different methods of communication that are based on their preferences. So some people like to watch video content, some people prefer to read blogs and text articles, some people hate reading, and they just want to have their questions answered. So they want to just jump on a chat and just DM someone. And then other people just prefer a phone call - old school. So the whole point of buyer enablement is that you actually let them choose their own adventure with your company and how they find out the information from you. And when you do this, and when you equip people with all of the information that they need at the right time, it has an added benefit, because you then are able to create a champion out of a potential customer so that they can sell successfully, internally about the business and get buy-in from the rest of the organisation. And I think that's really a key point when you're selling a big product, like for example software, and you've got a few stakeholders. So another simple example that I've got on this is that you can sometimes go to a contact form on a website, and then you fill out the form and you want more information. And I did this recently where I wanted to find out about a tech solution for interactive landing pages. And I typed in my details. And then I got the message box that said we're going to be in touch shortly. And all I wanted to know was how much it was so that I could deliver this for a client, is it something that would be relevant for them. And then what I realised is that shortly, could mean anything, it could mean an hour, it could mean the next day, or even it could be next week, and in that time your customer might have moved on. And I will say that I did move on, I didn't find out the information I needed. And then by the time that salesperson got back to me, I had found another solution and had already briefed something out. So that was the end of that. So how could that have been different? Well, with buyer enablement, what I could have had as an experience is actually getting a calendar for the sales team to speak to them, having the prices available, or even just having a form that instantly creates a task for that sales team to reach out with a deadline to me so that I'm hearing from them in a timely way, rather than letting it drag on until someone is able to find that contact form within the internal system. So timeliness is really important. And I will say that these kinds of methods and basically implementing these buyer enablement tactics can really easily be created in HubSpot, or other marketing tools like Marketo. And we have definitely seen an MQL uplift for conversions with clients that do this. So timeless and personalisation, as I mentioned, is really the name of the game in 2021. And if you're familiar with Account Based Marketing, or ABM, you may be wondering if there's any crossover between the two. So ABM is a very highly focused b2b strategy. And that is where the marketing team treats an individual prospect or customer like its very own market. And all of the content and events and campaigns are basically dedicated to the people who are associated with that account, rather than thinking about the industry as a whole. So you're really honing in on one company that you really want to get. And within that company, there might be multiple stakeholders in the decision-making process, especially if it's a big purchase item, which for many b2b brands it is. So with ABM, what you're doing is that you're ensuring that all of the stakeholders have the right information at the right time in order for them to, you know, make a decision and help your sales team close that deal more effectively. So when we're thinking about buyer enablement versus ABM, actually, buyer enablement is something that you do as part of your ABM strategy. But it also applies to a wider buying experience that could be for anyone that comes to your website. But Andrea is the true ABM pro. So I'll let you take it from here on how b2b brands can implement an ABM strategy.

