Amy Peck believes in the bright future of AR and VR — or at least, in trying to make that future a reality. Check out the latest episode of B2B Revealed for everything B2B companies need to know about AR, VR, and Mixed Reality.
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Surprise! — employees aren’t productive in their first day on the job. Guest Maia Josebachvili, VP of Marketing and Strategy at Greenhouse, has gone beyond that conventional wisdom and helped to create the Employee Lifetime Value Framework. This Framework helps companies understand how employee effectiveness changes over time. In this episode, we’ll help you understand the Framework.
The best way to listen to the episode is through Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, or Overcast. You’ll be able to listen to past episodes and subscribe so you don’t miss future episodes.
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David Fisher, author of Hyper-Connected Selling, knows that technology-enabled sales is great, but it’s never going to satisfy the need for human connection.
The best way to listen to the episode is through Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, or Overcast. You’ll be able to listen to past episodes and subscribe so you don’t miss future episodes.
As we mentioned in the show, if you’re enjoying the B2B Revealed show we’d love it if you would leave a nice review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to the show.
Chloë Thomas, author of “B2B eCommerce MasterPlan” joins us to talk about B2B eCommerce. Yes, B2B companies need to go online. No, they shouldn’t be taking their cues from the Amazon consumer experience.
The best way to listen to the episode is through Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, or Overcast. You’ll be able to listen to past episodes and subscribe so you don’t miss future episodes.
As we mentioned in the show, if you’re enjoying the B2B Revealed show we’d love it if you would leave a nice review on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to the show.
It’s not just newly-promoted, doe-eyed marketing managers who make serious management mistakes. Seasoned enterprise executives aren’t immune to expensive screw ups either. On the latest episode of the B2B Revealed Podcast, Herding Tigers author Todd Henry explained that mismanagement of creative teams leads to talent loss and companies that underperform compared to their peers. Henry shared some tips for conscientious creative leadership.
Creative Goals Need Business Results
Managers need to make sure their teams understand how their work affects the larger business goals of the company. This helps avoid an ego-driven company culture. Creative success should be measured in terms of business results.
“The reality is, for most of us, we engage in work that we don’t always love, we don’t always agree with necessarily, but it’s our job to get it done,” Henry said.
In a business setting, creatives need to be able to produce great work even when they don’t control the larger vision for the project.
Your Job Description Now Includes “Threading Needles”
Leaders need to understand how to build an environment where creativity thrives. According to Henry, that requires providing stability without getting near the border of Boredom Land. Without stability, the team will find itself working on the same problem over-and-over again, without every finishing the project. With too much stability, the team won’t feel creatively challenged. It’s the leader’s job to walk that fine line between stability and boredom.
To key elements of a great creative environment are:
Clear expectations.
An even playing field.
Protected time for creative cycles.
Stakeholders throughout the company who are invested in the creative team’s work.
A steady flow of exciting projects.
Is This Meeting Over?
Todd Henry teaches leaders and organizations how to establish practices that lead to everyday brilliance. He is the author of Herding Tigers.
Like it or not, meetings are a fact of life — especially on creative teams that depend on collaboration. Yet, even though we all wish we’d only have to sit in on useful meetings, the opposite is often true. That’s why at some point in all of our careers, we’ve all walked away from meetings scratching our heads and wondering, “Wait, what did we decide again?” Great creative leadership is about making this as uncommon as an enterprise company with no marketing vendors.
According to Henry, good leadership means being able to say, “Okay, this is the decision and now this meeting is over.” That’s true even if there are still 20 minutes left on the scheduled event. That kind of clear action is uncomfortable for people who don’t want to put their neck on the line for controversial or risky decisions, but is critical if your creatives are going to do effective work. Decisiveness eliminates confusion. Don’t less unnecessary meeting time detract from needed periods of creative focus.
Chekhov vs. Chesterton
Focus on building a culture that fosters creativity, but in a way that doesn’t just seek to flip over tables and start from scratch every time. To illustrate this, Henry referenced two quotes.
