better lead yield in the content marketing field · best practices for effective content marketing....

BETTER LEAD YIELD in the

CONTENT MARKETING FIELDHow to Select, Connect and Convert Business Buyers ThroughEngaging Content and Smarter, Multi-Channel Delivery

White Paper | June 2013

© Copyright CMO Council. All Rights Reserved. 2013 2

BETTER LEAD YIELD IN THE CONTENT MARKETING FIELD TM | WHITE PAPER

BETTER LEAD YIELD IN THECONTENT MARKETING FIELD

How to Select, connect and convert BuSineSS BuyerS tHrougH engaging content and Smarter, multi-cHannel delivery

B2B marketing organizations are now spending more than 25 percent of their budgets on the development, delivery and promotion of content to drive business leads, influence customer markets and grow brand presence and authority. Sales and channel organizations want more effective content marketing programs to prime new business pipelines, nurture lead flow, and upsell and cross-sell customers. Marketers are striving to become facile and efficient publishers so they can build viral awareness, create more meaningful customer engagement, and underscore their value propositions and marketing claims.

Yet, despite increased spending, most companies are still in the early stages of building the necessary strategies, processes, competencies, and best practices for effective content marketing. Too many organizations are still engaged in random acts of content development, without having implemented cohesive and effective strategies, customer-centric themes and platforms, efficient publishing and delivery capabilities, or the necessary content performance tracking systems.

BtoB buyers and influencers are turned off by self-serving, irrelevant, over-hyped and overly technical content. They’re migrating to peer-based communities and new sources of trusted, relevant and credible content and conversation. Meanwhile, BtoB vendor web sites are inadequate and hard to navigate. These sites lack the depth, objectivity and strategic context that buyers are seeking to inform and lead them through complex evaluation and purchasing processes.

Too many lead generation campaigns are failing in fundamentals ways. They lack rigorous targeting, filtering, tracking, scoring and utilization of prospect flow. They rely on poorly conceived content that doesn’t connect with customer needs and concerns. Or they fail to provide access across essential channels and touch points, such as mobile devices, that are now being widely embraced by BtoB audiences.

Professional associations and online communities Industry organizations and groups

Online trade publications

Seminars/workshops

Trade shows

47%

46%

41%

41%

35%

What sources of BtoB content are most valuable in shapingpurchase decisions?

Content seekers look to peer-oriented organizations for content that drives purchasing decisions.Source: Define What's Valued Online. CMO Council.

35%say online content highlights the vendors that best understand their needs.

Online content is helping shapeBuyer viewS on BtoB brands.

www.cmocouncil.org/r/define-valued-online



BtoB buyers don't trust vendor content.

67%vs.

9%are the percentages of respondents who name content from professional groups vs. vendors as highly trusted.

There's a critical need for moreengaging, customer-relevant content.

wHat BtoB BuyerS value online

To understand how global BtoB buyers are engaging with digital content and what they value online, the CMO Council’s Content ROI Center recently surveyed more than 400 BtoB content seekers around the world. The survey tapped into NetLine Corporation’s global content syndication network to capture a snap shot of how BtoB content consumers source, rank, rate and share content online. The study underscores the growing importance of online content in today’s purchasing process. But responses also highlight a critical need for more engaging, consultative and customer-relevant content. Marketers need to move beyond promotional messages and access customers and prospects across multiple trusted destinations and sources beyond their own web sites and social media channels, including peer-driven communities and organizations.

Online content plays an essential role in the BtoB purchase decision. Some 87 percent of respondents say online content has either a major or moderate impact on vendor preference and selection. Content helps buyers and influencers tap into new thinking and approaches to business challenges and validate the value of products and solutions in meeting customer needs. It also differentiates corporate brands in the minds of buyers. More than a third say online content plays an important role in identifying the solution providers who best understand their challenges and needs.

Valued content is widely shared within buyer organizations, highlighting its influence across complex decision-making ecosystems within an enterprise. Some 28 percent of respondents share content with more than 100 colleagues and 59 percent forward content to more than 25 people.

