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What are your predictions for technology marketing in 2012?
High-quality answers will be included in a handbook for technology marketers produced by Focus.
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12 Answers
When you write predictions, you have to be careful whether you are writing about what you hope for versus what you actually believe will happen. I cheated a little bit, but tried to predict versus project. Here is my list below:
1. Mobile marketing will be a factor in 2012 marketing campaigns -- It already a reality in the consumer space, but the reason I feel b2b marketers may actually do something about in 2012 is it's real. B2b buyers are mobile and if you are going to "be where your buyers are", then mobile is it. Keep in mind, b2b is not gimmicky like consumer so making adjustments to support mobile marketing does not mean re-inventing the wheel. Right now b2b marketers need to focus on creating their content so it is readable on mobile devices and that their call-to-actions will work from someones' smart phone. Examples include: ensuring your web and email content is readable, shortening email copy to be readable in small window.
2. We will still be talking about sales and marketing (mis) alignment at the end of 2012 -- I want sales and marketing to align and I believe a number of companies are achieving this goal, but we are so far from being remotely close on this topic that it will continue to be a problem through 2012. We just aren't there yet. Whenever I bring this up, people say "well I am seeing a lot of companies make great strides". Sure, but that is typically primarily the marketer talking. If we asked sales, what would they say?
3. Vendors will sell "Revenue Performance Management (RPM)" but buyers will be marketing automation -- I don't want to be controversial here because I fully support the RPM ideology but lets face it, people are submitting purchase reqs for marketing automation not RPM. That will not change in 2012.
4. Organizations will see benefit from inbound marketing IF they started two years ago -- Inbound marketing takes time and the organizations that see benefits in 2012 have been inbound marketing consistently for years. There is a warning in this prediction: as you roll out your inbound marketing plans, beware of setting unachievable success metrics. This effort takes time.
5. Marketers will be forced to find other channels and offers to nurture prospects -- the predominant channel for nurturing today is email and the offer is either a white paper or webinars. This is not just the vendors, we receive offers from media companies as well. How you get your buyers engaged in 2012 will be just as interesting as "what you use" aka marketing automation system you use.
6. 2012 maybe the year for irreverent and fun -- Okay, this may be wishful thinking, but here is reality. Everyone is creating content and it's the same thing over and over. Vendors, pundits, research firms. My example is an ironic one: "The changing buyer". The original goal of this theme was to awaken marketers to the changing buying and research habits of b2b buyers. Now, it's boring. We get it now, what else you got? There are emerging examples of making b2b content more fun such as infographics and video. Social media is also pushing b2b in a more casual direction.
7. Marketing will become more personal -- this maybe more realistic than my prediction above. Social media has driven us to the two-way engagement model and our marketing needs to support this change. Everyone says "stop talking at your customer" while they send them to a webinar with 5 minutes for questions. How can you open yourself up to your prospects and customers? is the question marketers will attempt to answer in 2012. Now the question is why do I believe this is realistic in 2012? A good proxy is the Twitter streams for people. A year ago, Twitter streams were primarily tweets and retweets of content. Now you are seeing many replies and conversations happening from corporate Twitter accounts and certainly from mine.
8. Salesforce.com will not buy a marketing automation company -- everyone wants them to and we have no indication that they will. Besides, who would fill the room in the Dreamforce expo?
Two big ones; more content curation (creating value through context) and "gamification" (better customer lifetime value, leveraging customers as evangelists).
Will return to explain...
I am hesitant to make predictions as in looking back at 2011 and all that were made most never came to fruition, but I will take the bait and here it goes.
1. Marketing and Sales will not fully align until organizations begin to address the real issues and not the symptoms. Organizations will spend big dollars to try and fix the alignment gap, there will be pundits writing about how to fix alignment and it will be more of the same as alignment is not the core issue, but a symptom of lack of process, lack of common goals and failed leadership. This will continue to persist and gradual gains will be realized.
2. The focus on relevant content and creating a 1-1 dialogue with customers will be top of mind. Organizations will realize that content can come in array of forms and should be tailored to individual personas and stages of the buying process. This will mean that organizations will take the steps necessary to better understand their buyers and customers and equip themselves to communicate (not necessarily sell) more effectively.
3. Leadership understands the value of change management. In order for organizations to catch up to the change that has occurred on the buyer side, organizations must begin a internal culture change. This takes time, but I believe organizations will understand the value of change management in order to make this happen and begin to lead their companies through the process.
4. Education will increase. Marketers will begin to take the necessary steps needed to educate themselves on the new world of B2B marketing and invest the time and dollars to learn what is needed to thrive and succeed. Those who don't will be left behind and be quickly exposed.
5. Use of Video will increase. As attention spans of buyers and customers wane, organizations will use more video to communicate their messages.
6. Mobile will continue to increase. This will be key especially in any attempt to reach executives.
7. Insanity - as the B2B marketing space continues to expand and mature, things will move at a frenetic pace, people will get caught up in trying to do more with less, sales will want more leads and we will have those who denounce automation and RPM as past their prime.
Carlos Hidalgo
@cahidalgo
Craig has offered some great ideas. Forrester interviewed 50 tech CMOs and VPs of Marketing to find out their priorities for 2012 - here they are: http://blogs.forrester.com/stephen_davidson/11-12-30-2012_tech_marketing_prio...
