It’s Time To Execute Your Market/Business Plan

Let's talk about the most important role marketing has, leading the development and execution of your annual business plan. If you don't have a clear, go to market strategy for 2009 in place, build one - now.

Typically in Q4, your business builds out the plan for next year. From my experience, having a well thought plan, with proper business alignment is critical for success. I have been fortunate enough to be a part of leadership teams that have for the past 8 years have yielded strong year over year revenue growth. There are many factors to this success, including: a clear, well thought out go to market plan.

So what does a good market plan look like?

First, you need to have a very clear target market. While many plans leverage vertical market groups, get specific - right down to the actual list of names.

Next up, review what is going on in that community. Look first at what is happening with your target customers, customers. They will have a significant influence on where your target customers spend their time and money. Look for new regulatory issues? Determine whether they growing or contracting? Find out what their corporate initiatives are? Identify a few market fast currents that you can capitalize on.

From there, develop a detailed revenue plan. Build out the pipeline you need, win rate, average selling price and breakdown revenues and units by quarter. I call this a revenue walk.

Not done yet, make sure every functional area that supports the plan documents what they need to do to make it happen - is your sales team sized properly? Is your lead generation program yielding enough? Can legal support the contract volume? Can your professional services department staff the work?

Once there is clarity and agreement on what the plan is and what needs to happen to make it happen - DO IT. Stay relentlessly focused on executing the plan. For sure, there will be many distractions, stay focused. Measure results against your expectations, and make adjustments based on facts - not opinions.

Plan B well executed is better than the Plan A that never happens.

Re-positioning After Mergers and Acquisitions

In the movie Apollo 13, engineers are faced with the problem of building new oxygen scrubbers for the lunar module with parts from the command module. Management dumps a seemingly disconnected set of parts, most of them with rounded edges, and presents the engineers with something quite square that needs to be built from those parts. Time is critical and lives hang in the balance.

Such is the life of marketing execs in the event of mergers and acquisitions. Your CEO will dump seemingly disconnected brands, market segments, web sites, and collateral on your desk with the expectations that you can quickly, seamlessly and inexpensively meld them all into a tidy box.

And by the way, it is not enough to build a case of 1+1 being something other than just 2. It has to be 3. And a half. Different merger profiles present different challenges. Let me give you three very different scenarios from my experience and a brief overview of how each were addressed.

At webMethods, we acquired three companies on the same day, all of which extended the ability of the company to address service oriented architectures and collaborative development. The acquisitions provided the perfect opportunity for reshaping the messaging of the company to demonstrate how webMethods had evolved from an early pioneer in application integration to a viable player in the world of Web services, Business Activity Monitoring, and composite applications. We could have done that positioning without the acquisitions, but the assets acquired gave tangible evidence that webMethods had truly evolved with the needs of the market, opening opportunities with a new set of prospects and demonstrating to the customer base that the company was actively working to protect their investment. The message was clear: the three acquisitions not only added new capabilities to the company, they actively synergized with the existing products and each other to create something much more compelling.

BTW, if you were wondering I can assure you that there are zero economies of scale in making simultaneous acquisitions, but that is a story for another time.

Cybertrust was a new entity formed by the merger of three companies, each with a diverse product set and each with differing geographic coverage. Our research showed that the pre-merger companies had positive brand equity, and most of that was based on the perceived talents, knowledge and abilities of the staff. We decided to buck the product driven mentality of the security market and build messaging that emphasized a collaborative approach that leveraged the perceived expertise of the staff, the strength of the combined portfolio of offerings, and the global capabilities. By departing from the positioning of the pre-merger companies - and the entire security market - Cybertrust emerged as something new and compelling, and we were able to create differentiation in a very noisy and confusing market. When we launched the new brand at the RSA tradeshow (THE tradeshow for security) the new positioning was so well received that we were given best in show honors for our booth and we were off and running.

Vovici was yet another scenario, this time the merger of two companies of similar size with similar product sets that addressed different markets (i.e. SMB versus enterprise). This scenario can be particularly tricky for messaging and positioning. Favor one market or pre-merger company and the other side will feel disenfranchised. Land somewhere in the middle and you run the risk that the end result will fail to resonate with either pre-merger group, and everyone will feel that the new company has left them behind. One solution is to take a persona based approach with messaging tailored specifically to each of the markets you need to address. The foundational elements of the brand and positioning of the new company can be used in each persona to create consistency, but the specifics of the messaging can diverge to accommodate the specific needs of each market.

What are Marketers Thinking, Part 1?

