FUSIONb2b Blog

by Pavel Solyak

Blogs by senior company officials-often referred to as CEO blogs are a great way for companies to engage and connect with their customers, prospects and investors as well as to talk about goings-on inside the company. Other benefits of business-to-business blogging include building a hub for all your social media initiatives, reinforcing the company’s brand, making company announcements to which people will pay attention, open new marketing channel for products and services and in some cases, even create a dynamic mean for providing customer service and support. B2C companies have been blogging for years, often having separate blogs for their product lines, customer service and investors. Some will keep company blogs, some – employee blogs, and some will go as far as hiring professional bloggers specifically to write posts in a manner consistent with expectation of blog-reading customers.

B2B customers are no different from B2C: fed up with companies that have grown detached from them, they are likely to favor companies that make an effort to connect with them and engage in dialogue and knowledge-sharing.

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b2b blogging, business blogging, CEO Blogs, company blog, engaging customers, executive blogs

by Eric Gagnon

Many agency and marketing folks often consider running only full-page ads in their B2B campaigns, under the mistaken assumption that a full page ad always makes a bigger splash than any smaller ad size.

But you can run a successful lead-generation advertising program using smaller ad sizes, if you focus on highlighting the boldness, clarity, and readability of your product’s major sales benefit, you can make a small ad generate even greater sales response than full-page ads.

In fact, once I’m able to un-hypnotize a client from thinking they need to run full pages, I usually advise them to start a new advertising program with half, quarter, and (sometimes) even one-eighth ad sizes, to reduce the risk and expense of their print ad buys, and to test the response of the publication, sales message, and promotion used in these ads.

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ad tutorial, ads, advertisng, agency, creative, print ads

by Pavel Solyak

Starting up a Blog for your B2B company has proven to be of great benefit for a variety of reasons. Think about all the internal links and search engine optimization gains, a new communication channel for company’s news and services, a chance to prove though-leadership and authority in the industry, not to mention a creative space for brand awareness. Most importantly, corporate blogs bring traffic to your site and in combination with other social media tools can become a great lead generation instrument.

There are many different ways to set up a blog and a number of blogging platforms to choose from. WordPress is the most popular, however some companies prefer Typepad, Blogger or even develop custom platform that fits their needs. Mashable has a great list of 40+ free blog hosts to get you started blogging, but before you do – think of a topic that would be interesting for you and for your readers.

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B2B, blog hosts, blogs, business blog, topics

Many companies have not yet taken advantage of even the most basic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) techniques. In most industries, SEO can be critical to achieving improved search results for websites — thereby increasing website traffic, and quite possibly sales and market share. Website programming, design and development as a foundation to increase or optimize search engine results that include your industry’s keywords.

As more and more business is conducted through the internet, how can business-to-business marketers leverage this important medium? An SEO foundation should include such optimization techniques as: meta-tag, alt-tag and title-tags coding, URL structure, site indexing and mapping, link building, keyword content or “landing” pages, blogs and social Media.

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alt tag, B2B, blogs, keywords, landing pages, link directories, meta tag, pay per click, PPC, search for dummys, SEO, site map, Social Media, title tag, URL directories

As business-to-business marketers implement next-generation websites that feature enhanced functions, many companies have not yet taken advantage of even the most basic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) techniques. In most industries, SEO can be critical to achieving improved search results for websites — thereby increasing website traffic, and quite possibly sales and market share.

SEO relates to website programming, design and development as a foundation to increase or optimize search engine results that include your industry’s keywords. As more and more business is conducted through the internet, how can business-to-business marketers leverage this important medium? An SEO foundation should include such optimization techniques as:

• Meta-tag coding
• Alt-tag coding
• Title-tags
• URL structure
• Site Index
• Link building
• Keyword content or “landing” pages
• Blogs and Social Media

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alt tags, B2B, business-to-business, Marketing, meta tags, search engine optimization, search marketing, SEO, Social Media, traffic, URL, web

Recently, FUSION b2b has witnessed an upsurge in clients’ interests, either for entering new markets or entering multiple markets with a targeted approach for each. As FUSION developed marketing plans and strategies for each client engagement, several similarities were identified and formed into a system or process called Vertical Market Development or VMD™.

