Next Generation Marketing, Day 1.

Some take-aways from Day 1 at the Next Generation Marketing, a B2B marketing conference in Berlin. Just a selection of tips and advices that seem reasonable to be published, knowing the've been ripped out of their respective presentations and context. For more check the #b2beu hashtag on Twitter.




- The day started with great news: Joel Harrison telling us it’s a great time to be B2B marketer. No more being reduced to creating glossy brochures. We’re kings of the data now.

- Chris Brogan made several good points, but for that you should read his blog first, and probably his book too. Major take-aways:

• Leverage the power of share buttons. Mentally they’re a mile away from forwarding an e-mail.
• Live or die by your database. What’s the use of 10k followers when Twitter shuts down.
• Be there before you need to make the sale.
• Do not automate status updates across platforms

- The panel discussion about Emotions and decision making in B2B marketing was more than interesting. Extraordinary moderator as well. The main point here was that in the end of the day you’re handling with humans, and they’ve got emotions. Handle them.

• Trust. (In you as representative of the company behind.)
• Fear. (Of disruption, change)
• Doubt. (Whether to make a good decision. Both for the business and  personally)
• Reward. (For the wins of a good decision)

- Tell a story. Make clear where your customer belongs in that story.

- John Gerosa from Google come with a refreshing view on search from a B2B perspective.

• Be found. If your print campaign is not backed up by proper search , you’re missing an opportunity.
• Be relevant. (Cfr. ‘Reward’, in this case for the click)
• Be Engaging. So people return afterwards.
• Be Accountable….and use video. 2 out 3 C-suit exec’s watch work related video at least once a week.

- @rlevans told us e-mail is not dead. Your teenage kids will start to use it when they enter the ‘real’ world. And when they get to work, they’ll get afraid of ‘unread items’ too, so don’t worry. However, be relevant. Use your data to be relevant.

- 42% of buyers search for 4 suppliers , 26% contacts 4 suppliers. 63% first contact supplier themselves. Don’t think you’re in control.

- When you market to Fortune 500 companies, focus. Do your homework and focus. On few customers, on few deliverables of high quality.

- Mobile is going to be great. Install Google Goggles if didn’t yet.

- Read “Groundswell” if you didn’t yet. Understand “Social Technographics” and then understand to whom you’re talking.

- Before: You Offer --> Customer Respond to offer --> You Fulfill the order. It was about you shouting.

- Now: Customer has Need --> You Match the Need --> Customer engages with you. It’s is about you being found (trustworthy).

- Use Inbound leads. They’re much cheaper than outbound ones. That basically means: using your brain instead of your wallet.

- Create persona’s. Let them become your best imaginary friends.

- Companies don’t talk to logo’s, they talk to people. So don’t put your brand in between them.

- Companies that blog have 55% more website visitors. 46% can tie a specific deal to it.

- Listen, humanize, optimize, share, create, rate, review, contribute,…



>> read more on Day 2 at the first European B2B marketing conference