Every business founder wants to find new ways to promote their message; this common conundrum is one that keeps new entrepreneurs up at night all too often. After all, how aware audiences are of your brand is a direct indicator of your brand’s success. Share of voice competition is fierce today; brands must maintain strong presences across every social platform. Luckily for brands, influencer marketing has made message amplification easier than ever. While influencer marketing is effective, there may be an even easier, and cheaper, approach you’re overlooking: your own employees. That’s right, your own employees have the potential to become influencers and brand evangelists in their own rights, but it may require a subtle nudge from you.

Engage with Your Employees on Social Media

Follow your employees on social media and encourage them to follow your company’s channels. Your employees are likely already creating and sharing content pertaining to their professional lives across all of their social accounts and your brand can amplify their efforts. Everyone wants to see their projects and insights reach new audiences. The more you comment, like, and re-share their work, the more likely your employees will be to create positive content around your company for their followers to see. Some of the most successful brands on social media today know that branding starts from the ground up, and they empower their employees to actively participate in the brand-building process on social media. By amplifying employee content, brands are showing their appreciation for those who enthusiastically speak about the organization’s updates and initiatives; which, subsequently helps employees to feel more confident and supported by their employers.

Highlight Your Employees

Social audiences love seeing behind-the-curtain glimpses into the inner-workings of their favorite companies, starting with the employees. Because your employees work with your product on a daily basis, they possess a deep understand of the field and the trends impacting it. Take J. Crew for example; in recent years the retailer has begun featuring its employees in its social content initiatives. Their magazine feature the current selections and outfit ideas from the staffers and their J.Crew Style Hacks Hotline video series gives customers the chance to ask the company’s stylists and designers fashion questions. The retailer has put their employees front and center, which has not only added another more relatable layer to their digital persona, but it has also created a deeper sense of community among the employees; they want to be involved – and featured – in the brand’s social initiatives and they’ll continue creating content around the brand to share with their own followers.

Offer Ongoing Social Media Training

Some brands fear asking their employees to engage on social media because they’re worried that employees may cross a line or create content that is not in line with the brand’s values. While most employees will engage with their employer in a strictly professional demeanor, companies can ease their fears by offering employees ongoing social media trainings. In addition to helping them stay abreast of the latest social trends and updates, ongoing trainings also empower employees to feel more comfortable sharing company successes and updates. Social media has disintegrated traditional company hierarchies; everyone from interns to CEOs has the potential to be a positive company spokesperson. In addition to technical social media tips, brands can also offer employee tips on how they can positively reflect on their experiences as an employee in a way that feels open and natural.

Don’t Force It

Every employee is different; some are more comfortable sharing regular professional updates on their social profiles than others. For employee social programs to work, they must be voluntary. If employees feel forced into social sharing on behalf of the brand, resent will brew. Additionally, forced employee social content will feel forced to the audience and evoke the exact opposite sentiment you are trying to achieve. Unless it is specifically written in the job requirements to post about the company, brands should take a gentle approach to employee social evangelism.

Creating a social army from within is entirely possible, but it’s not something that happens overnight. Brands have to take the initiative to arm their employees with the right training and resources to feel comfortable enough to promote the brand in the first place. Furthermore, the brands that empower and encourage their employees on a daily basis will see higher participation and enthusiasm from their organization.

Your landing pages are the worker collecting tickets for the Ferris Wheel at the carnival. They can either calm fears and encourage people to take the risk OR they can scare people away. There are a few simple and powerful principles you can use to ensure that your landing pages communicate benefit, prove your worth, and mitigate risks your visitors feel.

In the e-book, “The 7 Principles of Conversion-Centered Design,” Oli Gardner, the founder of the company Unbounce, makes an important differentiation between landing pages and other pages on your website:

“Unlike homepages that call for self-guided exploration, landing pages are uniquely equipped to be optimized for conversion because they are laser focused on a single goal: that of your marketing campaign.”

If you’re struggling with landing page conversion, it might be time to take a hard look at your landing pages. Chances are good that you’ll find something that you can optimize. Don’t just take our word for it; we’ve compiled a list of recommendations from other great marketing minds:

Eliminate All Distractions

There should be only one single and clear action for your users to take when they arrive on a landing page. Be sure to remove the main navigation and avoid linking to other pages on your website. Give the user all the information they need to make a decision and no more.

In this article from Forbes, John Rampton points out that having too many distractions dilutes the conversion message on your landing pages,

“The main goal of your landing page is to get conversions. Any other functions, information, or interactive elements you include will only serve to dilute the number of people you convert… your call-to-action should be big, bold, obvious, and shouldn’t have to compete with other elements.”

Cut the Jargon – Use Plain Language

Marketers are often enchanted by buzzwords that don’t have a lot of meaning. It’s important to simplify your messaging so that it’s easily understood by anyone reading it. Try not to use your brand names, acronyms, or other industry terms on your landing pages. Communicate as clearly and concisely as possible.

Focus on cutting out unnecessary and superlative language until you have your message in its purest form. By clarifying your landing page messaging, you help the user understand exactly why they care about what you have to offer. One article from ConversionXL reminds us to keep in mind who we are really writing for:

“Do not try to woo people with fancy, complicated business language – it just doesn’t work. You write for people, it’s people who read your site. A marketing director or a purchasing manager are people too. Don’t write for companies, write for people.”

Highlight the Value Proposition

The first step in creating any copy for a landing page should be, asking yourself “What’s in it for them?” As digitally-connected consumers, we have instant access to information at all times. If a viewer can’t figure out why your product, service, or offer has benefit to them, they will move on without a moment of hesitation.

Understand the common pain points that your customers face and how you can help them solve those problems. Communicate clearly what tangible results your users should expect to see and remember to keep them brief and clear, just like this example from Uber, which highlights their specific and unique value proposition.

By focusing on messaging that resonates with common pain points, they can attract people who are searching for something different from their job. MarketingLand pushes us to go beyond simple benefits, but instead promise something extraordinary,

“Let customers know the unique things you have to offer to get their attention. Value proposition should be something extraordinary they get by opting in for your service.”

Don’t Reinvent the Wheel

Your landing pages aren’t the best place for experimenting with new user experience designs. Keep these pages clear, simple, and easy to navigate. Don’t confuse users by creating extraneous animation, hyperlinks, or functionality. They are flashy elements that distract from your laser-focused goal.

If you are thinking of adding a new element to a landing page, ask yourself, “will this help make the offer and benefits more clear to the reader?” If the answer is no, save your idea for your homepage or other website page.

The AdVenture Media Group describes it this way:

“Make every element on the page as familiar as possible. Don’t make a complex (or cool) way for people to find essential information. Follow the same structure for navigation that other similar sites are using.”

Let Others Prove the Worth of Your Content

People trust other people. It’s as simple as that. Your audience is more likely to trust the words of your clients and users over you. Adding social proof to your landing pages is a great way to add credibility and trust.

If you don’t have social proof from real clients, there is no better time to start gathering it! Look for comments on social media, ask your customers to submit a survey or reach out to them directly.

Don’t just take our word for it, these stats from Entrepreneur show what a difference social proof can make,

“Studies show that 70 percent of consumers say they look at product reviews before making a purchase, and consumer-generated product reviews are 12 times more trusted than product descriptions from manufacturers. If you want to sell anything at all, you need credibility.”

Keep Your Forms as Brief as Possible

Your customer’s information is their digital currency online. In the same way that users will pause before swiping their credit card at the store, they will pause and think about how much they are willing to give in exchange for what you are offering on your landing page.

Consider what stage in the buying process a person would be when they are looking at your landing page. Try to match up your offer with the number of form fields you are collecting.

Tereza Litsa of Search Engine Watch put it this way:

“People are wary of sign up forms and giving out their personal details, so make sure that you’re only asking for what’s necessary. Find a reason to convince users to trust you, whether it’s a reward, or a highly appealing and relevant landing page, and return the trust with a quick and simple registration process.”

What’s Next?

Start by analyzing your current campaigns. Look at your lowest converting pages first. See if you can uncover what might be causing your users to question, second guess, or leave the page. Spend some time optimizing your pages for conversion and, with a lot of strategy and a little luck, watch new leads start rolling in!

Robo advisors are increasingly growing in popularity, and these automated services are threatening to take huge amounts of business away from traditional financial advisors.

Multiple different segments of the investing public have already taken advantage of robo advisors for a variety of reasons. Many traditional financial advisors have decided to work cooperatively with robo advisors rather than try to compete with them directly, and this strategy has helped streamline the process and reduce costs.

Millennials use robo advisors because they remove the perceived "guess work" out of investing, which provides a measure of comfort to hesitant millennial investors. And often, robo advisors offer cheaper fees than human advisors, which also makes them attractive to this group.

And retirees and high net worth individuals can often test robo advisors because they have more disposable income.

But which robo advisor should you use?

To help you narrow down the choices, BI Intelligence, Business Insider's premium research service, has decided to review some of the most popular robo advisors on the market to help you make the most informed decision.

In this article, we'll cover Wealthsimple.

• Wealthsimple Review Summary
• Fees & Pricing
• AUM, Returns, & Portfolio Performance
• Services Provided
• Competitors
• More Information

Wealthsimple Review Summary

Wealthsimple is a Canadian robo advisor that launched in the U.S. in January. The company has attracted 20,000 Canadian customers thus far and hopes to grow a customer base in the U.S. The service has plenty of attractive features, though some of the better ones are locked until you have $100,000 in your account and become eligible for Wealthsimple Black. This makes the robo advisor better suited for those with more disposable income or more seasoned investors, not those who are just getting into the world of trading.

• Assets Under Management (AUM): C$750 million
• Minimum Account Balance: $0
• Fee Range: 0.4% to 0.5%
• Account Types: Individual, Traditional IRA, Roth IRA
• Services: Portfolio Rebalancing, Dividend Reinvesting, Automatic Deposits, Human Advisors, Tax Loss Harvesting, Financial Planning, VIP Airline Lounge Access

Wealthsimple Fees & Pricing 

Wealthsimple has no account minimum, which should undoubtedly attract new investors who might not have enough cash to reach higher minimums charged by some other financial advisors.

As for fees, the robo advisor charges 0.5% on all accounts with $100,000 or less (however, the first $5,000 is always free). After that threshold, the account type changes to Wealthsimple Black, which has a 0.4% fee and unlocks additional features, which we'll explain in a later section.

Wealthsimple AUM, Returns, & Portfolio Performance

Wealthsimple manages approximately C$750 million in assets, 

As for returns and portfolio performance, let's level the playing field between Wealthsimple and Wealthsimple Black and use the robo-advisor's tool to determine returns with a $100,000 initial investment.

According to Wealthsimple's tool on its website, a "traditional investor" would grow this investment to $1,059,459 over 30 years. The basic Wealthsimple service would result in $1,279,033 by year 30, while Wealthsimple Black would reach $1,306,016. Wealthsimple Black would also save you $16,183 in taxes and $10,800 in fees.

Wealthsimple Features

Arguably Wealthsimple's greatest strength is its variety of features, though the premium features are locked until you reach the Wealthsimple Black level. Here's a rundown of what the company offers:

• Portfolio Rebalancing: Wealthsimple will create a diversified portfolio at a risk level with which you're comfortable, and then automatically rebalance that portfolio when investments move away from their target allocations.
• Dividend Reinvesting: The robo advisor automatically reinvests your dividends in order to help you take advantage of compound interest.
• Automatic Deposits: Users can customize their automatic deposit schedule to their liking.
• Human Advisors: Wealthsimple customers can call, text, or email flesh-and-blood advisors for help.
• Tax-Loss Harvesting (Wealthsimple Black only): This complex selling process essentially turns losing investments into a way to lower your tax bill.
• Financial Planning (Wealthsimple Black only): Customers can schedule a financial planning session with an expert adviser to help you reach your financial goals.
• VIP Airline Lounge Access: (Wealthsimple Black only): Wealthsimple Black customers can enjoy access to more than 1,000 airline lounges in more than 400 cities around the world. 

Wealthsimple Competitors

Wealthsimple holds up rather well compared to its peers in many aspects, but it certainly has some weaknesses when compared to other robo advisors.

The lack of a minimum account requirement should make Wealthsimple extremely enticing for new or inexperienced investors. Betterment and Hedgeable each have no minimum, while WiseBanyan has a $1 requirement. In the next tier, Wealthfront and TradeKing Advisors have a $500 minimum, while SigFig requires $2,000. Other companies have even higher minimums, such as FutureAdvisor ($3,000), Schwab Intelligent Portfolio ($5,000), and Personal Capital ($25,000). But none of these touch Vanguard's figure of $50,000.

As far as management fees, Wealthsimple is a on the higher end with its 0.4% to 0.5% range. SigFig has a 0.25% fee, while Betterment carries a range of 0.15% to 0.35% for their non-Plus and non-Premium accounts. And FutureAdvisor charges a flat 0.5% fee. And Schwab Intelligent Portfolio charges 0.08% for conservative portfolios, 0.19% for moderate-risk portfolios, and 0.24% for aggressive portfolios.

More to Learn

Wealthsimple is just one of the many robo advisors on the market, and each has its own strengths and weaknesses.

That's why BI Intelligence spent months putting together the greatest and most exhaustive guide on robo advisors entitled The Robo-Advising Report: Market forecasts, key growth drivers, and how automated asset management will change the advisory industry.

To get your copy of this invaluable guide to the payments industry, choose one of these options:

1. Subscribe to an ALL-ACCESS Membership with BI Intelligence and gain immediate access to this report AND over 100 other expertly researched deep-dive reports, subscriptions to all of our daily newsletters, and much more. >> START A MEMBERSHIP
2. Purchase the Complete Robo-Advisor Research Collection, which contains 5 in-depth reports, slide decks, and appendices. >> BUY THE BUNDLE
3. Purchase the report and download it immediately from our research store. >> BUY THE REPORT

The choice is yours. But however you decide to acquire this report, you’ve given yourself a powerful advantage in your understanding of the fast-moving world of robo advisors. 

Join the conversation about this story »

Everyone knows that Google is a tech giant and household name. But something less well known is how exactly Google generates profit. Due to its ubiquitous digital footprint, its wide reaching ambitions beyond search, and the verbification of its brand, we tend to take it for granted as a service that simply exists and always will.

Well, they do it primarily by selling advertising space on its search result pages. In 2016, about 71% of Google’s revenues came from ads on their native site. The real estate on their search results and the margins surrounding them are like the Times Square billboard spots of the internet. More consumers spend time looking at such results pages than any other type of page, making them extremely desirable for businesses and advertisers.

The good thing about these ads, though, is that they aren’t only accessible for the biggest brands. Anyone with a Google account can sign up for and bid on AdWords PPC ads.

Let’s take a look at some of the most important elements of successful PPC campaigns.

Keyword Research

Keyword research is an often overlooked element of running PPC campaigns. While this is likely a simple side effect of business owners and marketers having too much on their plates, it’s truly unfortunate. Keyword research can absolutely be the difference between a successful, revenue-driving campaign and an unsuccessful one.

The goal of keyword research is to find keywords to bid on that will bring in the most clicks, conversions, and revenue. Wordstream organizes keywords into four broad categories: brand terms, generic terms, related terms, and competitor terms. Among those, brand and competitor terms are easily grouped: these are terms relating to and/or containing the name of your business, and terms relating to and/or containing the names of your competitors, respectively.

Before you start bidding, it’s important to build a list of keywords encompassing some or all of these categories. A good way to start brainstorming is to move from the broad to the specific. So if you sell cameras for sale, Nikon cameras, canon cameras, camera deals, etc.

The best way to do this is combine online tools (more on these in a bit) with your innate understanding of your business and industry. In your conversations with customers, where do their pain points lie? Are they typically of a digitally native demographic or are they slightly less savvy searchers?

Setting Up Your Campaign

To start the actual set-up, log in to AdWords (do this if you haven’t already; and it will be necessary to get the most out of keyword research, anyways) and select the “Create Your First Campaign” button. As for Campaign Type, stick with “Search Network Only” for now (we’ll get into other campaigns in future posts.)

