Junta42 blog

Kodak: Why Content Strategy Is the Key to Marketing

I had the pleasure of meeting Tom Hoehn from Kodak at Online Marketing Summit - DC last week.  Tom has a really cool job at Kodak, where he is director of brand communications and convergence media.

After my presentation on the Keys to Social Media, Tom and I got to chatting and we realized that we focus on many of the same things, the most important being the creation and distribution of valuable, relevant and compelling content as a core part of marketing. Tom was nice enough to participate in this Q&A about Kodak's content strategy.  There's some gold nuggets in here...enjoy! Thanks Tom!

Joe: Does Kodak have a content strategy that's a part of their overall marketing strategy?  If so, how do you integrate it into the plans?

Tom: Yes, our content strategy is two pronged. First, we focus on content creation that showcases our products in use. We have a long history of doing this. Our Tips and Projects Center is the best example.
It is chock full of examples, projects, tips, and inspirational photo essays. The second part of this strategy is about distribution. We use the content in a number of different permutations and distribute through our various channels based on seasonality, promotions, etc. Channels include our website, blogs, partners sites, social media, e-mail tips, etc. You can see our social media presence at http://www.kodak.com/go/followus.

Joe: When you hear the phrase "content marketing", does it mean anything to you?

Tom: It means everything to me! Seriously, we love how people use the products we make to tell the stories of their lives. It is great to work in a category that enables people's self expression. Giving voice to those stories and inspiring others is what it is all about.

Joe: What does Kodak call the process of delivering consistent, educational and entertaining information to customers?

Tom: Our job.  It is an expectation of our customers that we walk the walk and talk the talk and have quality content. We make sure that we leverage Kodak's businesses and sponsorship for content at every turn. It is in our DNA.

Some examples include:

• Doing red carpet interviews along side other media outlets during the recent Celebrity Apprentice finale that included Kodak
• Activating on numerous fronts during last summer's Olympic Games in Beijing.
• Showcasing our presence in golf with the start of the Kodak Challenge, which includes a fantasy game that will launch next week.
• Making your Inauguration moment more memorable by combining professional content with personal content.
• Featuring beautiful images on our homepage. Each week we connect the photos to a blog post that contains information about them. This week we are featuring photos in conjunction with the Cannes Film Festival. When we are not featuring photos from events or special occasions we use photos submitted by our visitors. Take a look at the previous selections at the blog posts dedicated to these stunning homepage photos.

So there you have it, we are nuts about content! ;-)

Joe: How do you take customer education to the next level to drive increased loyalty and sales?

Tom: The next level? In my mind it isn't always about what we think people want to learn. Amplifying the voice of the millions of people who take pictures, do cool things with them, and share with others is the big opportunity for us. People take 70 million pictures every day with Kodak cameras. Yes, you read that right. Don't you think that is quite an incredible wealth of source material that can be tapped?

Joe: Kodak has been in the middle of social media for a while now.  What's worked really well?  What are you no so sure about?  What hasn't worked?

Tom: Our blogs, starting with A Thousand Words, have been active since September 2006. That is ancient history in the social media space - in terms of large companies blogging it is positively prehistoric! The stories and photos we have shared from everyday Kodak people have been acclaimed by many. We get kudos for recognizing the space and how to use it. We are adding value to the conversations that are occurring. We are not shoving marketing messages at people. That doesn't work and we knew that from the outset.

Our distributed publishing model has worked really well for us. We decided not to have a few dedicated Kodak rockstar bloggers and opted to have many employees contribute. It helps to spread the work. I am happy to say we have published every business day since our launch - that is no small feat. A wise person by the name of Joe Pulizzi ;-) mentioned that "Frequency" is an important aspect of blogging. It looks like we embraced that from the get go. Every post contains a few photos (of course), most have more. One post I did actually had over 200 clickable thumbnails (but that is a story for another day).

A benefit we saw that was unexpected was the employee pride in contribution. They loved the fact that anyone could contribute their stories and were proud to share with family, friends, and their networks. 

Joe: How is Kodak promoting the use of social media within the company?  Do you have set guidelines?

