Posted on March 10 2010 Read more...

If it clicks like a blind mole … it must be click fraud

Penny-wise, pound-foolish. Sucker born every minute. Hindsight is 20/20. Whatever cliche you want to use, I shouldn't have said yes. Yep, a bargain 'per click' offer sucked me in from a low-performing, but reputable, B2B directory. At less than a quarter per click, I didn't fear much. And for months I was right. Who was this company? ...
Posted on March 3 2010 Read more...

B2B SAAS puts pricing on website, salespeople gasp

Us industrial marketers have lots of logistical excuses reasons that we don't post prices on our websites. I've made a valiant effort to discuss it here at B2Blog in the past. Software is a borderless, virtual product, so the bar is a bit lower. And if you are in a very new marketplace, there's no ...
Posted on February 17 2010 Read more...

Proof it’s not about the benefits, but your product

Go look at Anne Holland's Which Test Won. Sorry to bypass the quiz screen, but my post's title already gives away the answer. "Version A, with its main visual of the printer itself, enticed 37.2% more visitors to complete the online call-back form, thus generating more sales leads for the industrial printers." While an awareness of the ...
Posted on February 17 2010 Read more...

BlackBerry check FAIL

What is this man doing? Stepping out of the booth to check his phone? Can't make the long walk to the restroom? moar funny pictures This was right across from our show booth, and this guy was like this for ten minutes. Since men don't take that long to water the bushes, we decided he must have been checking ...
Posted on February 4 2010 Read more...

Random thoughts while waiting for my crate

Written last Monday at 3:30pm while waiting for my show-crate to arrive at our booth at Moscone Center: Trade show setup is unnatural combination of union guys and marketers. Marketing managers who want large flat-panels in the booth, probably also want flat panels for their house. Coincidence? What's worse: missing your flight, losing your luggage, or you show crate ...
Posted on January 2 2010 Read more...

Terrorist customers: How should we react?

It happened again. Some nutty passenger attempts blowing up a plane, and suddenly other fliers have to endure stricter screening and flying rules. And as news of the revised policy spread, the jokes about Homeland Security followed. It happened again. Some nutty customer attempts to rip the company off, and suddenly other customers have endure stricter ...
Posted on December 18 2009 Read more...

Keep tweaking your website

Its way to easy to 'set it and forget it' when it comes to your website. But constantly tweaking it can make for sizable gains in effectiveness. Here are two tools to help you: 1. Browser size visualization tool Google just released a screen overlay tool that shows you what percentage of average users can see what ...
Posted on December 8 2009 Read more...

Snail-mail blows away email for lead-gen

Would you email to a mailing list for lead-gen, or snail-mail it? We marketers of limited means (time and staff, as much as money) love the email tools out there. Fire up SurveyMonkey and/or MailChimp, and bam!--leads and responses. But we should reconsider our actions based on split-testing reported at B2BMarketingSmarts: Email lead generation — perception vs. ...
Posted on November 30 2009 Read more...

Salespeople don’t listen to your emails?

As B2B marketers, our primary audience really is our salespeople, right? You'd think every email we sent to them would be treated as a precious treasure to aid them in their success. Of course we are humbled--or more likely irate--when we find out that they aren't even reading the emails. I thought making friendly sales-info videos was ...
Posted on November 9 2009 Read more...

Five nails in the Trade Pub coffin

Here is another voice putting to words the paradigm shifts we have been witnessing in the last few years. But the important point is noting that things HAVE changed, and that we need to act accordingly.Tom Pick at WebMarketCentral Blog asks rhetorically Will Content Marketing Kill Trade Publications?:"The challenges faced by trade publications go far ...
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