Peer-powered content, delivered through professional communities and industry associations, has tremendous influence with buyers. Bloggers, social media channels, print trade publications and vendor web sites are much less influential. Vendors too often fail to deliver engaging content that buyers trust and value.

Research and papers from professional associations are the most valued and trusted type of content, cited by 67 percent of survey respondents. By comparison, just 9 percent point to vendor whitepapers as highly valued. Other trusted types of content include papers from industry organizations (50 percent), customer case studies (48 percent), analyst reports (44 percent) and independent product reviews (40 percent).

Peer-powered content is more valued and trusted.Source: Define What's Valued Online. CMO Council.

Professional association research reports/whitepapersIndustry group research reports/whitepapersCustomer case studies

Analyst reports and whitepapers

Product reviews

67%

50%

48%

44%

40%

What types of content do you most value and trust?




What impact does online content have on vendor selection?

“As marketers, we have to be very careful that we’re not simply trying to bring new clients in the door by billboarding content with an expectation that it will result in genuine engagement,” says Jamie Mendez, director of channel marketing responsible for IBM’s global partnering infrastructure, PartnerWorld. “As an example, when I’m trying to understand something, I want to engage with an expert. I don’t want someone sending me a series of billboards.”

BtoB content seekers say they want breadth and depth of information, but also ease of access and comprehension. They value timely insights and original thinking. On the other hand, blatantly self-serving and promotional content is a major turnoff cited by 43 percent of respondents, and exceeded only by content that comes with too many requirements for downloading (50 percent).

Providing mobile access to content is now critical to reaching valued audiences. Forty-one percent of respondents use smart phones to access BtoB content and 30 percent use tablets. Desktop computers, however, are still the most widely used method of accessing content (68 percent).

modifying content StrategieS for a multi-cHannel world

Bringing more discipline and strategic thinking to content specification, delivery and analytics is now a strategic imperative for marketers. Too few companies have well-conceived, customer-relevant themes and subject areas, strong content origination partnerships and capabilities, effective delivery networks and channels, or measureable content performance and tracking systems.

While BtoB buyers and influencers are looking for depth and breadth of information, marketers must also contend with the proliferation of channels that reach these decision makers and the need to captivate and engage them in a cluttered, competitive and time-constrained online world.

The rapid proliferation of digital channels has created an acute need to improve and accelerate content creation and curation processes, while maintaining a common strategy and vision. Marketing organizations need to develop unifying themes, messages, brand value and visual identity across all content formats.

Laura Breslaw, CMO for AlixPartners, the global consulting firm that specializes in corporate performance improvement and turnarounds, says that demands for speed to marketing and increased distribution frequency across a greater range of channels and formats is challenging the capabilities of marketing organizations, but integration and strategy remain key.

“I think budgets for content marketing have to grow. It’s a much more complex process to manage,” says Breslaw, who recently joined AlixPartners from the Boston Consulting Group. “It’s a bigger investment of people; it’s a bigger investment of research; and it’s potentially a bigger investment of strategic partnerships. It's no longer about putting

New channels of engagement are increasing the complexity and cost of content marketing

Major impact

Moderate impact

Small impact

No impact

27%

60%

12%

1%

Online content plays a big role in vendor preference and selection.

Source: Define What's Valued Online. CMO Council.

27%

60%

12%

1%




a brochure or thought leadership piece in the mail and presenting at a conference. You have to address the various audience strategies, particularly around digital, and build those into your go-to-market plan early on.”

Web sites, customer communities, social media, online business networks, Internet forums, blogs, podcasts, video portals, mobile devices, email, web conferences and many others channels are all competing for customer mindshare and driving the need to develop more content across a growing range of formats. Many senior marketers are trying to come to grips with which channels most effectively reach key buyer audiences. They’re experimenting across many of these channels, and need to closely measure the impact and return.

Content today has to be configured, produced and personalized to optimize consumption, recall, sharing, influence and action. Marketers need to be able to leverage their research and ideas across multiple content and engagement channels. Digital content needs to be packaged and componentized to meet the needs of different audiences, channels and device types.