Now that you have your keyword research out of the way, you should have an idea of which keywords to enter for the campaign. When just starting out, it’s best to limit yourself to ten keywords or less, so you can gauge search volume for those before moving on.

The next step is creating the ad you’ll use. You’re investing time and resources to the campaign, so it’s important to create something that will bring you ROI worthy of your commitment. For the ad’s headline, try to include some of your most prized keywords. You’ll be limited to 30 characters, so it may become necessary to abbreviate. For the second headline, aim for a brief (30 characters or less) value proposition and/or a specific product feature that may separate you from the pack.

Next, set your maximum cost-per-click. You’ll see this referred to as a “default bid.” Remember, as Entrepreneur points out, “Every keyword is theoretically a different market, which means that each of your major keywords will need a bid price of its own. Google will let you set individual bids for each keyword later.”

As for the actual numbers you choose, it will depend on your budget. Whether you see AdWords as a bold new priority or an experimental side project, it’s best to start off on the lower end. Once you get the hang of its ins and outs, you can add more ad spend to the areas you deem most worth of investment.

After this, review all information for possible errors, enter your billing information, and your ads will start going live.

Landing Pages

Once you start bidding and winning phrases with your PPC campaign, you’ll need somewhere to send those users doing the clicking. Now, you could just let your PPC ad direct users to your home page or some vaguely applicable service page on your standalone website. In fact, if you are running many campaigns at once, across a multitude of product categories, some instances of this may be inevitable.

For the most part, though, it’s best to create dedicated landing pages for your PPC campaigns. In the parlance of online marketing, landing pages are typically standalone pages, apart from your website, that have a specific objective. Because of this, they can be specifically tailored to the type of user who would click on your ad, the mindset they might likely be in when they click it, and the readiness to buy they would typically exhibit.

Components of an effective PPC landing page include: a clearly defined title, a key conversion point, branding consistency, compelling (but not fluffy) copy, and a strong value proposition. Also, using a specifically dedicated landing page allows you to A/B test your PPC campaign in a more controlled environment. This helps maximize results.

Ad Ranking Factors

It’s widely accepted that the most important aspect of PPC ad ranking is your ad’s “Quality Score.” This is the value that Google gives to your ad’s relevance. You can see your Quality Score and the breakdown of its components (expected clickthrough rate, ad relevance, and landing page experience) in the “Status” column for your keywords.

In fact, it’s possible to outrank a competitor who is spending more than you if your Quality Score is high enough. Per Google’s very own AdWords Help portal: “When estimating the expected impact of extensions and ad formats, we consider such factors as the relevance, clickthrough rates, and the prominence of the extensions or formats on the search results page. So even if your competition has higher bids than yours, you can still win a higher position at a lower price by using highly relevant keywords and ads.”

Campaign Management

With PPC, as with most things marketing-related, it’s important to focus your efforts into dedicated campaigns. This way, you can attribute accurate ROI to specific campaigns and strategies. When patterns begin to emerge, you’ll know what direction to take campaigns in the future. Accordingly, PPC is far from a “set it and forget it” affair. Constant testing and tweaking are necessary to ensure you are spending your resources wisely.

One key aspect of campaign management is adding new phrases and negative keywords. While you are doing keyword research, you’ll notice some mid-volume, attainable search phrases that you aren’t ranking for. Try adding keywords contained therein to your campaign to access some of that much-needed traffic. Conversely, you should also begin to notice search phrases you are ranking for that are bringing you the wrong kind of traffic. We know, we know, what traffic could possibly be bad traffic?

Well, in the case of PPC, it makes sense to be picky. After all, you’re paying for this traffic. So, if there is a specific type or brand of product that you don’t sell, Google is awarding you ads for searches that contain it, you can add a negative keyword. These let Google know that you won’t be bidding on ads for any searches that contain said keyword. That way, you’ll avoid wasting your ad spend and ensure that the ads you do contend for are better targeted for clicks and traffic you can actually benefit from. After all, what would be the point of PPC if the clicks it generated for you weren’t helping your bottom line?

Finally, use the campaign management phase to refine your landing pages. Once you can see how they are performing, it’s a good opportunity to run A/B tests until you find the configuration that works best. PPC constitutes a diverse and often complex world of marketing strategies; as with anything, you have to start somewhere. Hopefully, this guide has been a helpful introduction, and look out for some more specific strategic informational content on the way!

With St. Patrick’s Day around the corner, green is abundant. But for businesses, “green” can represent two additional concepts: 1) Causing competitors to be green with envy and 2) Raking in the “green” from customers.

Effective marketing is critical to succeed in converting new and existing customers, and time and time again email marketing has proven to be the most efficient form. This season, channel the luck of the Irish for your brand by adopting these email marketing best practices:

Make the Road Rise Up to Meet Subscribers

There are more ways to consume email content today than ever before: desktop computers, mobile phones, tablets and more. This is both a blessing and a curse for email marketers. It means more chances for contacts to view content but also presents a challenge in ensuring that emails are rendered correctly across devices.

Utilize responsive design in your email marketing to make sure content is compatible with any device your subscribers may be using to interact with it.

Fiddle with Targeting Tools to Strike the Right Tune

Email marketing is unfortunately not a one-size-fits-all effort. Even subscribers of the same brand have different interests and shopping patterns, so marketers must target them accordingly.

Segment your audiences based on purchase history and demographic information to ensure they are receiving only relevant content. Additionally, conduct A/B split testing with different iterations of segmentation and personalization to discover which emails resonate most with which audiences.

Leverage the Top o’ the Mornin’

Research shows that email content sent between 8:00 and 11:00 a.m. receives the highest interaction rate from subscribers.

Keep this in mind as you’re planning campaigns and automating your content, but don’t lock yourself into those hours. Use 8:00-11:00 in the morning as a good starting point, but then play around with timing to see what works best for your brand’s email audience.

Procure Your Pot of Gold

The 80/20 Rule tells us that 80 percent of business comes from just 20 percent of customers, so be sure you’re honing in on high-value contacts to garner the most “green.” Identify your best customers and routinely offer them golden promotions to encourage their continued brand loyalty.

Since they are so attuned to your brand, this group also serves as a prime subject pool when you’re seeking feedback on products or services, marketing content or customer service. Keep this in mind the next time you distribute survey emails.

Give the Gift of Gab

Finally, word-of-mouth marketing is invaluable, and today social media is undoubtedly a big component of this. To increase the value of your email marketing efforts, make it easy for contacts to visit your social pages and share content on these platforms. Be sure to include icon links to your Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or any other social pages at the bottom of every marketing message you send.

Take it a step further by offering incentives to share on social, such as chances for a giveaway for anyone who likes and shares a post. This strategy not only amplifies your marketing efforts, but also gets consumers thinking about your brand outside of the inbox.

Keep these best practices in mind as you prepare your email marketing campaigns and your pot of gold will be filled to the brim. With the luck of the Irish on your side, green will be all around – from lucrative customers and envious competitors – through St. Patrick’s Day and beyond.

B2B companies are faced with the most transformative era in business history. On a greater scale than that of the first Industrial Revolution over a century ago, we are witnessing a technological and digital revolution that will disrupt business-to-business profoundly in the next 10 years. The scale of which is still unpredictable and undoubtedly will continue to have more disruption in store for businesses over the next decade.

The scale of disruption will mean the B2B buyer and seller dynamic will continue to be rocked. We are seeing many industries feel the impact of new technologies upending previously accepted norms of how business gets done. This is being felt by the supply-chain side of businesses acutely. As traditional supply and value chains are disrupted, upended, and even made extinct by new digital technologies. It is safe to say that no industry or B2B markets will go without some form of disruption affecting buyers and buying behaviors.

More so than in consumer oriented markets, B2B markets had a degree of predictability that companies often relied on. For example, many legacy B2B companies have consistently put forth a tremendous amount of effort and resources into trying to achieve a 2% to 5% bump in annual revenues. Relying on the predictability of long-ago established customers. Relying on this form of internal predictability is no longer possible.

A Time For A Reboot

The realization is setting in for senior executives that the time to develop their buyer insights assets and competencies is becoming mission-critical. Just as well, the realization also has materialized that what has worked in the past, is not working today when it comes to understanding buyers.

B2B companies are struggling to make gaining buyer insights more than the gathering of analytics, buyer intelligence, sales intelligence, and buyer personas couched in factual data. One consistent result indicates that CEO’s are perceiving that they are not getting the critical insights they need. Multiple studies over the past three years from the likes of PwC, Deloitte, Forrester, and IBM indicate that 75% or more of CEO’s are identifying building out competencies in insights as one of their top goals.

A big reason often named is the lack of insights about buyers for the purposes of helping to guide companies through significant transformation and achieving growth.

What B2B senior executives have come to realize is that it is time to reboot how their organizations go about achieving buyer insights that will help to drive growth today and in the future.

Rebooting

What are signs B2B senior executives will know they are in need of a reboot of their buyer insights? Let us examine 5 signs indicating to senior executives it is time to reboot:

Your Buyer Personas Are Outdated

When the first-ever sets of buyer personas were researched and created in 2002, they were done in an era when legacy B2B organizations were dominant in their markets. After conducting well over 3,500 buyer interviews and creating hundreds of buyer personas 15 years later, I can say with certainty – things aren’t what they used to be.

Yet, many B2B organizations are being misled into researching and creating buyer personas as if legacy B2B organizations are still dominant – or – that they have not changed. If your buyer personas are rooted in outdated sales and product marketing paradigms pertaining to role-based perceptions and the feeding of the perpetual content machine – it is time for a reboot.

You Are Working From Old Organizational Hierarchy Perceptions

Digital transformation in B2B is having a major impact on how people interact, solve problems, work together, and ultimately make buying decisions. The legacy issue mentioned previously still permeates the approach of B2B sellers. Whereby the chase continues to get in the C-Suite and get to the perceived ultimate decision-maker. I have seen entire sales and marketing strategy plans that amount to one thing only – get into the C-Suite. B2B organizations, due to digital transformation, are becoming flat and hierarchies of the past are no longer.

Your Views Of Hierarchal Buying Teams And Committees Are Off

Closely related to old perceptions of organizational hierarchies, the concept of buying teams and committees are changing rapidly. As companies become flat organizationally, we are seeing the rise of collaborative teams and units. Analogous to the rise of the self-directed consumer over the past decade, we are beginning to see the rise of self-directed teams working within organizations. Operating and performing outside the purview of traditional hierarchies. With a high degree of independence to make high-stake buying decisions

Your Analytics Tell A Story Of The Past Only

The capabilities to produce analytics has been expanding at an exponential rate. The advent of CRM, Sales Automation, and Marketing Automation has produced voluminous data. At issue is much of analytics remains tactical. Looking at the past histories of sales by variables such as geographies, territories, and various channels. Whereby marketing finds itself analyzing historical trends related to online visits and which content was accessed.

You Have An Internal View Of The Buyer’s Journey

While the concept of a buyer’s journey or customer journey has become somewhat of a buzz in B2B, the majority are still representing an internal view of a buyer’s journey. It is a mapping of all the internal processes taking place with a view of buyers having internal interactions with an organization. With many executives finding such a view inadequate and perhaps detrimental to efforts to aligning with buyers.

Reading Future Signals

In previous articles, I have written about the number of companies, nearly half, of the Fortune 500 and the S&P 500 over the past 20 years who no longer exist or are barely surviving. In the next 10 years, business prognosticators predict that we will see even more changing of the guard. With as many as a quarter to a third of the public companies listed currently not surviving.

To survive, B2B companies will need to become adept at reading future signals. Buyer insights can play an important role in helping B2B businesses understand and predict future strategies that will align with how their buyers are changing. To survive also means rebooting, building, and maturing competencies in buyer insights.

Not maturing buyer insights capabilities can undoubtedly lead to the fate encountered by nearly half of the companies listed on the Fortune 500 or S&P 500 from nearly 20 years ago – no longer existing.

(What follows is an engaging video from Howard Tiersky, CEO of FROM, a New York City-based digital transformation agency. He talks about the value of insights and how the lack of insights is one of the top challenges enterprises face in innovation and transformation.)

In their work at CEB Global, Nick Toman and Brent Adamson are on the cutting edge of what’s happening in the sales arena. They also do studies to determine what their observations really mean. In response to their recent article posted on CEBG, “The New Sales Imperative,” Anthony invited them to come on the show to talk about what they are seeing in this new age of sales when buyers have more information prior to contacting a salesperson than ever before. New times require a new approach and the guys cover what they think that new approach should look like, including the necessity of becoming a trusted sales advisor, on this episode.

How 2 Become A Trusted Sales Advisor w Nick Toman and BrentAdamson, Ep 83Click To Tweet

Becoming a trusted sales advisor to your clients is more vital than ever.

Buyers these days are able to get more information about solving their problems than ever before. Most of the time they come to you, the salesperson, with a load of data already – thinking they understand their options. It’s easy in that situation to believe that you simply need to give them what they ask for – but that’s not always the case. They need you to serve them as a trusted advisor, one who knows the solutions to their needs better than they do, in spite of the knowledge they’ve amassed. You need to help them understand what they’ve discovered and how to apply it to the specifics of their situation. Find out how Anthony’s guests, Nick Toman and Brent Adamson suggest you go about that, on this episode of In The Arena.

How salespeople inadvertently overwhelm potential buyers.

When a potential buyer comes to you, the sales professional, they often have all the information they need about the solutions to their need that exist. The temptation is to go deeply into the specifics of your particular solution to try and convince them that yours is the best solution. But often that results in information overwhelm and the buyer winds up NOT making a decision in your favor. Brent Adamson and Nick Toman outline how you can avoid doing that and actually guide your potential customer to an understanding of the solutions they’ve discovered, and they do it in this episode.

How salespeople inadvertently overwhelm potential buyersClick To Tweet

Why more information doesn’t always help buyers make buying decisions.

Our instinct as salespeople is to assume that a buyer who comes to us about our solution has everything figured out already. They talk that way in most cases because they’ve easily done their own research on the internet. So they really do know a lot, but is it enough? And does it really help them make a decision? It’s becoming more and more apparent from the research guys like Nick Toman and Brent Adamson have done that buyers are experiencing “information overload” that leads to a type of decision paralysis and they wind up not making a buying decision at all. Find out how you can become their trusted sales advisor and help them overcome that overwhelm, on this episode.

Why over 40% of purchases have some form of regret attached to them.

Buyers today appear to be making their buying decisions independent of sales professionals more often. It makes sense on one hand because they are able to get as much info as they want about the solutions to their problem that exist. But still, 40% of buying decisions have some form of regret about that decision attached to them. Why is that? It’s because they didn’t have a trusted advisor who knows the details of the decision alongside to help them. That could be you if you’re willing to learn how to pivot your sales approach to serve them as they really need. Brent Adamson and Nick Toman are on the show to help you know what that looks like, so be sure you listen.

Why over 40% of purchases have some form of regret attached to themClick To Tweet

Outline of this great episode

• [0:44] Anthony’s introduction of the article and prompting behind this conversation with Brent and Nick.
• [2:09] The beliefs behind the article, “The New Sales Imperative.”
• [5:20] Why more information doesn’t always help buyers make a buying decision.
• [7:08] The vital importance of the guidance the salesperson provides.
• [13:30] Why giving the customer what they want isn’t always best.
• [20:22] Why over 40% of purchases have some form of regret attached to them.
• [27:47] Prescriptive selling is a better approach these days.

Resources & Links mentioned in this episode

• www.CEBGlobal.com
• Article: The New Sales Imperative.