“There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road” Henry quoted G. K. Chesterton, the notable English writer. “The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, ‘I don’t see the use of this; let us clear it away.’ To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: ‘If you don’t see the use of it, I certainly won’t let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it.’”
Then, in contrast, Henry pointed to a quote from Anton Chekhov, the famed Russian poet, who advises, “Remove everything that has no relevance to the story. If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off. If it’s not going to be fired, it shouldn’t be hanging there.”
A great creative leader knows how to balance these two extremes. They know that they shouldn’t just throw everything out because it doesn’t make sense, but they also know that they need to remove unnecessary distractions for their team. Finding that balance creates an environment that allows creatives to reach new heights.
Push Play to Expand Your View of Great Management
This interview with Henry was packed so full of valuable insights we couldn’t fit them all in one article. Listen to the episode for more on constructing a creative environment, best practices for managing a creative team, how to (smartly) give up control over decisions, the secret benefits of having a pet project, and some great book recommendations.
The B2B Revealed Podcast is brought to you byCascade Insights, a market research firm specializing in B2B technology. Need more B2B expertise in your life? There are many ways tofollow us.
Your video doesn’t need to go viral to be a success. Despite that, too many marketers chase views at the expense of reaching the right viewers. In the latest episode of the B2B Revealed Podcast, we dug in on this topic with viral video expert David Feinman, the co-founder of Viral Ideas.
You Can Pay Bills With Sales, Not With Likes
Many professionals are tempted to craft a video with the sole intention of getting thousands of likes. For Feinman, that much emphasis on going viral is a waste of resources.
“In the B2B space it’s really tough to make something pop,” said Feinman. “What we like to think about from a B2B perspective is do you actually need to go viral?” B2B audiences are limited by nature. It’s more important to convince your niche pool of potential buyers than to go viral with the general public.
Feinman went on to give an example of a trucking company. They could have spent months creating a video that reached millions of viewers. However, there were only 20,000 purchasers in their vertical in the United States. For them, having a video that reached only that 20,000 people was more valuable than reaching millions of people. Why go viral with people who aren’t going to buy?
It’s a bit like sending a letter to a friend. Sure, if you send mass mail to every household in Boston they’ll get your letter, but you could save a lot of time, effort, and money by simply addressing the letter specifically to your friend.
Your Video’s Subject Matter Matters
David Feinman is the co-founder of Viral Ideas, which helps companies create impactful video content.
Spend time finding a topic that will allow your video to further your business goals. When picking a topic, Feinman stresses that what you personally find interesting is not necessarily what customers will find interesting.
The best way to make sure you’re making a video that’s customer-centric is to use the messaging that’s already proven to drive sales.
Once you’ve got the subject matter locked down, you need to figure out the why behind the message, says Feinman. Explaining why you do the things you do will keep your viewers engaged. Then, instead of feeling like they’re watching an infomercial, they’ll feel like they’re being told a story — one they’re invited to be a part of.
Will this approach lead you to the top of the YouTube leaderboard with a viral video? Unlikely. Will it get you business? Yes.
Set Your Sights on Micro-Viral Videos
If reaching the right audience is more critical than total views, you may be wondering what goals you should have for a video. As Feinman explained, most B2B businesses should be looking to go viral inside of their own vertical. After all, you aren’t looking for a consumer-scale viral video that lands on Good Morning America. Instead, you’re looking for a video that goes viral in your industry.
“Thinking about and reframing where you need your audience to be in a B2B environment might not be viral, per se,” said Feinman. “But, it might be micro viral in that we hit our entire target market. To me, that’s a huge win for any B2B audience.”
That’s a win that’s achievable for B2B companies, so long as they make the video in the right way. For that, listen to the interview. You’ll learn what the video making process should look like and some practical tips for creating a stand-out marketing video on a budget.