Tom: We have a simple social media policy that was crafted with input from marketing, legal, our IT group, and corporate security. It contains very sound and practical advice and isn't overly restrictive. We promote the use of social media channels to product marketing groups and adoption rates vary. I find that people are eager to learn and we are happy to share our experiences.

Joe: What's the next great frontier regarding online content? (is there one?)

Tom: It is the power of you. Instead of everyone being famous for 15 minutes perhaps we will be famous to 15 people. Telling your story requires content. Text, photos (yes!), videos (naturally!). What stories are you telling to your network?

Joe: How about print?  Do you do any print magazines/newsletters for BtoC or BtoB?  Wondering what your take is on the distribution of print content?

Tom: Yes, we do print and make products that support print. Did you know Kodak has commercial businesses that are in the printing and packaging industries? It is a multi-billion dollar per year category for us. That being said, we use print for B2B publications for our Entertainment Imaging (motion picture)
and Graphic Communications (printing) businesses. I would be remiss if I didn't mention that print also extends to personal needs. Are your precious memories locked on a hard drive somewhere? I hope not!

I hope you found this Q&A helpful.Thanks Joe for inviting me.
Leave a comment I would love to hear your thoughts. Thanks, tom @tomhoehn on Twitter

Relevant Articles:

• 10 Content Marketing Tips to Start Now
• Six Content Strategies for Keeping Content Fresh
• Five Content Marketing Ideas that will Pay Dividends

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New Research: With Economy Rattled, Marketers Spending on Content/Social Media

We've just completed our December Junta42 readership study and frankly, I'm surprised. I bought into the thinking, like most other marketing and publishing professionals, that marketers would hold back spending in all categories during these tough times.

I was wrong.

According to our research findings, marketers are continuing to stash more and more funds into their own content and social media initiatives. A full 56% of survey respondents stated that they will be increasing their content marketing spending in 2009 (remember, this study was completed the first week of December).

There will be some naysayers about this survey.  Junta42 subscribers, for the most part, have already bought into the fact that content marketing is the future of marketing, making them (most likely) predisposed to spending more in that area. Regardless, the results are staggering, and clearly tell us that corporate content initiatives aren't just a luxury anymore - they are necessity - the engine behind the entire marketing program.

Please check out the full results here, including who the respondents were, decision-making authority, and core content tactics for 2009.

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Seven Content Strategies to Build Trust with Today's Savvy Consumers - A Complimentary eBook

At the heart of all sales transactions is trust.

The greater the trust, the more likely the sale. Without trust, there is no sale. In today’s business world, where more and more relationships are being developed and maintained over the Internet—the need for establishing trust and building confidence with buyers may be stronger and more powerful than ever. One of the resulting challenges for marketers is to find ways to quickly establish rapport, and then build upon it. How can you best do that? By listening to your customers and prospects and giving them information they need—information that will build their trust in your company as a solutions provider, and lead to the ultimate goal—sales.

That's exactly the reason why have developed this complimentary eBook/white paper entitled "Seven Content Strategies to Build Trust with Today's Savvy Consumers." Big thanks to our sponsors McMurry and ContentWise for supporting this important project.

This comprehensive eBook will:

• Give you seven strategies to enact right now that can tip the trust scale in your favor.
• Provide clear examples of how leading brands are creating trust through content marketing.
• Identify factors that erode trust and how to avoid them.
• Show you simple and free online tools to help monitor what customers are saying about you.

Download your complimentary eBook now!

If you like this one, you may also be interested in our complimentary white paper, "How to Attract and Retain Customers with Content Now." If you are a custom publisher/content provider, check out The New Rules of Custom Publishing and How to Become a World-Class Content Provider.

If you are signed in as a Junta42 member, you'll go straight to the eBook.  If not, your name and email address will direct you to the white paper download.

Enjoy!

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Content News Flash from Forrester: Marketing Must Be Compelling and Make the Buyer Smarter

I had the pleasure of hearing Mr. Peter Burris, principal analyst from Forrester Research, speak today at the ISBM (Institute for the Study of Business Markets) conference at Penn State University.