Colleen Albiston, CMO for Deloitte in Canada, finds that reaching and influencing business audiences requires new shorter, more accessible formats, including video and multimedia. While large reports still have a place, the ideas they generate need to be offered in a wider variety of easily consumable media types. A recent study by Deloitte on the future of productivity in Canada included a major report of some 60 pages, she says. But her marketing team also generated infographics, motion graphics, social media communications and other content that reached a wider audience of decision makers and key influencers. The result, she says, was a dramatic increase in full report downloads and a two-fold increase in media impressions and news coverage.

Going from content consumption to conversation has to be expedited and must remain on a consultative level until opportunities are sales-ready. For professional services firms, the ultimate goal is to build conversations with the C-Suite, says Breslaw. “Our content is generally developed to create client conversations, to come in and position a new idea. So it’s very tied to the selling cycle, but it’s not a short-term cycle and probably requires many points of interaction.”

Keeping thought leadership fresh and timely is an ongoing challenge, says Lynn Ventimiglia, Global Marketing Lead for unified communications and collaboration solutions at NEC. NEC recently developed a thought leadership initiative around the changing work styles and expectations of Millennials in the workplace to highlight the value of NEC’s unified communications and collaboration technology in supporting the needs of a new generation of workers and decision makers. The theme and insights gathered by NEC was developed into a wide variety of online content.

A strategic and rigorous process for developing relevant and compelling platforms, ideas and research is deficient in many organizations. But

Content strategy needs to be part of a comprehensive integrated marketing program. — Laura Breslaw, CMO of AlixPartners

With how many people do you SHare BtoB content?

Over 100

50-100

25-50

15-25

5-10

1-5

None

28%

15%

16%

15%

13%

10%

3%

Online content is widely shared across complex decision-making ecosystems.

Source: Define What's Valued Online. CMO Council.

28%

15%

16%

15%

13%

10%

3%




LengthyregiStrationS frustrate downloaders.

companies like AlixPartners, Deloitte, IBM and others are investing significantly in both the creation of overarching themes and in the process of making content rich and meaningful to different audiences.

Staying in touch with the customer is key to the process, says Steve Mann, CMO of the Research and Litigation Solutions division of LexisNexis, “We have a customer discovery and innovation group and their sole job in life is to engage with our customers. Last year, they had 25,000 customer interactions and 1,000 one-on-one interviews. What we utilize them for is just that, to understand what their articulated and unarticulated needs are in terms of product and the types of content they want to see come out from us.”

driving and meaSuring converSion and converSation

Too few marketers truly understand the role and value of content in the process of sales lead acquisition, qualification, conversion and closure, or its contribution to customer retention and revenue generation. Most have yet to map and model content requirements for specific buyer types across the marketing funnel.

Channel analytics and content testing are needed to further “precision acquisition” of qualified, actionable leads that “fit within the filter.” Customer content requirements need to be anticipated and automated along the buyer’s journey. Those who are developing best practices in these areas are realizing significant returns.

Meagen Eisenberg, VP of Demand Generation at DocuSign, the electronic signature company, says the company has realized a 65 percent reduction in churn since implementing a content nurturing system at the start of 2012. 25 percent of the improvement was within the corporate sales group. Eisenberg worked with marketing, sales and support to map and model the buyer and customer journey for different customer types and identify content requirements to nurture them through those processes. Content requirements vary depending on where people are in their journey, their online and offline actions, job title, industry, geography and other factors. DocuSign now has more than 50 distinct nurturing programs running.

“The very first nurture program was a default program that started with whitepapers from third parties, then gave them a video and a case study, and then third and fourth communications invited them to a trial and so on,” Eisenberg explains. “Then we started to build out other more specific nurturing programs because if you’re in the HR department, you really don’t

Content performance requires customer input. — Steve Mann, CMO of the Research and Litigation Solutions at LexisNexis

BtoB buyers want depth of content, as well as accessibility. Source: Define What's Valued Online. CMO Council.

Breadth and depth of informationEase of access, understanding and readabilityOriginality of thinking and ideas

47%

44%

39%

What characteristics do you most value in B2B content?

50%say it's one of their top three turnoffs, more than any other point of frustration.




care about a sales case study, you care about the HR use case.”