I'm a huge baseball fan. Specifically, a Yankee's fan. Last night I wanted to watch the Dodgers play the Phillies so I could root for Joe Torre. I turned the TV on early and caught the latest news about the stock market: ANOTHER 800 point drop. After a few minutes arguing with myself about whether to leave my 401K money in stocks or to pull them out and stuff my mattress with them, the game started and I settled in for several hours away from the stress of the imploding economy.

Interestingly, the first commercial I saw during the game was from E*Trade. You've probably seen it: the baby sitting in the high chair talking to the camera about how easy it is to buy and sell stocks online; about the 100's of thousands of new accounts E*Trade opens every week. Now, I've seen that commercial many times, but last night it struck me differently. How could E*Trade put this particular commercial on TV in the midst of perhaps the largest global financial crisis we've experienced; when many, many folks are thinking the same thing as me? Given the failures on both Wall Street and Main Street, is it really so easy to invest in the market that a baby can do it? What were the marketers at E*Trade thinking? Did they stop over the past few weeks to consider how this ad would strike consumers? If they'd already purchased the air time, couldn't they fill it with a message of a different tone or substance? Was this a good use of marketing dollars?

The only thing that made sense to me about that commercial was the part at the end when the baby leans over the side of his high chair and loses his dinner. After living through the last month, I feel like doing the same.

What do you think? I look forward to your comments.

The Power Shift Happening on the Internet

In the beginning, businesses held the power

Think back 10 years ago to when B2B marketers got this great new tool called the Internet. All marketers regardless of the size of their companies now had the power to reach more buyers in more markets. It was especially powerful for small businesses.

Marketers were quickly adjusting their strategies to include the Internet. Then they started adding online advertising and integrated Email campaigns. The Internet gave marketers additional power to push out the messages they wanted their buyers to hear.

Today, power is shifting to the buyer

Now, fast forward to today. With the explosion of online communities, blogs, and user-generated content, power is shifting from businesses to buyers. Buyers have access to more information from more sources than ever before. They can ask questions, get answers, and start conversations with people they've never met. All on the web, all on their own terms, 24x7.

What does this new power mean for B2B Marketers?

This new power is shifting how B2B buyers find, learn about, and ultimately make buying decisions. Specifically:

1. Buyers expect to be educated not sold
Buyers are using the Internet to get smarter about the products and services they purchase - in advance of contacting vendors. They're looking for a deeper, more detailed level of information and they expect businesses to provide it.

Key takeaway: Focus on truly understanding what your buyer is looking for (forget about what you want them to have for a sec). For example, if your buyers typically want a feature-by-feature comparison with other vendors, provide it on your site. Content that is highly relevant to the buyer (because it answers their questions) will be perceived as more valuable. The more content you provide, the more valuable your company becomes to the buyer.

2. Buyers are listening to what others say
While buyers are coming to your site to hear what you have to say, they're also looking for 3rd party sources to validate your claims. And companies who don't have it are simply less likely to make it to the short list.

Key takeaway: You must identify the influential industry sites that your buyers visit and implement a plan to create a presence on those sites - whether it's by pushing out relevant content, or joining in the conversation.

3. Buyers are more informed, earlier in the process
The increase in the amount of online sources means your buyer is more informed and educated than ever before. And, this is changing the timing of the sales process.

Buyers no longer have to wait to have sales meetings or presentations to get a better understanding of what solutions are out there. And many times, they may not even be looking for a specific solution to a problem but instead come across a solution as part of their daily search of the blogosphere looking to get smarter about what they do.

Key takeaway: When your buyer does reach out to you they'll likely be better prepared than even a year ago. They may even come to the table with specific expectations in terms of pricing. It's important to quickly gauge what information your buyer already has and clarify any misconceptions they may have based on what others have said. If you're engaged in the conversations going on out there, you'll have an opportunity to correct any misinformation much sooner in the process.

It's not just about your site anymore

Your buyers are spending a great deal of time on the web getting smarter about what they do. Their web-centric behavior gives you the opportunity to be seen and to influence your them on a regular basis. To capitalize on this behavior, the web must be at the core of your marketing and communications strategy. Waiting for the buyer to visit your site is just not good enough anymore.

For B2B marketers to be successful at generating awareness, building brands, and driving sales, they must find ways to leverage this web-centric world to their advantage. B2B marketers who understand and capitalize on this behavior will have a competitive edge over those who don't.