Outside of some interesting statistics regarding business-to-business marketing, Peter's take on what marketers must do to survive really hit home with the audience of mostly btob CMO's and product managers.

Core research findings from Forrester state that new product adoption success, now managed by the buyer and not the seller (not new news here), is solely dependent on the quality of the need-matching effort. More specifically, Burris states that "marketing has to be compelling and must be a source of intrinsic value unto itself."

Burris continued with the idea that "the buyer or prospective buyer must feel that they are smarter or more certain of their buying decision after they engage in the marketing."

We've been talking about this for a while, and go indepth about it in our book, but this is one of the first times I've heard the analyst community discuss this concept in detail.

Although he never came out and directly said it, Burris implies that btob marketers must generate significant amounts of high-quality information throughout all stages of the buying process.

So much so that Burris used an example from one of his CMO clients, where they are now looking for employees that have journalistic backgrounds who understand how to create high-quality editorial content, which is now the essence of today's community marketing programs.

For most btob companies, products cannot provide all customer value. Marketing must be a source of value to the customer to ultimately get the most revenue out of the product and service offerings.

In talking with a few senior marketing executives after his speech, this is still a relatively new concept to most large business-to-business companies. Although, one large components manufacturer I chatted with said that while traditional programs usually find no internal support, customer content programs are almost always approved as part of their overall marketing budget. We are making progress!

We are in the middle of a content revolution. Most companies are still battling with the technologies and the implications of social media, but haven't yet realized that the key to their marketing programs will ultimately hinge on how valuable the information is that they send to buyers, and the types of conversations that content creates.

One step at a time.

To see a similar PowerPoint presentation from Forrester on this topic, click here.

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Driving Business with Content Tools: A Motorola Case Study

Had the pleasure of sitting through a presentation by Eduardo Conrado, Corporate VP of Global Business & Technology for Motorola at the Business Marketing Association annual meeting today. Most in attendance were amazed that 50% of Motorola's revenues come from B2B ($36.6 billion in total revenues, $18 billion in B2B). They are #1 or #2 in market share in 80% of their B2B customer segments.

There were some really interesting stats and takeaways from this presentation on Motorola B2B Marketing.  The key takeaway is that Motorola is investing in the creation and execution of valuable and relevant content (mostly online) to become a trusted partner and resource to customers.

Here are the highlights:

• According to Eduardo, Motorola's key challenge right now is communicating technology trends to the specific needs of their customers. They define all their businesses today by customer segment, not by product. In selling their solutions, they start with the needs of the customer, and then look for an overall solution, that may combine new solutions with those from their current portfolio.
• The two most important objectives for Motorola in getting new business: 1) Customers must trust Motorola first and 2) Motorola must show the human element (not the technology) in order to sell products and services.

Key Statistics that Motorola has Found in Their Marketing

• 80% of technology buyers use the web as their primary purchasing decision tool.
• 85% of business managers turn to search engines first.
• The #1 reason technology buyers visit the web: case studies and white papers.

Online is the Key for Motorola

• Motorola has increased headcount five-fold in the last few years.
• All campaigns now start with the online component first.
• Motorola's B2B site gets 1.3 million visitors per month. 34% get there through search engines (Eduardo feels this should be higher).

Content Tools Drive Conversion

With every type of demand generation activity (PR, Events, SEO/SEM, Advertising, Direct Marketing) there is a specific tool and landing page to tell the story. These include microsites, video showcases, video libraries, ezines (digital magazines), online communities, and widgets. From these, they look to convert information seekers into prospects to get through to the sales cycle.

Content Examples (specific to the Government Market)

Video Case Studies: Motorola has a huge library of video case studies. For each one, customers can also download a pdf version of the written study, as well as share with colleagues. Users spend an average of 8 minutes on the site.

This linked example is a YouTube type system that will bring up relevant videos based on vertical segment.

Motorola eZine: 17% open rate, 48% click-through rate. Users spend an average of 17 minutes on the eZine site.