What is VMD? FUSION typically begins with sales analysis in which customers are segmented into similar groupings, whether SIC/NAICS codes (Standard Industrial Classifications or North American Industry Classification System) or home-grown market descriptors. With sales data, FUSION can quickly identify largest revenue or highest margin segments, and often applies the 80/20 rule to prioritize segments for market development investment.

Within each market, the sales cycles are evaluated and decision-making processes are identified. It is important to note that in a given market, several sales scenarios may occur, or may differ by size or type of purchasing organization. Initial information is gathered from internal stakeholders, including sales personnel, but ideally such intelligence is gathered first-hand from customer interviews or surveys. Quite often, both channels (distributors or retailers and end users) must be considered.

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analysis, B2B. Vertical Market Development, customers, fusionb2b, measurements, NAICS, results, segmentation, SIC, strategies, VMD

Despite high interest in database marketing (DBM), many marketers still have not implemented DBM. One of the reasons for this is a lack of practical information. Depending on your objectives, you should consider one or more DBM strategies including:
1. Segmentation
2. New Customer Acquisition
3. Customer Penetration
4. Customer Retention
5. Marketing Intelligence
6. Measuring Results

Step 1 – Segmentation

Segmenting customers and prospects into various classifications is the first step in DBM. The most basic level of segmentation involves classifying, coding or sorting customers and prospects by type, size or potential. Business marketers can utilize Standard Industrial Classifications (SIC codes) established by the federal government to categorize most business types. Other typical classifications include sales revenue, employees, product purchases, purchase interest, etc.

A higher level of segmentation involves profiling, scoring, or modeling of customers and prospects. Profiling identifies frequencies (percentages) of different categories, for example, financial services comprise 17% of XYZ Corporation’s customer base. In addition, the 80/20 rule can be illustrated utilizing percentages, for example, 80% of XYZ profits are derived from the top 20% of customers.

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B2B, customer acquisition, customer penetration, DBM, fusionb2b, intelligence, Marketing, measurement, results, retention, segmentation

FUSION b2b recently was selected as a winner of the 2nd annual B2B Twitterer of the Year Award, which recognizes business-to-business (B2B) organizations for outstanding contributions in practicing, promoting, and/or enhancing business via the micro-blogging sensation Twitter.

Naperville-based FUSION b2b was recognized as the Runner-Up in the Local/Regional category for its Twitter profile @FUSIONb2b, which features over 1,300 followers. In addition to the Twitter profile, FUSION b2b uses Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube and a corporate Blog to distribute content posts, news and information.

“Twitter and other social media are growing rapidly as a critical weapon in the arsenal of B2B marketing”, states Pavel Solyak, Director Social Media for FUSION b2b. “FUSION has taken leadership in B2B social media by demonstrating marketing results including sales inquiries and leads, PR placements, improved search engine results and website traffic, and other metrics.”

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Awards, B2BTOTY, Facebook, FUSION b2b, Twitter

Developing effective taglines is a disciplined process that melds insight with positioning strategy and creativity. So what is a tagline, and how can tagline development deliver a breakthrough? Sometimes called tags, positioning taglines, slogans, jingles, unique selling propositions or descriptors, taglines distill your corporate or brand position to a few simple and memorable words—ideally from one to five words, and never more than seven words.

Taglines are flexible, persuasive, differentiating, extendable and very often, more memorable than the corporate and brand names they modify. Why? Many names are legacy names, likely descriptive and sometimes over time, less relevant to positioning due to changing markets. With years of equity, it can be difficult to change names, but taglines can change with new campaigns, or to target different audiences.

Like names, there are different types of taglines. With metaphorical names that have highly provocative meanings, sometimes simple, Descriptive taglines can add clarity and anchor aggressive branding. For our client AfterMath, we chose a simple descriptor, Claim Science to communicate industry focus and differentiation. In addition to descriptive taglines, Fusion B2B has identified other tagline types including Metaphorical, Aspirational, Comparative and Jingles. And note that hybrid types abound.

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B2B, Branding, brands, fusionb2b, jingles, logo, Marketing, slogan, taglines