Andrea Hoymann  35:43

Thanks, Sylvie. Yeah, so ABM is something we've been talking about, like, let's be honest, for a long time in b2b. But I think we're finally seeing some action. And one of the most important things you need for your ABM to work is really awesome sales and marketing alignment and clarity of who communicates what, with whom and when. But even if you have that in place, ABM isn't really right for every business. So let's start with having a look at when ABM is a good idea. So one thing you need to consider is that you should be looking at a relatively large average deal size, you probably around 100,000 plus contact would be worthwhile, or anywhere where there's big potential for recurring revenue, like in a software business or services that work on retainers. And the reason for that is that, you know, ABM can be quite intensive, especially on the sales side. You want to make sure that the effort you're putting in is really going to pay off and you get a good return on investment. So that makes ABM really an ideal fit for a lot of software companies. Anyone who deals with really big manufacturing parts or, you know, services, businesses, yeah, like agencies actually. And it can also work very well in niche markets. And especially in niche markets where you don't have a lot of organic search traffic, which could also be the case for companies that are building their own category, because you're the startup and really, onto something super innovative. And in this case, you may want to use an account-based advertising approach to drive traffic to your site, and really complement your inbound marketing activities. Rather than just relying on search, you actually, you know, investing a bit more into paid to get the right people to see your stuff. And what exactly your ABM approach will look like, obviously depends a lot on your target audience, your business needs and where they're hanging out online. But at a very high level, there are a few steps that you would need to take in the process. So the first one is to really define your target account list, which has really close similarities. And we recommend for that list to be between 20 and 50 accounts. And especially when you're first starting out, we don't recommend a larger account list. And the reason for that is that proper ABM, as I said, requires a lot of hands-on engagement. And that can quickly become super overwhelming if the number of accounts that you need to look after is too big. Because you would also do things like set up alerts when a target account hits up your site, you know, and then too much signal just equals noise. So then the second step is to work really closely with the sales team to define the key players in the decision-making processes and what the challenges are. And you need to really make sure that you're looking to define really key roles here. So that could be influencers, the actual decision-makers, champions, whoever approves the budget, and also potential detractors. And going through that process will actually help you a lot with the next step. And that is to define what content will get the attention of different people in the buying process. And once you've done all that, you can finally go to step four, which is defining an engagement plan. And when it comes to an engagement plan, more details are good. So you want to get super clear, what does marketing do and when? And when does sales get involved and how? Because the one thing you really don't want is to have an overlap of messaging and people kind of crossing over each other. Then ABM becomes kind of embarrassing, rather than effective. So let's talk a little bit about tactics. Again, what tactics you are going to use depends on your engagement plan, and what channels your target audience spends most of the time. That may include but is not limited to direct mail - that may sound super old school. But with so many messages actually being targeted at key decision-makers online, sending something physical can actually have a really big impact. And we're going to actually talk through an example that will show exactly that. So, another tactic is webinars. But here, you will be looking more for hyper-targeted webinars for specific people within your target accounts. And in this case, you may not get loads of attendees, but you should hopefully have a really captive audience. Then you can also incorporate blogs into your tactics, list-based ads targeting, and then obviously, for the sales team to go on LinkedIn and engage with target accounts, their posts, decision-makers, and all that. And then the last thing we want to mention is developing highly targeted and research-based sales sequences. And what you really want to achieve with that is that none of these emails should sound like it's being sent to somebody else. So there should be really a lot of detail on the account that makes it super relevant to who you want to talk to. And then another thing I'd like to stress is that with ABM, and actually more generally, your inbound marketing strategy, it's actually quite important not to just focus your attention on decision-makers. And there's a few reasons why. So more junior employees are actually not constantly inundated with emails or any kind of outreach you might get from sales. And then what you may also notice from your own practice is that more junior people are actually often charged with doing the research for a new purchase and can work as your internal champion. And that really enables you to give them the tools they need to persuade the commercial decision-maker to get buy-in. And if you really manage to show them how your product or service makes their life easier, it makes their job easier and gets results, you're really onto something. And targeting champions in the business was actually one of the strategies that HubSpot engaged when they first launched to market. So you may remember that they are still producing actually a lot of content that helps digital marketers sort of at the cold space of execution, with the implementation of their content or inbound marketing strategy, whatever you want to call that. And they did so well that these guys became fans of the brand, and brought the software to the attention of the decision-maker. And I think today, we can probably all say that they have been quite successful with that strategy and it has paid off for them. So let's talk about some examples of ABM in action. So the first example I want to talk about is actually ABM that was used to improve the opportunity to sell conversion rate. So one software company noticed that they were actually having some trouble converting some of the Enterprise tiers. So what happened was the conversation would go super well up to a certain point. And then their key contact just started to ghost them. So just that, no response. We all love that. And these are called super valuable deals. The team, they really had invested a lot of time on them and they didn't want to let it slip. So they decided to take some action. Marketing and sales worked together to set up alerts for when a deal was starting to stall in their system. And then for this year, the company decided to send a pair of socks to their key contacts. And it was complemented with a branded postcard that said, "Did you get cold feet?" And it was super creative. The mailing was a huge hit and actually brought many of the deals that had gotten cold back to life. So like really great ideas, we really love that one. And then this other example here is actually a key challenge that can be tackled through ABM, is using your content marketing as a way to drive awareness with key decision-makers. In this particular example, the company was actually struggling to get the attention of VP Global's at universities. So sales was often talking to people who didn't really fully appreciate the strategic challenge that their solution was able to solve. But we saw that the company blog was actually an opportunity to get the foot in the door. And what we did was we arranged an interview with the VP Global at Rutgers University, which is a really big and well-known university in New Jersey in the US. And after the launch of a successful programme in China, which was relevant to what this company is doing. And the result was that we got a meeting with someone super senior who thinks strategically, by not actually going in with a sales message first. And during that interview, made the VP and his team look really good, sort of in the industry as a whole. But it also made him receptive to hear about what the organisation was doing. And after the interview, the VP actually sent the company details to the relevant team within the university and gave the sales team a new chance for conversation. So that was a really great result, taking this approach at the top of the funnel.