The B2B Revealed Podcast is brought to you byCascade Insights, a market research firm specializing in B2B technology. Need more B2B expertise in your life? There are many ways tofollow us.
Mistaking a fancy title for thought leadership is a common mistake in the book publishing business. After all, a fancy title does not a good author make.
Writing books on professional topics can be a great marketing strategy or a wasted exercise in ego inflation. Before writing a book, make sure you have something worth saying that people will want to listen to.
In the latest episode of B2B Revealed, Sean Campbell interviewed Caleb Breakey, CEO of Speak It To Book. They discussed the best way to transform your business views into a story worthy of publication.
Building Your Business With a Book
For business leaders and aspiring thought leaders, books need to serve a purpose. It’s highly unlikely that you’ll be able to turn your experience as a B2B sales leader or consultant into a career as a full-time author. Since that’s not a viable path, why write a book?
As Breakey told it, the book should be one piece of a larger funnel. Start by publishing a book for free. It’s much easier to do so these days with the proliferation of eBooks and services like Kindle Unlimited. Next, you need a plan for how you’ll connect with your readers.
“The book is just the start,” said Breakey. “Now, what’s the next step with you? Is it a video series…Are you doing speaking engagements? Do you want to host a retreat for this particular niche?”
The goal isn’t to be a full-time, best-selling author. Instead, the goal is to use the book as a door opener: to conversations with customers, partners, and people interested in your industry.
This planning should happen before any writing — or ghost-writing — begins on the book itself. Once you have the plan for how the book will be used, then it’s safe to begin your investment in writing a book.
“Writing Is So Easy a 10-Year Old Could Do It”
Once they’ve got a plan, many authors foolishly assume they’ll jump into the writing process and wrap it up in a month or two. For example, let’s say a VP of something at a Fortune 100 company for the last five years leaves her role to start a consultancy. To promote the business, she decides to write a book about her experiences in her past role. The book never makes it passed the outline.
Believing a book will come naturally is a common misguided assumption, according to Breakey. In his time helping people turn their book ideas into reality, Breakey has seen far too many Chapter One drafts sitting in a desk drawer, collecting dust.
Writing is harder than it looks, folks. Breakey shared this joke: “There’s a saying that goes around in the writing industry about a writer and a doctor who go out on the golf course. And the doctor says to his writer friend, ‘You wouldn’t believe it, I’m so excited, I’m taking off the summer from my practice to become a writer.’ The writer turns back and says, ‘That’s crazy, because I’m actually taking off this summer to go into brain surgery with you as well.’”
The moral of the story? That writing a book is going to take time, especially for people who are long on industry experience and short on crafting stories.
Imagine Your Audience Standing There — Bored
These words of caution aren’t meant to discourage all would-be authors. Writing is about communicating important ideas, not seeing if you can hit an arbitrary page count. Instead, focus on the value you’re bringing to readers.
To do this, Breakey recommends putting yourself in the shoes of the audience. “Is it giving you value in the first five pages? Check. Great, keep reading. Is the author giving you value in the next 10 pages? Great, check. Keep reading.”
Publish something that delivers value on every page so that you can keep the attention of your audience. If that means your “book” is just a 45-page PDF, that’s fine.
After all, it’s better to leave your audience wanting more than to bore them so badly they don’t want any more from you, ever.
The B2B Revealed Podcast is brought to you by Cascade Insights, a market research firm specializing in B2B technology. Need more B2B expertise in your life? There are many ways to follow us.
Do you have the wrong people in the wrong roles? You have two options: resign yourself to mediocrity or rethink how you manage your team.
In the latest episode of the B2B Revealed Podcast, host Sean Campbell interviewed Dan Cox, CEO of EXOS Advisors. A long-time executive coach and expert in talent management, Cox shared his experiences using the Core Values Index (CVI) to help companies optimize their workforces.
Does The Predisposition Suit The Position?
Cox has spent years working with leadership teams to help them find solutions to what’s hurting their productivity. To do this, he relies on the CVI: an assessment of peoples’ core values.