The theme song “Into the Arena” is written and produced by Chris Sernel. You can find it on Soundcloud

Connect with Anthony

Website: www.TheSalesBlog.com

Youtube: www.Youtube.com/Iannarino

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/iannarino

Twitter: https://twitter.com/iannarino

Google Plus: https://plus.google.com/+SAnthonyIannarino

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/iannarino

Tweets you can use to share this episode

Becoming a trusted sales advisor to your clients is more vital than everClick To Tweet Why more information doesn’t always help buyers make buying decisionsClick To Tweet

The post How To Become A Trusted Sales Advisor & The New Sales Imperative, with Nick Toman and Brent Adamson – Episode #83 appeared first on The Sales Blog.

Your blog is a workhorse. Yes infographics and video are extremely popular at the moment, but a well written and informative blog that is consistently updated will never let you down.

You know the stats:

• Websites that include a blog have 434% more indexed pages and 97% more inbound links
• Blogging is the main component of the content strategy for at least 45% of marketers
• Marketers with a healthy blog element to their strategy are 13x more likely to see a positive ROI
• B2B marketers that include blogging receive 67% more leads than their non-blogging peers
• And more

As a business blogger, you’re aware of the basic best practices – keep paragraphs short, use descriptive headers and subheaders, break it up, keep it scannable, use bulleted and numbered lists – and you’re able to optimize for SEO (while avoiding the mistakes).

But what about engagement? You don’t just want visitors. You want engaged visitors. That includes reading your stuff, of course, but more importantly you want them to leave comments, share your posts with their social media networks, link back to your site, and return again and again. You want them to be unable to live without your blog.

Diversifying your blog content is one way. No one wants to see the same type of post on the same topic week after week. What would be the point? So mix it up.

Beyond that, there’s a lot you can do to give your business blog an engagement boost. I’m constantly amazed by the positive impact these ten tactics can generate. Try and see for yourself.

1. Understand your audience and what they want

You’ve already identified your target, and hopefully even created a few buyer personas to guide your efforts. But you can do more.

This may not sound like an advanced strategy, but far too many blogs ignore the obvious. You have an industry related to your business, and that’s obviously your umbrella topic. But what specifically is your audience looking for in a blog about your industry? Find out.

Conduct surveys and polls to find the topics that matter. Tools like Qeryz, SurveyMonkey, and Google Forms can help (the last two require leaving your site, while Qeryz functions like a slide box or popup). The best way to find out what they want is to simply ask them.

Or identify their interests using Twitter Analytics. Click on Audience at the top, scroll down, and see the Top Ten interests of your Twitter followers.

That should give you at least a few solid ideas and broad subjects to write about this week.

2. Build better headlines

If your headline doesn’t pull them in, it doesn’t matter how great the actual post is because no one’s reading it. The headline is the promise, the post is the delivery… don’t FAIL them (you’ll lose credibility each time you do). To paraphrase the Godfather, make them a promise they can’t refuse.

Use keywords, power/emotional words, limit it to roughly 55 characters and 6-8 words, and remember that numbered lists, FOMO, questions, and how-to headlines perform very well.

So spend more time on your headlines, and maybe run your ideas through a Headline Analyzer or Emotional Headline Analyzer for recommendations.

3. Track the trends

What’s got people buzzing online? What’s already resonating with readers?

Find out what’s hot with keyword research, a quick visit to Google Trends, and a peek at both Facebook Trending and Twitter Trends on a fairly regular basis. If there’s something trending in your industry, visitors will want to read about it. Harness that.

4. Links, links, links

Your link architecture can lift your engagement in two ways (to say nothing of its SEO benefits).

Your internal structure – linking to other posts on your blog – helps your readers find your (relevant) best stuff.

Your outbound links point them to other valuable articles and resources.

Both develop your reputation as an unselfish blogger ready to help more than pitch. Visitors will respond to that. Guaranteed.

Try including a few similar articles using either Related Posts at the end, or littered throughout the text. They will click.

5. Talk to them

The simplest strategies are often overlooked.

Ask questions, encourage shares and comments, make it easy for them to connect with you.

Comments can be wonderful. They’re a form of social proof, so when readers see them at the end, they’re going to trust and engage with your content more than if they see none.

Remove friction like Captcha and other services meant to stop spam (they don’t), don’t require registration to leave a comment, and maybe even link directly to your comment form in the post. Make it easy, end with a question, and people are more willing than not to respond.

6. Go the extra mile

What are the popular posts in your industry? Find out with a simple online search, or using a tool like BuzzSumo.

Next, identify ways you could build upon those posts and make them better: updated, more visual, current stats, more extensive, interview an influencer or leader, include a video or infographic… it doesn’t matter. You build upon the already-successful post and improve it in some way.

Called the Skyscraper Technique, it can bring in plenty of traffic and engagement.

7. Promote and repromote

Most of us already share our new posts on our social media accounts. It’s Marketing 101.

Simplify that with an automation service like dlvr.it (“Share Better”).

But don’t stop there. Sharing just once is not enough. Consider:

• Facebook posts hit 75% of their impressions within 2.5 hours, and 75% of engagement within five hours
• A tweet’s lifespan is between 18-24 minutes according to most research

The vast majority of your audience will NOT see that share if you do it just once. Set up a reposting schedule for each blog post – twice on the first day, once daily for a few days, the next week, the next month, and then periodically after that at a minimum – to get your content in front of as many new eyes as possible.

8. A plugin for All seasons

There are nearly 48,000 plugins available for WordPress. You don’t want to go overboard, but a few well chosen ones can increase the usability and UX of your blog just enough to bump engagement to the next level.

A few good ones to try out:

• Inline Tweet Sharer, Quote Tweet, Click to Tweet, or TweetDis allow readers to easily share your most alarming, striking, or thought-provoking statement or statistic with one-click.
• Reading Time provides an estimated reading time at the top so visitors know beforehand how long it will take them.
• Atomic Writer analyzes audience engagement with your content to provide recommendations on how to write better posts for them.

9. Build a community

We all love being part of a group. Provide that feeling on your blog, and your readers will be happy to hang around longer and engage more.

Offer groups, discussion boards, and online portals. Let your readers reach out and connect with you and other users.

BuddyPress, for example, allows readers to create profiles, private message other users, create and interact in user groups, and more. And there are currently over 700 WordPress plugins available to customize the platform into whatever you need.

10. Give a little to get a lot

Try a giveaway. Create a contest or draw with upgraded content, discounts, coupons, or other prizes (your latest ebook, your favourite book by an industry leader, a free sample, free attendance at your next webinar, or whatever).

Giveaways are a great tactic to encourage engagement because visitors have to comment, share, or sign up in order to enter. And everyone loves free stuff.

Pay with a Tweet (despite the name, the service works with Facebook, LinkedIn, and Google+ in addition to Twitter) requires readers to share a pre-made note and link to get access to something special.

KingSumo Giveaways makes creating a giveaway dead simple, and visitors earn additional entries for themselves with each new entry that signs up via their URL, so it promotes frenzied sharing (everyone wants to increase their odds). The plugin has worked amazingly well in generating interest, engagement, and email subscriptions.

Wrap

Your business blog is an extension of your business. You should only ever post the very best that you can create, because anything less will reflect poorly on you and your brand.

Share cheap, irrelevant, unimaginative junk, and that’s what readers will think of you. If you take only one thing away from this post, take this: quality above quantity at all times.

But you know that.

These ten tactics – in addition to that golden rule – will increase engagement. It’s a given. Get involved with your readers. Give them what they really want, and a place to connect with each other. Gift them your best stuff for free.

Engagement comes to those who earn it.

Have we missed anything? What strategies have you implemented to boost audience engagement on your blog? What tips have failed you?

Leave your thoughts in the comments below.

Do online sales of your products and services need a sales boost? You just might need to improve your digital marketing. Too often, our clients try to improve business through their own online marketing efforts, and find that they don’t get the lead generation results that they’d wanted. Instead of continuing with a strategy that isn’t working, try working with an automated CRM digital marketing agency with years of experience helping businesses like yours.

Getting results that increase your website’s traffic, from social media and search engines, requires good data for a solid strategy. When companies uses guesswork, they don’t know what will work for their customers. Our new automated, CRM software offers affordable, powerful marketing automation and uses inbound marketing strategy to ensure you generate the leads that your business needs.

A well-implemented CRM system can replace manual processes that create significant organizational inefficiencies. But CRM systems don’t just create efficiency by reducing the use of inefficient processes. Thanks to the ability of popular CRM platforms to integrate with other systems, such as marketing automation tools, the efficiencies of CRM can enable companies to interact with customers in ways that they wouldn’t have the resources to otherwise.

Our automated CRM strategies will also help you get organized and support you in creating the structure your company needs to strategize and create marketing results. The analytics you’ll receive are all in one place, and in the same area you create your task to-do lists. With automated software, for example, you’ll be able to instruct the automation to send a series of emails to certain types of segmented leads, and our automated CRM software will follow your instructions. We’re happy to help teach our customers how to do this.

Ultimately, for all of the benefits CRM systems provide to the companies that use them, the biggest benefit of CRM systems is that their use leads to a better overall customer experience. Customers are more easily and accurately segmented, their needs identified, and because the status of a company’s relationship with them is accurately tracked, companies can interact with them at the right times, leading to more sales, faster sales and higher customer retention and satisfaction.

If you’d like to learn more about our automated CRM inbound marketing services and how they can help your business, don’t hesitate to contact us. We work with a wide variety of industries and enjoy supporting businesses of all kinds!

Designing a great sales compensation program that integrates with the Revenue Roadmap can be complex and time consuming, but the return can be significant. Follow the link below to a free tool – your sales compensation report card.

http://whatyourceoneedstoknow.com/reportcard/

So now is the moment of truth: How does your sales compensation plan hold up?

read more

Email marketing is one of the most effective channels for digital marketers and entrepreneurs. In fact, it's a top priority: 73 percent of marketers say email marketing is essential to growing their business. [bctt tweet="73% of marketers say email marketing is essential to growing their business. #DoMoreWithEmail"] When you think about it, email is really all about influence. We share content with our subscribers on a regular basis, weighing our influence into their decision to buy our product or service. And that's why we believe following influencers is so important. The more you can learn and apply from them, the stronger your own email strategy will become. From content marketing gurus to growth hacking experts, see how these 11 digital marketers are using email in creative and innovative ways — and how you can apply their tactics to your own email strategy.

1. Nick Loper

Chief Side Hustler, Side Hustle Nation Twitter: @nloper

What's riskier: Starting your own business or relying solely on your 9-to-5 as your only source of income? If you ask Nick Loper, it's the latter. Nick is an author, speaker and founder of Side Hustle Nation. An entrepreneur at heart, he's been through the ups and downs of starting his own business and now shares those learnings with his growing community. His content is a must read for aspiring side-hustlers and entrepreneurs alike.

Why you should follow him:

Many people use their thank you page to share more information with new subscribers. Nick takes it one step further and uses it as an opportunity to learn more about his new subscribers with a survey. By following Nick, you'll learn innovative ways to level up your email game, just like this one: Leverage this tactic to learn more information about your own subscribers by including a survey or poll on your email thank you page. You'd be surprised how willing your new subscribers are likely to share. In return, you'll have valuable insight into who your prospective customers are so you can tailor content to meet their needs (and make more sales in return).

2. Brian Dean

Founder, Backlink.o Twitter: @backlinko

Backlinko is filled to the brim with actionable strategies that marketers can use to get more traffic to their websites and generate more leads. Brian, the brains behind it all, is a fantastic marketer who knows how to create and promote content that converts the right people. He's super active and engaged with his Twitter audience, making him a great resource for marketers who want to take their strategy to the next level.

Why you should follow him:

So why do over 105,000 people subscribe to his list? Because Brian knows the secret to profitability is to offer something of value to his audience. His email list serves as a source for link-building strategies, SEO tips, marketing case studies and more. His post on the Content Upgrade should be required reading for any marketer looking to grow a strong, healthy list. When you follow him, you'll get nothing but high quality, actionable content.

3. Henneke Duistermaat

Founder, Enchanting Marketing Twitter: @henneked

Neil Patel calls her "the best business blogger" he knows. Copyblogger's Brian Clark says you "should follow her every word." She was also named one of "50 Incredible Women in Marketing to Follow" by Search Engine Journal. No big deal. With a no-frills approach to marketing, Henneke knows how to write practical, useful content to attract more leads and get more business. Connect with her on Twitter for 140-character marketing tips and links to some of her best content.

Why you should follow her:

Henneke is a killer copywriter and uses this skill to teach others how they can optimize their web and email copy. We love her friendly approach to email and how she encourages her subscribers to stay in touch.

Try using her approach and inviting feedback from your subscribers in your emails. Like a survey, this is an excellent way to learn more about what your prospects needs and wants are.

4. Noah Kagan

Chief Sumo, SumoMe Twitter: @noahkagan

Noah is one the most recognizable names in the digital marketing industry — and for good reason. He boasts an impressive resume, most notably for his roles at Facebook and Mint. He has since gone on to become the founder of Gambit, AppSumo and SumoMe, where he dishes out no-nonsense advice to marketers and entrepreneurs. Follow him on Twitter for actionable growth-hacking strategies, product updates and interviews with other digital marketing experts on his podcast.

Why you should follow him:

We all know how important it is to send great content. But you need people to opt in before you can start sending them the goods. Take note of how Noah approaches sign up form copy to attract and convert prospective subscribers. We especially love his use of social proof and how he shows off his personality, giving a taste of what to expect from his emails. This is a great way to start earning your subscriber's trust from the moment they hit your sign up form.

5. Amy Schmittauer

Founder, Savvy Sexy Social Twitter: @schmittastic

Are you a vlogger looking to monetize your viewership with email? You need to follow Amy Schmittauer. Amy has mastered the art of video marketing, and now she's leveraging that expertise to show others how it's done with her YouTube series and book, Vlog Like a Boss. Short and sweet is Amy's schtick and it totally works. From her vlog to her emails, she connects with her audience on a personal level that keeps them coming back for more.

Why you should follow her:

Amy finds opportunities throughout her emails to connect with her subscribers on various social channels (because why stick to just one channel?). Take this example, where she includes a link for new subscribers to share that they just joined her list.

Why is this a smart approach? Because in return, she'll be exposing her brand to her subscriber's social networks, who are likely to have relevant interests. Try it for yourself and see just how effective it is!

6. Jeff Sieh

Founder and Host, Manly Pinterest Tips Twitter: @jeffsieh

Jeff is the founder of Manly Pinterest Tips — and host of the podcast by the same name — where he helps guys get to know how to leverage the marketing power of Pinterest. He's also the Pinterest Manager at Social Media Examiner, so you know he knows his stuff. His podcast is packed with actionable insights for men (and women), from power players like Cynthia Sanchez, Guy Kawasaki, Rebekah Radice and more. Follow him on Twitter to make sure you never miss an episode.

Why you should follow him:

Since he is a Pinterest guru, Jeff is all about using visuals to attract prospects. He even leverages his primary platform of Pinterest to teach marketers how to use — what else — Pinterest to drive traffic back to their websites and capture new leads. If you want to learn more about marketing on Pinterest, he's the guy to follow. Try sharing an eye-catching and descriptive image on Pinterest with links back to your website or landing pages. It's a great way to capture leads from relevant searches.

7. Derek Halpern

Founder and CEO, Social Triggers Twitter: @derekhalpern

Derek Halpern believes in the 80/20 rule. That is, you should be spending 20 percent of your time creating content and 80 percent promoting the heck out of it. It's this approach that skyrocketed the growth of his website, Social Triggers, and helped him to build audiences for websites across the internet. He's been featured in Fast Company and Entrepreneur and his podcast has hit number one on the iTunes Business section. I guess one could say he has a knack for writing copy that converts. His feed is filled with inspiration and actionable tactics that you can apply to your own strategy.

Why you should follow him:

From his blog to his emails, Derek is all about showcasing the value. That's why he's mastered the art of writing sign up forms. Notice how he positions his newsletter as "free"? This is a subtle way of hinting at the massive value that you'll receive at no cost when you join his newsletter. Always be sure to explain why someone should subscribe to your list. What's in it for them? The more valuable and descriptive you can be, the better.