Motorola Second Nature: This is a virtual city specific to government decision-makers (fire fighters, police, FBI, government IT and more). This is a digital experience that provides real-world examples of how these decision-makers can best leverage technology to get their jobs done. Worth the trip to see this.

With the computer-generated examples comes links to real-life videos, case studies and white papers of how actual companies are dealing with the same kinds of issues.

How They Do It?
Motorola has aligned with "best-in-class" agencies to help them create and execute these content programs. They also have 300 business-side marketers which doesn't hurt either.

Three Corporate Objectives
Motorola's three key business marketing goals are:

1. Differentiated positioning (address customer need for each segment)
2. Distinct, flexible creative platform
3. Cutting-edge marketing mix (create tools for their customers)

Summary

1. Everything Motorola does revolves around the customer. They align by customer segments (needs), not products.
2. Online first. Print and events are integrated, but the plan and creative are pulled from online.
3. All marketing leads to the creation of informational tools for customers segments. Online content marketing drives everything for Motorola.

Relevant Articles

• The Future of B2B Marketing - Ed Abrams from IBM
• Microsite Scorecard - Citi, Fidelity, IBM
• Microsite Scorecard - Chevron, Shell, FedEx

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BtoB Leaders In Branded Content Coming to NYC

American Business Media and Junta42 are proud to announce a "breakfast in July" about how the leading brands in business-to-business are creating and executing their own content initiatives. I'll be moderating the July 16th breakfast event "BtoB Leaders in Content" at the Scandinavia House in New York City.

We are currently in the process of securing our expert marketing panel, but have already signed up Paul Dunay, global director of integrated marketing at BearingPoint, and author of one of my favorite blogs, Buzz Marketing for Technology. We'll be signing up an additional three marketing heavyweights from brands that are creating their own content and making an impact on behavior.

Each marketer will give a brief presentation about how they are using content to drive their businesses. Then we will have a lengthly Q&A discussion with plenty of time for questions from the audience.

Here is the event overview:

More and more of the leading business-to-business brands are driving sales and customer growth through the use of valuable and compelling content. This means web content, magazines, blogs, social communities, eNewsletters, web events and more that are changing or maintaining behavior as part of the integrated marketing strategy.

In this limited attendance breakfast event, hear how some of the best-known brands in b2b are creating, executing and measuring their own content strategies that you can use in your own markets.

For more information or to sign up, click here. Note that this is a limited attendance event, so if it looks interesting to you, sign up soon!

Why are we doing this?
Even though the creation and execution of custom content is a full 30% of btob marketing budgets, marketing professionals still struggle with the best ways to create valuable, relevant and compelling content that gets them involved in the right types of customer conversations.

There has also been quite a bit of talk from btob marketers and publishers I work with about an event like this, focused on business-to-business content marketing best practices.  If this goes well, we'll be doing more of these types of events.

If you have any questions at all about the event, feel free to contact me at joe[at]junta42.com.

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The Future of B2B Marketing - From Ed Abrams at IBM

I had the pleasure of sitting through a presentation by Ed Abrams, VP of Marketing for IBM, at American Business Media's Spring Meeting a few weeks back.  Here are some of the high points.

The Customers Are In Control
Abrams was adamant about the notion that corporations have lost message control as part of the marketing process. Consumers choose what conversations they want to be involved in. The role of marketing is to work to get involved in those conversations that matter.

Research Shows that Non-Traditional Communications Have Impact (and are growing)
Abrams pointed to a number of research findings that state consumers get more and more of their information through such tools as blogs, wikis and more.  In the pictured chart to the right, 31% of IT professionals engage in IT blogs and wikis when searching for new product information. Critical Point: Abrams suggested that IBM looks for this number to double in the next year, theoretically making blogs/wikis the most powerful informational source for IT professionals behind only search engines.

IBM Making Impact in Social Networking
According to Abrams, IBM has the single largest community in LinkedIn at 175,000 members. They also have approximately 5,000 different communities on Facebook. IBM believes that, to be successful, they need to be a part of these conversations on an ongoing basis.