Andrea Hoymann  45:45

And so that was quite a lot on ABM. But let's talk a little bit more about the tools we absolutely love for execution at the moment.

Sylvie Hall  45:55

Yes, thanks, Andrea. That was so interesting. Yeah, we're going to talk a little bit now about the marketing tools that we're using and our recommendations. And firstly, I want to cover Clubhouse, which is a new audio-only social app that's caused quite a lot of buzz recently. And that's mainly because it's grown from two to 10 million users in a month. So obviously, that caught the attention of the national media and then caused a lot more people to want to jump onto this. But in case you're not familiar with it, Clubhouse is an audio chat social network. And it kind of acts like a virtual conference space. So it allows users to create a group and set up rooms where they can basically take to the stage and talk about a topic that they choose. So in this example, it's about Facebook announcing live audio rooms, Facebook's answer to Clubhouse. So we've noticed that there's been a lot of marketers and executives jumping on to Clubhouse for business-related chats. And that's why we wanted to discuss it here today. Because there's arguably a lot of uses for Clubhouse in b2b marketing. And that ranges from community building, developing your thought leadership, and you can even hold virtual conferences on Clubhouse. But is it worth the effort? Well, we think it kind of depends. So one thing I will say is that it's quite good to have a first-mover advantage on a fast-growing social network. You can get yourself out there more, you can gain an audience maybe quicker than you could on like the traditional ones. But as with all things content marketing, and actually getting leads and conversions takes time. And you might actually be better off using your time elsewhere. Because all of these conversations and all of these rooms, they actually disappear immediately after it's finished. So there's not really that much longevity in the content that you're creating unless you're screen recording everyone and then posting it to another social channel such as YouTube. So maybe your time is actually better spent creating a thought leadership piece on YouTube, where your content has the chance to be more evergreen and lasts for years. And then obviously, there's the YouTube SEO benefits as well. And the other thing is that Android hasn't really done well for Clubhouse so far, because they didn't have a version yet for Android users. So it's kind of shutting a lot of people out. And it's still only available for the iPhone, which has frustrated quite a lot of people. And both Twitter and Facebook are releasing their own audio-only features. So there's an argument that Clubhouse isn't a platform, it's a feature, and Twitter and Facebook, which have, you know, massive audience sizes already and where you've probably got a lot of your content and audience already actually could do this better. And it's a lot less hassle for you to do it on those channels rather than starting all over again on the new social network. So a mixed bag of feelings there. So my recommendation, in my honest opinion, is that if you can get on Clubhouse, and it's a great place to learn from other people, you can keep an eye out for trends and hot topics and content ideas. And then maybe once you're more familiar with the app, you could know whether or not it's right for your brand, and to see if your kind of decision makers and target audience are even on there and would be listening to you on that. But to be honest, right now, we don't really see that much value in it for b2b and actually recommend waiting until it matures a little more as a platform, before you start creating content on there. And actually, it's better for you to be creating content that can be distributed and reused on other platforms. And so you get the most out of your content marketing budget, and use it in the most effective way possible to drive leads and conversions.