According to Cox, research has shown that peoples’ core values rarely change over time. As a result, the test goes beyond mere personality or behavioral tests like Myers-Briggs.
Practically speaking, this test helps companies figure out if they have people in roles where they can make their most significant contribution.
It can also show if there’s a misalignment between someone’s core values and motivators with their current role. According to Cox, this is a common problem. He believes a majority of the workforce is ill-suited to their positions.
For example, companies may misguidedly hire problem solvers in roles that have no problem-solving needs. Or, they may put people who thrive with fixed processes in creative positions that require a high degree of flexibility.
What are your Core Values?
The CVI defines four core value personas: the Innovator, the Banker, the Builder, and the Merchant. Each of these pairs with a
Dan is CEO & Managing Advisor at EXOS Advisors.
“core energy.” Innovators are guided by wisdom, bankers by knowledge. Builders are motivated by power, and merchants are driven by love. You can find out more about these values here.
The CVI reveals the types of roles employees are predisposed to excel at. For example, Cox shared the findings of a CVI assessment implemented at a wastewater plant in California. The plant discovered that the 10-person maintenance team was made up of innovators who prized creative problem-solving. “The Achilles’ heel of the problem solver is that they will continue to solve problems, even when there are no problems to be solved,” Cox said.
Since the preventative maintenance central to the job required very little problem-solving, this was a clear misalignment. Further, the maintenance workers were unhappy in their positions since they weren’t able to meaningfully contribute their core strengths.
Meanwhile, the company had twice as many people as it needed to get the job done. All the company required was a few people who thrived with checklists. Instead, they had an unwieldy team spending the bulk of their time seeking out problems to solve.
Firing Isn’t the Only Option
Once a misalignment is evident, companies have to make some tough choices. Should companies leave employees in roles they aren’t wired to do or lay them off? Neither, according to Cox.
Instead, a more holistic approach is needed. Companies need to rethink their hiring processes to make sure they’re getting the right people in the right roles from the start. They should also look for ways to allow current employees to draw on their core values in their work. This may require some reshuffling of roles and responsibilities. Most companies find ways to give misaligned employees better-suited jobs in the same organization.
To Fire or Not to Fire: Tis Not the Question
Getting the right people in the right roles doesn’t just serve efficiency and profits. Cox ultimately sees it as a “humanitarian effort.” If the CVI can help people find roles that make them happy while furthering the companies’ goals, it’s a win for everyone.
The B2B Revealed Podcast is brought to you by Cascade Insights, a market research firm specializing in B2B technology. Need more B2B brilliance? There are many ways to follow us.
Growth problems? Try treating your sales development reps (SDRs) like vital resources rather than cogs in a machine.
That’s the message from Trish Bertuzzi, the President of the Bridge Group, which she shared with Cascade Insights CEO Sean Campbell on the latest episode of the B2B Revealed Podcast.
Upend Your Expectations for How SDRs Should Work
Sharing insights from her book, The Sales Development Playbook, Bertuzzi demonstrates the connection between SDR job satisfaction and sales growth.
First off, it’s important to acknowledge that SDRs are put in a very difficult position.
As Bertuzzi says, “It’s a hard job, we make it harder by not giving them what they need to stay longer.” SDRs are provided with little training, the wrong tools, and are managed by people who expect the average tenure to last only about a year. It’s little surprise then that when SDRs outgrow their roles they also tend to outgrow the company.
Bertuzzi believes there’s a way to fix some of these key issues, to the benefit of both the SDRs and the organization as a whole.
Give SDRs the Freedom to Grow Into the Perfect Role
In order to improve the SDR work environment, Bertuzzi urges companies to give SDRs the freedom to grow, without expecting too much, too soon.
To do this, Bertuzzi is a big proponent of micro-promotions.
“Trish Bertuzzi is the Best Selling Author of The Sales Development Playbook and founder of The Bridge Group, Inc.”
