When you’re searching for a specific email, any type of search parameter that can help you find a message is useful. Digital Inspiration shows off how to really focus your search with an undocumented Gmail search trick that lets you look for emails from a specific time.
With how fast the sales world is moving, sales performance hacks are more necessary than ever before.
There are always new competitors popping up as well as new products similar to your own that are being marketed differently.
And that is why it is so important to find and utilize any advantages that will help your team save time and become more efficient at their daily tasks.
So to help your sales team continue to improve and evolve, here are 4 performance-enhancing hacks.
Sure, chewing gum is great for keeping your breath fresh, but did you know that it can actually help improve your sales performance?
According to a recent study performed by St. Lawrence University, chewing gum can:
In that study, 159 participants were tasked with solving a slew of difficult cognitive tasks, such as memory challenges and dot matrix equations.
Of the 159 participants, half were given gum to chew prior to testing, and the other half did not receive any gum.
The results?
The study participants that chewed gum performed much better than the participants who did not, on nearly all of the tests.
This was due to heightened mental activity caused by chewing, which was shown to improve cognitive performance.
The other discovery, however, was that the brain-boosting benefits were only a temporary effect, lasting around 20 minutes.
Since you do not want your sales reps chewing gum while on sales calls, a great way to maximize this sales performance hack is to have your reps chew gum before or during a training session.
That way their alertness and memory levels are at their peak, and they can process and retain information more effectively.
If your sales team is achieving its goals regularly, then you are probably already setting goals daily.
But if your team is struggling and you feel like there is room for improvement, then maybe it is time to start setting goals more often.
This strategy works because setting goals daily keeps you and your team focused and on the road to success.
Here is a simple exercise that can help with setting goals each day:
Ask your sales team to do this each day and avoid looking back at the previous day’s goals.
At first, writing 10 specific goals with specific deadlines may seem challenging, but as your team continues to write down their goals every day:
By having your sales team spend a few quick minutes every day to “program” their minds for success, they will feel less burdened by daily tasks, and they will be able to handle challenges with greater ease as they come.
Yes, you read that right.
According to research from Wheeling Jesuit University, inhaling the aroma of peppermint can help improve cognitive abilities.
The simple aroma of peppermint was shown to improve memory and attention spans, while also increasing alertness and energy levels.
So how can you take advantage of this sweet performance hack?
Place some peppermint air fresheners around the office or provide fresh mint leaves in the kitchen to give your salespeople’s brains a boost. You can even combine this with tip number one (above) and chew some peppermint gum!
A Customer Relationship Management (or CRM) system allows your sales team to efficiently keep track of vital information collected from your prospects, leads and customers.
With the help of CRM software, you can store important data such as contact information, specific account information and other notes all in one spot.
That way, your team does not have to worry about losing track of vital information and you and your salespeople can quickly access all of it whenever needed.
Many sales reps, however, are hesitant to use CRM software for several reasons, including:
Whatever the reason, remind your sales team that using a CRM tool will help them use their time more efficiently, thus allowing them to focus on larger sales goals.
Sell your team on the idea of CRM software by showing them how using this tool can help improve their sales results and work more efficiently.
Let your salespeople try out the CRM software while you guide them through the process, and if possible, show them some positive results from using the CRM (such as a boost in personal productivity or sales).
With this sales performance-enhancing hack, you and your reps will never need to dig through an old-school Rolodex or poorly-organized spreadsheet ever again.
By getting your sales team to spend a little time upfront to gather and enter customer information into one system, they are saving tons of time in the long run, allowing them to focus on their overall sales performance.
Now that you know a few quick “hacks” to help improve your team’s sales performance, remember to focus on specific goals.
In addition, make sure you and your team take advantage of the extra time and/or the boost in productivity that you are getting from these helpful tips.
Even if you are only saving an hour every day, that adds up to over six weeks throughout the year—and that is a lot of valuable time that you can spend growing other areas of your business.
The post 4 Sales Performance-Enhancing Hacks to Boost Your Business appeared first on SalesDrive, LLC.
You’ve got a really great salesperson in your organization that you may be overlooking or ignoring. This salesperson will never take a sick day, ask for a raise, or leave you to go to one of your competitors. How great is that?
It’s your blog.
Think about it for a minute. What does a really great salesperson do for an organization? They know the customer. They’re able to remember lots of personal things about each customer. They know the brand inside out. They always ask the right questions and never forget to cover all the bases. And they always, without fail, follow up. They constantly learn from each new experience, thus improving their sales technique. Isn’t that exactly what an efficient well-designed blog does? Here are the 4 simple ways your blog should be selling for you:
Your blog is specifically designed to capture a prospect’s information. The more the prospect interacts with your blog the more information it will extract from them, until the site has a pretty clear indication of the prospect’s demographics, spending habits, hobbies, likes, dislikes, contact information, etc. Now isn’t that exactly what a good salesperson is supposed to do? Information is power, and it is also the basis for all customer conversion. Your blog can gather information and apply it much more accurately than any human salesperson. Typically, Google Analytics is where you will be able to analyze this data and see what demographics and behaviors you’re working with. Below is an example of an Analytics dashboard that shows some of this information, but of course Analytics can go much deeper than that. Learn more here.
How often has one of your salespersons been thrown for a loop because he or she did not know all the specifics of the product they were selling, or were brought up short when the prospective customer told them something about a competing brand that made a definite sale much more of a challenge? It happens all the time with human beings because memory is not perfect and knowledge is not absolute. Except with a computer. As long as your blog is constantly updated with all the information there is about your product, and about your competitors, it can handle every question and challenge from a prospect in a New York minute.
I recommend not only having a sales page to sell your product, but actually creating Buyer’s Guides (a different kind of blog). This will allow you to get more detailed into the product, so whether you’re a salesperson or not you’ll have a resource when you need it. ResourceNation.com does a great job of this (see their Table of Contents below).
Nobody cares for a pushy salesperson or for a hard sell. Consumers appreciate it when they are educated about the benefits of a product, and given encouragement to try it through the use of discounts and other marketing measures. A blog is the ideal place for a prospect to research your brand without feeling any undue pressure to buy right away. They can look at pricing, specifications, guarantees, and a whole lot more, without feeling pinned down by a salesperson in their office or home taking up their time. They can look your brand over at their convenience, at their own pace. And statistics show that consumers love that kind of salesmanship. The more someone can learn, the more likely they are to make a move in the future, so it’s important they have that opportunity.
Once the consumer decides he or she wants to purchase your brand or product, they are still not fully committed to the sale. The least little inconvenience or hindrance or brand new doubt can kill the sale instantly, never to be revived again. If your blog is set up so that ordering and payment can be done easily and conveniently, moving the prospect along at a comfortable pace to the moment where they click on the “Purchase Item” button, you will see your sales going up. By the same token, once your blog is programmed to follow up on every purchaser within a specified time frame, you won’t have to worry about this important keystone for future sales being forgotten or postponed by human error. Workshops for Warriors, a nonprofit that isn’t selling but rather asking for donations (it’s the same concept!), does this well by adding a donate feature next to every blog post. Some may find it distracting, but when you realize you don’t have to take action and it is a part of the blog it makes it more approachable:
Is there anything you would add to the list? Let us know in the comment section below.
Also read: Here’s How To Go From Blogger To Ecommerce Entrepreneur
Feature Image Credit: nextgenleads.com
Email can be nerve-racking.
How long should you make your thank-you note to the person who met you for an informational interview? How do you reply to your team telling them that their project isn't quite up to snuff without making them cry?
Enter "Unsubscribe: How to Kill Email Anxiety, Avoid Distractions, and Get Real Work Done," a new book by Jocelyn Glei that promises to provide simple answers to those tricky questions.
Below, we've rounded up some of Glei's best tips, based on her book and her interview with Business Insider. Read on and email them to all your friends …
As in: "I don't think these designs are where I want them to be yet."
Glei cites research by psychologist Carol Dweck, who says that the word "yet" helps cultivate in people a "growth mindset," so that they want to keep trying until they get it right.
Using this word "automatically shifts to this mindset where they are on a timeline, making progress," Glei said.
Most emails get opened for the first time on a mobile device. And a message that looks fine on a laptop might look epic — in a bad way — on a phone.
So test it out before you send anything to a busy or important person.
"You always have to take into account that someone will be processing that message on-the-go, in an impatient state, at a glance," Glei said. That means you need to "be concise and to get right to the point."
Glei said that whatever enthusiasm you intend to convey gets taken down a notch when the recipient reads your email: "When the sender thinks it's neutral, receivers tend to think it's more negative."
So if you think you sound overly upbeat, you probably sound normally enthusiastic. That's why it's not necessarily unprofessional to use an exclamation point or two in your message.
To boost your chances of getting a reply, make sure you establish your credibility early on in the message, especially if the recipient doesn't know you. Then get straight to the ask.
"In a short-attention span world, it's best to get right to the point immediately and do your explaining later," Glei writes in "Unsubscribe." "Think about what will appear in the two-line message preview the recipient will see as she scrolls through her inbox: Will it capture her attention?"
"If you're asking a question, propose a solution," Glei writes.
In other words, "What do you think about X?" isn't the best idea.
If you're requesting time off, for example, explain that it will be a slow period, your coworker has agreed to cover for you, and it will help you come back rested for the next big push.
Say someone emails you asking you for an introduction to someone in your network. You don't have to comply.
Glei writes that making a connection or intro means you're implicitly endorsing the people you connect. So if you don't feel comfortable, say so.
For example: "I'd love to help you out, but my relationship with [insert contact's name] is still fairly new, so I don't really feel comfortable making introductions at this juncture."
"It makes people feel warm and fuzzy inside to know they have helped someone," Glei writes. "… It also makes them more likely to help you or someone else again next time."
Here's one template you can use: "Hi Mark — We've been getting tons of positive feedback on the new responsive website you coded for us. Traffic is up 50% on mobile! We could never have done it without you. Much appreciation for all of your great work on the project."
"You always want to frame whatever you're asking in terms of the value for them as opposed to the value for you," Glei said.
Ask yourself: "How can I step into their shoes?" What would feel like a strong value proposition to them?"
One thing to avoid in your subject lines, according to Glei: ALL CAPS.
SEE ALSO: Here's the exact email to send your boss when you want them to say yes to something
Join the conversation about this story »
NOW WATCH: How to craft the subject of your emails so that people will open them
Mobile-app makers and content creators are vying for consumer attention in a crowded and noisy market.
Even if an app can stand out enough to prompt a consumer to download it from among a list of millions, it then faces the challenge of enticing him or her to use it enough times to recuperate development, maintenance, and marketing costs. To make matters worse, those marketing costs have hit record-high levels over the past year as discoverability has become more challenging.
And while consumers are spending more time in apps, most of that time is spent in a few favorites. Consumers spend almost three-quarters of their total smartphone app time in just their three favorite apps, according to comScore.
But it's not all doom and gloom: There are numerous tools at a publisher's disposal to engage and re-engage consumers, and there are new products and solutions coming to market that can help alleviate some of the issues around this app engagement crisis.
In a new report from BI Intelligence, we explore the current state of the app market, the issues around engaging consumers, and the tools at a publisher's disposal. We then identify best practices for the implementation of some app engagement tools, and present the pitfalls that some publishers fall into in this pursuit.
