There’s an old story that gets to the heart of what branding today needs to incorporate: A priest during the height of the Russian civil war would walk the same route every day from his home to church until one day he was stopped by a soldier who asked him, “who are you?”, “where are […]
After spending six weeks traveling through Southeast Asia with my family in 2017, I came home to more than 2,000 emails! We are inundated with information: blog posts, videos, social media, advertisements, podcasts, infographics, photos, bill- boards, videos, direct mail and more. The growing embrace of storytelling is an attempt to make sense of the […]
If you want to grow your B2B firm, you probably struggle with financial limitations. Well, even if you can’t afford major advertising and marketing initiatives, you can still boost positive awareness without spending a dime. How? (Que the angelic music…) Start public relations (PR) activities. How to Generate Fast Growth with PR Public relations is […]
When you think of public relations, you probably think about distributing a press release. After all, you want to get the PR content of your B2B message out to as many people as possible in a short amount of time. But, before you send out your press release, are you sure it engages media members […]
They’ve produced all kinds of blog posts, infographics and other forms of storytelling for marketers, but now two of Contently’s senior leaders have turned to one of the most venerable mediums of all: a printed book on how to create great narratives for brands. In The Storytelling Edge, Contently Co-founder Shane Snow and Editor-in-Chief Joe […]
‘A rational framework with no space — at least or less space — for emotions.’ This is a much-believed formula most business-to-business marketers follow without really questioning it. Marketing driven by emotions is considered to be the something that belongs mainly business-to-customer (B2C) marketers, whereas B2B firms rely on logical strategies and appeals to reason. That’s […]
At the recent Adobe Summit, Ben Gaines and Jen Lasser talked about how to use data to tell powerful customer stories. Making data useable is perhaps the biggest challenge for analysts and marketers. Combing through massive amounts of data can be overwhelming, and takes forever, and then it still needs to be interpreted and shared […]
When we talk about marketing content, we talk about expository content: videos, articles, blog posts and other content that tells stories, explains or informs. But recent data shows storytelling isn’t as effective in B2B marketing. Knowing prospects want content and added value not sales pitches, what is the answer? Storytelling matters, especially early in the […]
Welcome back to another edition of B2B Trending Conversations, our weekly roundup of what’s making waves on social media in the B2B space. While it’s a bit of a slow week with the Thanksgiving holiday in the US, there’s still plenty of B2B buzz, especially on Twitter and LinkedIn. This week, we’ll explore how to […]
It is almost guaranteed that at a conference you will meet someone who inspires you, whether an attendee, or a speaker at one of the sessions. The Marketing Profs B2B Forum is no exception. This inevitably happens to everyone. Someone says something that totally resonates with you, or makes that light switch go on. This […]
Yesterday B2BNN hosted a live Twitter Chat discussion with Derek Chezzi, Editorial Director, Collaborative Journalism of Edelman Toronto. There were some fantastic questions, so we thought we’d share them with everyone. Q1: You focus on business storytelling. How do you identify a good story to be told? A1: Stories – editorial or brand stories for […]
Marketo’s Marketing Nation Online conference (#mktgnation) was on Wednesday. There are two things I love about this conference 1) it’s free 2) it’s online. I don’t need to spend hours traveling somewhere, and I can still pick and choose agenda items that mean something to me. It was all about strategy for me, as I […]
Companies may be surprised to learn that popular messaging doesn’t always translate into sales, and consumers are generally more interested in how the product makes life easier, than the minutia of the product’s functions. That’s the conclusion from Larry Levy, who wrote recently about data driving content marketing for Martech Advisor: “The strongest brands […]
If you saw the 2013 Super Bowl, then you probably remember the Budweiser Puppy Love commercial, the one where puppy and horse make such a deep emotional bond often saved for Gary Marhsall films. You may even have shed a tear by the end, when these two unlikely soul mates defied all obstacles to reunite […]
