With the exception of a few large companies, B2B marketing is incredibly wasteful and ineffective. What causes this failure in so many companies?
- Marketers come from big company and consumer marketing backgrounds, because that is where most marketing has traditionally been done. But this is radically different marketing to what SMEs, particular B2B SMEs, need.
- The marketing manager is usually too junior to address the incredibly diverse and complex issues of New Media marketing. Or they are too senior – they are unnecessarily expensive. And they get bored doing implementation.
- Strategy gets bogged down and side tracked on peripheral issues e.g. website design issues. The website is no longer the main game.
- Focus of getting new clients is traditionally on cold calls – and calling cold is no longer needed in B2B (and can actually be negative). But the bosses, who typically don’t understand Social Networking, don’t know this!
- Even the young marketers are not much help on strategy – universities teach the wrong things (big company and consumer focus). And a lot of it is simply out of date – we have to retrain the young people who join us.
- And Finally, the ultimate decision makers are in their 40s and 50s and 60s and know nothing about Social Media:
- Don’t like it
- Don’t get it
- Don’t want to know
What are you doing to get clients, to fill events, in 2012?
The world has changed. For a radically different approach to B2B marketing, here’s a paper on Getting Clients in 2012.