Building out a comprehensive digital content program requires the integration of the right people, processes and technology. Sales and support need to be enlisted to help map the customer journey, says Eisenberg. Third party thought leaders are needed at the front end of the funnel in order to talk credibly to bigger issues and needs. DocuSign uses Eloqua as a marketing automation platform for lead tracking, scoring, content nurturing, delivery and measurement. It uses Demandbase to improve targeting and personalization, and also works with NetLine for content syndication and lead generation at the front end of the funnel.

LexisNexis’ Steve Mann says his team is continuously refining its metrics around content. Mann’s team measures traditional return on marketing investment (ROMI) as one of its key performance metrics, but looks at a wide variety of other metrics. “We measure conversions. We look at social metrics like engagement, number of comments, things of that nature. We also look at number of times shared and reach. We also have great tracking tools in place that allow us to determine what revenue is flowing through what sites and what campaigns.”

Content has seven discreet roles with Mann’s organization: Awareness, nurturing, conversion, customer service, retention, upsell, and finally the creation of active evangelists. Mann says a critical goal of content is conversation. His marketing team has built a web destination called ThisIsRealLaw.com to deliver thought leadership content and inspire conversation. “Content is what facilitates those conversations. It's pure content with the opportunity for social engagement. And we have light social engagement on the site, but we have heavy, heavy sharing of content. So we know it's being read and shared and that's really what’s important to us. The site has an engagement reach of about 400,000 followers, right now.”

content lifecycle management a muSt

Bringing more rigor to digital content strategy, specification, delivery and analytics is now a strategic imperative. Today’s “digital content factories” need to keep pace with rapid changes in market conditions, customer sentiments, competitive threats and technology advancements.

It’s not just the proliferation of channels and formats that is increasing complexity and resource requirements. Most BtoB companies now need to connect and converse with a more diverse range of decision makers than ever before. That means understanding and addressing more functional areas and titles, each with their own set of pain points, needs and

Overly promotional content and complex registration processes are big turnoffs.Source: Define What's Valued Online. CMO Council.

Too many requirements for downloadBlatantly promotional and self-servingNon-substantive and uninformed

50%

43%

34%

What characteristic do you most dislike in B2B content?

DocuSign reduced churn by 65 percent with a content-driven nurture program

Mobile contentiS critical to reaching today's buyers.

41%use smartphones to access BtoB content, and

30%use tablets.




requirements.

IBM’s Mendez says CIOs and IT managers were once virtually the only buyer audience that technology companies needed to engage. Today, CMOs, HR executives, line of business leaders and other non-IT executives are deeply involved in purchasing decisions and are often primary decision makers.

“There are far more types of buyers out there today,” says Mendez. “Buying used to be very hierarchical. Now we have all kinds of buying decision makers driving pretty significant purchases and strategy decisions.”

Meanwhile, technology is radically changing and accelerating today’s path to purchase. “With the growth of the Internet, social and digital marketing, we’ve had to turn up the amount of content we produce and really refine how we build content to map to the cycle of awareness, pain and discovery that our clients are going through.”

“We’re investing more in content marketing because we need more and more different types of content,” says Mendez. “People have become sensitized to dealing with very different types of content at specific points in their lives. I don’t know about you, but my behavior has definitely changed. I’m looking information up on my Blackberry. I’m reading stuff on my tablet, and I’m working on my laptop, maybe even all while I’m watching TV. And that’s now how I and many others engage content differently when making a buying decision."

Content marketing used to be about developing whitepapers and big presentations, she says. Today, it’s about getting specific information to the right decision maker, often on a just-in-time basis. Mendez believes content management and delivery systems will need to advance so that content seekers always get the right information when they need it. “Content will become more componentized and we, as content providers, need to provide our prospective clients with the ability to aggregate content in their own way so that it’s customized exactly to their individual needs.”

concluSion

Online content is playing an essential role in today’s BtoB purchase decisions. It’s helping define which brands and vendors are aligned with customer needs and requirements. It’s influencing and shaping strategic discussions throughout enterprises, and helping marketers and sales organizations accelerate and automate the process of customer acquisition, nurturing and retention.