Online Influences Most!
According to Enquiro Research as presented by Abrams, the three leading influencers for IT decision-makers are Vendor websites, search engines, and industry informational websites (in that order), followed closely by Word-of-mouth peer and Word-of-mouth friend.

Content-based websites are key for IBM. Abrams believes that IBM must provide ongoing, consistent information about what is happening in the industry to be successful.

Abrams' Top IBM Takeaways for Online
Abrams shared a number of key points that are essential to IBM's long-term strategy for growing their business. Here are the ones that made the most impact.

1. User-Generated Content. This is critical to IBM's success. IT professionals trust in this information, and IBM has to know how to become part of those conversations.
2. Trust in the Audience. IBM has to trust in their social audiences to be self-policing. IBM knows they cannot control the audience.
3. Peer-to-Peer Communications. IBM must facilitate this type of behavior in any way they can.
4. Transparency. In all online situations, IBM must be transparent and open. Consumers can "smell BS" a mile away. If something is broken, IBM must admit that it's broken and address it immediately.
5. Low Barriers to Enter Conversation. Must make it easy for decision-makers to get involved in the conversation.
6. Facilitate Collaboration. Must be willing to work with others and promote others' ideas and concepts.
7. Connect People to Information. Get decision-makers to the information they need quickly and easily.
8. People first, money later. IBM believes that attracting the right people is the key...making money off of those people will happen later if all these points are followed.

In Summary

• Power is with customers, who can now connect with each other
• Two-way dialogue is more valued than marketing messages
• A lot can be gained by ceding control – viral marketing, market intelligence, etc.
• Marketing has an opportunity to operate faster, be more flexible and more responsive

From my perspective, IBM has transformed themselves from a "command and control" company to one that may have one of the best understandings of the "new marketing environment". Over this time, they have also adjusted their product mix to be more service-centric than product-centric.

Related Articles

• Content Marketing at Four Companies: IBM, Siemens, CIT and Information Builders
• Microsite Scorecard: Citi, Fidelity, IBM
• IBM's "The End of Advertising as We Know It"

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Why Lease When You Can Buy? - A Case for Content Marketing

We are in the middle of working on a video about content marketing and one of the key phrases we are using is "Why lease when you can buy?"

If you are looking at a car or at a house, their are pros and cons to buying versus leasing (or renting).  To make a decision, first you have to understand the differences between buying and leasing:

"When you buy, you pay for the entire cost of the [asset] regardless of how [much you use it or what you get out of it.] When you lease, you pay for only a portion of [the real asset's cost], which is the part that you 'use up' [while you are occupying it]."

Buying is Creating Your Own Content
Think about that for a second in relation to the creation of content. By creating your own content, publishing it, then distributing it through print and online mechanisms, you've bought yourself an asset. Once you buy it, you could do nothing with it, or distribute the heck out of it.  Regardless, you still pay the same for that asset. Getting ROI out of it is ultimately up to you.

If executed correctly, you can leverage and re-leverage that asset to continually communicate with customers and prospects. The majority of top tier content does not depreciate either (what publishing folks call "evergreen" content), unlike a car. Great content works more like buying a house or property. If it's good and can be found (location), it goes up in value.

Traditional Advertising is Leasing
Although more and more companies are "buying" content, a good portion of marketing budgets are still spent on leasing or renting activities such as print advertising or online banners and buttons. Like in the definition above, you, the marketer, pay a small portion of the true asset cost or value (owned by the publisher or content distributor) for the area that you are "using up" during that particular time.

Since the publisher owns the asset, which is essential the community they bring to the table for your benefit, they have the right to charge you for the space you are taking up.

Now, advertising has its place. We at Junta42 use traditional advertising all the time. But understand that once it's gone, it's gone.  You have paid for renting the space and there is no asset created, in and of itself. The activity generated from the advertising may ultimately create an asset, but the space you occupied with your brief message is essentially worthless after the period of "occupation" is over. Poof...gone.