8. Michael Stelzner

Founder and CEO, Social Media Examiner Twitter: @Mike_Stelzner

Michael is the founder of Social Media Examiner, host of the Social Media Marketing podcast, the man behind Social Media Marketing World, founder of the Social Media Marketing Society, author, talk show host... I think it's safe to say he does it all. He covers everything from social media and and digital marketing to why email marketing is the number one channel to improve your ROI.

Why you should follow him:

Despite his social media marketing background, Michael knows the value that email can provide. That's why he emails his subscribers three times a week with the latest content from the Social Media Examiner blog and is a huge proponent of email marketing. [bctt tweet="Email is the most important channel for you to cultivate. @Mike_Stelzner #DoMoreWithEmail"] Take a cue from Michael and keep a regular cadence with your list. How often you send emails can have a huge impact on your results. While there's no right or wrong answer for how often to send, being upfront about it with your audience so that there's no surprises can significantly decrease your chances of unsubscribes (or worse, being marked as spam).

9. Laura Atkins

Owner and Deliverability Consultant, Word to the Wise Twitter: @wise_laura

With email deliverability a hot topic these days, who can we turn to to make sure that our emails make it to the inbox? Word on the street is that Laura is the industry’s email deliverability expert. She’s also the founder of Word to the Wise, an email consulting firm specializing in email deliverability and program management. Laura is serious about email deliverability and her Twitter feed serves up tips and strategies for marketers who want to make sure their messages get delivered.

Why you should follow her:

Because you want your emails to get delivered. The Word to the Wise blog is a great resource for staying in the know about changes and updates that could affect your deliverability. https://twitter.com/wise_laura/status/824760842415599617 Email deliverability is no joke. Make sure you're following email marketing best practices to make sure your emails get to their destination.

10. Ben Settle

Email Marketing Specialist and Author, BenSettle.com Twitter: @BenSettle

Ben is a great resource for marketers who want to amp up their email copywriting to convert more customers and make money with email marketing. People call him their "email marketing mentor" and he's even been referred to as "the King of Email." Pretty impressive, huh? Not only does he specialize in email copywriting, but he teaches others how to do the same on his blog, which is a great resource for those who want to understand how buyer psychology plays a role in the marketing funnel.

Why you should follow him:

Sign up for his daily Email Players newsletter to see for yourself just how effective his copywriting is. You'll also get a copy of his 24-Point Email Marketing Cheat Sheet, filled with subject lines, email openings and more profitable email tactics. Try out a few of his email marketing hacks and see how they work for you.

11. John Corcoran

Founder and CEO, Smart Business Revolution Twitter: @JohnCorcoran

John teaches aspiring entrepreneurs how to build profitable business relationships and expand their networks. He knows the power of investing in email marketing firsthand — his list is the driving force behind monetizing his blog and business. His expertise has been featured in Forbes, The Huffington Post and Newsweek (to name a few) and his content is aimed at helping business owners market themselves for maximum profitability.

Why you should follow him:

John knows his audience. His marketing approach is smart, straight-forward and offers valuable incentives to get the right people on his list. Try creating offers with your audience in mind (like the one above) to convert more subscribers and grow your list in no time.

What's next

While we've added links to Twitter, we highly recommend connecting with these incredible marketers through their other platforms. Check out their websites and blogs, and sign up for their emails to see firsthand why we chose them for our list. And follow us on Twitter for the latest email marketing strategies, tactics and news. Are we missing anyone from this list? Let us know in the comments! [bctt tweet="11 Digital Marketers Who Are Innovating The Email Game #DoMoreWithEmail"]

The post 11 Digital Marketers Who Are Innovating The Email Game appeared first on Email Marketing Tips.

In Hinge’s 2017 High Growth Study, we asked respondents to rate the impact of 24 possible marketing techniques. Of these, the technique that was rated as having the most impact was a bit of a surprise: partnership marketing. One-third of the high growth firms we surveyed rated its impact as significant (they rated it a 9 or 10 on a ten point scale). How many no-growth firms gave partnership marketing a high rating? Zero.

So what are we to make of this finding? First, let’s clarify what we mean by partnership marketing.

Download the “2017 High Growth Study Research Summary” Here

At Hinge, we define partnership marketing as a mutually beneficial marketing relationship between a firm and another organization. Now, this definition is pretty broad. It could include anything from co-producing webinars to actively marketing each other’s services. To benefit from a strategic relationship at any level, firms can’t be direct competitors and they must serve the same audiences, at least in part.

The implication of this finding appears to be that building partnerships makes it easier to grow.

When you think about it, the connection between partnerships and growth makes a lot of sense. If you can work cooperatively with another organization that communicates with a segment of your audience that you haven’t yet addressed, then your reach — your universe of potential clients — will expand. And if the firm you partner with is held in high esteem by its audience, some of that credibility can be transferred to your firm by association.

The strongest partnerships not only give you access to another firm’s list, they can benefit your audience, too. How? By endorsing a reputable firm that offers services many of your clients and prospects need, you expose them to a high-quality provider. When they need to buy those services, your clients have a great option (your partner) already at hand. Of course for this approach to work, you must vet your partners carefully.

What Goes into a Partnership Marketing Plan

So suppose you wanted to act on this information. What would a partnership marketing plan look like? How could we combine the best marketing techniques to create a plan that’s primed for high growth?

When we look at a list of the most impactful marketing techniques, nearly all of them can be rolled into a partnership marketing plan. Here’s one way you might approach such a plan:

Downloadable Content/Email Marketing/Blogging: Email marketing and guest blog swaps are common in partnerships. For instance, you might agree to send an email to each others’ list every other month. Typically in these arrangements, firms don’t exchange lists with a partner; instead, each organization sends for the other. You might agree to write (and host) guest blog posts a little more frequently than you exchange emails — say monthly. You can make the most of these golden opportunities in front of a new audience by adding educational content to the mix. Offer a free white paper or research report in each email you send. End your blog posts with a link to download related content. And be sure to gate at least some of your content so you can acquire email addresses and grow your firm’s list of contacts.

Speaking Engagements/ Conferences/Webinars: If you have an annual conference, offer your partner a speaking spot and exhibit space. This helps your audience learn more about your partner and puts a face on your partner’s name. If your partner has an annual conference, you can swap these opportunities. But what if they don’t? Consider inviting your partner to join you for webinars or to co-present at conferences that target an audience you have in common. More and more conference organizers are seeking presentations that involve more than one speaker, so offering co-presenters can give you an advantage when competing for a spot.

Website/Online Advertising: You may want to offer your partner advertising, branding and marketing opportunities on your website. If you sell ad space on your website or newsletter, for instance, include free ads as part of your partnership plan. Consider adding a Partners page or section to your website, as well. Ask your partner to provide relevant copy and graphics. This page can also tell your audience about any special pricing or packages they can get as a benefit of your partnership.

There is one item on the list of marketing techniques that’s not as easy to fit into a partnership marketing plan: outbound phone marketing. Most partners aren’t likely to provide phone numbers for clients and prospects — if they even have them. But if you include a phone number field in your download forms you might want to consider adding outbound phone marketing to your list of techniques. Check out this detailed description of how to make outbound phone marketing work for you.

In this post, I’ve outline one approach to a partnership marketing plan — one based on our most recent study of high-growth professional services firms. Feel free to customize it to fit the realities of your firm and industry. At Hinge, we’ve cultivated strategic partnerships for a number of years, and they have become an invaluable way to expand our reach to new audiences. While building partner relationships and trust can take time, it’s well worth the effort. In fact, it’s one of the best ways to start growing you firm!

 

Adidas chief executive Kasper Rorsted told CNBC on Wednesday hat the sports apparel brand has turned its back on TV advertising.

Rorsted explained the company is looking to boost its ecommerce revenues from €1 billion ($1.06 billion) in 2016 to €4 billion ($4.25 billion) by 2020 — and Adidas wants to use digital channels to get there

He told CNBC: "It's clear that the younger consumer engages with us predominantly over the mobile device. Digital engagement is key for us — you don't see any TV advertising any more."

Rorsted's comments shouldn't be taken too literally, however. Data from iSpotTV shows that Adidas has aired a number of TV ads in 2017, including a spot featuring Snoop Dogg, entitled "Original is Never Finished." However, its TV outlay in the US is relatively small compared to other advertisers, with Adidas ranked 511th in terms of TV ad spend in the last 30 days, according to iSpotTV.

Adidas increased its overall marketing investments from €1.886 billion in 2015 to €1.981 billion in 2016. As a percentage of sales, the company's expenditure for its point-of-sale and marketing investments declined 0.8 percentage points to 13.1%, from 13.9% in 2015.

The company spends almost half of its marketing investments on partnerships, while its other marketing expenditure goes towards digital, advertising, point-of-sale, and "grassroots" activations, on the ground with local sports clubs.

Adidas said in its annual report it wants to decrease the ratio of marketing expenses of partnerships to less than 45% by 2020.

In a letter to shareholders in Adidas' annual report, Rorsted said:

"A strategic topic that will transform our company over the next years is digital. Digital touches our company at every point along the value stream — how we design, develop, manufacture, and sell our products. Already today, Adidas.com and Reebok.com are our largest and fastest-growing shops and we will further accelerate our investments in this area to create competitive advantages through digital. Growing our digital capabilities will ultimately also help us do a better job on margin enhancement."

While Adidas looks to be ditching TV advertising in favor of digital, other brands have recently been vocally cynical about the effectiveness of online advertising.

In two recent speeches, the chief marketing officer of the biggest ad spender in the world — Marc Pritchard of Procter & Gamble — called on digital platforms to clean up their acts when it comes to measurement, transparency, and a "crappy" supply chain. P&G will no longer pay for ads that don't meet its standards, Pritchard said.

In the US, digital ad spending was predicted to surpass TV last year.The jury appears to be out as to which is more effective. A 2014 meta-analysis conducted by researchers at Ebiquity and commissioned by UK TV marketing body Thinkbox, for example, found that for every £1 spent on advertising, TV is "the best profit generator."

That is a view also shared by the chief marketing officer of Coca-Cola, Marcos de Quinto, who told Marketing Week last year that TV spend is "critical" to the brand and generates more sales than digital.

SEE ALSO: Turner CEO: Ad money is coming back to TV that was previously redirected to digital

Join the conversation about this story »

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My latest Publishers Weekly column announces the launch-date for my long-planned "Shut Up and Take My Money" ebook platform, which allows traditionally published authors to serve as retailers for their publishers, selling their ebooks direct to their fans and pocketing the 30% that Amazon would usually take, as well as the 25% the publisher gives back to them later in royalties.

I'll be launching the platform with my next novel, Walkaway, in late April, and gradually rolling out additional features, including a name-your-price system inspired by the Humble Bundle and the Ubuntu payment screen.

Selling your own ebooks means that you can have more than one publisher -- say, a UK and a US one -- and sell on behalf of both of them, meaning that readers anywhere in the world come to one site to buy their books, and the author takes care of figuring out which publisher gets the payment from that purchase.

It's all an idea whose time has come! My UK publisher, Head of Zeus, is just launched a very similar initiative for authors who don't want to host their own stores: BookGrail.

Buying an e-book from a website and sideloading it onto your Kindle will never be as easy as buying it from the Kindle store (though if the world's governments would take the eminently sensible step of legalizing jailbreaking, someone could develop a product that let Kindles easily access third-party stores on the obvious grounds that if you buy a Kindle, you still have the right to decide whose books you'll read on it, otherwise you don't really own that Kindle). But a bookstore operated by an author has an advantage no giant tech platform can offer: a chance to buy your e-books in a way that directly, manifestly benefits the author.

As an author, being my own e-book retailer gets me a lot. It gets me money: once I take the normal 30 percent retail share off the top, and the customary 25 percent royalty from my publisher on the back-end, my royalty is effectively doubled. It gives me a simple, fair way to cut all the other parts of the value-chain in on my success: because this is a regular retail sale, my publishers get their regular share, likewise my agents. And, it gets me up-to-the-second data about who's buying my books and where.

It also gets me a new audience that no retailer or publisher is targeting: the English-speaking reader outside of the Anglosphere. Travel in Schengen, for example, and you will quickly learn that there are tens of millions of people who speak English as a second (or third, or fourth) language, and nevertheless speak it better than you ever will. Yet there is no reliable way for these English-preferring readers, who value the writer's original words, unfiltered by translation, to source legal e-books in English.

Amazon and its competitors typically refuse outright to deal with these customers, unable to determine which publisher has the right to sell to them. Most publishing contracts declare these nominally non-English-speaking places to be "open territory" where in theory all of the book's publishers may compete, but in practice, none of them do.

London Book Fair 2017: Cory Doctorow Unveils His Latest Publishing Experiment—Fair Trade E-Books [Cory Doctorow/Publishers Weekly]

“Running a hashtag campaign for earned UGC is a bit like running a marathon but stopping 100 feet before the finish line…”

When you spend every waking moment for the past two years thinking about user-generated content as it relates to customer engagement, you start to look at the world a little differently.

For me, since starting BYLINED I now see the world through the lens of engagement, reach, ROI, usage rights, and metadata. Especially usage rights and metadata.

I see campaigns like the “Shot on iPhone 6” campaign that are incredibly engaging and inspiring. I also see influencer marketing campaigns gone wrong or read about brands inappropriately using photos without permission and ask myself “What in the world were they thinking?”

After thousands of hours researching and interviewing brands and their customers, here are the 5 hard truths behind UGC:

1. UGC campaigns today squarely benefit networks and not brands.

UGC campaigns can certainly help brands generate a bit of reach, some can even hypothesize an ROI around reach. However, when you consider all of the effort brands put into driving user-generated content… the thousands of hours spent creating #hashtagcampaigns… the tens of thousands of dollars spent on #influencermarketing campaigns… unfortunately, all of the work involved in the current process for driving UGC is largely for naught in the long-term.

Why for naught? Because when brands run UGC campaigns on social networks, they are effectively giving away all of the content they worked so hard to create.

My friend Erik and I were discussing this very issue recently, he put it this way:

“Running a hashtag campaign for earned UGC is a bit like running a marathon but stopping 100 feet before the finish line…all the time, effort and resources to create a hashtag campaign should yield more than just brand touches and exposure. It should also generate a stockpile of amazing, owned UGC that will be worth their weight in gold to a creative brand manager.”

2. Permission: Implied Usage Consent vs Explicit Usage Consent

One workaround to the issue of UGC ownership is to create the illusion of implied usage consent through the creation of hashtag campaigns. When fans and customers submit photos to hashtags, there’s an implied usage consent between the creator of the photo and the brand hosting the hashtag campaign. However, again that consent is implied and not explicit consent.

Some brands will go as far as personally reaching out to their fans who post content to their hashtags, requesting explicit usage consent to reuse photos, particularly those photos that focus on an identifiable person (or model) and as a result, the brand would also request a model release.

As content creating customers become increasingly aware of the value of their content, brands will need to have the systems in place to support the collection of UGC with explicit usage consent.

No brand wants to face a $6 million lawsuit, such as Duane Reade incurred when they posted a photo, without permission, on Twitter of Katherine Heigl holding two of their bags.

3. “May we use this photo?” vs “Did you take this photo?”

With either scenario (implied consent vs explicit consent), it’s not the platform that hosted the hashtag campaign that owns the copyright. It’s also not the fan that posted content to the hashtag campaign.

It’s the person who actually took the photo that owns the rights to the photo. And in some rare cases, the monkey that took the photo.

Many earned content platforms work with brands to request explicit consent by asking the question “May we use your photo?”

The first question brands should and must ask is “Did you take this photo?”

4. Brands ultimately don’t own their metadata

Copyright ownership ultimately belongs to the person who actually took the photo, the only surefire way to confirm ownership is through EXIF (Exchangeable Image File) metadata.

Think of an EXIF file as a fingerprint. No two are the same and they can provide incredibly valuable information behind each photo including ownership, provide a date stamp, time stamp, location stamp, image size, file size, and much more.