“What we talk about in the book, and what we talk about with our clients is creating a learning culture and creating micro-promotions,” says Bertuzzi. That means getting rid of the system of of promoting SDRs to account executives after they’ve outgrown the introductory SDR role.
“If you’re an SDR1 you just do the SDR role, you’re an SDR2 maybe you get to start participating in discovery calls and even maybe running some of those discovery calls. You’re an SDR3 maybe you get to run with a couple small deals.”
By following this system, SDR’s responsibilities increase with their experience. Incremental changes in job title and compensation provide more of an incentive for SDRs to stick around.
Sharing from personal experience, Bertuzzi says that ultimately it’s “all about advancing them through a learning process that gives them the full set of skills they need to be successful.”
Equip Your Team with the Right Tools and Tactics
SDR success also depends on mastery of a few key communication skills.
Bertuzzi emphasizes that SDRs should have a solid grasp of how to use a phone and send effective emails.
While these skills can improve with training, it’s best to hire people with a natural inclination for the role from the start. Bertuzzi describes how one company had SDR applicants spend a day shadowing the current team. After seeing what the job would really be like, only 50 percent of them continued to express interest in the role.
In all honesty, it did make recruiting more difficult. At the same time, it also meant that the people who were hired came in with a clear expectation of what the job would be like, making them more effective.
More SDR Wisdom
Listen to the full episode for more SDR answers, such as:
Where does the idea of “all bound” fit in a world of outbound vs. inbound?
Which is more effective: PACT (Pain, Authority, Consequence, Target-Profile) or BANT (Budget, Authority, Need, Time-Frame)?
What qualities should you be looking for when hiring for your SDR team?
What are some effective outreach tactics for phone, voicemail, and email?
The B2B Revealed Podcast is brought to you by Cascade Insights, a market research firm specializing in B2B technology. Need more B2B brilliance? There are many ways to follow us.
Too often, marketers go after the C-suite when it’s really a developer or marketing manager making the buying decisions. Marketers enumerate cumulative leads but forget to track how many actually brought in revenue. They become enamored with data without checking its validity and don’t push to understand the “why” behind the numbers.
On this episode of the B2B Revealed Podcast, Cascade Insights CEO Sean Campbell discussed measuring marketing ROI with Samantha Stone, author of Unleash Possible: A Marketing Playbook That Drives B2B Sales. Stone founded The Marketing Advisory Network and serves as the chief marketing officer.
Remember, marketing goals should also further the broader goals of the company. “A lot of the ways that marketers measure ourselves today really are not measurements of the business overall,” Stone said. “We do things like measure the number of leads that we create. But what really matters is whether those leads are converting to opportunities, revenue, and business and in the strategic markets that we want to go after.”
Find Out How Long Buyers Linger In The Sales Funnel
Since B2B buying is a group decision, Stone argues that B2B buyers are unlikely to skip stages in their buying process no matter how good your content or messaging is.
“One of the things that we need to start measuring is the impact of our programs on the amount of time that people spend in each of those stages- because we can influence that,” Stone said. “If we can break down and measure on average where different market segments are spending their time, we can start to create programs to help them move faster through that.”
These measurements can identify areas where potential buyers turn into “no’s.”
“A lot of companies that I work with find that they have a lot of people who see and trial their software and then they get stuck. They never move beyond that stage,” Stone said. “But there are things that marketing can do to help make that process different, so that we can make that trial efficiency better. We can make sure the right people are going into a trial. We can help them design a test during the trial period that’s actually going to surface our value in the right way.”
Samantha Stone, author of “Unleash Possible: A Marketing Playbook That Drives B2B Sales”
Check On How Adoption Went Post-Purchase
According to Stone, marketers should adopt accountability metrics around the adoption of technology.
“We want our customers to be customers for a long time,” Stone said. “And the only way they’re going to renew their contracts with us or buy additional products and services is if they use what they purchased the first time. Yet marketing tends to say, “The sale is closed, we’re not responsible for that anymore.””