Here are some key takeaways from the report:
In full, the report:
Interested in getting the full report? Here are two ways to access it:
In part 1 of this blog series, I posed the problem of how quickly jobs and opportunities are changing and how we, as parents, can prepare our children for career success in an unpredictable future. I mentioned having an approach that I believe will teach children to cope with whatever job they pursue in the unpredictable technology-driven future.
It’s borrowed from my experience in software development methodologies and involves taking concepts from Agile development and applying them to create learning processes that develop the right skills.
Agile development ‘helps teams respond to unpredictability through incremental, iterative work cadences and empirical feedback’ meaning it provides a way to deliver software projects in the context of high levels of unpredictability. Though not all Agile techniques are relevant here, there are two core techniques that I believe provide a framework for parents who wish to raise an Agile child:
Agile development dictates that instead of spending months providing an end-to-end specification, detailing every aspect of a software project upfront – only for it to change during the course of the project – rather agree on a high-level direction and start delivering working, valuable software within the first 2 weeks.
This is achieved by the team discussing and agreeing on a feature or tool that is required within the project, planning the details at the beginning of the delivery period called a ‘cadence’ and then demonstrating it by the end of the period. Not only does this approach guarantee that there will be working, valuable software early on in the project, it also allows for the software to be validated i.e. ensures that it solves or contributes to solving a problem.
To apply this method as parents – you identify a high-level direction for your child’s future career (technology, finance, creative/arts, entrepreneurship). Then you define a skill, practice or knowledge area that your child can learn and demonstrate within a specified period or cadence (usually these are not longer than 4 weeks).
It is best to plan the learning process at the beginning of the cadence with your child. This involves agreeing on the parent-led interaction sessions, as well as the self-study (practice) sessions. You also need to agree on what will be demonstrated by the end of the cadence. Clarify that this process must be driven by your child (side note: you’ll be surprised how even young children take to this responsibility with the incentive of impressing their parents at the end of the cadence period).
Check-in every morning with your child for 5 minutes to see how they are progressing. If they are struggling with a particular aspect, provide guidance on how to fix it or agree on a time to sit together and work through the problem. At the end of the cadence, gather the family in the lounge and allow your child to demonstrate what they have achieved.
You’ll be shocked at how effective this approach is in teaching your child a new skill, practice or knowledge area.
By delivering and demonstrating each piece of software in short cadences and allowing the customer to validate the value of the software, the direction of the project can be adjusted. This is to ensure that it remains in line with the evolutionary understanding of the project goal and resulting requirement changes.
As the customer’s vision becomes clearer over time, the software delivery process corrects course where necessary and refines future deliverables to more accurately target the end goal.
Similarly, as the influence of technology plays out on the market and your child’s interests and preferences come to the fore, the skills/practices/knowledge-areas delivered during each cadence can be adjusted to follow the desired course.
As your child’s talents and interests become clearer over time, the learning process can correct its course where necessary and refine future deliverables to more accurately target the goal – a successful, fulfilling future career.
I have no doubt that many parents will see this approach as onerous. It does require dedication and discipline, but in my opinion, the results are worth the effort.
While I have been using Agile in the software environment for many years, I‘ve only recently introduced it into my home. I have seen immediate results with my 6-year-old daughter. It is clearly accelerating her ability to learn new skills and is teaching her practical techniques for approaching long-term, evolving projects which are common in the workplace.
It would be great to hear your thoughts on the above and get feedback on your experience in using these techniques to prepare your children for the unpredictable future.
Footnote: the above technique also incorporates the principles of ‘deliberate practice’ defined in the book Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise by K. Anders Ericsson, Robert Pool – a worthwhile read for all parents.
According to Forbes, over 72% of Gen Z plans to start their own business one day. One question many aspiring young professionals ask themselves when building a business is, “How do I build a powerful network? How can I reach out to people and build meaningful connections?”
There is an art to the process—and it’s not just attending networking events.
The fastest route to showing your value as a young professional is to find your niche and start to “own” it.
Too many people want to wait until they have hit a certain point, achieved a certain title (or worse, made a certain amount of money) before they start to establish their thought leadership. But when will you ever be ready? It’s crucial to stop overthinking it.
Chances are, whatever you define that moment to be, once you get there, you’ll still not feel ready. The truth is, you’ll never be truly ready. You just need to take the things you’re interested in, and start.
Start sharing what you learn as you go along. Start providing value to others. Start participating in the larger conversations within your niche or industry. And slowly but surely, people will begin to take notice.
Young people especially still rely too heavily on resumes and job titles to represent who they are and what they do. Instead, start building your presence—both online, and in your immediate community.
Make sure your profile pictures are professional and friendly. Make sure your headers are designed and explain what you do.
Make sure your bios are proofread. Make sure the content you are putting out is a good reflection of who you are and what you know.
If you do these little things, then when people look you up they will be impressed—and when you have a well-crafted personal brand, far more willing to listen to what you have to say.
One of the greatest assets a young person has is social media—and the inherent fluency of each platform. Twitter, for example, is an incredible way to reach out and connect with people you would otherwise never have the opportunity to meet.
You would be surprised how many people (especially in your area) respond and are willing to either hop on a quick call to connect, or meet up for coffee. It’s all about how you present yourself.
The caveat here is that your chances of connecting increase exponentially when you have something to offer of value.
For example: If you are a blogger and you want to “interview” them for a blog, that’s value to them because that’s exposure. Find ways to deliver value and you will end up meeting a lot of people.
Networking is an exponential thing. At first, it’s very difficult, and then once you start to get the ball rolling, it moves very, very fast. An introduction is, and will always be, more effective than cold emailing someone.
Utilize your surrounding network and ask for introductions to people you want to connect with—either through a friend, or a friend of a friend, or a friend of a friend of a friend.
That first impression starting with, “Hey there, I’d like to introduce you to my friend…” is so effective, and is a great way to start expanding your own circle.
The final piece of advice here worth noting is that true networking isn’t really “networking.” It’s just making a lot of friends.
The more people you connect with on a genuine level, the more people will want to help you. The key here is to always focus on how you can first provide the other person value. Offer to introduce them to someone you know.
Offer to help them out in some way. Show your value first, and others will be so much more likely to provide you value as well.
As a small business owner, you know that despite how many subscribers you have on your email list, the search for new ones never stops.
Gaining subscribers — let alone maintaining your current list — can seem like an uphill battle at times, especially when the average email marketing list decreases by approximately 22.5 percent every year.
So what’s the best way to ensure your list continues growing instead of dwindling down? By taking action now that will help replenish your email community and build your audience.
Here are our five top ways to grow your list:
Adding an embedded sign up form to your website or blog is a great first step to growing your email list. But if you already have one featured, it may be time to consider other ways you can optimize your list growth.
Pop up forms, for example, can be a simple yet effective way to bring more attention to your email list. But it’s important to establish a few ground rules before getting started.
For one, you want to make sure the content in your form describes the value your audience will get when they subscribe. So if you already have an awesome email strategy, be sure to communicate that in your form.
This includes setting clear expectations about your email list in your form. Share details around how often you’ll be sending them emails, the type of content they should expect and the overall benefits of being on your list.
Another thing to keep in mind is that you don’t want to interrupt or annoy your website visitors with too many pop ups. Not all forms have to pop up in the middle of a screen and darken the background content. You can use a “sticky” form that unobtrusively remains on the bottom of the page as a user scrolls, or a slide in form on the side of the screen.
You can also set the timing of your pop up forms, so they can display after a user has been on the page for a certain time. Or, set it so the form displays only when a user takes a specific action (like attempting to exit the page) or reaches the bottom of the page.
Here’s an example from our friends at CrazyEgg, who feature a slide-in form that displayed when I scrolled down to the bottom of the post:
As a business owner, you probably already know a consistent social media presence can help you engage with customers, promote special offers and build brand awareness. But did you know that you can use channels like Facebook and Twitter to grow your email marketing list, too?
By encouraging your social followers to sign up for your email list, you’re able to tap into an audience of people who are already interested in your business and what you have to say.
While you can certainly post about the benefits of your email content along with a link to your sign up form, you can also share past emails you’ve sent by linking to your email archive.
If you want to get more creative, consider launching a social contest or giveaway that requires an email address in order to enter.
Or, explore the native opportunities within your social channels to see if there are any ways to add links back to your site or sign up form. Facebook’s call-to-action feature, for example, allows you to include a link directly in your business page cover photo.
When it comes to growing your email marketing list, it’s crucial that you demonstrate the value of your business. After all, most people won’t hand over their email address unless there’s good reason.
That’s why we recommend offering free digital incentives like ebooks, white papers, webinars, or video series as a reward for subscribing to your email list. But if you already offer an incentive, it may be time to consider either updating the content to be more relevant, or swapping it for a new one.
There are tons of digital incentives you could use to gain subscribers, but it’s important to choose ones that fit your business and draw the right audience. Figuring out what types of content get the best response from your subscribers involves some experimenting and varies across industries, but here are some ideas to help you brainstorm:
By providing exclusive, high-value bonuses like the ones listed above, you’re giving people a reason to subscribe to your list. It also creates an opportunity to demonstrate thought leadership in your industry and establish yourself as a trustworthy and valuable source.
Enabling your existing customers to tell their networks about you can be a powerful way to grow your email list. In fact, one study found that 78 percent of consumers said “word-of-mouth” was a top influencer in their purchasing decisions.
Since people are more likely to trust a business of if it’s recommended to them by someone they know, it’s important to make your emails easy to share and subscribe to.
Every time you send an email to subscribers, include social sharing buttons to encourage them to promote your content or ask subscribers to share the email with their friends in a P.S. section. You should also include a “Subscribe” call-to-action at the bottom of your message so someone can easily opt into your list when your email is forwarded to them.
Adding these to every email provides access untapped networks of friends and colleagues who may be interested in learning more about your business.
Here’s a great example from AWeber’s Product Marketing Manger (and host of our Podcast!) Tom Tate, who publishes the e-newsletter, Weekly Coffee:
Notice how there is both an option to subscribe to the email list, as well as one to share it with others. Plus, it’s done in a way that isn’t too promotional.
You never know when you’re going to meet someone interested in signing up for your business’s email list.
That’s why it’s important to be ready when you attend conferences, trade shows, and networking events. By leveraging in-person conversations, you can naturally ask people you meet to sign up to your list. Whether you take their name and email address the old school way with a pen and paper, or download a sign up form app (like our Atom app), it’s an easy way to build relationships with people you meet in person.
Building a list takes time, but there are steps you can take right now to gain subscribers and increase the reach of your audience. I encourage you to choose one tip above, and dedicate time this week to implement it.
Have other ideas for growing your email list? Share in the comments below!
For more ideas on how to grow your email list, download our free case study, How One Blogger Grew Her Email List to 50K and Counting!
The fintech industry is growing every year, and the market is starting to fill up with financial services providers and fintech startups who are trying to fulfill customers' needs and shape the future of finance.
After reaching $19 billion in total in 2015, global fintech funding had already hit $15 billion by mid-August 2016. Several innovative financial services and fintech companies are driving that growth by attracting investors who are offering new financial products and services.
But as more and more companies pour into the fintech space, it can be tough to sift through them and identify the major players. To help, we've listed below the most important financial technology startups across six areas: Banking, Payments, Investment and Financial Management, Insurance, Currency and Exchange, and Lending and Financing.