Internal Marketing for Mergers and Acquisitions

In my last three roles, I have found myself dealing with companies either formed by mergers or companies in the midst of acquisition, or both. Such circumstances create some unique challenges for the marketing team in creating or modifying the identity, messaging, and brand of the company. I will address some of my experience in multiple entries, with the first topic the subject of dealing with the internal culture and the employees.

For any company to gain identity in the market, the employees must be ready to put down the flag of the old company (or companies) and take up the flag of the new. In my experience, employees will continue to identify themselves with their pre-merger company until you have given them reason to do otherwise. Indicators are such things as retaining the old company name in email signatures (formerly...) and continued use of pre-merger branded materials. This serves to undercut the efforts of the marketing team to establish the new identity for the company and sends conflicting signals to the market.

Remember that many of these people have invested a significant portion of their work life with the pre-merger companies. Their identity is tied to the identity of that company and there is a sense that the company and culture they helped build is somehow being lost. You have to present them with an exciting and compelling case for the new company, and back that up with the messaging and materials that allow them to let go of the things that gave them comfort in the past.

When we launched Cybertrust (formed by the merger of three companies which were in turn formed by merger) formally to the market we in fact had two parallel campaigns. The first was a normal external launch directed to the market. We had a second, equally coordinated internal launch that aggressively took the new messaging and branding directly to the employees with materials created specifically for the internal team. The marketing team came in the weekend of the launch and cleaned out the employee pantries of old coffee mugs, eliminated all of the old collateral materials from lit racks, and replaced the pictures on the wall. At team meetings that followed the launch we carefully laid out the new messaging and branding, and encouraged employees to embrace the new company. A comprehensive set of newly branded materials, collateral, stationery, and sales giveaways were ready for use.

The results of the internal campaign were very good, largely because we gave the employees something exciting that had real form and substance. By the time Cybertrust was acquired by Verizon Business, the brand had quickly gained traction, and I am convinced that the internal campaign was a huge factor in that success because the employees were aligned with the brand and reinforced the efforts of marketing on a daily basis.

Have fun with it! Push a trash bin through the halls, shout "bring out your dead" a la Monty Python and replace old logo wear on the spot. Collect all of the old materials and have a bonfire in the parking lot (call the fire department first, please). But find a way to take the message to the employees because without them on board, the marketing road will be far steeper.

It is easy to move past the employee and culture issues and go straight to the broader marketing challenges in a merger or acquisition scenario. Constraints on time, resources, and budget make running a two pronged approach difficult. But getting the employees squarely behind the messaging and branding of the resulting organization is the first, key foundational element toward success.

Keeping up with Online Marketing

In today's fast-paced business world, how do technology marketers keep up with the latest and most effective tools in online marketing? When one is focused on execution, who has the time to lift his head up, take a breather and really observe the many changes taking place?

Below are just a few suggestions of how I keep up with the fast-paced world of online marketing:

1. It may sound old-fashioned, but I talk directly with customers and prospects and ask them:

• how they make their purchasing decisions
• which sites they visit to find and learn about products
• if they read online product reviews or participate in online forums about products they are considering
• do they write or read blogs and if so, which ones, etc.

Online customer surveys are valuable and provide quick and useful information but nothing takes the place of a real-time conversation with consumers to better understand their buying behavior.

2. Talk with your employees in every department, not just marketing and sales. Besides asking them for their ideas on how to improve your company's product or customer experience, you might consider asking them how they make their online buying decisions. My office is right outside the cube area where our young and talented engineers toil away. I enjoy listening to their witty and light-hearted banter, but more importantly, I learn from them. They tell me why they like or use Facebook, Twitter (most think the novelty of Twitter wears thin pretty quickly), etc. and what online tools they use to communicate, obtain their information and make purchases.

3. Invest some time to read recently published business books. I just finished reading Groundswell, which was published earlier this year. It helped me to better understand how I should prioritize our online marketing efforts. The book is written by two Forrester analysts and through their Social Technographics Profile methodology, they explain online consumer behavior by categorizing them into six groups: Creators, Critics, Collectors, Joiners, Spectators and Inactives. The book includes interesting case studies of companies that span from big brands like Best Buy to newcomers like eBags. Take a look at the Groundswell blog to get a taste of what the book covers.

I welcome other suggestions as I am interested in hearing what my marketing colleagues recommend for ways to keep up. Looking forward to the next TMA lunch event on September 24th.

TMA Survey Results Show Market Optimism

Thanks to everyone who participated in the TMA marketing survey. We received 33 completed responses during the April-May survey window. In general, the majority of respondents cited a positive outlook in 2008 as evidenced by increased marketing budgets, increased outsourcing of marketing services and cautious optimism about the economy.