Why Are More Marketers Buying/Creating Content Today?
It's quite simple if you think about it. As we see more technological advances, the consumer of content has more and more control over what they engage in. In the past, there were limited options (television, radio, newspapers, consumer and trade magazines). Today, a buyer can go to a search engine and find exactly what they are looking for in a second. And, since Google has democratized content, ANY company with good content and a little search engine savvy can distribute it to that targeted buyer. (Here's a good white paper that spells it out from A to Z.)

Content is also worth more today since it is constantly "alive" on the web and available for consumption, even years after it was first distributed.

So, as the value of traditional marketing vehicles declines with the number of media choices increasing, the lower technological barriers for content creation, and greater content accessibility, corporate content marketing becomes more valuable for the same reasons.

Some "To-Do's" for the Traditional Marketer
Don't worry if you still spend a boat-load on traditional marketing.  If you are, you also realize that the tide is moving away from traditional media and you may not be sure what to do next.  Here are a couple easy steps to take:

• Don't go canceling all your traditional print and online advertising (I'm sure you won't). But do leverage those communities to distribute valuable, relevant and compelling content that can entice a behavior. Microsites, white papers, webinars, video shorts are all good ways to engage with a target buyer. IBM, Seimens, and Unilever are all leveraging traditional media outlets with big investments to drive consumers to their own content. Unilever's DegreeRookie content campaign was promoted all over DirecTV this weekend (on channel 116 I believe). Note that they are also leveraging a traditional media outlet (Fox) to get the job done.
• Get serious about content in your organization. The title of Chief Content Officer is starting to pop up in more and more businesses.  Why?  Because content is a strategic marketing device that can drive substantial revenues, so it must be taken seriously. Content is the asset you create that becomes the foundation for your customer relationships. Give ownership to someone that can help guide your content ship. The future of marketing is in the content you create and distribute. Be prepared.

Buy and Build Your House
A great content strategy does not happen overnight, but it's very similar to buying and building your house. The more investment in skilled builders (journalists, content experts, custom publishers), the better your house will look (customer relationships, loyalty and increased sales).

There are always situations where leasing works, but if you can buy the asset of content, and you know that, if done correctly, the asset will grow in value, why would you ever miss out on that opportunity?

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Content Marketing at 4 Companies - IBM, Siemens, CIT and Information Builders

In yesterday's post I gave an overview of the BtoB NetMarketing breakfast where leading marketers discussed, in detail, the use of content in their overall marketing plans. What we are starting to see is an evolution of the marketing profession into a marketing/publishing mixture.

Here are some of the highlights that pertain to online content marketing.

Bill Stabile, Siemens Corp.

• According to Forrester, the majority of marketers want to put more budgetary funds into the web.  This includes Siemens, which at the present time puts 20 - 30% into online.  Mr. Stabile stated how huge this number is, especially since, according to him, Siemens barely had an online footprint a few years back.
• Siemens is positioning themselves around online thought leadership and credibility, with a focus on engagement.
• There is no doubt that online is the focal point of their ongoing campaigns.
• Siemens Answers campaign is Siemens first big push into an integrated print/online campaign. Print, online media, search, online pr and social media all push to the Siemens Answers microsite.
• They measure their activity in awareness, favorability, response and leads.
• Mr. Stabile focused on the use of traditional, mainstream media to drive to their own online content initiatives.
• He stated that 90% of technology and industrial decision makers go online to find suppliers. This is something Siemens is taking very seriously.
• Their future area of focus: moving to two-way communications.  Right now, he would consider what they are doing one-way communications.
• INTERESTING STATEMENT - Mr. Stabile said that minor changes in the marketing mix can lead to substantial business increases (5% movement of trade shows into online was the example).

Chris Boylan, Information Builders

• His goal for the $300 million btob software company is to generate more leads from less traffic.
• Big goals: increase brand awareness, generate leads, integrate lead generation reporting with SFA system, and track campaign through to sales.
• Mr. Boylan stated that the main goal when someone gets to their website is to guide visitors to the most compelling content.
• They use separate landing pages for their white papers with minimal distractions - just get them to complete the form!
• They use Baynote - had 10% increase in conversion just by using this software.
• They shoot for lead price to between $20 and $40 per lead when using lead gen and white paper syndication sites such as ITToolbox.
• Over last year, they increased their overall budget by 15%. 57% of that goes into PPC and organic search efforts.
• Since last year, they saw a 40% lead increase. 857,000 unique visitors, 25,994 total leads - $45.82 per lead. This generated $35+ million in new business. 13,991 leads from PPC and organic search. 12,003 through syndication.