Note: All employee and funding data comes from Crunchbase.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $17,699,015
One Thing to Know: U.K. digital-only mobile bank Monzo was founded as Mondo in 2015.
Number of Employees: 1 to 10
Total Funding: $70,000,000
One Thing to Know: Amazon Web Services named Starling Bank as one of its four Hot Startups to watch in November 2016.
Number of Employees: 1,000 to 5,000
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Ally Financial went public on April 10, 2014
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $34.8 million
One Thing to Know: Digital-only bank Tandem has an official banking license with the Bank of England.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Groupe BPCE acquired the Munich-based web bank on July 28, 2016.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: $2 million
One Thing to Know: Tide claims it can get you a business MasterCard in just three minutes.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $52.73 million
One Thing to Know: Famous Silicon Valley investor Peter Thiel has backed the company, which obtained a full German banking license in July 2016.
Number of Employees: 251 to 500
Total Funding: $15.29 million
One Thing to Know: Simple has more than 100,000 customers and processed $1.7 billion in annual transactions in 2015.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $166.34 million
One Thing to Know: Atom users can log in to the mobile banking app using facial recognition.
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: $32.45 million
One Thing to Know: The Des Moines-based company announced in November 2016 that it would drop its consumer app.
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Braintree acquired the peer-to-peer payments company in 2012, and today it has become a household name in P2P payments.
Number of Employees: More than 10,000
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: PayPal was founded on December 1, 1998 and acquired by eBay on July 8, 2002.
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: $34.6 million
One Thing to Know: PayPal-owned Paydiant uses a cloud-based platform that helps merchants and banks deploy their own mobile wallets inside their own apps.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: The mobile wallet supports more than 300 banks, and Samsung has plans to add more.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Visa Checkout has partnerships with Best Buy, Starbucks, the Home Shopping Network, Under Armour, and more.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $1.75 million
One Thing to Know: BitPesa currently accepts Bitcoin and delivered fiat currency directly to mobile phones in Kenya, Nigeria, Uganda, and Tanzania. It also sells Bitcoin in Kenya, Nigeria, and Uganda.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $147.66 million
One Thing to Know: WorldRemit is available in more than 50 countries and has received backing from investors such as Accel Partners and TCV.
Number of Employees: 501 to 1,000
Total Funding: $440 million
One Thing to Know: Stripe's latest funding round of $150 million values the company at more than $9 billion.
Number of Employees: 251 to 500
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: The PayPal-owned company powers payments for companies such as Airbnb, Facebook, GitHub, Pinterest, and Uber.
Number of Employees: 1,000 to 5,000
Total Funding: $291.33 million
One Thing to Know: Klarna recently acquired Berlin-based peer-to-peer payment startup Cookies, which had announced its was shutting down.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Android Pay has a nearly 60% market penetration in Singapore.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Chase Pay officially debuted its app on November 21, 2016.
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: $46.59 million
One Thing to Know: Azimo promises money transfers in one hour or less.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: PayPal acquired this international money transfer company on July 2, 2015.
Number of Employees: 251 to 500
Total Funding: $172.29 million
One Thing to Know: iZettle boasts the world's first mini chip card reader and software for mobile devices in 2010.
Number of Employees: 501 to 1,000
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Square went public on November 19, 2015 and raised $243 million.
Number of Employees: 251 to 500
Total Funding: $266 million
One Thing to Know: Adyen's customers include Facebook, Uber, Netflix, Spotify, Airbnb, Yelp, Booking.com, SoundCloud, Vodafone, and more.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $72.2 million
One Thing to Know: ShopKeep has more than 23,000 customers and is a member of Apple's Mobile Partnership Program.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $100 million
One Thing to Know: Remitly operates in 49 of the 50 U.S. states and Washington D.C., as well as Canada.
Number of Employees: 251 to 500
Total Funding: $116.37 million
One Thing to Know: Transferwise CEO Taavet Hinrikus was part of the small team that started Skype in 2003.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Apple Pay launched on October 20, 2014.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $205 million
One Thing to Know: Betterment is the most popular robo-advisor in the U.S. and has more than $6 billion in assets under management.
Number of Employees: More than 10,000
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: The Vanguard Group manages approximately $3.6 trillion in assets.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: BillGuard announced on September 24, 2015 that it would become part of Prosper Marketplace.
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: $29.81 million
One Thing to Know: Moneyfarm operates in Italy and the United Kingdom.
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: $66 million
One Thing to Know: Robinhood has a service called Robinhood gold that allows for pre-market and after-market trading, additional buying power, and larger instant deposits.
Number of Employees: 1 to 10
Total Funding: $3.59 million
One Thing to Know: Advizr CEO Hussain Zaidi worked as a client-facing advisor for 12 years before he came up with the idea for his company.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: $75.02 million
One Thing to Know: Nutmeg specializes in ISAs and pensions.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: $129.5 million
One Thing to Know: Wealthfront manages accounts less than $10,000 for free and charges a 0.25% fee after that.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $2.2 million
One Thing to Know: Habito targets home buyers and tries to remove the friction of mortgage applications.
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: $126.5 million
One Thing to Know: Motif offers eight different types of accounts for different varieties of investors.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $1.85 million
One Thing to Know: Hedgeable focuses on millennials and touts itself as "your personal investing sensei."
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: $60 million
One Thing to Know: SigFig has backing from UBS, New York Life, Santander InnoVentures, Eaton Vance, Comerica Bank, and more.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $12.27 million
One Thing to Know: The Munich-based company focuses primarily on risk management.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Intuit acquired Mint on September 14, 2009.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $25.66 million
One Thing to Know: Wealthsimple is the largest automated investing service in Canada.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Charles Schwab went public on January 10, 2003.
Number of Employees: 11-50
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Bought by Many was a Fintech Innovation Awards winner in 2015 and 2016.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $3.9 million
One Thing to Know: The insurance technology startup offers a pay-per-use policy for Uber and Lyft drivers while they are on the job.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $11.8 million
One Thing to Know: Shift Technology uses data to automatically detect networks of fraudsters in the insurance and e-commerce sectors.
Number of Employees: 1 to 10
Total Funding: $759,150
One Thing to Know: The UK-based company provides insurance on a car for only as long as the customer needs it, whether that's an hour or a day.
Number of Employees: 251 to 500
Total Funding: $727.5 million
One Thing to Know: The health insurance startup was founded on July 1, 2013.
Number of Employees: 1 to 10
Total Funding: $40,000
One Thing to Know: WeSavvy provides insurance policy rewards for healthy behaviors such as walking, running, and bicycling.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $18.3 million
One Thing to Know: The mobile insurance company has offices in Switzerland, Germany, and Serbia.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $6.48 million
One Thing to Know: Roost specializes in smart home technology.
Number of Employees: 1 to 10
Total Funding: $682,710
One Thing to Know: Kasko was founded on New Year's Day 2015.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $13 million
One Thing to Know: Lemonade has access to more than 2,500 retailers and advertisers through back-end partnerships with companies such as Apple, Netflix, Macy's, Nordstrom, Walmart, and more.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Teambrella's users provide coverage to each other. When one person submits a claim within his or her team, the teammates reimburse it.
Number of Employees: 1 to 10
Total Funding: $44,000
One Thing to Know: Fitsense uses wearables data to help insurance companies personalize their health and life insurance packages for individuals.
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: $15.3 million
One Thing to Know: The P2P insurance company rewards small user groups with cash back bonuses at the end of the year if they remain claimless.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $4.11 million
One Thing to Know: Cocoon specializes in smart home security.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $93.6 million
One Thing to Know: Ripple claims that it has partnerships with 15 of the top 50 banks.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $6.5 million
One Thing to Know: The bitcoin exchange says it was the first to have its trading price and volume displayed on the Bloomberg terminal.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $117.21 million
One Thing to Know: Coinbase was founded on June 1, 2012.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $10 million
One Thing to Know: Bitstamp was the first regulated and licensed virtual currency exchange in the European Union.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: BTC is the world's largest Bitcoin media group.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: Ethereum works with bitcoin, developer APIs, consumer applications, and more.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: $67.2 million
One Thing to Know: Digital Asset has formed partnerships with Accenture, Broadridge, and PwC.
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: $136 million
One Thing to Know: Goldman Sachs, Accel, and other heavyweights have poured their financial support into Circle.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: AvantCredit, a subsidiary of Avant, has lent more than £2 billion to more than 450,000 around the world.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: $68.63 million
One Thing to Know: Zopa was one of the first three members of the U.K.'s Peer-to-Peer Finance Association, along with FundingCircle and RateSetter.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $11.50 million
One Thing to Know: Bond Street offers small business loans of $50,000 to $500,000 with rates starting at 6% for terms of one to three years.
Number of Employees: 501 to 1,000
Total Funding: $1.38 billion
One Thing to Know: SoFi has loaned $13 billion to date to more than 200,000 members.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $4.94 million
One Thing to Know: Assetz claims that no investor has ever made a loss in its automatic investment accounts.
Number of Employees: 251 to 500
Total Funding: $273.24 million
One Thing to Know: Funding Circle has provided loans to more than 20,000 businesses and helped more than 55,000 people around the world invest in small businesses.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $74.34 million
One Thing to Know: Younited Credit was formerly known as Prêt d'Union.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $44.70 million
One Thing to Know: Orchard uses its technology and infrastructure to build systems that help marketplace lenders grow.
Number of Employees: 1,000 to 5,000
Total Funding: $91 million
One Thing to Know: The company is the largest online consumer lending marketplace in China that serves online users and the growing middle class in the world's most populous nation.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $24.8 million
One Thing to Know: Through the third quarter of 2016, Patch of Land had $194,083,766 in loans originated, $168,283,766 in loans funded, and returned $46,733,895 to investors.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $111.5 million
One Thing to Know: LendUp offers credit education courses through its website that cover credit building, consumer credit rights, and more.
Number of Employees: 501 to 1,000
Total Funding: $354.9 million
One Thing to Know: Prosper was the first marketplace lender in the U.S. when it launched in 2006.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $420 million
One Thing to Know: The San Francisco-based financial services company was found in 2012.
Number of Employees: 251 to 500
Total Funding: $152.19 million
One Thing to Know: Kreditech focuses on providing credit access to people with little or no credit history.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $198.18 million
One Thing to Know: Auxmoney is a German peer-to-peer loan marketplace.
Number of Employees: 501 to 1,000
Total Funding: $190 million
One Thing to Know: OnDeck has delivered more than $5 billion to small businesses worldwide.
Number of Employees: 101 to 250
Total Funding: $58.62 million
One Thing to Know: LendInvest touts itself as the UK's leading online platform for property lending and investing.
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: $7.01 million
One Thing to Know: Bondora has processed more than 400 million euro in loan applications from prime and near-prime borrowers.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $51 million
One Thing to Know: Lendio takes a customer's free application and places it in front of more than 75 lenders.
Number of Employees: 501 to 1,000
Total Funding: N/A
One Thing to Know: CEO Renaud Laplanche resigned after an internal probe in early May 2016.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: $22.76 million
One Thing to Know: Seedrs boasts that it is the leading equity crowdfunding platform in Europe, and it plans to open to U.S. investors soon.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: $238.65 million
One Thing to Know: Kabbage has provided more than $2 billion in funding to more than 84,000 businesses.
