Currently the marketing market is still into outbound marketing: machine gunning the supposedly target customers with emails or calls.
This means using call centers and email marketing campaigns in order to address as many potential customers as possible. As email marketing is possible for as low as 1cent per email it is now the most widely used method.

At the same time the more emails that are being send by all companies worldwide, the less chance of emails getting opened and read.

As apparently no company can do without all this email marketing is good for both:
- The providers of email marketing services
- Spam filters vendors
Companies buy ammunition (email lists) and at the same time bullet proof vests (spam filters).

Measuring outbound marketing

Not only the low price per contact addressed, but also the ease of measurement of outbound marketing makes it popular.
Feed in tens of thousands of email addresses, push the button and register the number of clicks afterwards. And in some cases the number of sales closed.

The same can apply to using telephone calls by a call center:
The number of people in companies called lead to a number of deals but it comes at a higher cost and takes much longer to process all the contacts.

One of the problems with email blasts that arises is obtaining the tens of thousands of email addresses. No company in B2B can sustain collecting so many contacts.

Additionally outbound marketing is interrupting the normal workflow of the addressee. Chances are the timing is wrong and the message not appropriate for the receiver at that moment.

Inbound marketing is more complex but priceless

Inbound marketing is much more difficult to measure, as the seeds planted that are effective generating traffic to your website can be anywhere and their effectiveness will change over time.
The metrics and the measurement systems required are much more complex or even impossible to set up and to operate.

People in business are already starting to use search engines, blogs, forums and social media sites to get product or services information and reviews.
Inbound marketing is priceless as the timing is always right: the potential customer is interested for one reason or another as he was searching for the problem or a solution.

Still in the long run, when outbound marketing is no longer effective, inbound marketing will have taken the lead for generating leads.

Inbound: long lasting – Outbound: one time only

Inbound marketing efforts can have a long lasting effect: once a link embedded in a website, a catalog, a directory, a blog, a review or a document: the source can remain in use over many years to come.

Whereas outbound marketing efforts are one off: the marketing action (email or call) generates immediately a click or never.
Once the email is out of sight in the Inbox, no chance that it ill get any attention.
Once the call has been finished, hardly any chance of the called person will call back.

This brings an additional factor: timing. The timing of sending an email needs to be appropriate: too early or too late regarding an event, the daytime, or during the week and the email campaign is much less effective.

Inbound marketing is durable: like a marathon.
Outbound marketing is a quick one time win: like a sprint.

Inbound marketing (seeds planted) can have long lasting wonders and also total failures.
Outbound marketing (emails send or calls made) has one hit wonders or total failures.

Inbound marketing can hit the jackpot if their message becomes viral.
Outbound marketing has less chance to go viral.
Going viral is the best inbound marketing that you can have: the message lives and propagates on itself by Word Of Mouth.

When will the market turn to inbound marketing?
When will the switch be made?
The recession will probably help a hand as currently the amounts of email marketing used by companies is increasing significantly.

How long will you be continue using outbound marketing?

In any sales deal, instead of starting with the minimal or basic configuration for your products or services, start by proposing the full option or the best complete offering that includes already several options.
Do explain the benefits and the necessities of the included options.
Make clear this is the best suited and complete package for him.

Then the buyer will:
- Only take out those options that are not relevant to him or his company.
- Only remove those options that make the price exceed the budget.
- Take a faster decision as the package is the best suited for his needs.

Selling more using endowment

People don’t want to give up ownership of something in order not to feel or minimize the pain that this generates.
This is called the endowment effect by Victor Antonio Gonzalez. People place a higher value on objects they own than objects that they do not.
Once the sales process has reached final phase, people already imagine they own or have taken ownership of the solution. From then on they become reluctant to give something or a part of it up. It will feel like a loss to them.

B2B and budget

This sales method not only works in consumer business but also in selling to enterprises. Not all purchases are completely based upon rational facts and figures as emotion comes into play too.