To drive greater content performance, however, marketing organizations need to do more to ensure they are focused on content creation and delivery that excites and motivates buyers at every phase of the engagement process. Self-serving and promotional content is turning off buyers and short-circuiting the lead generation and nurturing process. Companies need to fully evaluate and calibrate where customers are going to access valued content, what issues, pain points and needs are driving their decision making, and what information is needed all along the buyer’s journey.

BtoB purchase decision makers are more diversified in today’s enterprise — Jamie Mendez, IBM Marketing VP

Online content significantly influences buying.

87%of survey respondents say it plays a major to moderate role in vendor selection.

There's a critical need for moreengaging, customer-relevant content.



Taking more engaging, thought-provoking and meaningful content to market is a critical core competency that needs to be continuously evaluated, calibrated and improved. Best practices must be developed to improve all aspects of the content value chain – from strategy, messaging and platform development, to content origination, distribution, reach and response.

wHo we Surveyed

Our survey of BtoB content seekers was distributed through NetLine’s syndication and engagement channels. Some 41 percent of respondents came from companies with more than $100 million in revenues, and half held titles of director and above. Two-thirds said they had influence on key purchasing decisions or final purchase-making authority.

contactus with any questions. Dave [email protected]

Kevin [email protected]



The Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council is dedicated to high-level knowledge exchange, thought leadership and personal relationship building among senior corporate marketing leaders and brand decision-makers across a wide range of global industries. The CMO Council's 6,500-plus members control more than $350 billion in aggregated annual marketing expenditures and run complex, distributed marketing and sales operations worldwide. In total, the CMO Council and its strategic interest communities include more than 20,000 global executives in more than 110 countries covering multiple industries, segments and markets. Regional chapters and advisory boards are active in the Americas, Europe, Asia-Pacific, Middle East, India and Africa. The council's strategic interest groups include the Coalition to Leverage and Optimize Sales Effectiveness (CLOSE), LoyaltyLeaders.org, Marketing Supply Chain Institute, Customer Experience Board, Market Sense-Ability Center, Digital Marketing Performance Institute, GeoBranding Center and the Forum to Advance the Mobile Experience (FAME). More information about the CMO Council is available at www.cmocouncil.org.

NetLine is the world leader in business content syndication aimed at driving buyer engagement, customer lead acquisition and sales pipeline performance. Its Precision Targeting Engine™ and global multi-channel network of over 15,000 web site properties enable BtoB marketers to reach a diverse audience of more than 75 million business professionals across 300+ industry sectors. NetLine’s multi-channel content delivery model allows for brand customization, content adaptation and flexible market access through publisher web sites, expert blogs, email, search engines, social media networks, eNewsletters, and mobile. Founded in 1994, NetLine Corporation is privately held and headquartered in Los Gatos, California with operations across the globe. For more information, visit www.netline.com.

The CMO Council’s Content ROI Center is a strategic interest community dedicated improving the performance of content content marketing within marketing organizations. The center is developing thought leadership and driving conversation among its membership on content marketing best practices, trends and challenges. The Center also works selectively with B2B companies that are making significant investments in content marketing to analyze and evaluate current practices and help elevate content ROI.

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The only fully integrated North America-based global newswire, Marketwire Inc. is a full-service partner to IR, PR, and MarCom professionals seeking premier distribution, media management, multimedia and monitoring solutions. Marketwire’s customer-centric corporate philosophy focuses on being the best by infusing every aspect of its business with the following core attributes: precision, adaptability, innovation, and simplicity. Marketwire delivers its clients’ news to the world’s media and fi nancial communities. With a reputation for technological leadership, Marketwire off ers innovative products and services -- including Social Media, Search Engine Optimization, Dashboard Mobile Financial, News Dashboard coverage reports, exclusive access to networks such as the Canadian Press Wire Network, Easy IR and Easy PR workfl ow solutions, and more -- that help communication professionals maximize their eff ectiveness while ensuring accuracy and best practices. Having merged companies (Market Wire and CCNMatthews) in April 2006, and enjoying a combined history of 25-years of service, Marketwire is now majority-owned by OMERS Capital Partners, the private equity arm of one of Canada’s largest pension funds.

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