value of advocate marketing ebook
TRANSCRIPT
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Social Media Buzz
Customer Engagement
Revenue Generation
GET REVENUE (AND MORE) FROM YOUR CUSTOMERS
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We live in a world where buyers increasingly bypass B2B companies to access the information, insights and advice they need to make buying decisions. To get the real skinny on your solutions, they are turning to more trusted sources of information, such as colleagues and peers instead of corporate web sites and marketing campaigns. And they’re doing so at every stage of the purchase process.
NEWSFLASH B2B buyers are bypassing vendors to access the information, insights and advice they need to make buying decisions. To get the real skinny on your solutions, they are turning to more trusted sources of information, such as colleagues and peers, at every stage of the purchase process.
As they consult peers on social media channels and online communities, companies like yours are seeking new ways to stand out. Modern businesses must change to survive, and advocate marketing is one of the most effective strategies for thriving in the new vendor-buyer paradigm.
60 percent of B2B tech buyers seek peer reviews before they make a purchase decision.1
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INFUENCING TODAY’S BUYING PROCESS In the B2B world, advocates play a critical role as an extension of the marketing and sales team, engaging prospective buyers during the first two-thirds of the buying journey – when prospects are holding sales reps at arm’s length (or ignoring them altogether).
Moreover, advocates can help B2B companies scale their outreach during what is often a long, complex buying cycle involving multiple stakeholders. Through advocate marketing, companies can transform word-of-mouth from something that is haphazard to an intentional, actionable process. It’s no wonder advocacy now ranks higher in importance than advertising and traditional marketing.
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MEASURING THE VALUE OF ADVOCATE MARKETING
Discussions on social networks and content shares via social channels drive buzz, brand awareness and web traffic. Advocates' product feedback and reviews, reference calls and Net Promoter Scores contribute to faster sales cycles. Most importantly, advocates directly boost revenue and lower customer acquisition cost through referrals. That means B2B organizations can directly tie advocacy to measurable ROI.
This eBook demonstrates how forward-thinking organizations are mobilizing their best customers to uncover new opportunities and move deals more quickly through the pipeline, measuring the influence of advocate activities on every stage of the revenue cycle.
Revenue Generation
Customer Engagement
Social Media Buzz
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REFERRALS
84% of B2B decision-makers begin their buying process with a referral.2
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Act-On implemented a powerful referral program for their advocates to willingly introduce hot prospects.3
209 Generated over 209 high quality leads in six months
Created $175,000 in sales pipeline
Converted referral leads at 5%, blowing through industry standard lead conversion benchmarks by more than 500%
500% Click here to see their case study.
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REFERENCES Reliance on knowledgeable peer references has more than doubled in the past 5 years.4
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Ceridian creates an environment for their advocates to network with their prospects, in turn, shortening their sales cycle.5
Generated over
20
high quality sales references
In a few months:
35 Shining testimonial videos.
Case studies and testimonials.
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of tech B2B customers search for peer testimonials or reviews of a product.6
PRODUCT REVIEWS 60%
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DocuSign encourages their advocates to spread their positive sentiment on as many product review sites as possible.
In just 3 months:
reviews
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Demandbase fortifies the relationships with their advocates by celebrating their successes in case studies.7
A case study is like a little report card – it’s a way for me to help my customers show their peers, managers, board members and the general public the value they’ve derived from our partnership. People work with others whom they genuinely like and I believe that advocate marketing improves your “likeability.” Farkhanda Zhublawar, Senior Customer Success Manager
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Ektron mobilized their advocates to create key pieces of content for their organization and electrify their annual event.8
Crowd sourced
customer generated videos for the opening key note at their annual Synergy event
Dozens
of hours of customer testimonials and content were generated as well
90% of Ektron’s Synergy track sessions were from customer generated content
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Okta leveraged the relationship with their advocates to rapidly launch an insight rich beta testing program.
