By Whitney Satin

B2B marketers certainly don’t have it easy in a down economy. Consider the typical levers at your disposal to drive stronger commercial performance. New business opportunities have virtually dried up in most industries, leaving little room to attract new, highly profitable customers. Cost-conscious customers are unwilling to pay for nuanced product differences, and many times they’ll ask for all sorts of customized “add-ons” at little or no extra cost. A lot of companies hoped that strong relationships between customers and sales reps would pull them through the downturn, but that just hasn’t been the case. Increased scrutiny into budgets has put relationship-driven demand in jeopardy, and the odds of a “relationship seller” being a high performer in this environment are just 7% – the lowest of all salesperson profiles.

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Cramped in seat 17F somewhere 30,000 feet over Texas, I’m reading Business Week’s 100 Best Global Brands issue and trying to square the circle of David Kiley and Burt Helm’s article “The Great Trust Offensive,” outlining how companies are bringing trust back to the forefront of marketing to boost consumer perceptions (and ostensibly, profits).  Earlier this month, I heard 20 B2B CMOs from major Fortune 500 firms agree that ‘trust’ was merely table stakes, a common benefit all customers expect.  If you don’t have it or can’t build it, you might as well pack your bags.  Yet none of them were staking their future growth on it; none saying it was their unique differentiator. Read More »

By Laura Morris

Results from the first 100 companies (Fortune 1000 or larger) to take our new Social Media Opportunity Diagnostic show organizations are significantly under-investing in listening.

Largest Social Media Opportunity Gaps | Fortune 1000 Enterprises

Companies report "listening" as an important social media-related business opportunity (index 59/100), yet few demonstrate even moderate levels of competence (index 23/100).

Across the board, marketers aren’t heeding that old adage to “look before you leap.”  And the few who’ve done their due diligence have more often than not bought their way to competency rather than truly committing to listening.

That’s a problem for three reasons: Read More »