Metadata can also provide brands with deep insights into customer buying habits as well the information necessary to build email lists and highly effective retargeting campaigns.

Unfortunately, when brands capture UGC from social platforms, they don’t capture or own the metadata behind the UGC.

As I mentioned in this AdAge article on this subject, “if content is king, its metadata is heir to the throne.”

5. Authenticity > endorsement deals & the Instafamous

The practice of signing Hollywood stars for endorsement deals, paying influential style bloggers, and hiring Insta-famous celebs are far from endangered as they can be a predictable, effective way for a brand to get in front of a large, focused audience.

Brands shouldn’t fool themselves, though — only the best such campaigns will ever feel natural and authentic.

For many brands, the realness and authenticity of everyday customer stories to enhance brand awareness and influence purchasing decisions holds incredibly powerful potential as smart consumers want to buy from brands that speak and interact as everyday humans, not celebrities.

Summary: Creating, owning and monetizing authentic UGC

Done right, a UGC campaign can yield a stockpile of powerful owned (vs earned) authentic content, create meaningful brand touches, and a measured monetization through the metadata collected.

And as content-creating customers become more aware of the value of their content, they too should have the opportunity to monetize their UGC by transferring UGC ownership to brands.

Opaque Terms of Use around Data are making things worse

Recent years have been marked by seemingly never ending scandals about surveillance programs aimed at gathering data about private citizens unbeknownst to them — the most iconic example of which was the NSA’s Prism program.

To avoid facing public outrage when it comes to data collection and ownership, however, governments and their agencies would be well advised to seek inspiration from the current practices of most of the biggest tech firms in the world.

Indeed, services such as Snapchat, Instagram and the likes have well understood that unintelligible Terms and Conditions can go a long way in getting often unsuspecting users to hand over their personal data — in all apparent legality!

This is no big news. Impatient to access the product, virtually no one actually takes the time and hassle to read what are often tens of pages of provisions written in a language only a law postgraduate can fully grasp the meaning of. If most adults swiftly scroll through the T of C in hope of finding the ‘I’ve Read and Accept’ button, imagine what the situation is for kids who don’t even know what Terms and Conditions are in the first place.

However, the reality of what’s hidden behind this intimidating, complex legal jargon is itself rather straightforward. By agreeing to their terms of service, one essentially gives those companies ownership over most of the personal data one shares on their platform. Tech firms are then free to keep, use, sell — and all-too-often lose — private information most of us do not even know we gave up the right to in the first place.

If you think this is bad, wait until the Internet of Things kicks in — further blurring the already complicated issue of data ownership. The question of who owns the information collected by smart-watches, smart-thermostats, or even connected-roads is indeed far from being resolved and the ecosystem is currently developing in what is essentially a legal vacuum. Arbitrating the question of data ownership between users and providers of increasingly ubiquitous data-driven services is one of the next big challenges the hyper-connected society will be facing — with deep implications both financially, ethically, and in terms of cyber-protection of the privacy of citizens.

Regulators cannot leave the question of IoT data ownership be governed by unintelligible Terms of Conditions and forced click-thru agreements that lead to a meaningless consent. And this is the direction the European Union has been taking with its General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which will come fully into effect in 2018.

The global regulation of this issue, however, will sure be complicated and will likely demand years of negotiations between all stakeholders, but moving towards tangible actions to engineer informed consent is absolutely key.

Practical actions could be taken straight away like requiring companies to translate and summarize their Terms of Service into transparent, meaningful language and plain English. A language that is also adjusted to their target audience, in particular if they are aiming at children or young adults.

Of course, such a move would remind users of the cold truth that if a product is free in monetary terms, then your personal data is the real currency because in reality, you are the product.

In reality, it is the long-term trust of consumers and citizens in the digital society that is at stake. The cynicism of many millennials towards technology and the rise in the use of ad blockers show that consumers are waking up to the reality of the problem. Trillions of dollars of economic value could be left unrealised if we fail to protect the trust people can put in the digital transformation, and that goes way beyond the short-term profits of a few tech firms.

Unknowingly, we have an inherent need to say “yes”. Now many of you may argue with this statement but the reality of it is that you tend to say “yes” more often than you probably should. Whether it’s the enormous pressure you feel to fit into a culture or the weight of an authoritative figure that coerces the response. Sometimes it’s out of guilt. Other times it’s because you don’t want to let the requester down. There are several reasons for it and all of them result in the same response from you. You say yes and then have to deal with the repercussions of that response. Saying yes in most situations can be a problem.

Saying yes isn’t always that bad – at times it’s the logical and right response. So you could get away with a “no”. Though that itself can lead to problems. So now you’re stuck between saying yes or saying no. Either one of them has its set of consequences and benefits. The question is how do you respond appropriately?

Here are 4 ways you can avoid saying yes without the fear of a negative impact.

1. Say Yes When it Adds Value

While you’re going against your inclination to say yes, avoid being dismissive when there’s value that you can gain. If saying yes would allow you exposure, learning, eventual growth, and forming alliances then that’s precisely what you should be saying. Sure it may be stepping out of your comfort zone, working extra hours and forgoing something that you were looking forward to, but think about what you gain rather than what you lose. Sure, avoid saying yes when there’s no value added to your career aspirations. Though, if your career can gain meaningful value by saying yes then that’s the route you should take. It may seem like you’re being selfish, but honestly, how else would be attain a win-win situation!

2. Calculate Your Risk

Every situation that requires a yes or no response is different and should be treated that way. You can’t generalize nor can you simplify it down to a rule of thumb. It’s not that easy and nor is it that straightforward. It’s for this reason that each time you’re stuck on this roadblock you need to take a deep breath and calculate your risks for each option. Think logically and objectively. Analyze what’s at stake, the outcomes and what it all means. By doing this you’ll probably realize that the choice you make would be the one with a lower risk.

3. Take the Middle Road

When caught off-guard or put under the spotlight your time to react is minimal. Sometimes you just have to give a prompt response without the ability of thinking it through. That can be tough. So how do you respond when you’re under such pressure? Take the middle road which avoids a commitment (by saying yes) and a dismissal (by saying no). Blurting out a response (either yes or no) without careful consideration could be unfair – not only to you, but to the people who rely on your response. It could also be detrimental for your business. In situations like these it’s best to respond with “I’ll get back to you on that” rather than giving a definitive response.

4. Avoid the Herd Behavior

Herd behavior is when a group of individuals act collectively without a centralized direction. That basically means you’re agreeing with everyone without having your own opinion or applying your reasoning to a situation. This situation is more catastrophic than you alone saying yes and dealing with its outcome. The trouble with herd behavior is that you’re following a group of individuals even though you’re not aligned with them. In the event the group splits up, you’ll be left out to fend for yourself and there’s a good chance you’ll have nothing to offer since you had no opinion of your own when you were part of the group.

Life’s full of choices – some easier than others, some with deeper impacts than others. Saying yes is a great way to “feel good” and maintain a “positive vibe”, but it’s not necessarily the best choice. Avoid saying yes needlessly. Say it when you mean it.

In late 2014, a good friend (who serves as a high-level executive of a major publishing outlet) authored and rolled out his new book. Looking for ways to increase its sales, he reached out to me asking how we could utilize the power of affiliate marketing to aid in his objective. The only question I needed to ask before answering his was: “How are you currently selling the book?” (read: which online property would you envisage affiliates to drive the prospective buyers too?) The answer was: “It’s sold on Amazon, and I want affiliates to increase my sales there.” We could never start that affiliate program. The conditions made it purely impossible.

Fast-forward two and a half years, and someone requests a quote on having us build and launch an affiliate program for her video courses on Udemy. She is willing to share a portion of the revenue received from the affiliate-referred sales with those affiliates who drove the sales. While this is a perfect example of a performance-based affiliate program, the Udemy situation is basically identical to the above-referenced Amazon example. It is a no-go on “adding an affiliate program” front; and it’s high time I elaborated why.

Online marketplaces are great for giving your products targeted exposure. However, whether you are selling a product on Amazon, eBay, Etsy, or CafePress, a service on Upwork, or a video course on Udemy or Lynda.com, you cannot set up an affiliate program of your own for these.

The reason is pretty simple: for the affiliate program to function, the platform on which you sell needs to collaborate with the affiliate marketing solution which you use on attributing conversions to the referring affiliates. Whether it requires firing a tracking pixel on the order confirmation page, or ensuring a server-to-server postback of the data associated with the conversion, a technical integration of some sort must take place.

Circling back to the two examples that I started with, neither Amazon, nor Udemy would be open to the integration of the aforementioned kind; at least not to my knowledge. In fact, both of these platforms operate affiliate programs of their own, and these can be used to promote your products. However, the relationship with affiliates in these cases would be owned by Amazon and Udemy, respectively.

To start a direct revenue share affiliate program, you must have an online storefront of your own. If/when you do have a standalone website, fully controlled by you, where your product or service is sold, setting up your own affiliate program becomes absolutely possible.

In some situations (possibly even the above two examples) it may not make sense selling directly, while in other scenarios it makes all the sense in the world! Should you wish to discuss your specific situation, feel free to hit me up.

The post Direct Revenue Share Affiliate Programs and Online Marketplaces appeared first on Affiliate Marketing Blog by Geno Prussakov.

Sales organizations face steep hurdles in today’s increasingly competitive market, where mobile technologies and ultra-informed buyers have forever changed the selling environment. Sales professionals — from new hires to veteran sellers — need the knowledge and skills to navigate in a digital world while still making personal connections with clients.

At Richardson, we know that learning to compete in new ways requires a new approach to training. While foundational sales skills are as relevant today as they ever were, the technology to engage, motivate, deliver, and reinforce learning has leapfrogged ahead. Combining technology with elements of gameplay is called gamification, and it is proving an effective way to keep learners engaged in content.

More rigorous than the name suggests, gamification applies game-design elements and principles in learning situations to create fun and engaging experiences. Games bring out natural tendencies to achieve, compete, and gain status or recognition. The serious business of making learning enjoyable leads to lessons that are sticky, meaning they are more easily and better retained. Online contests and leaderboards add friendly, competitive pressures within sales teams, which intensify engagement.

There are several types of gameplay currently available to reinforce learning that we find work here at Richardson. Some examples of these include:

• Flashcard-based games,
• Video scenarios that require learner responses,
• Formative quizzes to check progress and redirect learning to areas in need of improvement,
• Bite-sized learning reinforcement modules delivered via daily e-mail,

These types of gameplay break down content into smaller chunks which are easier to absorb, remember, and apply on the job.

As with most games, keeping score is a performance motivator. The use of leaderboards and badges can foster a sense of competition that keeps learners engaged and motivated to reach their goals. Tracking players and scores allow learners to see how they’re doing and compare themselves to others or to benchmarks. Particularly competitive individuals can try to beat their own best scores and stay on top of the leaderboard. With these tools, managers can gain visibility into the performance of individuals and the team as a whole, and they are able to see who is making progress and who might need help.

Game elements like messaging and reference guides allow managers to encourage their team members to participate in games and beat their scores. Managers learn to coach to higher performance and scores, whether within their teams or across the entire sales organization. Such manager messaging works to drive continuous learning in a fun, friendly, and competitive way.

Gamification is based on learning science and behavioral theory. It’s also great fun. And learning that is fun and engaging, with a healthy bit of friendly competition thrown in, works well within a sales culture. It also works well for sales leaders, who see the results in terms of quick uptake, application, and consistency of skills that drive results.

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We live in an accelerated world, where the ways in which we work, learn, and even socialize are constantly in flux; where consistent growth is difficult — and consistent performance is rare. While selling organizations have adapted by becoming nimbler, they’ve experienced a gap between their developmental needs and the learning solutions available to them in the market. Richardson Accelerate^TM is here to close that gap. For more information about Richardson Accelerate^TM contact us at 215-940-9255 or info@richardson.com . You can also click here or on the image to download an informational brochure.

The post Put Gameplay to Work for Your Sellers appeared first on Richardson Sales Training & Enablement Blog.

Account based selling or marketing are both big buzz words in the sales industry right now. It’s not a new concept, but new technology, data, and tools are bringing this selling method to the forefront for many sales leaders and company owners.

My friend Joanne Black and I were talking about this resurgence the other day, and we both agree that getting a referral is the best way to start a sale. Let’s be honest, it’s a lot easier to get a referral than it is to cold call — even if it is account based. When sales leaders combine a proven referral program with account based selling, they can drive enormous growth. Joanne wrote a blog post that is a must-read for any sales leader who wants to amp up their account based selling with a proven referral program, and I wanted to share it with you.

Let me let you in on a secret: Account-based selling isn’t anything new.

This lead generation strategy is the source of much hype in our industry. There are even new acronyms and monikers, such as “land and expand” and “seed and grow.” People talk about it as if it’s some recently discovered prospecting strategy. But it’s just a new word for what those of us who sell to named accounts have always done.

Account-based selling is, however, an extremely effective way to sell, especially when it’s partnered with a robust referral program. Getting referrals is the No. 1 way for prospecting into named accounts and then expanding to other areas of a client’s company.

1. How to Land and Expand (or Whatever Buzzword You Want to Call It)

Savvy sales leaders understand that when selling to large enterprises, reps must get in quickly, close deals, deliver on their promises and expand to other divisions. But account-based selling requires more than just determination and lead generation tools. It requires a referral program—a disciplined, measurable, systematic system.

It’s much simpler to get to decision-makers with qualified referrals. Prospects will always take meetings with B2B sales reps referred by colleagues they know and trust. And your current clients would be happy to refer your team to decision-makers in other departments.

The problem is, they probably won’t think to do so unless they’re asked.

When your account-based sellers ask every single client for referrals, your team will generate qualified sales leads faster and more consistently than with any other prospecting method. Referrals are even more important now that the average buyer committee has at least 6.8 people, according to CEB. (I’m scared to think what 8/10 of a person looks like, but you get the picture.)

Last year, that number was 5.4. As committees grow and sellers need to impress more and more people just to get one deal, it will be more important than ever to build relationships and establish trust quickly. Referrals give sales reps a head start on both.

A referral program, systematically executed, enables your sales team to:

• Build referral skills, so they know how to make all sales leads count
• Convert more than 70 percent of prospects into clients
• Ace out the competition (While others must rely on digital lead generation, your account-based sellers are getting personal introductions to decision-makers)

Best of all, your team can get these results without ever cold calling again. And that’s good news because today’s buyers don’t respond to cold calls, cold emails, or cold social media tactics. It takes 18 dials for a cold caller to connect with a buyer, according to research by TOPO, and only 23.9 percent of sales emails are opened.

Do you really want your top sellers wasting their time with such outdated and intrusive lead generation tactics?

2. Relationships Are Better Than Technology in Account-Based Selling

Many truly believe that technology is the key to lead generation. Really? I’m stymied.

Sure, for reps who sell commodities, enhanced technology is imperative. But account-based sellers are selling complex solutions that require an in-depth understanding of the prospect company—who all buyers are, how decisions get made, what their real business challenges are and what other solutions and vendors they’re considering.

Your sales team won’t get this intelligence with a cold outreach—even if their emails are enticing. But when they receive referral introductions, they get relevant insights right away.

Technology still plays an important role for account-based sellers. It can help them identify key drivers in their target companies, determine who to contact, find mutual connections, and even learn a bit about the challenges prospects are facing. But technology won’t tell account-based sellers how to minimize risk for prospects. It won’t tell them who the key influencers are within a company, who has the budget, how decisions get made, or any of the other “personal stuff” that matters.

Why? Because people buy from people, not from technology. More specifically, they buy from B2B sales reps who develop and foster relationships, ask probing questions, and uncover pressing needs that must be addressed.

3. The Early Bird Gets the Deal

The No. 1 goal of account-based sellers is to get in before prospects even know they have a need. Referred salespeople get in the door early, build relationships, and get the lay of the land. They don’t just offer solutions to prospects’ unique needs—they help identify those needs. Suddenly, the chances of a competitive challenge are slim. Sure, many companies are required to send out an RFP. But your account-based sellers are in a position to help draft the RFP.