Andrea Hoymann  50:21

Yeah, Clubhouse is super interesting. I'm one of those frustrated Android users who can't get on it. And, you know, I'm almost losing interest now, taking too long. But yeah, it could be a good channel if you are in a market that kind of targets early adopters of technology, it could still work. But let's have a look at what else is out there. So we are always trying and testing some new tools here at Brand chemistry, and therefore, in particular, that are really getting us excited at the moment. The first one is SparkToro, that's a really cool new platform that has been launched by Rand Fishkin. And it's super valuable if you're looking to diversify your channels, as we discussed earlier. Ultimately love it; if you're looking to verify some of the behavioural insights you're getting from persona interviews, so it really gives you the opportunity to get some greater data insights than anything you'd be able to possibly create yourself. So it actually allows you to discover what your audience actually reads, watches, listens to and follows. So the platform identifies your customers' biggest source of influence, and the hidden gems, so you can really reach them where they're hanging out. So I think in light of everything that we've discussed, it's going to be a super valuable tool going forward. The other tool we love is Typeform. It allows us to finally finally, make conversation and marketing a part of your digital marketing mix. So the reason why we love it is because it allows you to build some really cool tools, relatively easy that you would previously probably have to spend a tonne of money on dev for. It lets you do it almost instantly without the check headaches. And the thing with Typeform is also that you can easily create conversational forms and quizzes that are just super beautiful and engaging. And the best thing is that you can integrate those with HubSpot, or you know other marketing automation tools. And you can use those responses to improve the effectiveness of your lead nurturing. Another tool we're looking at is SE Ranking. So we are currently trialling this as a potential alternative to Moz because let's be honest, the user interface of Moz could do with a bit of an overhaul. It's definitely worth taking a look, if you're keen to get a bit more strategic about your search engine optimisation efforts. And you don't want to spend hours trying to find the insights. And then last but not least, the tool we're going to talk about is MatchMaker.fm. It literally has us all ears. Because if you're looking to get your leadership team to talk on podcasts, but not sure where to start, that platform is actually for you. So in essence, you can think of MatchMaker as a marketplace for podcasts. So for podcast hosts, to discover industry experts and book guests for their shows, it's also an opportunity for you to get booked on shows and expand your reach and audience by setting up a profile there. And I think Sylvie, you have actually had some success with MatchMaker, haven't you?

Sylvie Hall  53:54

Yes, I've used MatchMaker as both a host for the podcast that I am on. Shameless plug. It's called the Female Founders Network. You can listen to it anywhere you listen to your podcasts. And I found quite a lot of guests on MatchMaker. And it's all business-related chat. So there's a good host of people you can find. And I've actually also used it myself to be featured on podcasts. So yeah, I can definitely vouch for that tool. It's really easy to use, and it's free, which is also a benefit. So we're almost at the end of the webinar. I'm conscious of the time so we're now going to take questions. If you do have a question then please type it into the chat. And I will just say that if you are in need of an extra pair of hands or some of this information has felt overwhelming or you just want to dive in deeper, then we'd love to speak to you. If you are in need of an extra pair of hands and you just don't know who to hire as well then we might be a good fit, and we'd love to hear how we can help you reach your marketing goals as the agency. So we did have a question that came in first that I think is a really interesting one that I want to just cover before we dive into the ones that come in. And this is from Sarah. And she asked if white papers are still working for b2b. And we were kind of thinking about this before and thinking, What do you mean by working because if you mean generating leads, then yes, they can still be very effective. But if your topic isn't compelling enough, then people probably aren't going to download it. And you'll need to have a lot of new data in there as well. So we think that white papers really need to demand attention to get new leads. And that's definitely something that you need to hone in on. What are the main problem areas that people are finding? Andrea, do you have anything to add to that question as well about whether white papers are still working or not?

Andrea Hoymann  55:59

Yeah, good question. So I think, yeah, I think they're still working. I think it's just about coming up with the right topic. I think sometimes what we're seeing is, that brand stands a bit too close to the topic. And that kind of general content is kind of evergreen and can be a little bit trickier. Because there's just so much content out there like everyone is doing it now. It's not like, you know, 5-10 years ago when there was a lot of opportunity out there that hasn't been covered yet. B you know, if you're going a bit broader and kind of, you know, still producing something that's close to what you're doing, but not exactly, you know, it's close to your product, but it's not about your product if that makes sense. There's still a lot of opportunity out there. I also think producing your own research is really where you can build a lot of demand. And that can be either through surveys, or any data that you have from your own product, actually. So if you have a software company, you might have a lot of insights from the usage of your product that can actually be turned into white paper material. So I'd really, really recommend that.

Sylvie Hall  57:12

Hmm, yeah. Thank you. That was a great question, Sarah, and hope that you're listening and find that helpful. And we did have a question that's just come in live. So I think we'll answer this one next. And this person asks, regarding targeting decision makers, what percentage of material should go to the junior staff? Do you recommend using the same message of "what's in it for me"?