I've summarized some of the highlights for you here.

• 48% of respondents said their marketing budget is more than 10% higher this year than in 2007.
• Almost half of respondents (48%) indicated that their biggest challenge is hiring the right people. Numbers two and three on this list were Aligning with Sales Initiatives (45%) and Seeing a Return on Investment (33%).
• TMA members are feeling bullish on the economy. Approximately 42% describe themselves as optimistic, with 33% feeling cautious. Only 18% say the economy is limiting their ability to execute on their marketing plans.
• 67% of TMA respondents claim that they'll be outsourcing more to agencies and freelancers this year.
• The most frequently outsourced tasks are public relations and design work (both 61%), followed by SEO/SEM (42%) and Website design (39%).
• The election is not seen as a contributing factor to marketing strategies; 79% of respondents say the election will not affect their marketing strategies or plans at all.
• The demographics of the respondents: 64% startup or small business, 18% mid-market and 18% large business or publicly traded companies.

If you're interested, take a look at the entire report.

If you have any questions about the survey, don't hesitate to reach out to Elizabeth Shea. Thanks again for your participation.

A Marketing Guy’s Thoughts on What I’ve Learned About Working with Sales

Why do software companies have marketing departments? When I meet prospective employees, I like to ask some variant of this question. The answer is usually pretty telling about the candidate. While I've heard some, er, interesting responses, most marketers will say something about helping to increase revenue.

But what does this really mean? Functionally, marketers can help increase revenue through developing great strategy, building market awareness, providing insightful competitive analysis, generating qualified leads, or communicating clear product differentiation. Clearly it's all of these things and many others.

But to my mind, creating a truly valuable marketing function means working closely with Sales. Contrary to the typical business school approach, revenue isn't a line item on a spreadsheet. It's the sum of the wins of hard fought street fights executed by your sales team. It's our job to put our sales teams in the position to win these fights quickly and decisively.

For what it's worth, here is what I've learned.

1. When considering a top marketing job, interview the top Sales executive and his or her management team. Understand how they think about Marketing, how they'd like to work with you, and how their organization works. No matter how good a marketer you are, you will fail if your counterparts in Sales aren't effective. I've been fortunate enough to work with some outstanding Sales professionals - and it's made all the difference.
2. Once you're aboard, get to know the Sales executives, directors, managers, and reps. It would be easy to just work with top sales management and let them represent the needs of their reps. This is necessary, but not sufficient to be successful. Go on calls with key reps, take time to listen to what they're hearing from customers, be clear about your priorities and plans and ask them for their feedback. You don't need to act on everything that's suggested, but if you don't listen, you'll miss a lot.
3. Build a sales driven culture in your marketing organization. Ask your team to think about how their decisions, plans, and programs will ultimately impact sales. Make this point regularly and reinforce it through your own actions.
4. Get on the same page about Sales priorities for marketing by being completely transparent. In my company, we maintain a ‘marketing plan of record' that tracks what the various marketing groups are working on along with delivery dates. This gives us a useful tool for discussing priorities with Sales management. If one of your sales directors wants a new competitive document, you can have a rational discussion about where it fits with existing priorities. You can also use this document to enable the Sales VP to help you load balance across the priorities suggested by his or her subordinates.
5. Jointly define measurement criteria. Clearly agree on key terms like what constitutes a "lead" or what would make any given lead "hot". Marketing and inside sales are both part of a process akin to manufacturing. We provide the raw material (leads), inside sales enriches it to build pipeline. If you don't agree on the definition of good raw materials, you are unlikely to get the desired result out of the factory. Once you have terms defined, create a dashboard in your salesforce automation system, and use it to jointly manage the process. If it's appropriate, publish the dashboard to all the relevant sales reps and marketing programs managers.  In his outstanding newsletter, The Taber Report, David Taber has written extensively about managing the lead process.
6. Accept that parts of your work are more likely to be valued more highly than others. For instance, most sales reps will value lead generation over PR or industry analyst relations. That does not mean that these activities won't ultimately help them to be successful or that they aren't critical. It just means that the line between A and B isn't as clearly understood. Without being defensive, have an open discussion about why you're doing what you do.
7. Use plain English. Always. Prospects rarely ask your reps for a "market beating end-to-end integration solution for the enterprise." Explain your product in clear terms that your reps will be able to use credibly with their prospects. This goes for presentations, press releases, whitepapers, and everything else.
8. Ask for feedback. Often. From all levels of Sales. Without being defensive.
9. Provide feedback. Sales and Marketing should be working towards the same goals, working from a well understood priority list, and using common metrics. All of this provides executive level marketers with the foundation to provide candid, constructive feedback to Sales leadership.
10. Maintain a regular dialogue with your sales counterpart. I talk to our VP of Sales most every day. I understand her world and she understands mine - warts and all. Our running dialogue makes it easier for us to support one another. It also makes conflicts easier because we both know that we're both coming from a place of respect and desire to do what's right for the business 