Number of Employees: 501 to 1,000
Total Funding: $1.69 billion
One Thing to Know: Lufax was incorporated in September 2011 in Shanghai with the support of Shanghai’s Municipal Government and has since become China’s largest Internet finance company.
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: $29.74 million
One Thing to Know: The P2P fintech platform has funded against £1,021,631,610 to date.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $4.9 million
One Thing to Know: The Los Angeles-based company focuses on changing U.S. laws to make it easier for startups and small businesses to raise funds through equity or revenue-based financing.
Number of Employees: N/A
Total Funding: $28.23 million
One Thing to Know: The equity-based crowdfunding platform has invested £197,333,589 for 325,220 registered members.
Number of Employees: 11 to 50
Total Funding: $64 million
One Thing to Know: BlueVine offers credit lines up to $100,000 and fixed repayments over a six-month period.
Number of Employees: 51 to 100
Total Funding: $46.83 million
One Thing to Know: RateSetter has lent £1,581,503,579 to date.
This comprehensive list of fintech companies merely scratches the surface of the fintech industry, which is growing in unprecedented ways.
That's why BI Intelligence spent months compiling the best and most exhaustive guide on the world of fintech entitled The Fintech Ecosystem Report: The Emerging Technologies and Firms Driving Change in Financial Services and How Legacy Players Can Navigate The Disruption.
To get your copy of this invaluable guide to the payments industry, choose one of these options:
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 financial technology.
It can feel counterintuitive at first, but this approach works wonders in attracting new clients on LinkedIn.
With nearly 500 million members in 200 countries, it’s easy to get lost in the crowd on LinkedIn.
The key to standing out and winning new business on the platform is to remember a golden rule of sales and marketing – the riches are in the niches!
One of the biggest challenges on LinkedIn is how to narrow the field of potential customers you can serve.
The #1 thing I’ve found in teaching others how to use LinkedIn to generate new sales leads, add clients and increase revenue is that you’ll immediately fail if you try to be all things to all people.
Instead, you need to target some niche audiences or industries, and then become a big fish in those smaller ponds.
That way, you don’t get lost inside the ocean of competition on the platform.
For example, when I was growing my own business using LinkedIn back in 2012, I decided to sell my marketing services to a tiny, niche group (Debt Collectors) who were gathered on the platform.
Despite my initial fear that targeting such a small niche wouldn’t bring me enough business, it did just the opposite: In less than 90 days, I’d generated six figures of revenue and had to hire staff to complete all the new projects I’d landed!
One way to do this is to consider what key audiences you want serve, and to make that very clear on your profile, so that those target audiences can find you and get excited about working together.
For example, the reason I chose Debt Collection as my initial “niche” on LinkedIn was simple – I’d worked for a trade association in that industry, so I had familiarity with the biggest problems and challenges debt collection agencies faced on a daily basis – especially when it came to PR and marketing.
Also, my first (and at the time, only!) client was a debt collection agency, so I had both industry-specific examples and a testimonial to use in appealing to other collection agencies.
You can do the same thing – niching your product or service down to some target audiences based on your existing clients – using those industry-specific work samples and testimonials to appeal to additional prospects who do the same type of business.
Another way to niche yourself on LinkedIn is to become the de facto expert on a certain type of service or product that appeals to clients in numerous industries.
A great example of how this can be done successfully is taking look at high-level Business Coach and Consultant John Hawkins.
Rather than targeting a few industries or audience types, he decided to dominate the “Leadership” niche and appeal to a wide variety of audiences – from casinos to churches to companies and individuals – looking for leadership consulting and coaching.
“When you provide a service and you help people where they’re at, with what they need versus what you think they need, all kinds of doors get opened and all kinds of people become interested,” Hawkins told me during a recent podcast conversation. “I’ve worked with casinos, auto manufacturers, schools, hospitals, churches and more.
“It was funny because I started out very, very, very focused, and now it has expanded,” he says. “People might think, ‘You’re all over the map,’ but I’m really not, because I fit within leadership, building and increasing sales and revenue, and also increasing quality of life for employees.”
Which niche approach you take (industry-specific vs. topic specific) might depend on how refined your experience is.
Either way, the key is to make your LinkedIn profile appealing to a specific group of people interested in your products and services.
The best way to do that is by getting as clear and niche-focused as you can, especially if you’ve already generated great results for clients in a specific industry and can leverage those testimonials and examples to appeal to more prospects in the same vein.
You can also choose to try and dominate a topic, similar to John Hawkins’ approach, but you’ll need a large swath of testimonials and case studies to win over the broad base of audiences you want to appeal to.
With all the progress that’s been made around demand orchestration – from technology to enable ABM and predictive, to top-of-funnel automation, to advanced Pipeline analytics – marketers have more power to influence revenue than ever before.
But interestingly, this technology doesn’t always show us the way, at least not at first. Instead, it often uncovers a murky mess of bad data, or a tangle of workaround processes. Much has been written about the consequences of dirty data or time wasted manually processing spreadsheets, but those are just two of the most blatant, deadly problems marketers face.
The reality is, we still have a lot silent killers lurking out there, threatening to drag down our marketing results. So how do you identify and weed them out before they do real damage?
Of course, learning from the mistakes or problems that other demand or marketing ops pros encountered is always beneficial. In the spirit of sharing, I’ve compiled some of the silent killers we uncovered at Integrate in 2016, and how we solved them. Note that I cover these from a marketing-specific point of view, even though some clearly have critical implications for sales ops as well.
As we move into 2017, and get more advanced with our processes and technology, I certainly expect to uncover more “silent killers”. My hope is always that we find them before they drag us down too much, and that we get better at prevention through systems that automate, govern, validate, and of course integrate.
What are some of your silent killers? Let us know in the comments, or on Twitter.
The next great technological revolution is at our front door as businesses start to embrace artificial intelligence to filter qualified leads and easily hit their sales goals. Gone are the days of weary travelling sales reps, and short are the days of sales teams guessing about qualified leads.
AI is able to filter your prospects and learn patterns in your sales flow to better prioritize your actions. Your time will be spent more effectively, and your conversations better.
Here’s how AI is changing the sales process for the better.
Data is replacing intuition as a sales tool.
“In the back of their heads, most sales professionals have some vague idea of who is likely to buy their product,” Gary Gerber writes at the Selling Power blog. “It’s based in part on genuine experience, and part on plain old guesswork. But new AI tools are emerging that can analyze your existing customers’ profiles and derive a highly … well, intelligent set of target customers for you to pursue.”
Not only can AI highlight potential leads, but it can also suggest products and solutions that would interest potential customers and meet their needs.
“Sales professionals make critical decisions every day, deciding which prospects to reach out to, what product and service offerings to highlight, and which communication channels will work best,” Wrik Sen explains at CXO Today.
“Many salespeople make these decisions based on intuition or follow an organizational playbook. [AI] offers a better alternative by making the buyer central to the process, and applying artificial intelligence to the data.”
All of these tools are relatively new, and innovations in data collection, data management, and data literacy will only strengthen their capabilities, Amanda Kahlow writes for Inside Big Data. After all, “over 90% of the world’s data has been created in the last year alone.”
Historically, sales teams have only had a 2D image of their prospects. These new models turn them into multi-dimensional prospects with specific needs and opportunities.
If the role of the salesperson is changing, then the business as a whole will be affected. That means sales team leaders must adapt to newly required skillsets, as well.
“For sales teams to truly be effective, they must have leadership in place that supports the work they do each day.” Steve Olenski writes at Forbes. “Data-driven sales managers will be in high demand as businesses realize the importance of analytics in the sales process. When sales managers arm teams with the tools they need to source workable leads and close those leads efficiently, they see higher levels of success.”
Along with a strong backbone in analytics and data science, development skills will also be in demand within sales departments.
“AI is continuously developing and being refined. As it develops, having access to digital media and coding skills will be a requirement,” Liz Alton writes at Sales and Marketing Daily Advisor. “Even if you’re outside technology development, it’s going to be important to have the technological literacy and skills to navigate the evolving landscape.”
All of this change is actually good news for sales teams that worry about AI making their jobs redundant. The roles aren’t going away; they’re just evolving.
“Forrester made waves with a report that said that 20 percent of B2B sales jobs — 1 million in total — would disappear by 2020,” Chris Bucholtz writes at CMSWire. “Salespeople will need to evolve into subject matter experts — on both their own products and on the methods that those products can be delivered going forward.”
Ironically, this is all good news for sales teams that aren’t tech-minded. AI can eliminate many human-machine interactions altogether: While the machines identify leads, salespeople will be responsible for applying the human touch.
“For the companies that embrace radical transparency and company-wide adoption, tools like automated data capture and predictive analytics will become the foundation of a new customer-centric culture,” Bullhorn’s Mike Restivo says.
“Responsibility for customer relationships will transcend sales and marketing teams as staff at all levels capture vital information — whether related to new business opportunities or existing relationships — that may otherwise have fallen under the radar.
AI works to sort leads for you, reducing repetitive or mundane tasks.
“The everyday hassle of monitoring the required orders and sorting it out will require regular interaction with the team, which will take away your valuable time that you need to focus on other critical areas of your business,” Patricia Vaz writes at Tweak Your Biz.
Think about how much time your team spends trying to find qualified leads. If your team is like most, that’s a lot of time. But if leads were generated automatically, your team could spend more time closing and working toward your sales goals.
“On average, sales reps spend 80 percent of their time qualifying leads and only 20 percent closing,” Alex Terry writes at CRM Magazine. “Qualifying leads requires advance research and many phone and email hours trying to hone in on a lead that can be turned into a sale. What if this vetting process could be done by a machine that engaged all inbound leads in an amiable, human-like way?”
Along with helping sales teams directly, AI also assists marketers in tracking customer interest and moving them into the sales funnel.
“These indicators paint a more holistic picture of a lead’s level of interest, beyond just a form submission typically associated with lead generation content like ebooks.” writes Amy Wood and Helen Arceyut at Unbounce. “And automating lead scoring takes the pressure off marketers having to qualify prospects via long forms, freeing them up to work on other marketing initiatives.”
Think about it this way: Your marketing team collects the ingredients needed to make the sales recipe. If the ingredients are poor, the chef has nothing to work with.
“Chances are, you’re already monitoring leads’ engagement with your ads, emails, and website pages in your marketing automation system,” Jingcong Zhao writes at Socedo. “These are all signals that indicate buying interest and can be incorporated into your lead scoring model. Social media activity represents another opportunity to understand your leads and personalize your messaging.”
By channeling customers deeper into the funnel, the leads handed to sales teams improve even before the AI system starts filtering and identifying them.
“Timing is key in B2B sales situations, and engaging potential buyers at the right time is a big problem for both marketing and sales teams,” Shelley Cernel writes at KnowledgeTree. “Another benefit is the access to immediate data and feedback — brands will be able to literally have ongoing dialogues with their customers and get instant feedback.”
With the ability to adjust quickly to messaging and products, marketers can better tailor their messages and let fewer leads slip away.
A business needs to strike a balance between generating new sales and retaining existing customers in order to continue growing.
AI can help answer questions like “When will this customer buy again?” and “How do they use this product now?” We’re already seeing tech giants utilize big data to make decisions and identify potential increases in demand.