Moreover if a budget has been set, how would you know the exact amount? You can extimate the budget or have a best guess. Anything you propose below the budget is less revenue.
Proposing a complete package deal that is slightly over the budget that you have estimated will be adjusted by the purchaser to the real budget limit by taking out one or two options.
As such your price will be just under the budget limit, probably offering the best price/quality, best price/functionality or price/features compared to your competitors.

If the purchaser was looking to buy at the lowest price in the market then this endowment method will not work.
However as you are the best salesman around, it is your job to convince the buyer the lowest price is not necessarily the best choice for the company.

If you want to sell more, offer the best suited complete offering.
What did you offer lately?

Once upon a time in the seventies the record labels controlled the music business.
They owned the rock groups that needed money for producing the albums.

Once upon a time during the Web 2.0 era start-ups got funded by Venture Capitalists.
VC’s owned start-ups as they controlled the companies.

Disk jockeys for getting hits

They paid pluggers to promote the records of their rock groups to disk jockeys of the pirate (offshore) radio’s that broadcasted their radio shows from boats anchored in the North Sea.
Pirate radio stations and their disk jockeys were immensely popular due to the popular songs they played, whereas the national radio stations played less popular (then decent) music.

The disk jockeys played the plugged music, entered them into the music charts and the songs became a hit.
This generated mainly money for the record companies.

Bloggers for getting hits

The new web services of the startups needed to be promoted to the public else nobody except a few geeks and nerds would use them.

Instead of using expensive advertising, the VC’s wanted to influence the bloggers: the more famous the better (ReadWriteWeb, TechCrunch, VentureBeat, GigaOm, …)
Bloggers instead of journalists, as bloggers were more popular than journalists and could address the target public online.

Thus VC’s engaged people who could promote the function, features and the coolness of Web 2.0 services to the most influential bloggers.
The bloggers wrote about the cool new Web 2.0 service and people signed up for a free web service.
As the number of users increased, more bloggers wrote about the new phenomenon or hype (myspace, Flickr, Facebook, Twitter, …).
As a result even more people signed up.

The valuation of the start-up increased and the VC could sell the shares to a major company that acquired the start-up for different reasons (not for the profitable business).
This generated mainly money for the VC.

Credit Crunch killed the Start-up Star

As change is the only constant in life:
Music business change:
- The music business changed, as the role of promoting music was taken over by the disco’s, which became more important as influencers.
- A few years later the video killed the radio star completely.

VC business change:
- The Web 2.0 business changed as funding dried up induced by the Credit Crisis/Crunch and faulty CDO’s (Collateralized Debt Obligation).
Thus no more successful IPO’s or acquisitions by larger companies of the venture backed startups.
- The hyping had created already too many web services, requiring shutting down many of the newly acquired start-ups as revenue, profit and users were lacking.
- The decline of online advertising was driving the income of bloggers down.
- Start-ups needed less funding as technology made developing and operating web services cheap compared to marketing and advertising costs.

Will bloggers become employees just like the disk jockeys?

The pirate radio’s disappeared and some got licenses the broadcast from mainland.
The radio disk jockeys became less popular as their pirate image was taken away while working for a land based radio as an employee – playing the same popular music as the national radios.

Will bloggers just become paid writers who are part of the team writing for popular blogs that are overtaking (killing) the printed newspapers?
Or will the online advertising model further fail and make living from blogging impossible?

What will become of the bloggers?
What or who will influence people and decision makers in the future?

Paypal is known for the person to person (P2P) payments using email.
However PayPal also provides Merchant Services for getting paid using credit, debit cards almost worldwide and even direct bank payments in certain countries.
The Merchant Services require no email for sending money and no signup to PayPal for your customers. For the customer a similar payment service as any other online payment processor.