John Carnero, CIT

• Created "Behind the Business" series in partnership with Conde Nast, which was a video series promoted using The New Yorker, Wired, Portfolio and Golf Digest. The premise is an ongoing series with leading CEOs about how they became CEOs and define success.
• The entire program includes advertorial, events, online advertising, video/podcasts, etc.
• They also promoted it through a LinkedIn advertising plan.
• Also created a program called "5 Minute Capital", which is a 5 minute podcast on Intellectual Capital. Their goal is to position key employees as thought leaders, partnering with media sites to drive traffic to their content.

Eric Andrews, IBM

• IBM is to transition from push to pull marketing strategies.
• Mr. Andrews stated that they can no longer interrupt their customers - they must provide relevant content for when their customers are ready, and in formats they prefer.
• Marketing is changing to a conversation.
• In Web 1.0, we were consumers of media. In Web 2.0, we are participants.
• At IBM, customers are in control and they guide the marketing conversation. That means that IBM has to be quicker, more responsive, and must listen to all feedback.
• Social Media enables those conversations through communities, forums, discussion groups,etc.
• IBM promotes employee participation in blogs (has blogger's code of conduct).
• The strategy starts with listening - posts, feedback, what customers are saying, etc. This helps them to understand the language they speak.

As you can see from the notes, these four companies get it. They get the fact that the marketer is in control, and to be part of the conversation, they have to create relevant and compelling content consistently, and in multiple formats.

Toward the end of the presentation, there was a lot of talk about how marketers need to be storytellers - creating useful content...specifically targeted micro-niche audiences with very precise bits of information.

The future has arrived!

Recent Articles

• Is the Main Job of Marketing Today Publishing?
• Microsite Scorecard: Citi, Fidelity, IBM
• Microsite Scorecard: Chevron, Shell, FedEx, MasterCard

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Is the Main Job of Marketing Today Publishing?

I had the pleasure of attending the BtoB NetMarketing breakfast about a week ago while I was in New York. I was really looking forward to this, especially when I saw the panel:

• Jon Carero, VP, Interactive Marketing at CIT
• Bill Stabile, Sr. Director, Brand & Marketing Communications at Siemens Corp.
• Chris Boylan, Director of Internet Marketing at Information Builders
• Eric Andrews, VP, WW Demand Generation at IBM

Here is a link to the videos from the event.

My key takeaway was this: Leading marketing organizations such as IBM and Siemens are focusing the majority of their time, attention and resources on the creation and distribution of their own content to customers and prospects.

Don't get me wrong, companies like IBM buy plenty of TV and online "space", but those buys are part of an integrated communications plan that direct the buyer to their own content.

This is especially important in the business-to-business buying cycle where it may take six to 24 months for someone to make a purchase decision, and involve from six to possibly 20 people who have a say in the final choice (ouch!).

Marketing today is all about publishing.

Considering the vast changes in buyer behavior, these marketers understand that their marketing function is not about getting prospects to buy now (which is impossible in a b2b environment).  It's about getting the prospect engaged in the information provided...making it relevant to their lives and jobs, and motivating them to come back for more (by creating more relevant content).

By providing this type of content marketing and setting up the building blocks for a long-term relationship, the opportunity is now available to actually sell your solutions, because they trust you, have a stake in your brand, and believe in your solutions-oriented message.

The whole idea of this, even ten years ago, would seem like the hard way to increase sales. Today, it's the only way.

I'll have more on some specific takeaways from each presenter tomorrow.

Related Articles:

• To Publishers: Your Customers Don't Need You Anymore
• Media Companies Are Waiting to Make You Publishers
• Corporate Content Will Take Over Media as We Know It

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