Think about what’s happened in the past when you responded to an RFP. Your sales and marketing teams spent hours or even days crafting an excellent proposal. Perhaps you made the short list, so you spent more time developing a presentation, determining who should be on the team, and flying them somewhere to present. But you still lost, because your competitor had already established a relationship with the prospect before you ever entered the picture. And that’s how people make decisions.

That’s why referral selling is your biggest competitive differentiator and your team’s ticket into the C-suite.

Account-based sellers can’t depend on marketing for lead generation. They must take responsibility for qualified lead generation and scoring meetings with decision-makers. Help them get started by implementing a strategic referral program with skills, metrics, accountability for results, and an immediate integration into your sales process.

For personalized coaching to help you and your sales team combine new technology with proven techniques, call me at 775-852-5020 or schedule time to chat about it.

The post 3 Powerful Ways Referrals Can Boost Account Based Sales appeared first on Alice Heiman, LLC.

Lead generation is one of the most crucial components of a well-oiled B2B sales and marketing operation. To get more clients, you need to get more people to know about your products and services first.

If no one knows what you sell, how do you expect people to buy from you? Lead generation addresses that. In a nutshell, lead generation is the process of cultivating interest in your products and services to generate leads. Leads, in the business-to-business setting, are companies who are interested in your product and are a good fit as customers.

Yes, good fit. Lead generation is more than a numbers game. It’s equally important that you generate quality leads or those which are really suited to be potential customers of your business. These are leads which can be closed by sales or further nurtured to becoming customers.

To generate b2b leads, marketing departments need to take a multi-channel approach. This means they shouldn’t center all their efforts on one avenue–it’s crucial to tap into various channels to get the most bang for their efforts.

Interested in which channels and approaches net the most ROI for B2B marketers? Read on.

How to generate b2b leads: 4 Effective Leadgen Channels

There are many ways to generate leads for B2B companies. However, not all approaches are created equal.

Here are four channels that provide the most ROI for B2B companies.

Content marketing

Today’s most effective marketing techniques heavily rely on content creation–but creating massive amounts of content doesn’t guarantee an outpouring of leads. The key is to create content that sets you apart from other players in the field. Your content has to be remarkable.

The mass production of low-quality content plagues B2B marketing departments today. These content pieces leave readers with very little value to take away.

Since B2B decision-makers, gatekeepers, and influencers are all sophisticated prospects, you must create content that hits them in different pain points throughout their journey as buyers. A solid content marketing strategy for a B2B company is one that is multi-faceted and takes differing buyers’ journeys into consideration.

SEO

SEO is often regarded as a completely separate matter from lead generation but it plays a very crucial role in generating B2B sales leads.

Most people carry the notion that SEO is only important because it brings people to your website so your brand and content gets noticed. However, with how B2B marketing has evolved in the past few years, SEO is critical in any B2B lead generation effort because it identifies how potential buyers find you.

The importance of “user intent” is one that’s often understated in many marketing departments. Beyond keywords, competitor research, and page analytics, there lies the qualitative data that can elevate the way you do marketing: understanding user intent.

SEO specialists, with their grasp of data, hold the keys to unlocking this knowledge that would help not only the marketing department but the company as a whole. Knowing what your prospects are searching for when they find you holds great value in shaping your messaging and your product as well.

Social media

Social media is one of the “must-haves” of any marketing effort. Despite this, the majority of B2B marketers are not effective in using social media to generate B2B leads. According to the Content Marketing Institute, 10% of B2B marketers using social media for B2B leadgen, only 10% are able to report concrete results. This implies that many B2B marketers are still not confident in solidly incorporating social media into their lead gen campaigns.

What needs to be recognized and acted upon is that different social media sites provide different marketing value.

Here’s a quick rundown of some popular social media sites for B2B:

LinkedIn

• Ideal for showcasing services, posting regular company updates, and advertising new job opportunities within your company

• “Pulse” feature allows the talking heads of your company to pose themselves as authorities in your niche

• Sales tools such as LinkedIn Sales Navigator make social selling easier

• Networking with decision-makers and other stakeholders in your target industries by engaging with them in LinkedIn groups and walls

Twitter

• Prospect research: industries, job titles, hashtags, connections, lists

• Engaging with influencers and decision-makers

• Establish thought leadership through constant updates and engaging in Twitter chats

Facebook

• Largely considered as B2C playground but gives you access to powerful data

• Ideal for running very targeted paid ads

• Some opportunities for professional discussions in Facebook groups

These are just three of the most popular social media sites that B2B marketers use. Something that should be given more emphasis is the quality and quantity of data B2B marketers can get from these social media sites. Also, monitor your niche using tools like Hootsuite or Mention to keep your team abreast with the latest in your industry so you could create content that reflects the interests of your prospects.

Email marketing

Econsultancy reported in a study that 73% of marketers regard email marketing as the most superior marketing channel in terms of ROI. It might seem like email marketing efforts are for naught because you try to put yourself in the recipient’s shoes and you think there’s just no way that marketing emails can be effective.

However, doing email marketing right can net you great results. The key is to strike a balance between assertive and polite. If you create emails and subject lines that are able to tickle your audience’s interests, you’ve already done half the job.

With a lot of players using email marketing, it’s essential to know what works and what doesn’t. It all boils down to the details.

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These are the most effective B2B marketing channels that you should be tapping into to create steady lead streams into your sales pipeline. Without productive lead generation campaigns, companies will struggle to keep afloat. B2B lead generation is a critical partner of sales development and sales. All of them work together to ensure the company’s constant growth.

We feed on our CRM maturity model and revisit the ideas behind its first 3 levels to come up with the approaches and must-have CRM elements to energize specifically long-cycle sales – the ones that take up to 3 years to occur. This is typical for selling highly technological solutions to public and private sector organizations in Defense, Aerospace, Transport, Oil & Gas, etc. So how can their vendors win it by using CRM tools?

CRM maturity is key

In our practice, we identify 4 CRM maturity levels that reflect the depth and efficiency of CRM adoption at B2B enterprises. This model reflects the progress from electronic record-keeping (Level 1) through all-round communication management (Level 2) to milestone-driven relationship development (Level 3) and strategic relationship management (Level 4).

For high-tech companies with long-cycle sales, it’s critical to reach Level 3 – step-by-step customer relationship development that makes it a must for salespeople to cooperate towards the relationship milestones specific for particular opportunities and customers to stimulate new contracts. At this stage, a CRM system would carefully track the dynamics of this progress over prolonged periods and align required activities with the sales force’s productivity goals.

Such gradual progress would also cover all the important stages of CRM maturity that enable, from down to top:

• Customer database management
• Customer segmentation
• A single view of communication and billing history
• Tracking of outbound/inbound communication
• Lead nurturing and email marketing automation
• Relationships analytics

Level 3 is where a CRM system can bring a balanced value when utilized deeply with high adoption rates among the system users (primarily, sales representatives and managers). What’s the result? As mature as this, your CRM will eliminate any instance of missing a single strategic activity that could otherwise spoil a-few-years-worth relationship development.

To illustrate the point, we provide particular techniques for reaching the 3^rd CRM maturity level below.

Tip 1: integrate presales in CRM

Long sales cycles can be well explained by the high complexity – and diversity – of products and services on offer. Decision makers from the above-mentioned industries are no school folks, and they require ultimate competence from their vendors-to-be. To showcase it, you don’t have to go to great lengths if you literally have the pool of technical experts mingling with your sales forces, albeit in a virtual space of your corporate CRM system, and helping them with specific tech-related questions

Integrating presales functions with sales processes will make your CRM a cross-collaboration point for the specialists engaged in presales activities (e.g. responding to RFPs, preparing demos, etc.). Each of them would have access to opportunities’ profiles to source important information with no need to shuffle emails and attachments that could be easily lost or overlooked in busy inboxes.

Tip 2: automate lead nurturing

Advocating the role of CRM in lead nurturing is beyond the scope of this article, but those who doubt it may want to refer to Sid Smith’s expert response on MarketingProfs. In our CRM consulting practice, we accept it as a given.

In the case of long-cycle sales, automation can help to sustain prolonged periods of lead nurturing and customer re-engagement via timely and effective communication.

Lead nurturing automation will bring structure and rhythm into nurturing activities. Through custom workflows and a system of automated alerts to assigned salespeople, it will assist in keeping up with the corporate lead nurturing strategy, which should define time intervals and communication policy. If multiple salespeople work on the same account, their activities will get synchronized and registered in comprehensive CRM profiles for leads, opportunities and customers.

Lead nurturing automation can also be extended to introduce custom rules for timely identification of communication gaps in lead nurturing processes, as well as custom reports on their progress and results.

Tip 3: raise CRM adoption rates

The success of any CRM project depends on its adoption by end users. Without unified, engaged and proactive participation from sales managers’ side, such project is likely to fall short of accomplishing its goals.

First, the CRM’s functionality should correctly reflect and support sales processes as it affects the quality of entered data and sales force’s work efficiency. This would require CRM consulting and customization to make the system convenient: enable intuitive, highly usable interfaces, rapid data processing, availability of shortcuts and automation of manual routine (e.g. synchronizing emails, scheduling appointments, following up meetings, etc.).

Second, the mobile UI has to meet expectations. As mobile CRM users will be visiting customers on premises, the speed and quality of the data displayed on a mobile screen should not affect their performance. This should include adapting frequently used forms to mobile screens with only a careful selection of fields visible instantly and the rest hidden under separate tabs.

Third, eliminating users’ technological ignorance raises buy-in rates, so it should be a requirement for CRM users to attend training sessions and workshops after the system is deployed. The goal would be to gain an understanding of how CRM can contribute to salespeople’s daily work with a detailed explanation of its relevant functionality.

And finally, unanimous adoption by users is key, and identifying poor CRM adopters should also be on the agenda. Those sales representatives or managers who are not ready or willing to use the system diligently would be impeding their colleagues’ work and reducing the impact. Therefore, it is likely to result in filtering the sales team to leave only those who comply with the new CRM policies and parting with others.

Conclusion

Selling highly technological, complex solutions won’t happen in the blink of an eye. In extreme cases, it can take years, and, want it or not, your CRM system have to accommodate it. As a IT consulting company, we have worked for over 8 years to define the CRM maturity model for effective customer relationship management, and now we revisited it in terms of addressing the complexity of vendors’ offering, sustaining long-term nurturing and raising CRM user adoption rates.

This article originally appeared on ScienceSoft Blog and has been republished with permission – source article.

It’s time we challenge conventional thinking with regard to who owns the lead generation process. In the last several years, a lot has been written about how Sales and Marketing need to come together if we ever expect to resolve the issue of generating leads. In keeping with my habit of challenging the norm, let […]

3 Shifts That Will Take Your Story To The Next Level written by Guest Post read more at Duct Tape Marketing

The global aid organization, Mercy Corps, tested a story approach to fundraising.

Their traditional email approach told about the work the organization was doing throughout the world. How they had grown over the years through contributions and support. And how the money was being spent. Then it called for action — a donation.

Their story-based email campaign shared stories like Giselle, a 12-year-old girl forced to flee her home in the Eastern Congo when fighting broke out.

That campaign revealed that Giselle was one of 1.2 million refugees in need of food and shelter and $50 would feed her as well as 140 others for 10 days. Then it invited prospective donors to respond to that acute need.

Which campaign do you think raised the most money?

It’s no surprise, the story approach was 22 times more effective in generating donations. Why? That’s what this article seeks to help you understand and successfully accomplish through your business.

Don’t Tell Your Story Better, Tell A Better Story

As a literature major turned marketing executive, I’ve spent much of my career studying why some stories take off like rockets while so many remain whispers in a hurricane. And I’ve put these learnings to the test as a practitioner in the field.

If I were to boil everything I’ve learned so far down to a single idea, it would be this: Most businesses think their job is to tell their story better, while the most successful companies and causes tell a better story — one that is open-ended, participative and bigger than themselves.

So what does that mean for you and your business? What steps can you take to “tell a better story” and take that story to the next level?

Here are three shifts you can make to start on this journey.

Shift #1: From Expression to Connection

Despite a plethora of books, research and best practice examples proving the opposite, the majority of today’s marketing and sales materials are still written from the perspective of “about us.” Heck, we even have “about pages” on our “about us” websites.

Who is the focus of the story you’re telling — your business and its offerings or those you exist to serve?

A fast, simple way to check yourself on this is to use what I call the “highlighter test.” Take two different colored highlighters. Print off your home page copy, grab your sales brochure or open the next email you’re planning to send out. Highlight every reference to you, your company and service in one color. Highlight every reference to your prospect, her company and need in the other. Then calculate total mentions for each color. What’s the ratio?

I’ve found that the “about us”-to-“for you” ratio averages 3:1 for most companies I’ve advised. Now, re-write the content in a way that flips the ratio to be 1:3 “about us”-to-“for you.” You should see an immediate lift in engagement.

Why? It’s pretty obvious. No one cares about your business. What they seek is information, insights and inspiration for themselves. Shift your content’s focus from self-expression (i.e. about us) to others-connection (i.e. for you).

To do this, start with the story your prospects tell themselves. Often that story is tied to a specific job they’re trying to get done in their lives: more leads, more clients, more recognition, more independence, less hassle, etc. Instead of trying to tell your story, enter their story by helping them get that job — the one your business exists to do — done.

Mercy Corps’ traditional approach to fundraising was to share an “about us” narrative, then ask for support. Their approach using stories like Giselle’s shifted the focus to a job the prospective donor could help get done. The story was no longer about Mercy Corps, it was about saving and improving lives. And it invited participation in an experience. Which leads to the next shift you should make.

Shift #2: From Information to Experiences

Everything evolves in waves. Take the internet.

The first internet was essentially a massive collection of online directories. Many were curated by humans. But these directories quickly became too large to find what you were looking for, so search ushered in the second wave.

What search does well is help you find the best resource by tying your keyword or phrase with your intent. What search can’t do well is create serendipity — those random recommendations people make that you never would have discovered had it not been for them. Social media (i.e. humans recommending and sharing things with humans) was the third wave.

With the iPhone and iPad, and the app infrastructure that came with them, we no longer had to go to the internet using a computer. We could bring the internet with us. Mobile was the fourth wave.

Today, the internet is everywhere. It’s in our phone, car, watch, appliances, you name it. The internet of things is the fifth wave. What do you think the next wave will be?

In his latest book, The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future, Kevin Kelly describes a shift to an internet of experiences. In other words, the internet so far has been an internet of information. This will soon become what we think of as the old internet (kind of like we think of the internet of the 1990s).

It’s already happening. Snapchat, emojis, Facebook Live, Pokemon Go, virtual reality and artificial intelligence-like systems like Amazon’s Echo are bringing that experience-driven future to us today.

What this shift means is that stories that rely too heavily on informing will increasingly be ignored. Not only by your prospects, but by the search engines and filter bubbles too. However, stories your prospects can experience — see, hear, taste, smell and feel — will earn more and more attention and authority.

The faster you can move your prospects from information to experiences, the more powerful your story (i.e. the story they tell themselves about you) will become.

John skillfully does this by inviting prospects to take “guided tours” of the Duct Tape Marketing Consultant Network. No doubt these hands-on, human-to-human touches play a critical role in shaping the Duct Tape story in the minds of prospective partners and clients.

Maya Angelou said, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” No one really wants to buy consulting, coaching, accounting or whatever you’re selling. What they really want is to feel smart and successful. And they want to feel like they’re part of something greater than themselves. That’s what they’re buying.

Is your story something others can actively participate in and experience? Or is it mere information intended for passive consumption?

Shift #3: From Closed to Open

I continue to see many companies and causes try to manufacture and control their story. And I continue to hear and read business advisors talk about storytelling as if all narratives are closed-loop: Something happens, conflict ensues, then all is resolved.

In his brilliant SXSW talk in 2013, John Hagel argued in favor of open narratives, those without a predetermined ending. Those in which we can participate and impact the outcome. (Are you starting to see how these three shifts work in harmony?)

