Tactics

Add Calls To Action (CTAs) to drive lead conversion

Calls To Action (CTAs) are relatively simple devices that are so often overlooked by b2b marketers in their inbound marketing campaigns. Getting quality traffic to your site can be hard work so you should spend some effort to keep them there, nurturing the lead, engaging with them further and pulling them down the funnel towards making a purchasing decision. Is it really good enough to end your blog article with a generic "what do you think?" and hope for a flood of comments? How much better to end the blog with a well designed, clear CTA button READ MORE ›

By Chris Fell|Tactics|

align.me CEO & Founder, Hugh Macfarlane’s featured keynote at DemandCon now available

Hugh Macfarlane’s featured keynote at DemandCon in May 2011 now available as an interactive video. July 8, 2011, Melbourne, VIC, AU – Hugh Macfarlane, Founder and CEO of align.me and author of The Leaky Funnel, was a featured keynote at DemandCon in May 2011. He then joined Funnel Coach, Charles Besondy, to run a full day Funnel Plan training workshop with the foremost thinkers in B2B demand generation. His keynote was centred on a topic that has made it to AMA’s Top 10 list of primary focus areas two years in a row – Sales and Marketing READ MORE ›

By Hugh Macfarlane|Strategy, Tactics, Velocity|

Maximise CRM investment for productivity and return

(Too) Many sales organisations undertake a CRM strategy and associated hefty investment, and then when the software vendors come on site to undertake their (too) often “generic customisation”, the purchasing sales organisation is jolted into a process that forces them to retro-think about the functionality and the process support that can be derived from their investment. This common egg-and-chicken scenario usually results in one or two forms of investment sub-optimisation: Paying for functionality embedded in the system that is unnecessary but the organisation was not well prepared to say they didn’t want it; Conversely, they don’t adequately tailor READ MORE ›

By Glenn Guilfoyle|Alignment, Sales, Tactics, Velocity|

Why lead generation is time-wasting for B2B Marketers

Those of us who provide marketing services and solutions for B2B Marketers get to speak with many, many marketers and organisations during the course of a year. Its one of the best parts of my job. I have had four prospect meetings this week. It was a week of extremes. On one end of the spectrum I met with a gargantuan international Telco and at the opposite extreme a classic smart, entrepreneurial small software business. What I found interesting was despite almost every facet of their businesses being so different, they had the same issue. Content. The READ MORE ›

By Chris Fell|Tactics, Velocity|

B2B marketing secrets of high-growth companies

Hugh Macfarlane, Founder & CEO of align.me, writes... B2B marketing professionals know that nurturing a prospect is a fine art. So if there was a demonstrated way to master this art, we would all want to know about it, right? Well at DemandCon Jon Miller (VP of Marketing, Marketo) is aiming to teach us how we can reach 1000 customers in three years by telling us the ‘secrets’ of a certain company. Jon has been named a Top 10 CMO for companies under $250 million revenue by The CMO Institute, and he co-founded Marketo. His experience has READ MORE ›

By Hugh Macfarlane|Tactics|

Nurturing your Leads with Segmentation & Automation

Hugh Macfarlane, Founder & CEO of align.me, writes... Surely this is a goal for most B2B marketing teams. But of course personalisation often reads as almost synonymous with difficult, so it sets the alarm bells start ring for many of us. The trouble is you will get better results with personalised B2B marketing tactics. At align.me we certainly believe in clear, specific tactics for carrying-out optimised B2B marketing and sales solutions. So is there any way to take the difficulty out of personalisation? Just after my own heart, Kim Albee believes a nurturing attitude to prospects will READ MORE ›

By Hugh Macfarlane|Tactics, Velocity|

B2B Marketing Nirvana – targeting emails

Hugh Macfarlane, Founder & CEO of align.me, writes... We’ve had a social media Mecca and now we’ve got a B2B marketing nirvana. Dictionary.com defines nirvana as, “a place or state characterised by freedom from or oblivion to pain, worry, and the external world”. So if there is a B2B marketing ‘nirvana’, in what sense can you achieve it? Firstly, you would need to cut-out marketing tactics that are all worry and no results. People are almost immune to mass marketing efforts these days, so B2B marketing professionals need to be all-the-more savvy. To do this they need to READ MORE ›

By Hugh Macfarlane|Tactics, Velocity|

Marketing Operations of the Future

Hugh Macfarlane, Founder & CEO of align.me, writes... Marketing Automation doesn’t happen overnight. There is a transition process involved. B2B marketing organisations will need to work through this process and respond to new ways of doing things as they go. B2B marketing delivery, user tracking, scoring and strategy all come into play. So what does this mean for the whole B2B marketing team? It means exactly that – the whole B2B marketing team needs to facilitate changes. And what’s more, B2B sales teams need to be on board to ensure full Marketing Automation roll-out. Ryan Abreo, Vice READ MORE ›

By Hugh Macfarlane|Tactics, Velocity|

Is Bargain Basement Data Really a Bargain?

Hugh Macfarlane, Founder & CEO of align.me, writes... You need names to fill your Funnel. There are lists available for B2B marketingcompanies that give you names. But whether these lists offer quality leads is another matter. B2B marketing professional can find themselves torn between the idea of a quick-fix, and using up valuable resources trawling through data to find names of their own accord. This may seem like a catch-22 to some, which is why gaining an expert’s insights on the topic is valuable. Suaad Sait, Chairman Reachforce, and one-such expert on the matter says, “Essentially, poor READ MORE ›

By Hugh Macfarlane|Tactics|

Virtual events for B2B marketing

Hugh Macfarlane, Founder & CEO of align.me, writes... The internet is no longer an optional B2B marketing channel, but a key platform to almost every campaign executed. If we consider the huge changes that we’ve witnessed in the last decade, it’s logical to think that the virtual landscape will only continue to move to the centre of every B2B marketing professional’s world. The best approach is to embrace what you can of the digital world to avoid being left in the dust! Has your company started conducting virtual events? In this presentation at DemandCon, Dennis Shiao will READ MORE ›

By Hugh Macfarlane|Tactics, Velocity|