Stone suggests measuring how long it takes the customer to go from purchase to adoption. Marketers should also devote some resources to making sure that customers are able to adopt the product or service quickly and easily.
Turn Your Customers Into Advocates
Marketing, Stone explains, has a role to play in getting happy customers to spread the word.
Stone urges marketers to consider, “Once somebody has adopted our product or service, how do we make sure they’re going out to market and are writing reviews about us? Or sharing positive content with their networks? Or giving us referrals?”
Beware Of Overemphasizing Cumulative Lead Scoring
Conversion, adoption, and advocacy metrics give a much fuller picture of marketing success than looking at lead gen alone.
Content consumption does not necessarily lead to a sale, Stone warns.
“Oftentimes, a person who will come to your every educational web seminar and they will read all your blog posts and download all your white papers. But they may just be interested in the topic. They may have a competitive product that they’re already satisfied with, but your content is good. Or they may, in fact, have a need for your product but no budget to support it,” she said.
Look beyond the number of hits and examine the buyers’ behavior for clues of their intentions.
Stone offers this example:
“In a B2B environment, we’re selling to an organization, not just an individual person. We need to think about what activity across multiple people might signal.
So, I may have a single person who is doing a lot of work at a company and attends every web seminar and downloads every whitepaper. But maybe no one else at the company has ever participated in anything we’ve done.
If all of a sudden, I see four additional people’s activity spike at that same organization, this might tell me something. I might surmise that the person who had been doing that research all along slowly and quietly has finally got the attention of other people in the company and maybe there’s a real project happening.”
Know Who Is Really Making The Buying Decision
Many marketers get sidetracked by the executive who signs the check. They misguidedly throw the bulk of their resources to trying to woo the C-Suite when it’s actually quite rare for C-level executives to be the most influential in the decision to buy. Key buyer personas often have lower titles.
“The reality is it takes an incredible amount of effort to get the attention of a C-level executive. It’s a very expensive marketing and sales proposition. We have to be really measured about when we try and go after those folks… and make sure that there’s a real opportunity and a real influence that they need to have on the buying process,” Stone said. “Our resources are much better used towards other folks when the C-level executive is really not involved.”
Drama With Data
While marketing metrics mishaps often involve a fair amount of hubris, sometimes the data simply leads marketers astray. Stone cautioned against relying on incomplete or bad data.
As more and more data becomes available to marketers, Stone advises balancing quantitative research with qualitative ones. “Quantitative research is very valuable. I do a lot of that work for clients and for my own practice and my own learning. But it doesn’t explain why something is happening. We have to take the time to learn that. Sometimes that means we have to apply qualitative processes to the hypothesis we’ve gained from the data,” Stone said.
Behavioral habits don’t always fit neatly into a spreadsheet. Don’t allow your data to reduce people to algorithms that erase their flawed humanity.
“When I look at a spreadsheet or I see a chart, I don’t see the person anymore. I don’t see the individual anymore. I only see the summary of the data about that individual,” Stone said. “There’s a risk in losing sight of the fact that people are emotional and don’t always make rational decisions. We need to make sure that we… really understand what’s underlying.”
Metrics That Matter
While in times past, the primary function of marketing may have been to raise awareness and literally get customers in the door, marketing is responsible for much more of the sales funnel in the Internet age.
“We have the opportunity to change what we measure to actually influence the entire purchase process by which [customers] adopt our solutions or services. And then, hopefully, we help them become advocates,” Stone said. “Marketing has a responsibility to be able to do that. But the only way that marketing can take that responsibility is if we stop holding them accountable to vanity metrics that are not actually driving the business.”
Listen to the full episode for more insight on flawed data sets, company leaders’ responsibility to content creation, and good measurements of marketing success.
The B2B Revealed Podcast is brought to you by Cascade Insights, a market research firm specializing in B2B technology. Need more B2B brilliance? There are many ways tofollow us.