Let’s go back to the Mercy Corps example. My understanding is that Giselle’s story was one of many stories Mercy Corps used for fundraising. Each of those micro stories added up to a macro narrative of “saving and improving lives in the world’s toughest places.”

Notice that the broader narrative of “saving and improving lives” is an open narrative, because the movement of saving lives is endless.

Nike’s macro story has never been about shoes. It has always been about striving for greatness — a much bigger story than shoes or a shoe company. It’s open-ended.

Disney’s macro story has never been about cartoons, kids’ clubs, adventure documentaries, films or theme parks. It has always been about creating magical moments and memories. It too is an open narrative.

What open narrative does your business serve?

Your Story Revisited

The reason I’m such a fan of John is that he gets that storytelling in business isn’t about telling your story better, it’s about telling a better story.

A better story is one that is for those you seek to serve, rather than about your business and its offerings.

It’s one that invites participation in experiences, rather than merely informing through telling.

And it’s one that is open and can be co-created in real-time over time.

I hope this has given you a new lens through which to see and evaluate your story. And I hope it has given you some actionable shifts you can make to increase engagement and conversion.

If you would like to go deeper into how you can leverage these shifts in your business, let the Duct Tape Marketing team know.

About the Author

Keith Reynold Jennings‘ mission is to help leaders and creatives see, tell and scale their story. As head of corporate marketing for Jackson Healthcare, he is implementing a “story culture,” as well as helping position and grow its new companies. He also writes and speaks about story-scaling and narrative intelligence.

The mere addition of an SDR team can increase a startup’s lead conversion by 35% while also freeing up account executives to focus on closing deals. While the benefits clearly show the vital role played by SDRs, far too few companies are investing in building out teams that are truly set up for success. So, in an effort that change all that, here I’ll drill down into what’s actually necessary for SDRs to hit their goals.

Measuring Productivity

There’s little doubt that an SDR team helps AEs focus on hitting quotas. But whether they’re qualifying leads, setting meetings or doing both, SDRs organize a necessary process that’s hard to tie to specific deal quotas and revenue goals. So how do we know you’re using their expertise correctly?

SDR work is a grind. Certainly, there’s an art to learning the right things to say that gets a prospect to pick up that phone after a voicemail has been left. And there’s no doubt SDRs learn to finesse phone calls over time to get prospects to commit. But in between the opportunities to actually speak with potential clients comes a litany of unanswered dials. And the necessity of putting in the calls can’t be overlooked.

If your SDRs are responsible for setting meetings, logging the number of calls and emails is an excellent way to introduce some method into the madness. Let’s look at the incredible effort it takes to just connect with a prospect from data collected by Craig Rosenberg:

• 12.73 dials are needed to connect with a prospect when you have their direct line
• 18.83 calls are needed to connect with a prospect when you have go through a switchboard
• Between 22.5 to 30 calls are needed to have just one solid conversation with a prospect

Finally, if we consider that it will likely take three calls to set a demo meeting, that leaves each SDR with a 60 to 90 call range just to land one session. Getting their reps in on the phones is essential, even if it’s tedious.

It’s okay to cheat a little…

Now if we consider that each AE needs about 50 to 100 qualified leads each month to hit their goal (if that goal falls between 8 and 12 deals), 60 to 90 calls per prospect can teeter on being unsustainable. It’s necessary to find ways to increase efficiency and improve the movement through your pipeline.

This is where an account-based strategy across your sales and marketing teams really shines. Setting up email sends to hit prospects’ inboxes 24 to 72 hours before an SDR calls can wildly increase the success rate of getting a connection earlier. Additionally, following and engaging on social media with the target company and the individual you’re trying to reach even further warms up the conversation. This keeps your company top-of-mind, provides enough reason for a prospect to do some research and hopefully entices them to pick up that phone and say hello.

Big takeaway: Make sure your SDRs are putting in the necessary calls and helping to coordinate with sales and marketing to increase efficiency.

Finding the Right Number of SDRs

You never want to hire just a single rep, but just how many SDRs do you need? It depends on the organization. As David Skok writes “There is wide variation, much of which can be attributed to company size. Smaller SaaS companies in particular, deploy higher SDR to AE ratios, meaning one SDR supports fewer AEs.”
But normally, the number of SDRs to AEs will fall somewhere between a 1:1 to 1:3 ratio. Your need for lead volume and lead qualification rates also play a role in how many SDRs you hire as you’ll need your team to be able to create sufficient opportunities to make their roles succeed.

To determine the right number, consider the deal range you need each month to hit your goal. Then you need to be able to determine the average number of leads needed to close one deal. Do you actually have enough SDRs to create that many leads?

In smaller organizations, this is less likely to be an exact science. However, attempting to identify these metrics adds discipline to the process and helps you better execute a hiring plan and protects you against the wasted time and money of an inefficient SDR team.

Now that’s a system that succeeds.

The post Setting Up a System for SDR Success appeared first on OpenView Labs.

How to Use LinkedIn Groups to Generate Quality Leads Continuously written by Guest Post read more at Duct Tape Marketing

If you’re a professional or job seeker (which, if you’re on the DTM blog, you obviously are), you’ll know that LinkedIn is the biggest, baddest kids on the block.

With over 400 million users to date, a recent acquisition by Microsoft, and a revamped user interface, LinkedIn seems poised to be the best platform for you to get leads, job opportunities, and keep the conversation going with the white collared community.

And it is.

A recent survey by the Content Marketing Institute found that a staggering 89% of B2B marketers focus on LinkedIn as their main platform, making it one of the highly sought after platforms to master when it comes to B2B content.

That’s all good fun, but now comes the hard part.

How do you actually generate Quality Leads from LinkedIn consistently, besides having a powerful LinkedIn profile?

Now, let me start off by saying that there’s more than one way to do it.

In fact, there are so many ways that I’m still in the process of crafting a comprehensive guide on LinkedIn marketing (13,000 words and counting) few weeks in.

Today, I’m going to share a little secret with you, and teach you one of the best ways I know how to generate continuously leads from LinkedIn.

LinkedIn Groups.

In today’s article, you’ll learn how you can generate a steady stream of leads, new conversations, and opportunity from LinkedIn (in a non-spammy way).

You’ll also learn about the two different aspects of LinkedIn groups, and how you can leverage on both sides of the virtual fence, to bring your business to the next level.

Let’s begin!

The two aspects of LinkedIn groups

In general, there are two ways of looking at LinkedIn groups.

The first aspect of LinkedIn groups is from the perspective of a member.

LinkedIn Group Member

A member of a LinkedIn group has restricted capabilities, and there are certain restrictions to what he or she can or cannot post on the group.

These group rules vary from group to group.

If you want to access these rules, go to Groups that you are already a part of, and click on Group Rules on the main page, on the right-hand side of the Group like so:

In other words, whatever content you share, such as a piece of content, on the LinkedIn group as a member is subject to the removal and approval of the LinkedIn Group admin.

For example, some groups restrict you from sharing self-promotional posts,  sales advertisements, and content that offers no real benefit to the group’s overall objectives.

You can find a Group’s objective by reading more about the Group above the Group rules section.

That means to say, that as a member, the number of things that you can do to share content isn’t that much.

But as you shall see, there are ways to go around this.

The next aspect of LinkedIn groups is as a group owner.

LinkedIn Group Owner/Admin

A group owner is simply someone who starts a LinkedIn group or is appointed as a group admin by the group owner.

As a group owner or admin, there are various other options that are open to you, as you shall see.

Firstly, however, let’s take a look at the different options that you can use to generate leads from LinkedIn groups as a group member.

Part 1: Generating LinkedIn leads as a group member

As we mentioned above, being a group member severely limits the amount of content that you can share, and the type of content that you can distribute.

That being said, it is still possible to leverage on LinkedIn traffic to get consistent leads.

Step 1: Find and join groups that are aligned with your niche

The first step is to find as many relevant groups as you can that align with your industry or your relevant area of expertise.

For example, if I’m a content marketer, I would look for groups that are not only about content marketing, but I will also try to join groups that are relevant content marketing, such as copywriting, and digital marketing.

Joining groups is a relatively simple process.

Firstly, go to your LinkedIn dashboard, and search for a button that says “Business” at the top.

Click on it, and you should see a drop-down menu.

Click on Groups, and you will be redirected to the Groups page.

Once you are the Groups page, there are different ways that you can join groups.

My Groups

If you already have groups that you are a part of, you can skip this step, and move to the next section.

Click on this button to view your current groups.

However, for the sake of those who are not yet part of a group, let’s dive deeper, and click on Discover Groups.

Discover Groups

By default, LinkedIn already filters groups by your industry (bet you didn’t know that!) and recommends groups for you to join.

For example, since my field (content marketing) is somewhat related to Advertising, LinkedIn places it at the top.

You can easily scroll down the page, and find groups that you want to be a part of.

Some groups are open groups, but some “Like Advertising Age” are closed ones and require you to apply to join.

In case you can’t find the group that you want to, let me show you another way.

LinkedIn Advanced Search

Since LinkedIn’s new UI actually makes it harder to use the Advanced search function, let’s use our trusty friend, Google.

Go to the top of your browser, and type in “LinkedIn Advanced Search”.

You should see the right suggestion pop up at the top.

Click on that, and you should be redirected to the Advanced Search page.

Then, on the search bar, click on the button that says: Groups.

The next step is relatively straightforward.

Type in your industry, or a keyword that you are interested in.

For example, my keyword is “content marketing”.

To tell if the suggestions that pop up are a Group, you can look at the tag it comes with, as you see in the screenshot above.

Once you’ve decided on a group that you are interested in learning more about, click on it.

Read about the Group first

Next, you will want to read more about the group, under the About Group section, located on the right-hand side.

If you think that the group is a good place to distribute your content, click on Ask to join, and wait.

Step 2: Create a piece of content that is of super value to that group – make it relevant!

Now that you have a few LinkedIn groups under your arsenal, it’s time to create content that actually attracts the right people to you.

That means you need to find the best topic to write about.

I always find the following checklist useful whenever I try to create content for a particular group of people.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• What type of people does this group consist of?
• What are the end goals of this group of people?
• What motivates this group of people?
• What topics is this group of people most likely to be interested in?

Once you have decided on the topic(s) that your LinkedIn group is most likely going to be interested in, you want to decide on the type of content to create.

For example, you can choose to either create a video or a blog post, depending on the purpose of your content.

Remember, whatever the form of content that you create, it has to be relevant to the groups, and the people in the groups.

I have seen it too many times before, clients of mine who come to me saying that LinkedIn didn’t work for them, but it turns out they were talking about totally irrelevant stuff, sharing information like sales funnels in a LinkedIn group about book publishing.

Create a Lead magnet or Content Upgrade

If you want to take your content one step further, make sure to include a lead Magnet, otherwise known as a Content upgrade.

A content upgrade is simply a piece of information that is relevant to that particular post so that it maximizes the chance of a reader actually converting into a subscriber after reading or watching your content.

For example, suppose you were doing a piece of content about sales funnels, a content upgrade would be something like: “The 10-step checklist to Great sales funnel copywriting”

Think about it.

If you’re reading a blog post about sales funnels, and there’s an offer asking you to opt into a checklist that helps you to solve the problem easily, why wouldn’t you opt in?

Step 3: Share that piece of super valuable content

Now that you’ve created your super valuable content, it’s time to distribute it, and share it extensively on the LinkedIn groups that you have joined.

LinkedIn makes it relatively simple for you to share it among your groups.

If you are using social sharing applications like SumoMe,  simply click on the LinkedIn sharing icon and a window a pop-up that looks like this:

Make sure that you enable the “Post to Groups” option before you proceed to the next step.

Important: When sharing your content, the message you write in your social update is as important as the headline in your blog post: If it doesn’t entice me, I’m not clicking through!

Crafting a delicious social sharing message

A social sharing message is that block of content that you write, that accompanies your article share.

Simply put, it is your elevator pitch to the LinkedIn group and should reveal just enough for Group members to want to click through to your article.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• Can you include any statistics from your findings?
• Can you include any interesting findings in your content?
• What is the problem that your content aims to solve? How can you frame that problem in a way that needs to be solved now?
• Are there any emotions that you can use in your message?

For more references, you can use a list of power words such as this.

Once you share your content, wait for your content to be approved by some groups – as they undergo moderation.

Step 4: Use Dux Soup to encourage views to your profile

Dux Soup is a software that helps to boost your conversion rates on LinkedIn, using the power of psychology and automation.

Essentially, it is a tool that helps you to locate your prospects, visit their profile, so that they are intrigued by your visit, and are drawn into your profile page, which acts as a landing page.

While there are many different tutorials out there about Dux Soup, I realize that not many people talk about using Dux Soup for LinkedIn groups.

In fact, using Dux Soup for LinkedIn groups is one of the most highly converting techniques that have worked for me in my content marketing journey so far.

To get started using Dux Soup, the first thing you have to do is to download the software.

Open up Google Chrome Store by going to the right-hand corner of your Chrome dashboard.

Click on More Tools, and then Extensions.

Next, click on extensions, and you should be redirected to the Chrome extension page.

Scroll down to the bottom of the page, and you should see a button titled “get more extensions”.

Click on that.

This should redirect you to the Chrome Web store.

Next, go to The search bar, and type in Dux Soup. click enter.

Download Dux Soup, and you should see the extension popping up on your Chrome dashboard on the top right-hand corner.

Next, open up a new Chrome tab.

Quick Adjustments

Next, we would want to make a few quick adjustments to the options in Dux Soup.

Click on the Dux Soup icon, and click on the options button.

You should be redirected to a page that looks like this:

 

Under the section titled Skipping Rules, set the default to 14 days.

In other words, if you have used the software to visit a particular profile for the last 14 days, we want Dux Soup to avoid that.

This is to ensure that we do not waste the limitations that the free account has; in other words, allows you to maximize the use of Dux Soup, and let you visit as many different accounts as possible.

Since the free version of Dux Soup only allows you to visit up to 100 profiles per day, this means that you have to make the full use of the software in any single day.

Starting Our Group Member Visits

Click on the Dux Soup icon, and you should see a drop-down menu that looks like this:

Next, click on groups, and you should be redirected to your LinkedIn Group Page.

Choose a group that you want to use Dux Soup full, and click on it.

In this example, I shall visit the Digital Marketing Group that I’m already a part of.

Next, you’ll want to click on the number of members in the group.

This will open up the list of members that are residing in the group.

At the same time, you should also see Dux Soup giving you a heads up, like this.

Giving Dux Soup the Green Light

Now, it’s time to command Dux Soup to begin visiting the different profiles.

Click on the Dux Soup icon again, and this time you will see a totally different menu:

Click on Visit Profiles, and Dux Soup will begin the visiting process.

And… you’re done!

Dux Soup Limitation

Once Dux Soup has finished visiting the profile up to 100 every single day, you should see a notification telling you that you have reached the limits for that particular day.

It should look something like this:

As long as you repeat the process every single day, without fail and with consistency, you should see a steady rise in the number of visits to your profile, as well as the number of engagements.

Pro tip:  if you own a copy of the paid version of Dux Soup, it also allows you to endorse the profiles that you visit.

To enable the feature, simply go to the section titled “Automation Rules”, and check the box that says: “Automatically endorse the Top 3 skill(s) of a profile when visiting”.

That adds another layer of engagement, it seems.

From my own content marketing experiments, the reply rate tends to be higher when you take the initiative to endorse the skills of every profile that you visit.

We cover this technique in closer depth in Step 6.

Step 5: Direct Message to group members with your content

Another powerful way that you can engage with the group members is by sending them a direct message.

To send Group members a Direct Message is really easy.

Go to the Groups page, and open up the member’s list by clicking on the number of members in that group as I’ve shown earlier.

Then, hover over a member’s name, and you should see a box that pops up like this:

Click on the mail button, and you’ll be redirected to a Direct Message Box to that member.