“Uber uses data to provide rides, but it also uses heat maps to analyze patterns and help drivers be in the right place at the right time,” explains Tx Zhuo, managing partner at Karlin Ventures. “If you want to jump into the on-demand game, discern what problems you can solve using data.”
Meanwhile, Amazon uses machine learning to expand beyond replenishment. It’s able to discern buying patterns and anticipate the needs of customers beforehand.
“Machine learning technology also helps Amazon predict and forecast demand, thereby informing supply decisions to prepare for any given increases and wanes,” Luke Turnbull of Principa explains.
“Keeping up to speed with fashion trends and styles is vital in such a competitive and seasonal industry. Retailers can’t afford to ignore the advantages that technology like machine learning brings to the table.”
From a B2B perspective, AI — and machine learning specifically — can monitor industry trends to inform sales teams about potential barriers to buy or opportunities to close a sale.
“For truly game-changing functionality, machine learning would have to be applied to all sales process-relevant data,” Giles House writes at Martech Advisor. “Once that happens, AI could function as an incredibly useful assistant, helping each salesperson make the right decisions, instantly providing the right content and giving on-point upsell and cross-sell suggestions.”
Beyond functioning as a perfect sales assistant, though, AI’s big promise is that it reduces friction for salespeople as they navigate their stacks of sales tools. In turn, this will allow sales reps to spend less time on predictable, repetitive work, and more time building relationships with potential customers.
The future of automation isn’t replacing people, but rather letting them focus on the human element of sales.
Originally posted on SalesforceIQ blog.
The German economy is the most powerful in Europe, boasting a strong export sector, resilient jobs market and highly developed industrial expertise. While the country faces challenges posed by an uncertain future for the Eurozone and potentially shifting US trade policies, the economy remains on firm ground.
Here are the key numbers you need to know:
Sources: 1. The World Bank, World DataBank, 2015 | 2. CIA World Factbook, July 2016 | 3. Trading Economics | 4. The World Bank, World Integrated Trade Solution database | 5. “German Economy Regains Momentum as Manufacturing Powers Growth”, Bloomberg, October 2016 | 6. Deutsche Börse Group, September 2016 | 7. World Federation of Exchanges | 8. Bloomberg
If you’re looking to access the German market, consider the iShares MSCI Germany ETF (EWG), or broaden your search to other countries.
EXPLORE: Research other countries in the Worldviews series
This post is sponsored by iShares® by BlackRock®.
Visit www.iShares.com or www.BlackRock.com to view a prospectus, which includes investment objectives, risks, fees, expenses and other information that you should read and consider carefully before investing. Investing involves risk, including possible loss of principal.
International investing involves risks, including risks related to foreign currency, limited liquidity, less government regulation and the possibility of substantial volatility due to adverse political, economic or other developments. These risks often are heightened for investments in emerging/developing markets and in concentrations of single countries.
The iShares Funds are distributed by BlackRock Investments, LLC (together with its affiliates, “BlackRock”).
This article was sponsored by iShares by BlackRock. BlackRock is not affiliated with Business Insider Inc., or any of their respective affiliates. BlackRock does not control or guarantee the accuracy or completeness of information contained in this article or any content linked to this article; or any third parties which produce and provide such content; and does not endorse the views and opinions they express or the products and/or services they may offer.
©2016 BlackRock. All rights reserved. iSHARES and BLACKROCK are registered trademarks of BlackRock. All other marks are the property of their respective owners. iS-19803
The government is proposing that all new cars and light trucks be able to talk wirelessly with each other, with traffic lights, and with other roadway infrastructure. Officials say the technology holds the potential to dramatically reduce traffic deaths and transform driving.
Vehicle-to-vehicle communications, or V2V, enables cars to transmit their locations, speed, direction and other information ten times per second. That lets cars detect when another vehicle is about to run a red light, for example, in time for a driver to prevent a crash.
Vehicle-to-infrastructure communication, or V2I, is when cars are able to communicate with infrastructures to supply information to the driver. For example, Audi recently became the first automaker to implement a V2I infrastructure in Las Vegas where some Audi cars talk to traffic lights to warn drivers when the light will turn green.
The Transportation Department's proposal requires that V2V systems "speak the same language" through standardized messaging the government has developed with the industry.
Automakers have said the technology is ready for the road, but they've been waiting for government regulations to ensure compatibility.
The 2017 Mercedes E-Class is actually being built with V2V capabilities, but it only works at communicating with other E-Class cars on the road. The government is proposing that cars and light trucks could talk to each other outside of their specified brand.
Data gathered by V2V could also help self-driving cars navigate more easily by allowing them to collect information on traffic flow, accidents up ahead, and even incelement weather.
The Department of Transportation noted that personal privacy will be protected and that the communication channels wouldn't be used to share private information.
SEE ALSO: Audi made a big move in the self-driving car game this week
Join the conversation about this story »
NOW WATCH: We got a ride in a self-driving Uber — here's what it was like
Solid banks form the foundation of every stable economy, and Canada’s are consistently named among the soundest in the world. As the local economy gains momentum, boosted by stabilizing commodity prices, this solid footing puts it in good stead.
Here are the key numbers you need to know:
Note: Canada’s debt-to-GDP ratio is for gross general government debt, as opposed to net federal debt; gross general government debt includes both intragovernmental debt and the debt of public entities at the sub-national level.
Sources: 1. CIA World Factbook, July 2016 | 2. Trading Economics | 3. The World Bank, World Integrated Trade Solution database | | 4. OECD Data | 5. Bloomberg, October 2016 | 6. World Federation of Exchanges |
If you’re looking to access the Canadian market, consider the iShares MSCI Canada ETF (EWC), or broaden your search to other countries.
EXPLORE: Research other countries in the Worldviews series
MORE: This chart shows Canada’s economy is about way more than oil
READ: Why the best investment in the US could be from outside the US
This post is sponsored by iShares® by BlackRock®.
Visit www.iShares.com or www.BlackRock.com to view a prospectus, which includes investment objectives, risks, fees, expenses and other information that you should read and consider carefully before investing. Investing involves risk, including possible loss of principal.
International investing involves risks, including risks related to foreign currency, limited liquidity, less government regulation and the possibility of substantial volatility due to adverse political, economic or other developments. These risks often are heightened for investments in emerging/developing markets and in concentrations of single countries.
The iShares Funds are distributed by BlackRock Investments, LLC (together with its affiliates, “BlackRock”).
This article was sponsored by iShares by BlackRock. BlackRock is not affiliated with Business Insider Inc., or any of their respective affiliates. BlackRock does not control or guarantee the accuracy or completeness of information contained in this article or any content linked to this article; or any third parties which produce and provide such content; and does not endorse the views and opinions they express or the products and/or services they may offer.
©2016 BlackRock. All rights reserved. iSHARES and BLACKROCK are registered trademarks of BlackRock. All other marks are the property of their respective owners. iS-19696
Google's picking up the pace on its RCS rollout with support for Rogers customers in Canada. Rich Communication Services is the evolution of SMS, and Google's Universal RCS platform launched just last month with Sprint in the U.S.
The post Google rolls out RCS support for Rogers customers in Canada appeared first on Digital Trends.
Most the time, we use Google as a basic search engine to look up different events, places and questions. As a business owner, we want to make sure that our business is easy to find and has our accurate information. The process to get your business listed, updated or corrected on Google can take up to weeks! Then there is always the possibility that something might go wrong. Throughout this blog post, I will take you through different situations that can occur with having your business listed on Google and the exciting avenues you can take to talk with Google.
All businesses need to be verified through Google+ to appear in the search engine as a credited source. The verification process includes having Google email, call or mail a four-digit code to you that you enter under the ‘My Business’ App. Below is a picture of an ‘Google Approved’ business.
Once your listing is updated it’s a good idea to ensure all your information is correct. Beware that it may take some time to for your changes to show up. Here are some issues you’ll want to be aware of:
Now that we have looked at the reasons why we might need to reach out to Google, let’s look at the different and exciting ways that you can communicate with the large conglomerate.
STREAM KICK START STEP: Take action and getting started by Googling your business to make sure that all your information is coming up and that your listing is verified. If its listed but does not have the verified check mark or has incorrect information, log into Google My Business to start the process of updating your listing!
Your personal data is pretty valuable to companies, especially because many of them mine and sell it. Utilize the middle name field to find out which companies have sold your personal information.
Most of us tend to think about success in terms of working hard to accomplish something in order to find happiness. Neil Pasricha, author of The Happiness Equation, makes the case for the opposite: start with happiness, then use it to accomplish your goals.
The sales pundit who tells you that there is no way to create value for your dream clients, that they prefer instead to buy without any help from a salesperson, has infected you with their belief, if you accept that statement as being true.
The prognosticator who prematurely shouts that salespeople are going to lose jobs by the millions in the next few years has also installed a virus in your operating system, if you believe this is to be a fact and act on it.
When someone puts forth the idea that one generation is not recognizable to previous generations and will not fall eventually into the patterns of the dominant culture they are a part of, they are sharing an opinion that doesn’t jive with the lessons of history.
The idea that everything is going to collapse into being a simple transaction, regardless of industry, regardless of business, regardless of strategy, and regardless of any other fact is infecting you with their belief, even when this idea isn’t true.
There are other beliefs, healthier beliefs, with which you might decide to be infected.
You could choose to believe that you have the ability and the responsibility to create value for your dream clients, deciding that you can help them make better decisions because of what you know and how much you care.
You can decide that while some sales jobs will disappear far into the future, that it won’t be yours. You might also look at the research and see for yourself that there is a massive shortage of salespeople now, and that it’s third on the list.
You might also recognize that people of all generations share far more in common than their few differences. You can study history and realize that deep human needs don’t dominate behavior, even buying behaviors. Meet the new boss . . .
Markets are changing, but they are not collapsing into being purely transactional. They are splitting into two different strategies. You can do as well in one as the other. You can choose to believe that you can choose to go the other direction and succeed.
Some beliefs speak to your fears. These beliefs disempower you. Other beliefs speak to the better part of you, the part of you that is drive, purpose, and meaning. You can choose what you allow yourself to be infected with. Choose thoughtfully and carefully.
The post Choosing the Infections that Make Up Your Sales Mindset appeared first on The Sales Blog.
I have a challenge for you: Ask your sales or business development professionals how many sales they’ve won because of your CRM system.
Chances are, if you’re like most organizations, you’re going to hear crickets or maybe even spy the slightest eye roll.
We base our hypothesis on a study by CSO Insights. They report that more organizations than ever have CRM systems. In fact, it’s almost ubiquitous considering 80% of the more than 1,000 companies they surveyed have a CRM solution. But only a third have adoption rates of at least 90%, this is almost a 10% drop over the past decade. This is concerning, especially now that more organizations than ever have CRM system.
We believe CRM isn’t embraced by business development and sales professionals because, frankly, they don’t think it gives them a good return on their investment of time and resources. At best, they consider it a waste of time, at worst, they think it hinders them. Consider brand new research by Accenture that reveals:
It’s evident that most companies are struggling to drive value from their CRM tools. Yet CRM is showing the highest growth of all the sub-segments of the cloud-computing industry, according to Gartner. That’s probably because we all know customer data is useful, so we invest tools to collect it. But the statistics show that there’s a huge disconnect between gathering information and transforming it into something sales professionals and business development professionals can use to achieve their objectives.