Marketing in the 21st Century = Digital Body Language and Automation

One of the key ingredients in our marketing recipe at Sourcefire is Eloqua, an online demand creation software application. With Eloqua, we are able to not only generate and manage leads but study each lead's digital body language. This gives us the insight into what they are doing online, what they are most interested in, when they are ready to buy, and, most importantly, when and how we should pursue them.

Eloqua offers a great deal of automation functionality reducing the time needed to complete inefficient manual activities. We have tapped into various areas where automation is available including lead scoring/rating programs, event promotion automated programs, and automated lead nurturing programs.

Need to better manage and prioritize your database for your Sales Team? Try implementing an automated Lead Scoring Program. Our automated Lead Scoring Program gives a lead a score based on both implicit and explicit criteria. Implicit criteria would be visiting our site, filling out a form, clicking through an email, searching for us on Google, etc. Explicit criteria include such things as a lead's title and profile type. The score is then put into a rating (A, B, C, D) for the Sales team to view for each of their assigned leads. This rating allows our Sales team to prioritize leads and spend their time more efficiently.

Do you host or participate in lots of events each year and find it challenging to effectively market to your contacts by getting them to attend the events and then follow-up with them promptly after? Consider using Eloqua's automated event programs. We host seminars throughout the year and have found Eloqua's event programs immensely helpful in automating when invitations, reminders, and follow-up emails are sent. Once the emails and program are set up, the program can be relied upon to deliver on time and with minimal effort. You don't miss a beat! You can increase attendance rates, increase follow-up activity, and get those prospects one step closer to buying your service/product (and sleep better at night because you just did all that).

Do you have inactive contacts in your database? We all do. At Sourcefire, our sales cycles tend to be long (on average, 6-9 months) so it is imperative that we keep moving leads along and do not lose them due to inactivity. We have always nurtured the existing leads in our database through mostly manual means but now we are implementing an automated lead nurturing program that will touch leads that have become inactive for six months or greater. The program sends the leads customized emails and moves them through the program until they perform an activity and let us know they are actively considering Sourcefire again. Then, their lead score increases and they are removed from the program and delivered to the Sales team to reengage.

Have you tapped into the search engine marketing craze? More and more consumers start their research online at a search engine. This trend that is expected to continue and increase over time so if you haven't tapped into it, you're missing out on capturing great leads! Our search engine marketing generates high quality leads which are tracked in Eloqua. We can tell what word a contact searched on, what pages they visited on our site and when (and can have automated email notification sent to Sales to let them know their contact is on our site), what forms they submitted and view all their responses, and much more. This tracking helps us best understand each contact's digital body language which, again, is crucial for us to be effective with our marketing and prospecting. It also helps us tweak and optimize our search engine marketing efforts.

Considering a marketing tool like Eloqua? We highly recommend Eloqua and would happy to discuss it with you.

Book Review: Advanced Web Metrics with Google Analytics by Brian Clifton

The Web is a perfect medium for understanding your customers and prospects. The amount of data available on visitors to your site is incredible. The challenge is finding the priceless needle of insight in the haystack of raw data. Google Analytics is a great (and free!) tool for sorting through all of that data so that you can improve your site performance.

In his book, Advanced Web Metrics with Google Analytics, Brian Clifton offers the long-awaited look into the bells and whistles of Google Analytics. As the leader of the Google Analytics team for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, he is well qualified for the task.

Clifton's writing style is very easy to follow and the concepts of the book will be familiar to everyone in the TMA. The book does contain some examples of HTML and JavaScript. Don't let this scare you if you're not a technical person. Clifton explains everything pretty well and, even if you can't read the code examples in detail, you'll come away with a much better understanding of what's possible with Google Analytics. The most technical material doesn't start until chapter seven. Up to that point, Clifton describes how to get started with Google Analytics, walks through the major features and explains the most commonly used reports.

Even if you're already using another web tracking software package, I recommend looking into Google Analytics. It's easy, free and well integrated with Google Adwords. This book is a great place to start.