Received over
customer opt-ins for product beta testing in a matter of hours when it use to take weeks
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Traffic from Linked generated
the highest visitor-to-lead
conversion rate at 2.74%, almost
3X higher than both AND
SOCIAL DISCUSSIONS
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Xactly mobilized their advocates to dominant social discussions on social networks resulting in prestigious industry award wins.10
Drove more than
80%
• recommendations • follows • shares
making Xactly one of LinkedIn’s 12 best company sites of 2012
of customer activity on Salesforce AppExchange to win:
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SOCIAL SHARING OF CONTENT
28% of B2B buyers share online
vendor marketing content with
over 100 other people 11
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Bomgar’s advocates heated up the social sphere with a wildfire of mentions and activity on popular social networks like Twitter and LinkedIn.12
increase in mentions and 45% increase in content shares
social impressions 66%
…in 6 months
55 added Bomgar to their LinkedIn skills
customers
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Brainshark used their advocates to generate a tidal wave of social media engagement across a variety of social networks.
boost in social media engagement
In just a short span of time we were able to increase our social engagement on Twitter by 106%, not including multiplier effect from the social networks of employee and customer advocates - Influitive really enabled us to expand the reach of our content on social.
Sabrina Cote, Social Media Manager
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OTHER USE CASES A 12% increase in advocacy, on
average, generates a 2X increase in revenue growth rate
plus boosts market share
connections.13
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ReadyTalk formed a highly engaging advocate program resulting in referrals, references and new customer logos closing in record time.14
referrals
33% of referred opportunities closed twice as fast
In 4 months…
70 enthusiastic sales references
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Quorum cemented the relationship with their advocates and created a powerful stream of advocacy, including reviews and references.
Spiceworks reviews and testimonials were posted by customers within a few months
5+ SUPER advocates (customers who enthusiastically swoop in and help Quorum) were identified
15+ customers willingly raising their hand for reference calls
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SMART’s army of advocates have generated a wealth of value through thousands of acts of advocacy.15
Return on advocacy: Mobilized 349 advocates to take more than
13,000
individual actions in the first 30 days
SMART’s advocates are a gold mine, and Influitive helped us engage with all of them. Each advocate brings $130,000 of value to our organization.
Deena Zenyk, Advocate Marketing Manager
per advocate per year
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191 Niagara Street, Toronto, ON M5V 1C9
1.888.684.0758
influitive.com
@influitive
Let’s chat!
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These companies knew their customers loved them.
How are your customers helping you?
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SOURCES 1 Google and CEB, The Digital Evolution in B2B Marketinghttp://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/research-studies/the-digital-evolution-in-b2b-marketing.html 2 Edelman Trust Barometer via LinkedIn http://sales.linkedin.com/blog/a-story-of-two-sales-experts/ 3 Act-On Software Case Study http://influitive.com/advocate-marketing-case-study-acton/ 4 SiriusDecisions via Funnelholic http://www.funnelholic.com/2013/09/04/29-insights-data-points-and-anecdotes-on-advocate-marketing/ 5 Ceridian Case Study http://influitive.com/case-study-ceridians-advocate-reference-program-generates-over-260-sales-references/ 6 Google and CEB, The Digital Evolution in B2B Marketinghttp://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/research-studies/the-digital-evolution-in-b2b-marketing.html 7 Demandbase Case Study http://influitive.com/demandbase-advocate-marketing-customer-success/ 8 Ektron Case Study http://influitive.com/influitive-case-study-ektron-advocate-marketing/
9 HubSpot http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/30030/LinkedIn-277-More-Effective-for-Lead-Generation-Than-Facebook-Twitter-New-Data.aspx 10 Xactly Case Study http://influitive.com/advocate-marketing-case-study-xactly/ 11 "Better Lead Yield in the Content Marketing Field" White Paper, CMO Council http://www.cmocouncil.org/images/uploads/262.pdf 12 Bomgar Case Study http://www.bomgar.com/bomgar-forrester-groundswell-entry 13 The Ultimate Question: Driving Good Profits and True Growth Hardcover by Fred Reichheld (Harvard Business School Press) 14 ReadyTalk Case Study http://influitive.com/readytalk-groundswell-submission/ 15 SMART Technologies Case Study http://influitive.com/advocate-marketing-case-study-smart-technologies/