Customer Relationship Automation bridges the gap. It transforms data into information that sales and business-development professionals can easily understand and take action on. Plus, they don’t have to do any mundane data entry. As a result:
By embracing this technology, companies will have an edge on 70% of the marketplace that, according to this Accenture study, are not mining key customer and prospect information from CRM systems.
If you’re interested in making your CRM something that your sales and business-development teams will embrace, because it wins sales instead of wasting time, you’ll want to learn how to solve your CRM adoption problem.
In 2008, as the CEO of a software company that had just missed its target for the second quarter in a row, I was so intent on hitting our fourth-quarter revenue number of $8 million — and so scared for my job — that I promised the company I would get a tattoo of the number somewhere on my body if we hit it.
No single metric has more drama surrounding it than quarterly revenue. Make it, and you’re a hero. Miss it, and you may not have a job. But beneath the drama lies real danger. In my experience, nothing has done more long-term damage to promising young companies than focusing on quarterly revenue.
For public companies, the issues surrounding the “beat or miss” quarterly updates are well documented. Short-term scrutiny leads to short-term moves, activist shareholder shenanigans, and other tricks used to bump up the price of the stock. These pressures distract company leaders from the company’s long-term health.
But it’s not just the big public companies that fall into this revenue-focus trap. I’ve advised hundreds of startups and growth companies that feel the same short-term pressure. Their boards push aggressively on quarterly sales goals. And with only six to eight board meetings a year, most outside board members don’t grasp the big-picture strategy in the same way that the CEO does.
There’s nothing wrong with having a quarterly target; cash is the oxygen of a growth business, and it needs to be managed very carefully. But company leaders, especially those who are still learning to navigate their market, must have a deep, unwavering focus on how they will win over the long run. Doing anything else is like driving across the country while looking only five feet in front of your car.
Here’s an example from an SVP of product for a once-promising $20 million software company:
We raised over $100 million in venture capital but were still figuring out a repeatable business model. We couldn’t learn how to make the model work because our strategic moves were always trumped by having to make the quarterly number. The CEO we hired was a bean counter who made the numbers reinforce his story, and the board bought into it, but it was a false story. The sales team was amazing, but it was too hard to sell because the product had no more differentiation or vision. Over time the company lost relevance in the market, all the good people left (myself included), and the potential acquirers were no longer interested.
In a scenario like the one above, the sales team may respond admirably to revenue pressure, but their “do whatever it takes” mentality usually leads to chaos in the name of getting deals done. The result? You push innovation aside, compromise market positioning, turn the product into a dumpster of features, and create a trail of mayhem, making these deals successful post-sale. And every subsequent quarter becomes increasingly difficult.
It doesn’t have to be that way.
While not every company can have a Jeff Bezos or a Steve Jobs who can keep the board focused on long-term vision, it is possible for CEOs and other leaders to have an enlightened conversation around strategy and to better manage unrealistic or misguided expectations from the board.
In the chart below, you’ll find a few “canary in the coal mine” warning signs that the number has gotten too important and advice for avoiding the situation.
If you are a CEO or top executive and find that revenue has become shorthand for whether the business is working, it’s time to change the conversation. In my experience, these are the four main ways to drive that change:
Quarterly sales numbers are important, but they are also a deceptively comfortable way to manage a growth company. It can feel good to hit the number and pop the champagne. But leading with that number is lazy, is a death knell for innovation and long-term success, and can disguise the real issues facing the company’s prospects. The biggest value creation comes from companies that know how to win over the long run.
Oh, and my tattoo promise? We did hit our number that quarter. And yes, I still have Roman numeral VIII on my ankle. I’m proud of that period of time, but if I were coaching a CEO foolish enough to make the same promise, I would recommend a more inspiring, strategic image. And maybe start with a temporary tattoo.
Is there still such a visible difference between B2B and B2C marketing, and the general approaches these two industries have towards communications? While both of them intend to attract their audience and build a relationship with sales growth in mind, there are interesting distinctions to make when it comes to audience drivers and approaches to content, but also in terms of purchase process and length of the chain. Indeed marketers don’t take as much time to reach their prospective customer from B2B to B2C. This is explained by the number of layers within the decision making process and how many individuals it involves to reach an agreement on the purchase of a B2B product or service. A common belief would be that such technical limitations do not – or in only rare cases – exist in B2C, as the purchase happens much more quickly and within one or a few days (length varies, depending on the product purchased). So what issues do B2B and B2C marketers really face? Are they similar or are they completely of different scales? Our experts answer our questions.
1) Differences at first sight: Lasting impact vs. emotions
One of the most striking differences between B2B and B2C marketing is still the approach companies have towards promoting their product or service. Investing in marketing seems more obvious for a B2C brand than for B2B firms, which can possibly be explained by the differences in evaluating results. As Ryan Gould, Vice President of Strategy and Marketing Services at Elevation Marketing explains, companies should view marketing as a capital expense and not as an operating expense: ‘When done right, marketing has a direct and lasting impact on an organization. Unfortunately, we often see companies take marketing too lightly’. For Gould, B2B marketing is about much more than quick lead generation: it should be used to build, grow and nurture relationships with prospective clients. ‘It is critical to look at the infrastructure, programs and activities that are directly responsible for developing these business assets as an investment’, he adds.
But starting a marketing campaign may not have the same meaning for B2C companies, as audiences are not driven by the same elements. We spoke to Tabara N’Diaye, Sales and Marketing Manager at Cocktails in The City, who explained: ‘B2B are B2C marketing have similar goals but we’re communicating to two very distinct audiences. B2C marketing is more emotional and focuses on the benefits of the product whereas B2B is more logical and focuses on the knowledge and return on investment.’ B2B and B2C marketing then focus on different aspects of a campaign, delivering information to an audience in contrasting ways. Indeed the B2B purchase process (and length of the chain) makes communicating through the funnel more challenging for B2B marketers, as the information gets ‘paused’ and analysed at different levels of the chain.
2) Technical differences between B2B and B2C marketing: Mapping & measuring
One technical difference between B2B and B2C marketing is in the way it is measured, valued and analysed. Setting up sales goals and KPIs are much more straight-forward in B2C than in B2B, which makes the operation trickier for B2B marketers, but just as crucial. Combatting these difficulties can be helped by a tailor-made reporting system, and by establishing the right tools, metrics and even dashboards to measure success against KPIs. As Ryan Gould puts it, ‘many great marketers and professionals fall into paralysis by analysis by focusing on lower level priorities and metrics. Top-level alignment of metrics to goals is critical in keeping all eyes on the prize and establishing how success will be measured globally.’
When it comes to success measurement and reporting, B2C marketer Tabara N’Diaye, has noticed a technical change in the past few years: ‘The lines between the two are definitely blurred nowadays. Quantitive and qualitative data are invaluable when targeting both audiences.’ This lies in finding out the reasons for purchase. A common cliche would be to think B2C marketers spend less time trying to understand their audience because the purchase process is quicker. She adds, ‘As a B2C buying decision is more emotional towards the product, understanding lifestyle and market segmentation to really target your message is key. We spend quite a lot of time trying to understand our audience and create a profile so all our content is bespoke and something they are effectively going to engage with.’ Finding out a customer’s real time steps through the sales funnel is as much of a key for B2B marketers as it is for B2C marketers. ‘Mapping the customer journey is crucial, as well as finding the various touchpoints at which the interactions with our product happen’, adds N’Diaye. But marketing managers for both sectors ask themselves the same questions: Where do people hear about them? Which channel did they use? When did the customer make the purchase and why?
3) Are B2B and B2C marketing professionals facing similar issues?
When asked the biggest issues they face as marketers, our B2B and B2C experts have different experiences. ‘Guarantees are a tricky thing’, says Gould. ‘Most B2B marketers struggle with providing guarantees and agencies are no different. The typical B2B buyer’s journey contains a number of variables that are difficult for an agency to control. Add in the usual struggles most organizations face with marketing and sales alignment and you have recipe for unpredictable success.’ Another issue can be found in content marketing. In an interesting paradox, while B2B marketers focus on providing informative content to promote their products or services, B2C marketers might just be struggling with too much of it. Tabara N’Diaye explains: ‘The abundance of information is sometimes problematic. Before making any purchase, people will read reviews and check the product on Google. Customers make less and less impulsive decisions, and we interact with an informed audience who will gather more and more information about our product as well as its competition before deciding to make a purchase.’ Is the B2C sales funnel getting longer?
There are still striking differences between B2B and B2C differences, although the issues faced by marketers might get similar in the near future, with ever-changing technology and ways to communicate. While the sales funnel looks like it is getting more complex in B2C since the arrival of micro-moments and the abundance of information available to the customer, B2B marketers are still – in a world where the importance of B2B marketing is proven over and over again – testifying to the underestimated value of a lasting relationship with prospective customers.
Originally posted on the Jennifer Hakim Communications blog.
Success is how high you bounce when you hit bottom.
-George S. Patton
Motivational quotes like that can be inspirational but not very practical. Intellectually we know bad times eventually come to an end. But why is it that some people seem to bounce back more quickly than others?
The authors of Stronger: Develop the Resilience You Need to Succeed believe there are five characteristics of highly-resilient people:
Let’s take a look at these in a little more detail:
Active Optimism. We all know someone who always seems to see the positive side of a situation. It’s as if their personal motto is ‘Every cloud has a silver lining.’ But active optimism is not just a belief system. The emphasis is on the word ‘active’ and the belief you should always move forward and be an agent of change.
Decisive Action. The key to rebounding from a setback is to take action. Often the exact action is less important than the simple decision to do something. Decisiveness requires us to be comfortable being wrong because complete clarity is never possible and indecision can be costly. The motto which applies here is ‘He who hesitates is lost.’
Moral Compass. Since decisions are based on imprecise information, it’s critical to have a set of principles which guide you. The authors claim there are “four points to our moral compass: honor, integrity, fidelity, and ethics.” But I find these can be too abstract in business. My version is simpler: put your customers’ interests before your own.
Relentless Tenacity. Make your motto ‘If at first you don’t succeed, try try again.’ We all love to read stories about overnight successes but these are mostly myths. In most cases, what seems like overnight success is really the belated realization of the value of a product or service. Likely the creators refused to give up in the meantime. One of my favorite examples is the story of the failures of Abraham Lincoln.
Interpersonal Support. In the western culture, there’s a romantic image of the great loner – epitomized by the novel Robison Crusoe and the movie Cast Away. But like overnight successes, this is mostly a myth. Yes, great strength comes from within us but even greater strength comes from the support of others. Remember ‘No man is an island.’ Knowing when, and how, to rely on others is the key to bouncing back.
I can’t say whether this is a sure-fire formula to become more resilient and bounce back more quickly. In fact, I can’t say whether any such formula even exists. But I can say that following these recommendations will give you solid tools to deal with setbacks. As Confucius said:
Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.
This blog was originally posted on Manage by Walking Around on November 27, 2016.
The B2B buyer journey has been rapidly evolving. Here’s what B2B sales and marketing professionals can expect in 2017.
The B2B buyer has become very sophisticated in how they conduct research online using digital channels. The buyer’s search is not limited to Google. The buyer also searches LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, etc. They search hashtag streams and product reviews. In Facebook and LinkedIn, buyers might join groups and participate in discussions and/or observe the conversations as well as the people who engage in these groups. The B2B buyer in a group is astutely looking for resources to help their buying journey. Those resources include people.