Andrea Hoymann  57:38

Yeah, good question. I think that really depends on what exactly you're selling, what's the value and like, you know, often the value of what you're selling dictates how involved the decision maker or the final decision maker is going to be in the whole process. So that will then dictate how you're going to split your content. In terms of the messaging, I think the kind of content that works well with junior staff, or like what we call the champions often, is the more kind of how-to content that actually helps them do their job better. And they can really see how your product or service addresses their pain points, and then they become the champion of your business. So I think, at that stage of their career, they're more interested in actually doing really great work and kind of moving up and any company that can help them do that is going to do quite well.

Sylvie Hall  58:37

Yeah, definitely. So like, from the "what's in it, for me perspective", it's how we're going to make your life easier when you're actually in the trenches doing that work. So it's definitely more like practical stuff, isn't it? Rather than the kind of big factors that affect profitability and things like that? 

Andrea Hoymann  58:52

That's right, yeah.

Sylvie Hall  58:54

Great. Any more questions? Feel free to drop them in now.

Andrea Hoymann  58:59

There was another one in the chat, actually. So how would you go about marketing organically on social platforms for both b2c and b2b with different leads? Do you see that wasn't a chat rather than...

Sylvie Hall  59:17

Having the Q&A? Oh, no.

Andrea Hoymann  59:19

That's fine. Yeah. So yeah, that can be a tricky one. So I think what's really important is that you actually see if you want to kind of have the same channels for those different audiences or might, you know, depend a little bit on the particular setups. You might have to have a really good look at the personas you're targeting for both your b2b segment and b2c segment and see if there's overlap or if there might actually be a conflict. So if there's a conflict, you definitely want to separate it because you don't want to alienate one customer. You don't want to consume a customer because of the work you're doing in b2b and vice versa. So yeah, it really requires a bit more digging in the terms of your target audience to give kind of a definitive answer on your targeting and what channels you're going to use for that.

Sylvie Hall  1:00:13

Yeah. And I think that's where one of the books I recommended, which is Lean Customer Development, that's where that kind of methodology really helps. Because in that sense, what you're doing is you're reaching out to those customers and asking them where they're finding information, and what they're actually using. And then that will help you to really drill down on where you should be posting certain content. And you might be surprised, you might find that maybe people are on Reddit. Speaking regularly to customers is a massive thing that we sometimes just... we get in our little bubbles, and we don't talk enough to people. And that's, that's really key in ideating where the content should be posted and what should be made. It should actually come from feedback from people. So yeah, definitely one to explore. We've got another question here from Ian, "How useful is a Wikipedia entry for a brand?"

Andrea Hoymann  1:01:13

Um, yeah, another good question. I've actually set up a Wikipedia page for brands before. And it is useful. It's kind of part of what I call corporate profiling. So that's more about, okay, how much real estate can you take up online when it comes to your brand, and Wikipedia is a great way to do that. So that, just making sure you know, when you're typing in your brand, into Google, you almost want to make sure that your website or anything that your brand created is coming up on the first page, and you don't get kind of comparative reviews and things like that. So Wikipedia is great for that. Writing a Wikipedia entry is a little bit tricky. Actually, you need to first create an account and you just start editing some, you know Wikipedia content before you can actually start setting up your own article. And you need to be super neutral. So you almost need to, I guess, take on like a journalist hat and just write about the facts and not that you know, dial back, definitely dial back on the marketing message. Otherwise, it will get rejected.

Sylvie Hall  1:02:22

Yeah, no sales language there.

Andrea Hoymann  1:02:26

And as many references you have, like if you can, you know, have any press releases or, you know, any kind of media articles about your company that you can reference to support anything you're saying, the better it's going to be. It's, yeah, it's almost like you need someone who's really good at academic writing to write this for you.

Sylvie Hall  1:02:49

Awesome. We've got one question from Emily, "Do you guys have any recommendations for case studies, i.e. new and interesting ways to showcase this type of work in the b2b world?" Huh, I think that is an interesting thing. Because like that is the thing we're like, when we're talking about the attention economy, is that we're wanting to use these tried and tested. And we know that case studies can help to convert, and they're really bottom-of-funnel content, but how do you make them stand out? How do you make them more engaging? So I think one thing that I've found is that actually when you're creating video case studies, you want to make sure that they're not too long. People don't always have time to watch a whole 10 minutes on something, but you could actually maybe have that long video, and then tease it with story content. So actually editing parts of it down into a vertical video format. And using LinkedIn stories, which is new, and people are using it more and more to actually start to pique interest in the case studies and have people come to watch. I think that that could be a way of like, taking a piece of content and showcasing it in a different way. What do you think, Andrea?