The reasons why we choose for PayPal:
- No setup costs
- No monthly fees
- Multiple currencies included
- Accepting money in many countries
- Direct bank and Giro payments accepted in certain countries
- Relatively simple and automated verification of bank account and credit card.
- Commissions or processing fees in line with other payment processors

Limitation – limitation lift
There is just one thing you should not overlook: after the first payments received you will notice a rather low limit (USD 2500 – EUR 2500 – GBP 1700) as the total amount that you can receive during the first year. That’s impossible for any company.
In order to lift this limit you need to go through the address verification by telephone or by post, both requiring entering a verification code that you receive.
Just don’t miss the verification telephone call like we did (stupidly) as it takes over 2 weeks to get the letter with the verification code in the mailbox.

After the limitation lift there is still a limit per transaction: USD 10,000 – EUR 8,000 – GBP 5,500
If we need to receive a higher amount we ask the customer to use a bank transfer.

Communicating with PayPal
Communications with PayPal are by email. It just requires time to get a response: thus patience is required.

What online payment processor do you use?

Although social media is in most cases related with consumers, still several platforms exist in B2B too: LinkedIn, Xing, Viadeo, ecademy, Social Business Club, Ryze and sometimes Ning.

In the presentation below, every player and part of the social media is being compared to the living species, plants and the coral of a reef by Jeremiah Owyang (Forrester Research analyst).
He calls it the Social Reef, an industry perspective.

The analogies he makes are just great.
The pictures are beautiful.
Enjoy the beauty.

The fish and the fishermen
Just wondering if the fish (people – potential customers) that are food for the fishermen (the Brands) and get consumed: that would be a one time event. However consumers live beyond the brand.

Or should the fishermen be the brand marketers that reach out for the fish with nets and fishing poles: trying to capture the Internet traffic, landing on pages and converting into leads?

Missing the web analytics
Most traffic on the Internet can be measured, thus also the people going in and out of the social reef.

These are the web analytics of every website (like Google Analytics) or the general traffic measurement and ranking systems: Alexa, Compete, Quantcast and comScore.
These so important traffic measurement systems for valuation and advertising should also be represented in the social reef model: the electronic fish counter?

Where are the bloggers?
The bloggers are an important species in the Social Reef: are they the sharks, the dolphins or the crabs?
- Sharks could drive fish into social reefs by fear. (fear relates to advertising).
- Dolphins could drive fish also in social reefs but they have a positive attitude.
- Crabs can prevent the death of certain coral reefs.

The outsiders
The surfers enjoying to ride the waves breaking on the reef.
They have no place in this eco-system as they don’t take part in the community, but just briefly pass by to catch a wave. Or are they the opportunitists that ride briefly the social wave?

The social reef is an ever-changing ecosystem, where many participate driving constant change and building together a larger environment.

Where is your place or what species are you on the Social Reef?

Consumers and business visitors require to be segregated

The web analytics of your website provides visit data on all of your website visitors on your business to business website.
All visitors of your website means data about both the visitors using their home connection and those surfing from their office. All mixed without differentiation although segregation is required.

The vast amounts of data are not representative as the main segregation is not in place: consumers or businesses.

Twins who are very different: Olsen

If you can’t segregate residential surfers visiting your website from the business visitors:
- What are you measuring with your web analytics solution?
- How to know if your SEO or marketing campaigns are successful?
- How to know if marketing is wasting or spending money inefficiently?

Web analytics provide insufficient information

In whatever business you are, your visitors consist if 2 distinctive categories:
- Residential = consumers
- Business = potential customers

However your analytic and visit data is a combination of both groups without any distinction.

So how can you measure the effectiveness of your online advertisements, print advertising, SEO and all other marketing efforts, if you are not able to make a distinction between the two main categories?

Visiting company differentiation

Just knowing the amount of companies visiting is not enough as your products and solutions in most cases only appeal to a certain market segment:
- Country or geographic location
- Language
- Size of company

Again how can you measure the effectiveness of your marketing efforts with just a web analytics that provides you with the number of unique visitors from a country or geography, speaking a certain language without knowing if these visitors are from a company or not, from a company large enough or small enough to be interested in your products and solutions.