Nearly half the U.S. workforce is millennial and by 2025 millennials will comprise 75 of the workforce. Remember that millennial age runs through early to mid 30s. In addition to younger executives in decision making roles, many B2B support staffers are millennial. This is a demographic who is adept at using digital channels both personally and professionally. Therefore, their first line of engagement is digital. Don’t expect to call this person or to respond to an email. Rather, you’re more likely to engage through a Twitter DM or a LinkedIn message or a text message.
All the social media channels are increasingly becoming more video centric. Have you noticed how videos are prominent in your Facebook stream? Instagram and Snapchat are video centric. You can upload video content to LinkedIn. And, of course YouTube is the king of video. Live video on Facebook and Periscope is an easy way for buyers to consume relevant content.
The B2B buyer in 2017 is already predisposed to consuming video content. Don’t depend on your company to produce all the video to reach your buyer. Get guidelines from marketing on the video content you can produce through social media.
Some examples of video you can produce include video summary points that were delivered in webinars produced by your company, or video excerpts from company executive’s speeches, etc. Consider producing short video “cold calls” that are customized for an individual you want to reach. Deliver it as a DM or text to a password-protected YouTube channel. This is just one idea. Find creative ways to use video to reach your B2B buyer.
During the research phase, the buyer is gathering information and wants to remain invisible. She doesn’t want to talk with salespeople yet because she hasn’t yet determined the final list of potential vendors. Talking to sales people could be a waste of time in the research phase….Unless…..You supply information to the buyer that legitimately inserts you into her research.
Once the buyer has determined a short list of potential vendors, she is ready to engage with them. Even if your company is on the short list, it’s still very important that you are digitally qualified to engage with the buyer. Chances are the buyer has come across people during her evaluation phase that made an impression – some good, some bad. You want to be someone who has made a good impression through your well written social profile and by being a source of relevant content and relevant engagement.
If you were visible to the buyer during her research phase, you have a greater chance of being engaged by the buyer when she is ready. You have a better chance of being perceived as a trusted resource by the buyer.
In the final selection stage, you don’t want to be closing the deal based solely on price. If you and your company created a good experience for the buyer during the journey and you’ve established value, winning the deal will not be dependent on price alone. Establishing value should’ve started way back in the evaluation phase.
Your sales process in 2017 should be focused on creating a great experience for the buyer considering these attributes of how she wants to proceed on the journey. The successful B2B sellers in 2017 will engage on the buyer’s terms, levering social media and content every step of the way.
Download our guide: 8 Reasons Sales Professionals Must Use Social Media
Got plans for 2017? Do they include launching a marketing automation program? If the answer is “yes” – congratulations. But be aware you’ve got a lot of work to do before you buy marketing automation software, much less schedule your first campaign.
You see, if you want marketing automation to work, you’ll need to set up a few things first. You’re not going to get good results if you just buy the software and jump right in. Here’s a checklist to complete before you make the leap:
Marketing automation runs on data. Some is behavioral data, for sure, but the starting point is the data in your existing database. If that’s a mess ― or outdated, or incomplete, or inaccurate ― your efforts will be crippled from the start. Nobody wants to get an email personalized for someone else.
Of course, this is hardly breaking news. Data quality has always been the bedrock of marketing. Here’s some recent research from Experian that quantifies the importance of strong data foundations:
An excerpt from an infographic by Experian, published on eConsultancy.
How do people go from never hearing of your company to becoming customers? That process is called the “buyer’s journey.” Depending on your business, you may have more than one type of customer and more than one method of acquiring them.
All this needs to be defined and mapped with buyer’s journeys. Don’t get too specific and granular-level here (aim for outlining 2-5 processes, not 25), but if you often need to address a group subset differently, that’s a sign you need a separate buyer’s journey for that persona.
So how long could and should this take? If you’ve got a simple sales funnel, or you’ve done this exercise within the last year or so, it might take only an hour. If you’ve never mapped how your prospects become buyers, it might take 2-3 days’ worth of analysis.
And don’t forget: Check with your sales team before you make your buyer’s journey maps official. They know an awful lot about how people become customers … their income depends on it.
Not sure how to get started on this step? See our blog post, “Don’t Let Prospects Get Lost: Create a Customer Journey Map” for more information. Or watch our video, “Marketing Automation for the New Buyer’s Journey in 15 Minutes.”
I know it sounds like a lot of work, but don’t skip this. “Lack of an effective strategy” was the #1 barrier to success for marketing automation in Ascend2’s 2016 “Marketing Automation Trends Survey.”
This is no small task. If you believe you’ve got your content in place for this buyer’s journey thing, we assume the following:
Hopefully you’ve got a “content hub” or content vault where everything is corralled, tagged, and trackable. If you don’t, please make your life easier and round all that up now. Otherwise it’s very likely you’ll recreate content you’ve already got. And that just wastes your budget and your time.
Want more information on how to do this? Read our blog post, “Get Started with a Content Marketing Library.”
This means everything has been reviewed and revised as necessary within the last year. Any content more than a year old needs an update. But don’t worry – this process can help your SEO. See our blog post, “How to Breathe New Life into Old Content.”
For example, if you’ve got an eBook called “Advertising for B2B Companies” that is ideal for your B2B buyers but will turn your B2C buyers off, you need to make a new version of that content asset specifically for the B2C crowd.
This stylistic polish is less mission critical, but is one of the marks of a coordinated marketing automation program. For example: Your eBooks should have a consistent look and a consistent structure. Same for your videos, datasheets, white papers … you get the idea.
For more information on how to get the right message to the right person at the right time, see our workbook, “4 Steps to Creating a Content Marketing Plan: Right Person, Right Message, Right Time.”
If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it, right? And you want to show the C-suite exactly what results you got from all your work, right? So, define what you’re going to track and at which touch points you’re going to track it … Then bring that plan to the sales team, so they can remind you about how plans on paper don’t always match reality. Prepare for some edits while you and they get this ironed out.
How long does it take to complete this step of the process? I would say about a week.
Here’s why: You need to get the blessing of your C-suite about which KPIs to track. You may be able to figure this out in an hour, but getting in front of an executive – much less getting the official approval of the executive – could take some time. And then there are the back-and-forth discussions with the sales people to figure in.
Actually … maybe it’s more realistic to schedule two weeks for this step.
Corollary to this: If you do lead scoring, you’ll need to have that spelled out too. And don’t even think about finalizing that until you’ve let your sales department contribute.
Not sure where to start? Consider the graph below. It shows the metrics your peers are most likely to track:
In a sense, all your work comes down to getting people to respond to your CTAs. So think about them carefully. Consider setting up a couple of tests. Then when it’s time to hook up your marketing automation system, you’ll be ready to go with effective CTAs – and not just quickly typing something in to fill the space.
This is best done while you’re verifying that all your content is up to date and easily found. Just add another checklist for your content check up. Something like, “Got CTA?”
Every piece of content should have a call to action to prompt readers to either see the next piece of content or to contact sales.
Marketing automation is effective, but it’s not magic. Expect to put in several months of work before you see results. Make sure all contributing parties in your company understand this, too.
So, how long before your automation efforts pay off? Here’s how long it took your peers:
Marketing automation is, in many ways, just marketing systematized. It improves efficiency and gets better results, but you’ve got to have all the pieces in place to make it work.
Another way to say this? Marketing automation is greater than the sum of its parts. But you need all the parts to make it work.
Have we missed anything? Is anything else required before you start a marketing automation program? If so, please leave a comment and tell us what it is.
With 2016 coming to a close, now is the time to look ahead and start planning for the lap around the sun.
And as the content marketing landscape continues to rapidly evolve, it makes sense to look to research to identify trends and patterns that can help guide your strategy. That’s why we’ve gathered 25 content marketing stats all in one place – so you can start thinking about how this data will inform your plans for 2017.
Let’s dive in and explore these stats to get a firm grasp on what’s new within this realm.
Content Marketing Stats for 2017
The takeaway: Next year, we can plan on seeing a higher volume of high-quality content from content teams, and therefore – maybe your team should consider stepping up your efforts as well. If you don’t have the bandwidth to produce more content in-house, you could always consider hiring a team of freelance writers to support these efforts.
The takeaway: Long-form content is becoming the norm instead of the exception. Rather than churning out short-form pieces of content, consider investing more time in longer, more in-depth pieces of content that deliver higher value to your audience. It can be difficult to pack much educational punch in pieces that are shorter than 500 words.
The takeaway: Email marketing, when part of a larger content marketing strategy, needs to be mobile-friendly in 2017. As it’s become the preferred method by recipients for reading, be sure you’re using templates that are mobile responsive to best accommodate your audience. This will help boost ROI and extend the readability of the content and campaigns you’ve worked hard to put together.
The takeaway: As mobile continue to rise as the preferred medium for users, marketers are increasing their advertising spends accordingly. We know that there mobile searches outpaced desktop back in 2014, so it makes sense that more and more marketing teams are putting an intense focus on mobile ads.
The takeaway: This year, there was a large projected uptick in the use of interactive content for content marketing teams–and we can expect this trend to continue again in 2017. Why? Because interactive content, a highly engaging form of content, is helping teams gather more audience insight and transform leads into customers.
The takeaway: Personalization makes content marketing messages feel more customized to the individual. Leverage the data you’ve collected from your audience members and put it to work to drive open rates and increase the effectiveness of your efforts. Email is one place where personalization is simple and easy to deploy.
The takeaway: As marketers strive to publish long-form content more frequently, they’re often turning to outsourced freelance help to accomplish their goals (rather than piling more on the plates of the internal team.) When it comes to writing, this can often be an advantage, as writers can be hired for their speciality or subject matter expertise.
The takeaway: The population is becoming more and more savvy about skirting unwanted advertisements with tools like ad blockers–which can complicate things for content marketers using these paid avenues to increase the reach of their content marketing efforts. As a result, more and more teams are looking for more organic ways to expand the reach of their content.
The takeaway: Online attention spans are shorter than ever–so content needs to be snackable and easy to read. With an average read time of less than one minute, more content writers are realizing the importance of structuring easily scannable articles and using bolding, bullet points, and italics to make important themes stand out from the page.
The takeaway: As content becomes more aligned with the buyer’s journey (and the different needs at each stage of that process) marketing teams are becoming better at creating content for sales enablement. This boosts the ROI of content and can be an extremely powerful tactic when sales and marketing teams work together.
The takeaway: Infographics make it easy for readers to understand a large amount of information quickly, as the visuals here make statistics easy to grasp. Plus, when these become interactive, they create a more engaging and hands-on experience that sticks with the reader much more than a static piece of content.
The takeaway: Content teams using repurposed content are ensuring they’re getting the most possible mileage out of their content investments. By strategically distributing these on social media and repackaging old materials into new ones (transforming an old blog post into an infographic, for example), they can capitalize on reusing information in more than one format.
The takeaway: Video is becoming increasingly popular in the content marketing world, and as a result, teams plan to increase their budgets to produce more video content in the coming year. Thanks to video’s ability to quickly explain ideas and concepts in a visual format, it’s no surprise that this medium is being used more and more.