2011 saw a shift in inside sales support from centralized in marketing to centralized in sales. In 2012, sales will decentralize inside sales support out into the regions. This will prove unsuccessful. By mid-2012, frantic managers will be looking for the right solution to managing inside sales support. Inside sales support should and will be centralized and reside between marketing and sales - not within one or the other group.
1) Content marketing will grow up.
From isolated eBooks to strategic portfolios
2) Infographics will wane.
Too many busy, wordy messes. Great graphics will float to the top.
3) More and shorter videos.
It's a great way to tell complex stories. More granular video is on the way.
4) Mobile will take a few baby steps.
As tech websites and emails get mobile friendly. Plus isolated marketing-driven mobile apps.
5) Analytics will bed down.
As marketing cultures move towards science & math(s).
6) HTML5 will romp.
With sexy, interactive, multi-platform digital experiences.
Not sure if these are predictions or wishes, but here goes:
11. B2B marketers will slowly get better at managing the full prospect pipeline, and operationalizing a pipeline discipline around how they generate and manage leads, as well as how they track their own success.
10. Marketers will increase the use of trial offers and "impulse buys" as a means of engaging prospects early in the sales process, and treating a superficial or entry product/service engagement as a lead.
9. Direct mail will make a comeback. The Realtors and credit card companies have retreated, and effective direct mail (for the right products) will once again take an active place in the marketing mix.
8. Partnering will increase, as companies look to work with complementary product and service providers to increase awareness, interest and penetration.
7. Bundling will increase as marketers get smarter about pre-packaging products and services based on customer needs and problem-solving opportunities
6. Appointment-setting services will grow significantly, as more companies experiment with inside sales and early-pipeline lead generation beyond their own walls and with a higher-touch than tradition marketing-driven lead generation
5. Marketers will accelerate the launch and testing of smarter, prospect-centric offers that more quickly provide value and create trust/credibility with the company
4. Video usage among B2B companies will increase, with far more value-added content and fewer boring demos
3. Mobile usage will increase, but B2B marketers will struggle to balance between advertising and value. Event-based mobile marketing will lead the charge for B2B.
2. Marketers will get smarter and better at creating content that engages and drives action among their prospective customers, especially early in the buying process.
1. Social selling will be the buzzword (or phrase) of the year, as B2B sales and marketing professionals alike jostle to find qualified leads from across the social Web.
There has been a lot said here, by many, that is spot on. Mobile, yes - content, yes - alignment, attempted - buzzwords, abound. Perhaps the one area that tech orgs have not done a great job at historically, but you are starting to see a select few differentiate themselves with, is recipe marketing or the evolution of the case study. The longevity of many of today's emerging technologies is rooted in the ability of the purchaser not to see value today - but also at contract renewal. The best way to stimulate ROI is to create the definition of if. You are seeing that today with many of the more complex and often fuzzy spaces, (cough) Marketing Automation. In order to accelerate adoption, promote usage, create satisfaction, many execs and marketers are looking for a playbook, and even more, a well drawn out timeline that acts as that success barometer. Its a delicate line to walk, too much and you're condescending, too little and you get CRM circa 1995. But get it right and you literally define the pace of adoption, highlight the best features, provide a roadmap for upgrades and you build advocates of your brand. It sounds simple and obvious, but the organizations that teach their customers how to use their solution, before they own their solution - will own 2012.
Justin Gray
@myleadmd
http://leadmd.com
I just realised how few mentions there have been for marketing automation, lead nurturing, revenue performance management...
Even I forgot it -- and I do believe we passed the tipping point for it this year.
Seeing the crowd at the Marketo Revenue Rockstars event convinced me -- it's crossing the Chasm.
Everybody needs to implement a Web-Mobile Social Business presence. If you are not in, you are out of business.
Here are some thoughts, perspectives and predictions for 2012 and 2013 (getting a jump on it) from my recent (free) newsletter ( http://storageio.com/newsletter/Fall2011.html ):
Thoughts and perspectives for 2012:
•Addressing storage woes at the source
•Big data & bandwidth meet big backup
•Cloud confusion finds clarity on the horizon
•Cloud and virtualization stack battles
•Data protection modernization
•End to End (E2E) management tools
•FCoE & Fibre Channel continue to mature
•Hard drive shortages drive revenues/profits
•Metrics, measurements and management
•NAS gains respect at both high and low end
•Object storage resurfaces this time for cloud
•QoS & SLA/SLOs part of cloud conversations
•Clouds are a shared responsibility model
•Return on innovation is the new ROI
•Solid State Devices (SSD) confidence
•Virtualization beyond consolidation
•Will applications be ready to leverage cloud?
•Zombie list grows (more items declared dead)
The above and others are expanded up in the following post:
2012 industry trends perspectives and commentary (predictions)
http://storageioblog.com/?p=2349
Cheers gs
@storageio
To add to rather than repeat the above... Gamification will increase.
Fun games to engage (with viral potential), diagnostics in the nurture process, configurators in the selling phase, structured support for implementation and recognition and rewards for referrals.
Hubspot are one of the companies I'm seeing as a pioneer in this area.
Also Klout, BranchOut, and of course lots of example in the smartphone market.
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