Sadly, this is the part where I see many people messing up as well.

In your first message, you should not, and should never try to sell anything but a conversation and relationship with the other party.

Think about it this way. Would you like it if you were walking along one day, and you see a random stranger come up to you and start selling something to you?

Chances are, you wouldn’t.

A more subtle approach

That being said, a more relevant method is to reach out with a simple message that says the following:

Hey [insert name of connection],  great to be connected with you in [ insert name of group].

I’m always on the lookout to be connected with like-minded individuals like yourself.

How are things going on your end with [insert name a company]?

Take note that not everyone will reply to your message, it’s to be expected.

However, you will definitely see a response from some people, which you can then take to the next level by building rapport, and slowly pushing them to the next stage of the content funnel with your sales and qualifying process.

Bonus Step: Endorse group members

Before you proceed to learn step 6, understand that this step requires you to have a paid version of Dux Soup.

From my own experience, I found that by endorsing the top three skills of the group members that I visit, the level of Engagement and replies that I got increase by over 200%.

This makes sense,  since LinkedIn sends a notification about your most recent endorsements, and asks if you would like to thank the person who endorsed you.

In other words, it makes it really easy for the group member to reach out to you.

This is where you can take it to step 7.

Step 7: When group members reply, counter with relevant content

Once you get any form of replies from these group members, it’s time to engage them with your content.

At this moment, you should already have created a relevant content for the group members to view in Step 1.

Whenever you get a message or reply from a group member, you can send them a counter message change them to view the content the created, such as this:

Hey [ insert name of group member],

Thanks for your reply/ Message.

[ insert you all message and reply to the group members message]

By the way,  I’ve just created a piece of extensive information about [ insert topic].

Thought you might be interested in checking it out.

[ Insert link]

By personalizing the message, and the fact that you are replying to a message that the group member has sent, I found out that this significantly enhances the open rate, as well as that Click through rate to my content.

Step 8: Go for the comments, not just sharing

If you are a seasoned LinkedIn group, you will know that it can be hard to draw attention to your content, especially if the group is very active, with new content being posted constantly.

That being said, I found out that comment in the group on the active discussions I actually a very good way of Distributing your content that gets read.

Think about it.

Discussions that highly engaged with by the group members content that is closely watched by the commenters, but is also more likely to draw the attention of existing group members.

That being said, your article stands a higher chance of being read, if it is:

• Relevant to that particular discussion
• Adds value to the existing conversation
• Supports the point that you’re trying to make in the discussion

Remember, the more relevant and valuable information to share with the group, The more likely they will be to check out any new discussions that you post in the future.

Ask yourself the following questions:

• Is this discussion relevant to my industry?
• Can I provide any comments that are insightful and valuable to the group members?
• Can my link provide further study on the problem, and how to fix it?

Once you pre-qualify the discussion, and you decide that it is relevant to you topic, it’s time to comment, and engage in the discussion.

Always make sure that whenever you link to your own content, it has to be relevant to the point that you make.

Nothing turns readers off more than being redirected to a page that it’s not related to solving the problem.

Step 9: Ask group owner to share content via announcement

Another interesting and creative way that you can get your word out to LinkedIn groups is to make a deal with the group owner.

As I mentioned earlier, all group owners of LinkedIn groups have the ability to make an announcement to the entire group.

They can also pin your discussion at the very top of the group, which obviously gets you more eyeballs and more leads in the process.

Approaching a group owner is very much like approaching an influencer.

The key is present yourself professionally, and build a relationship, before you ask for any favors.

Identify who the group owner is

The first step is to identify who the group owner is.

You can do so by going to the member’s list.

Under the member’s list tab, click on Admin.

Click on it, and you should see a list of the Group Admins.

Again, you can send Group Owners a direct message by hovering over their names and clicking on the mail icon.

Next, you will want to drop the group owner a message, and introduce yourself along the way.

Remember, at this stage, we don’t want to sell anything but a relationship.

A good introductory message could go something like this:

Hi [ group owner’s name],

It’s a pleasure to be connected to you via your group [ insert group name]

I hope things are going well with [ insert name of company].

That being said, I just wanted to reach out to you, because I think you’re doing a fantastic job with [ insert name of group].

Cheers!

Now that you have sent the group owner and introductory message, it doesn’t mean that you can expect a reply, simply because they might not have time to reply to a message, have too many messages, or just didn’t see it.

But that doesn’t mean that your work is done.

Instead, you can look out for posts by these admins on the group.

Read through what the discussion is about, and note down the group owner’s viewpoint on the topic.

For example, suppose the group owner has written a piece of content or started a discussion on the group about a particular method of doing things,  he or she would no doubt list down the reasons for thinking in that particular way.

That being said, you can comment on these discussions by sharing your own inside, and following the steps that we have a little later in the comment section.

By now, if you have engaged the group enough, you should have gotten the attention of the group owner.

This means that it would be a good time to send them another message.

This might go something like this:

Hey [ insert name of group owner],

It’s been awhile since I heard from you, ever since my last message.

Just wanted to check in, and see if everything was going fine.

P.S.  love your discussion on [insert name of LinkedIn group] on [insert topic of the discussion you just commented on],  by the way,  I’ve also shared my insights there as well. Let me know what you think!

Finally, once you have some kind of a conversation going between you and a group owner, it’s time to request for a possible collaboration between the both of you.

You can do so by sending a message set looks something like this:

Hey [ insert name of group owner],

Hope everything’s going fine with [ insert name of LinkedIn group]  and [ insert name of group owner’s Company].

I was creating this piece of Epic content on [ insert topic],  and I was thinking who might be interested in reading this, and getting epic value out of it, when I thought of [ insert name of LinkedIn group].

Being an active member of [ insert name of LinkedIn group],  I’ve come to appreciate and understand the members who are in the group quite extensively.

That being said, I am quite confident they would be able to bring their understanding of [ insert topic] to the next level with this guide.

I want to put it up front that my intention with this guide is not to sell anything but to really add value to everyone in [ insert name of LinkedIn group].

That being said, [ insert name of group owner],  I was wondering if you would like to do a possible collaboration between the two of us, to do a group announcement about this piece of content?

Whatever the outcome, [ insert name LinkedIn Group owner],  keep Rockin this group!

Cheers,

[your name]

If all goes well, and you follow the steps that I’ve laid out extensively earlier,  getting the group owner to post an announcement on your behalf shouldn’t be too difficult.

Step 10: Be careful of publishing requirements and restrictions

At every step of the way, posting on LinkedIn groups can bring you a ton of quality leads and sales opportunities consistently.

However, take note that at the end of the day, you don’t have control over whether your content is distributed or not.

Therefore, you should always keep in mind the limitations, publishing requirements, and restrictions if there’s any.

Conclusion

At the end of the day, LinkedIn groups offer a cheap and cost-effective, sometimes free, way of getting the word out about your content, and translating that traffic into conversion, leads, and sales.

The key, however, is to approach LinkedIn content distribution as a relationship building game, just like any other content distribution technique out there.

Remember, those are real humans behind every single profile!

Did I miss out any steps that you can take to generate high-quality leave continuously in LinkedIn groups?

Do you have any other techniques on LinkedIn Groups that can help to generate more leads?

Share your comments down below! I read every comment.

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About the Author

John Chen is most commonly referred to as the Human Guinea Pig in Content Marketing.

His Content Marketing Experiments and Product Reviews have helped thousands of business owners, entrepreneurs and bloggers find clarity in their brands, and take their online presence to the next level.

He has helped professionals from multinational corporations like Microsoft and Accenture scale their personal brands with the right content and powerful words that persuade and sell.

John is now carving his own content marketing journey at Contentrific, where he shares his every step and move to a $100,000 per month brand.

You can catch John on Twitter @Contentrific, read more about him here, or listen to his content ramblings on his site Contentrific, where he teaches entrepreneurs, professionals and small teams to grow their audience the right way with persuasive content.

In Google’s “The Changing Face of B2B Marketing“, they dispelled the myth that B2B marketing should only target the highest-level executives.

They discovered through their research with Millward Brown Digital that in reality, B2B researchers who are not in the C-suite also influence purchase decisions.

“While 64% of the C-suite have final sign off, so do almost a quarter (24%) of the non-C-suite. What’s more, it’s the latter that has the most influence; 81% of non-C-suiters have a say in purchase decisions.” ThinkWithGoogle

Getting Access To The Decision Maker

CEB Marketing surveyed more than 5,000 stakeholders involved in B2B purchases and discovered that, on average, 5.4 people formally sign off on purchases.

This number tallies with research from SiriusDecsions that there are 6-8 people in the average sized B2B buying committee.

Although they may not all be C-level executives, they are all decision makers in their right.

Collectively decisions are made between this group and therefore, you need to engage with each of them.

When running your demand generation campaigns, you need to ensure you are targeting each relevant decision maker.

It is important because early access to decision makers is vital to an effective and efficient conversion of business leads.

Efficient Conversion

Of greatest importance, early access to the decision makers allows you the most direct path to a sale – albeit there are different people involved.

People at the top are most aware of the critical issues facing a company, along with the strategic direction the company is taking. And ultimately the final decision will rest with them.

But firms must not underestimate the importance of engaging all of the potential decision makers.

As McKinsey&Company have noted in their report (full PDF link) “The B2B Customer Decision Journey: For The Best Route to Increasing Sales”, it is imperative that organisations understand what it is that drives customer decisions to make informed choices when it comes to allocating resources.

Time Savings?

A close extension of the opportunity for efficient conversion is time savings. When you get early access to the right people, you avoid investing a lot of time and energy interacting with someone not authorised to make purchase decisions.

Often, companies call on the first contact discovered when sourcing business leads. If that person isn’t empowered to make decisions, they can feel that their time invested is a waste.

However, although that person may not be the primary decision maker, she could very well be involved in the decision-making process as an influencer.

Or it could simply be that she is not interested in being involved at this early stage.

Higher-Quality, Value-Orientated Solutions

Even when other contacts at a company can make purchase decisions, your best chance to sell a high-value solution is with top-level decision makers.

Managers closer to the front lines usually focus on a practical usage of products, whereas top leaders look for solutions that help achieve revenue or cost-savings objectives.

They understand that providers of high-quality solutions charge more than inferior competitors.

Selling higher value solutions is crucial to optimise sales growth and results as well.

Successful deals with top decision makers are more likely to set the stage for recurring sales and referrals to other senior leaders.

When you prove your worth to company executives and stay committed to the relationship, you take on the role of a partner.

This is what Jim Holden, business author and world-renowned leader in the sales process improvement field, would call Stage III or Stage IV sellers – “true compete sellers and customer advisors”.

Align Your Content Strategy

The evidence of the value of early access to the top decision maker is obvious. You can save a lot of time and money with reaching the top contacts, while also increasing your opportunities to close high-value deals with business leads.

However, it is not enough to only identify the right decision makers. Your team needs to be able to influence each of these people at each point in their buyer journey by aligning your content strategy.

One of the simplest and most efficient ways of doing this is through working with an organisation that can reach each of these decision makers and target them with bespoke content specifically for them.

Let’s say you work for a company that sells HR software. The Marketing Director doesn’t want to read a research paper about streamlining HR processes.

But he may well want to know about the impact your software will have around employee advocacy.

Get your messaging correct for each of the decision makers in your target audience and success will follow.

• Julius Caesar was assassinated on the Ides of March over 2,000 years ago.
• Caesar held a number of roles over the course of his career, serving as a high priest, general, and dictator.
• His actions and assassination contributed to the downfall of the faltering Roman Republic.

Julius Caesar had a pretty bad day at work on March 15, 44 BCE. The dictator of Rome was lured to a meeting and stabbed to death by his coworkers.

He would've done well to beware the Ides of March.

Several years earlier, the politician and general had rose to power in a civil war. His assassination sparked yet another civil war that doomed the Roman Republic. The state ended up mutating into an empire, with Caesar's adopted heir Octavian at the helm.

Today, Caesar is still considered one of the greatest military commanders in history. His name is also synonymous with cults of personality and political strongmen.

So how exactly did the one-time high priest of Jupiter accrue so much power during his lifetime?

Business Insider looked through some of his own writings — as well as the less-reliable but still interesting works of contemporary ancient writers — to get a sense of his leadership style.

SEE ALSO: 9 timeless lessons from the great Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius

DON'T MISS: I read the 87-year-old book recommended by Elon Musk, and my favorite chapter reveals the dark side of innovation and adventure

1. Presentation matters

The best leaders don't just do amazing things — they know how to present a compelling story.

After a relatively brief war with a certain Pharnacles II of Pontus, Caesar had to sit down and write out a report to Rome detailing his conquest. According to both Greek biographer Plutarch and Roman historian Suetonius, the commander didn't go into too much detail, writing simply: "I came, I saw, I conquered."

The phrase proved so catchy that we still remember it, centuries later.

Caesar could have gone on and on about his military prowess (in fact, he was the author of several long military accounts). Instead, he realized that the simple note would convey the most powerful message.

2. Take risks

In ancient Rome, crossing the Rubicon River with an army was kind of a big deal. It was tantamount to a declaration of war and could be punishable by death.

When Caesar crossed the Rubicon with his legion, he put everything on the line. In "The Life of the Deified Julius," Suetonius writes that Caesar quoted an Athenian playwright as he crossed the river, declaring "the die is cast."

He risked it all and it paid off (in the short-term, at least).

3. There's nothing wrong with starting small

Oftentimes, you've got to start out as a large fish in a small pond in order to succeed as a leader.

Caesar understood this. He managed to climb back into a position of power, even after losing his inheritance in a coup as a young man.

According to the ancient Plutarch's "Parallel Lives," the general also made a rather curious remark while passing through a small village in the Alps: "I assure you I had rather be the first man here than the second man in Rome."

See the rest of the story at Business Insider

Security issues surrounding cyber commerce and communication must surely be among the most unsettling in an age in which the world has never been more dependent on instant interconnectivity.

Hacking allegations surrounding the US election continue to cause unease; critical infrastructure is in danger of becoming a target; denial of service attacks are becoming increasingly common; and even the defences of high profile names such as Yahoo, LinkedIn and Tesco have been breached.

It would be reasonable, in such a climate, to expect that the impact on the cloud-based systems which host day-to-day interactions would be dramatic.

However despite incidents which have attracted headlines in 2016 (a year in which more than two billion records were stolen) there still appears to be a strong element of trust in the integrity of the cloud.

Why should this be the case? Well, over a career which has focused on migrating businesses large and small to the cloud, I have found that accessibility, flexibility, mobility, reliability and costs trump concerns about security in the vast majority of cases.

I suspect the underlying reason is that users are now comfortable with the cloud as an essential component of their communications infrastructure. Look at the billions who use cloud-hosted facilities such as Gmail and Facebook on a daily, if not hourly, basis.

It is not hard to understand why this element of trust exists. The proven benefits include disaster recovery, hot backups, scalability, data encryption, role level access and strong password policies.

Another important benefit, referred to as data redundancy, is the process of having a constant backup on another server so that in the event of a catastrophe the system could shut down immediately and all the stored data would jump onto one of thousands of new servers worldwide with only limited disruption.

In recognition that we are in a rolling battle with the cyber criminals, the EU is introducing the General Data Protection Regulation in May 2018 as a result of which global companies such as NetSuite are required to be compliant with data centres for EU customers hosted within the EU.

The US also is increasingly turning the spotlight on to accountability, with organisations such as the Federal Trade Commission taking a strict line with companies for perceived security beaches or privacy failures.

In a climate of security challenges, some organisations – particularly smaller ones – may still consider self-hosting, on the grounds that data remains within their control, affording an apparent peace of mind.

But that perceived assurance comes with a cost. That cost includes the need to purchase additional hardware to scale up, data and time loss in an outage, and fees which are incurred whether or not all the resources are used.

Given that the conflict with the criminal side of the connected world is not going to cease anytime soon, it makes sense to have the best possible defences.

And that, for the foreseeable future, means the cloud.