The takeaway: Long-form content tends to be more educational and in-depth, thus increasing the amount of value delivered to the reader. In turn, this builds trust with the audience. Creating longer blog posts often means devoting more attention to high-quality content that translates into eventual sales.
The takeaway: Social media marketing continues to help content marketers extend the reach and shareability of their content and campaigns, and this will continue next year. It may be time to consider how you can better participate on these channels and get the most out of the opportunities presented by mediums like Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Facebook (to name a few.)
The takeaway: Lead gen and sales will likely continue to be the top priorities for content marketing in 2017–the question is: How can you create more effective campaigns and content that accomplish those goals?
The takeaway: As content marketing becomes more visual, photography is more important than ever before. These are the images that will help tell your brand story–so it’s wise to invest in professional help in this department or to pursue professional stock images.
The takeaway: Marketing tech stacks are becoming more important as teams pull together multiple resources to deliver relevant, personalized marketing assets to their audiences. Now is the time to start thinking about what tools are currently missing from your marketing and sales automation efforts so you can start the new year on the right foot.
The takeaway: The shareability of infographics continue make them an important piece of the content marketing puzzle. Add interactivity, and they become even more engaging for the reader.
The takeaway: For B2B companies, LinkedIn is the most widely used platform for content distribution–which makes sense, as this is a network for professionals. With groups that have active conversations happening daily and a publishing platform built in, LinkedIn is a great place to start if you’re just beginning to use social media as part of your content marketing plan.
The takeaway: Blogging allows marketers to create educational material, to collect audience information via opt-ins, and to improve SEO efforts–all at the same time.
The takeaway: As we saw earlier, the trend of dislike towards ads continues amongst readership and decision makers–which is why more and more content teams are turning to blog posts and email drip campaigns to nurture their leads and grab new customers instead of ads. With automation making this simpler than ever before, now is the time to consider different means of advertising to your target audience.
The takeaway: Strategy, benchmarks, and clear objectives are necessary for teams who want to see their content efforts pay off. Be sure you have proper metrics in place to ensure your content marketing is doing everything it should do.
The takeaway: The modern B2B customer is a digital one–and content plays a large part in the buyer’s journey. This is likely part of the reason companies are planning to create more high-quality content in the year to come. It makes sense to tailor marketing assets to the needs and wants of the buyer.
The takeaway: Digital marketing continually proves to be successful in a way that traditional advertising simply isn’t–and thanks to the advanced metrics that digital channels can provide, content marketing teams can make more informed future decisions with the digital medium. Now may be the time to rethink your budgets for next year.
Keep these stats in mind as you and your team considers the best plan of action for 2017–and get prepared with an intelligent strategy. When content marketing is executed effectively, your organization benefits…so don’t wait to brainstorm what will work best for the year ahead. Start now.
Keeping a healthy Account Based Sales Development operation means providing a steady source of new contacts for each account across all account tiers. We’ve talked at length about selecting and tiering your accounts. Next, you’ll need to fill these accounts and buying centers with specific contacts based on your ideal buyer profiles. This is the fastest way to grow your account-based strategy.
There are many ways to get quality contacts, but in order to sustain a healthy pipeline, you need a predictable and reliable source. Finding a method that balances quantity, quality and price may sound impossible, but in this post we’ll lay out three ways you can strike that balance.
This skill is one that all SDRs and ADRs (Account Development Reps) should learn to develop. Reps can manually find contacts by looking through social networks (LinkedIn and Twitter at the very least), a company’s website, meetups or conferences, and blogs, forums or discussions boards to name a few.
The key is to get scrappy. Some of the hardest working reps get creative and learn to exploit tools and hacks to begin to automate some of this manual work. Here are some more examples:
If you’re really ambitious and scrappy, get technical. Advancements in technology have enabled sales reps to execute highly technical tasks without requiring highly technical proficiencies. For example, one sales development hack I love to use is APIs and web scrapers to collect the names of everyone who has upvoted a competitive or complementary product on Product Hunt. Another killer example is using BuzzSumo to find popular articles on a given topic or keyword and view all the people who have shared said content on social media. Then use a previously mentioned data scraping tool to collect the data. You can also find top influencers by a given keyword and, again, collect the data. The last “hack” I want to leave you with is leveraging Mention.com (a social monitoring tool) to set up monitoring around your keywords. Then export the list (it only gives you Twitter handles) and use another tool or vendor to enrich the data.
There are plenty of data firms that have developed their own tools to scrape data (or they may have outsourced the work), who then turn around and sell it. However, this approach comes with a caution: you often get what you pay for. In other words, if a list price is too good to be true, you may be purchasing stale data.
There are other companies that not only scrape data, but also clean and enrich it. These companies build and maintain large databases and supply some of the fastest growing account-based companies with the contacts they need. Some of my favorite companies are Datanyze, LeadGenius, ZoomInfo, InsideView, and DiscoverOrg.
If you take this approach, here are 5 steps to ensure you get data with the most accuracy and integrity.
This is a great way to get quality leads at a fraction of the price. It involves working with freelancers (generally overseas) — which can take some resources to build and manage — but the results are worth the cost when you’re up and running.
Here are 5 steps to setting up your outsourcing army.
Having good pipeline coverage can’t be emphasized enough. It’s one of the most predictive indicators of a sales development organization’s health. And to keep that pipeline full, you must develop a predictable and reliable process for discovering key contacts at your target accounts. In fact, this must remains a priority if you want to be successful with Account Based Sales Development.
Only after you’ve figured this out can you move on to the next step in the Account Based Everything framework: developing account insights.
You are probably using HubSpot to build your lead nurturing campaigns. That’s great. But effective lead nurturing is not just about using the best marketing automation software available. Don’t forget to address these business processes as you build out your campaign.
Does your lead nurturing campaign align with your buyer personas? For example, if you’re in the education space you may have a Superintendent persona. Superintendent personas may have pain points related to budgets, testing results and cultivating education outside of the classroom. Your lead nurturing campaign to your Superintendent should weave in those themes.
Talk to your sales team as you build out your lead nurturing campaign. They’ll be familiar with where prospects get stuck and offer insight into the language or content you could include that will help prospects get ‘unstuck.’ Maybe you’re selling into Human Resources in an organization, but the software you sell ultimately needs buy-in and support from IT. A lead nurturing campaign to HR managers should have content focused on selling the solution to IT before seeking CEO or executive management approval.
What are the most frequently visited pages on your website? Or what frequently asked questions do prospects have? FAQs or frequently visited pages offer clues as to the type of content to include in your lead nurturing campaign. If a common question is ‘How long does it take to recoup my initial investment in your company’s software,’ be sure to include a CTA to an ebook on ROI in a lead nurturing email.
You’ll want to focus your campaign differently based on the stage your prospects are in. Moving a prospect from Consideration to Decision requires a bit more oomph. You’re essentially looking to set up a call or consultation and seal the deal. This may even be a good time for the sales team to call on a warm lead and elevate communication from email to verbal. Or at least leave a voicemail.
Start with the goal in mind. Is the goal a sale? Or is it to move a prospect from Awareness to Consideration? Each of these end points require different types of content and different sorts of triggers. What value can you provide through the course of your lead nurturing? A checklist, a template, a guide to cost of switching from one software to another? Can you offer a free trial, a free sample, a free consultation? The more value you provide before the sale, the more likely you’ll close the sale.
Finally, once you have your campaign up and running,don’t hesitate to tweak it. If you see leads getting stuck or dropping off in certain places, change a subject line or content within the campaign to help drive leads through the entire campaign. These aren’t by any means all the factors to consider in the creation of a lead nurturing campaign. But they’ll get you headed in the right direction.
If some or all of your company revenue is driven through reseller or distribution channels, you’ll appreciate the (fictional, but true-to-life) story of Dave Presser, a Channel Manager with Acme Business Equipment (ABE). Dave manages Gold-tier resellers across North America, the UK and Ireland. He often has his first partner forecast call around 5am on Mondays, and is often back-to-back until about 7pm.
Even though he works with some of Acme’s top producing partners, Dave constantly struggles with getting accurate, timely forecast information from his channel counterparts. Sometimes committed opportunities slide into the next quarter, or vanish off the tracking spreadsheets he gets from each partner. There have been a few occasions where an urgent order comes in out of the blue, and ABE doesn’t have adequate inventory of the hardware the ultimate customer is looking for.
Dave’s boss, James Driver is seeing similar behaviors across all his company’s partner channels, and has tasked Dave with finding ways to:
Do these scenarios sound familiar? Many manufacturers, software companies, and other channel-centric companies struggle with partner forecasting. Solving the problem is in part technology, part business process re-engineering, and a measure of psychology.
Dave decided to change partner forecasting business practices first, and he’d select technology solutions which would facilitate the process. He implemented a Lead Registration process, where each partner used a common set of criteria to qualify an opportunity and register it as soon as possible.
To motivate compliance with the Lead Registration process, Dave offered full margin on the sale to the partner that registered the deal first. Any other reseller would only be eligible for a reduced margin, though only with a customer confirmation that they didn’t want to do business with the partner with the initial deal registration.
Another practice ABE put into place was to create an opportunity scorecard, with clearly defined ratings systems, sales stages and parameters for pricing out a hardware configuration. At first, all the forecast data was populated into a Google form and Dave took the input and manually entered it into ABE’s Salesforce.com application.
After communicating all this Dave immediately recognized an increase in registered deals. He would quickly respond to inbound requests for the latest product literature, success story information, and kept his colleagues in manufacturing and logistics apprised of committed and potential deals. Forecast calls improved, though there were still some glitches in the Google Forms process which wasn’t meeting the goals of the pilot project. Dave found he was still scrambling to update his CRM system before his sales team meeting, and by the time his partner cadence calls rolled around, he had to document and communicate scope creep or other changes in his reseller opportunity funnel.
It’s in a channel partner’s best interests for their manufacturer/publishing partner to have accurate forecast data. In Dave’s case, it’s a lot easier for him to gather support and resources for a partner with an opportunity that is slated to close soon. One of the easiest ways to streamline the forecasting process is to implement a secure portal for partners to register and update leads and qualified opportunities. Integrating it with an organization’s CRM creates even greater efficiencies.
The more informed Dave is, whether through conversations while looking at opportunity records together in real-time; (regardless of where Dave and his partner are located) or through a high-level pipeline dashboard, the more effective he can be in support of his assigned partners.
Now Dave has current forecast data and background notes at his fingertips including:
Enabling partners to submit this information in advance, and update it as sales cycles progress helps partner managers to be less administrative, and more strategic. Instead of spending hours a day chasing updates and completing data entry, they can curate resources for sales pursuits, and collaborate with partners on building strategic co-marketing campaigns for lead generation and nurturing deals to close.
The Partner extranet and an intranet facilitate live conversations about opportunities to ensure everyone’s on the same page. Now, forecast conversations don’t need to dwell on opportunity mechanics and instead can focus on strategy. In this case, ABE implemented a partner community portal, and streamlined their partner forecasting activities through dashboards, scorecards and frequent forecast updates via web and mobile devices. ABE executives found Dave and his partner manager colleagues were delivering more value to the partners they manage, and they realized better ROI from their web presence and CRM investment. Partner satisfaction increased, and stronger relationships were forged.
Looking to improve the accuracy and timeliness of your partner forecast data? Contact Magentrix for a discussion about how you can leverage a self-service partner portal to improve channel transparency and effectiveness.
