DirectionGroup The B2B Nirvana: The always-on campaign- Edge presentation

© DirectionGroup 2017 | directiongroup.com
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The B2B Nirvana:
The always-on campaign

Our marketing world is changing
Our world of marketing is changing (yes again, and still!)
From the funnel and ever changing buyer behaviours, to new marketing fads like
ABM, lead nurture, conversion optimisation and customer experience, we’re
really getting punch-drunk with the speed and intensity of change.
If all these things are changing, then it’s safe to say that the dynamics of the
humble marketing campaign is changing too.
Today’s discussion focuses on an emerging school of thought that brings
together multiple, fragmented techniques, tools and approaches.

We all know the dreaded stat that’s been doing the rounds for a few years now:
Up to 70% of the buying process is complete before a business engages with sales
Introduction
marketing sales
How do we maximise our effectiveness,
consistency and relevance here:
So it’s OUR sales team who
gets engaged here:
70% 30%
We really are entering the “age of the customer” – and if we’re to survive and thrive in this
new buyer obsessed world, we need to make some changes - and soon.

The 6 sins of campaign
marketing

Often we simply don’t know enough about our audience to be
able to serve their needs properly
Campaign marketing relies too heavily on luck
 We typically don’t have the right insight about buyers and
where they are on the journey
 We’re hoping the stars align in our favour and that our buyers
are ‘in market’ at the time we’re running our campaign
1
83% of customers only want to hear
from you if you are able to be relevant
and contextual
IDC and Salesforce, 2017

90% of business buyers say when
they are ready to buy, they’ll find you
We’re focusing too much on outbound2
DemandGen Report,
2016
 Outbound means hoping that the timing is
right and we have the means to reach them
 B2B buyers are doing it on their terms
– self educating their way through the buyer
journey
 In fact, they’re spending more time, more
resources and taking longer to come to their
own decisions
 We’re relying too much on outbound,
disruptive marketing techniques
DemandGen Report, 2016

More than 60% of B2B marketers say
they run more than 15 campaigns per
year – more than one per month!
We’re creating too many campaigns3
Annuitas, 2016
 We’re wasting time and money creating too many campaigns
 Our messaging is too fragmented and inconsistent
 We’re our own worst enemy – we’re so keen to move on to
the next thing
 Even our language perpetuates the multiple campaigns that
end up being hard to manage, execute and prove value from
A DM
campaign
LinkedIn
campaign
A product
launch
campaign

Only 17% of business to business
(B2B) leads are sales-ready
when first generated.
We’re dropping the ball on engaged prospects4
 We’re so keen to generate engagement, often we’re not prepared to deal
with situations where the engagement doesn’t equate to a sale within our
timeframes
 Nurture is the new hot topic in B2B – but how are we planning that to be
customer focused and not just another switch-on, switch off tactic?
 Are we really considering behaviour and nurturing in a relevant way – or
are we just spamming our warmest prospects?
What happens to a top of funnel lead who engages just before we pull
the plug on a campaign?
Pardot

Our campaigns are shorter than the buying process5
 Our content marketing approach is designed
to allow us to engage earlier in the buying
process – but we haven’t made our
campaigns any longer to accommodate that.
 We talk about accompanying a buyer
through the journey, until they’re ready for
sales….
 But only if they move fast enough…
 Until we’re off to create the next campaign
We create 8 – 12 week campaigns – but how does that work to engage and
then convert a buyer on a 6 month buying process?
DemandGen Report, 2016

We’re not optimising our campaigns6
 Digital marketing techniques are iterative
and require ongoing optimisation – but
often we haven’t got time to test
sufficiently and optimise our tactics
 Content interactions and analytics (what's
working and what’s not) hold the key to
campaign improvement…
 but we’re often only coming to
conclusions or recommendations once
the campaign is over. That's too late.
We’re not learning enough from our mistakes - testing, iteration and agility
are required to maximise the return on our marketing investment
37%
30%
37%
Landing pages
Email Marketing
Social media
Content marketing
Paid media
39%
34%
% not optimising, or only some limited testing
Dave Chaffey, Smart Insights
B2B marketers are not testing and optimising

© DirectionGroup 2017 | directiongroup.com11 | © DirectionGroup 2017 | directiongroup.com
Summary: the six sins
We’re not optimising our campaigns6
Our campaigns are shorter than the buying process5
We’re dropping the ball on engaged prospects4
We’re creating too many campaigns3
We’re focusing too much on outbound2
Campaign marketing relies too heavily on luck1

© DirectionGroup 2017 | directiongroup.com12 | © DirectionGroup 2017 | directiongroup.com
Always-on Campaigns
What’s the
answer ?

So what exactly is an always-on campaign?
A campaign that delivers consistent, audience-centric
messaging and content,
that generates engagement throughout the
buying process,
through a process of ongoing optimisation in content,
messaging and marketing tactics.