Andrea Hoymann  1:03:59

Yeah, I agree. I think video is the way forward with case studies. I think, in general, people just like to hear from people that are similar to them and kind of talk them through their own journey. I think it's just, you know, no matter how well you write it up, I think it's never gonna get to that, you know, that same level of connection that you get through a video case study. I really like the idea of using snippets. I think you can use that. I think it's more maybe not so much about how you create the case study, but how you're distributing it in creative ways. So it's editing it down. Just snippets that can work on different channels and things like that. I think it's a really great approach.

Sylvie Hall  1:04:44

Yeah, definitely. I hope that answers your question, Emily. And I know it's those hard things that find new ways to get attention. And we do have another question from Melissa. How best would you leverage a five-star Google rating with loads of reviews? Now it's an interesting one!

Andrea Hoymann  1:05:04

It's an interesting one, that's a nice position to be in. Well done, for doing that in the first place. So yeah, you can, one of the ways, you should definitely look for ways to have that feed of the five-star Google ratings come into your website. So that should kind of be front and centre of your marketing. But then also, I think you can actually use that in your nurturing as well. So if you're getting kind of different leads or different stages, actually really highlighting those, those great reviews in that email content is a great way. And then another way I can think of really, really instantly is, you know, if you're writing content, it could be blog content or website content that talks about your product or service. Just really make sure you're bringing in those great testimonials, and actually use the language that you're using, rather than what you use as a brand. I think it's a really great way to create more connection with your customers because ultimately, the language they're using is going to really reflect why as well as on your brand level as well.

Sylvie Hall  1:06:15

Yeah, yeah. Awesome job on your five-star reviews. So we've got one last question. We'll just answer this quickly. So from anonymous, how do you find Google's increased focus on intent is changing the way that we should be developing content? And so I've just been thinking about this while Andrea was just speaking then, and I think that what this is really coming down to is what is driving people's behaviour, and what is the psychology behind their intent. So when we're thinking about developing content with intent in mind, we've really got to like, go back to those key problems. And I think this also comes back to what we highlighted in the webinar about making sure that you're talking and interviewing people and having conversations to really drive down to what is the driving behaviour of your customers, rather than just like a keyword search and just like thinking of keywords, and okay, well, this is highly searched. Like, we want to focus on quality rather than quantity. And in that sense, especially with b2b, there's like there's less keyword volume anyway, that tends to happen across many industries. So I think from my point of view, if we're focusing more on intent, it's definitely thinking about problem-solving, and really like, what's the driving consumer behaviour behind the problem that you solve as a business. Andrea, do you have any ideas on that one?

Andrea Hoymann  1:07:43

Yeah. Just to add to what you said, I think you're definitely right. I think I'm actually not sure if it's changing that much. Because I think if you've been producing great content, it should have always been focused on the problems people are trying to solve rather than the keywords because the problem that you're having is, if you're, if you're only focusing on the keywords, and you know, getting that ranking, you might get a lot of traffic, but it's going to have a huge bounce rate. It's going to be irrelevant, right? So you might be getting traffic, but it's not really satisfying the search user. So I think, you know, great content should always be actually aligned with what people are trying to achieve. And I think that shouldn't really change their approach too much.

Sylvie Hall  1:08:34

Thank you, everyone, for your questions. And if you still have a question, and you didn't want to type it, then we'd love to help you out. And you can always email us at hello@brandchemistry.com.au. And you can speak to us about your current challenges, what you're really kind of struggling with. I know sometimes, as marketers we work alone inside an organisation and you don't always have people to bounce ideas off with. And that's where we come in as an agency and can be a real kind of partner and champion for you. So thank you very much for joining us today. We've really enjoyed putting this together and answering your questions. And it's been awesome to host this. We love doing webinars, didn't we, Andrea?

Andrea Hoymann  1:09:17

Yeah, it was awesome. Thank you so much for all the great questions as well. Really good.

Sylvie Hall  1:09:23

Great. Well, that's it from us today. So thanks, everyone. Have a great rest of your Thursday and week and goodbye.