Campaigns: it’s the sum of the parts
Campaigns by their very nature
should be multi-faceted.
Digital marketing has changed the game
in terms of:
 Integration of multiple tactics,
 optimising them real time,
 monitoring and responding to
buyer behaviour
 and proving the ROI from campaign
investment.

From Campaigns to Conversations
Small
campaign
Product
Launch
Brand
campaign
Short
burst
Year-end push
campaign
Shorter, inconsistent campaigns create a
fleeting spike in engagement.
With peaks, come troughs.
Long idea
campaign
launch
Optimisation
New
content
Product
launch
Optimisation
Smaller activities within a always-on
campaign based around a long idea
generates continuous and increasing
engagement
time time
Multiple, siloed campaigns Consistent, always-on campaigns

Always on success factors
Buyer
insight
Content
strategy
Long
ideas
Inbound
techniques
Learn and
Optimise
Lead
Nurture
Budget
1
2
3
4 7
5
6

We need to remove the guesswork and the “luck factor” and focus on real
insights that guide relevant and timely communication
Buyer insight
1. Understand the buyer journey
Consider buyer needs along the journey and our task in addressing those needs
2. Get closer to customers
Use market research, your sales teams or existing customers to gain real
insights
3. Consider third party data to help
New third party data can help in identifying the right people to speak to at the
right time. Consider the growing trend around “intent data”
1

What does the buyer journey look like?
Changes over
time
Recognition of
needs
Committing to
a Solution
Problem
defined
Justifying the
Decision
On boarding
Changes over
time
Recognition of
needs
Problem
defined
Exploring
Solutions
Loosening of
the Status Quo
Committing to
Change
Defining the
problem
Early stage
awareness –
seeing the problem
Awareness and early
need identification
Ensure seamless
customer on-boarding –
minimise time to value
OUR
TASK
Influence how they
define their problem
and solution
Close the sale and
maximise the value
of the deal
EDUCATION SOLUTION VENDOR SELECTION
Demonstrate we have the most
compelling proposition
Sees an
analyst blog
on trends
Downloads
vendor
solution guide
Attends
vendor
webinar
Visits a
supplier
website
Uses an
ROI
calculator
Reviews some
competitive
analysis
Receives a
“welcome
pack”
Goes to
supplier
event
Downloads
analyst
whitepaper

The buying process varies
Depending on what’s
being purchased, the
buying process will
vary considerably in
terms of:
 Length
 Complexity
 Stakeholders
Committee
Consensus
Independent
Agreement at the
executive
leadership level
Agreement among
individuals
Agreement across
teams, or
departments
3-6 months
or more
3-6 months
Less than 8
weeks
5 or
more
3-4
1-2
6-10
(or
more)
3-5
1-2
Scenario:
Decision
orientation:
Typical
timeframe:
Buying
centres:
Peers /
colleagues:
Sirius Decisions, 2015 Buying Survey

We need to move away from the “big idea”- multiple times and instead focus on
many small ideas that stitch together in a coherent and consistent L-O-N-G
idea. Think of small ideas as the chapters of your long story.
And think of your brand as a storyteller.
Long ideas2
L O N Gsmall ideasmall ideasmall
idea
 Long ideas build value over time
 They deliver consistency for audiences
 They create a platform for always-on marketing
Think about the Dove “campaign for real beauty”… 17 years and counting.

Long idea example: Fujitsu
Long Idea: Secure Thinking
Objective: thought leadership, content based lead generation
Customer theme: Security
Sub topics / campaigns: (6)
Big Data, Compliance, Mobility, Cyber, Supply Chain and Connected
Citizens
Campaign duration: 18 months
Content volume: dedicated campaign website now hosts over 50 assets
such as blogs, videos, infographics, datasheets, opinion papers and
more
Digital tactics: Search, Social media, Display advertising, gated content,
PR, email marketing

We need to develop a content strategy that suits our buyers, their interests and
their journey. This is a more effective approach in an environment where the
traditional ‘push’ marketing model is broken.
Content strategy3
 It’s a move from simply pushing product information on the unengaged, to
developing an earned relationship with prospects
 It’s about being customer focused, using insight to ensure our content is:
Our content strategy needs to feed off bigger, customer-centric themes like the
Fujitsu Security example.
Relevant Compelling Timely

What kind of content works across the buyer journey?
IDG Customer Engagement Survey, 2016

“Campaigns” fit better with the old outbound-
centric way of marketing.
We need to shift our thinking from demanding attention to
creating the best possible customer experience.
 We live in an self-directed, opt-in world
– we have to earn their attention
 Customers will seek us out because of the quality of the
information on offer to help them make better decisions
 Content is the worm on the inbound hook
Inbound techniques4
Inbound Marketing
The process of creating
text, audio, video and other
online assets and
optimising them to appear
when prospective
customers are ready to pull
the trigger on a purchase.

DirectionGroup The B2B Nirvana: The always-on campaign- Edge presentation

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