Post Click Marketing solution

You are only fooling yourself and your company with incorrect data and analysis. Thus you could be wasting marketing money.

Stop cheating yourself and change this by getting a Post-Click Marketing solution like LEADSExplorer, that makes a distinction between your home and business visitors.

Only then you will be able to draw correct conclusions about SEO and your marketing campaigns.

Extended payment term vs sales target
Since many years you have used the same payment terms: “60 days end of month”.
Due reasons related to the recession your main customer starts asking for 120 days. That is almost doubling the existing payment term. The purchasers are under the pressure of their management to extend the payment terms to preserve cash. It is a worrying idea (The MCCA Blog) especially as it will be the larger companies putting the smaller ones under pressure for longer payment terms (Sarah Johnson – marketingmagazine.co.uk).

If you would agree upon this, the Days Sales Outstanding (DSO) of the company will increase. This means getting the cash later. The cash needed to keep the operations and purchases running. It can mean the company will need to increase the loan or credit from the bank.
On the other hand if your company is cash rich, extending the payment terms will be a competitive advantage over your competitors (Joe Fox on Supply Excellence).

Also this event will create a precedent that is difficult to reverse afterwards: once 120 days, always 120 days. The customer will insist keeping this extended payment term forever or get something in return.
Moreover other customers could find out and ask for similar terms.

As always when things turn bad, this will happen at the very moment you need this deal in order to achieve your minimal sales target for the quarter.

What do you do?
- Interrupt the meeting in order to call your VP Sales.
- Interrupt the meeting in order to call the CFO.
- Interrupt the meeting order to call the CEO (small company).
- Stop the meeting by explaining you need to talk face to face with your VP Sales.
- Stop the meeting by explaining you need to talk face to face with the CFO.
- Try to negotiate 90 days without consulting your VP Sales and give away an additional service.
- Agree upon the 120 days without any discussion as you need the deal.
- Agree upon the 120 days and get it in writing on the contract it is a one time event.
- Agree upon the 120 days under the condition that the customer doubles his order quantity.
- Stay with the existing payment terms even if you might loose the deal and the customer.
- Stay with the existing payment term but give an additional discount or free service.

Whatever your action or decision, it will have an impact on the business and finances of the company.
Will consulting the CEO, CFO or VP Sales have the best outcome for you?
Will consulting the CEO, CFO or VP Sales be good for your bonus as they don’t care about it?
If you decide alone what will be the consequence for you and your career?

Probably this demand will not be a unique event, but will happen with several of your customers within a short period of time.

The best would be if your management prepares guidelines for such events as it is likely it will happen on several occasions for most of the salesmen.

How would or are you already handling this extended payment terms demand?

Currently your B2B business is slow due to the recession.
Spending on advertising could be a total waste for the moment. And a waste for the next few quarters.
Decision makers won’t pay any attention to your publicity.

Timing of advertising

The problem is that you don’t know when it is the best time for addressing the market with your advertising:
- If you address too early:
   A lot of money is being wasted as no decision maker will have interest for your messages.
- If you address too late, when the upturn has already started:
   Your competitors will already have gotten interest from the decision makers

   It is like paraglider pilots deciding when to take off: once started there is no easy return.

What to advertise

Even if you would know when it is the best time to start your advertising, then you need also to know the product or solutions that will be the most in demand.
How can you know what products or solutions will be required if you don’t know the outlook and demands to come. All markets and requirements will have changed.
The rules of the game have changed.

Test your advertising for measuring

If you can measure, you will know.
Thus the only method to know is to test the advertising effectiveness at a slow pace and low cost.
Just spending a minimal amount of advertising in order to measure the changes in level of interest of the market.
Still with this minimal advertising you also need to test the different products or solutions as it is unlikely you will know what will be successful.

Once the interest starts picking up, the advertising spending needs to be increased fast in order not to miss the recovery.

Never forget:
When the rules of the game are known, the windows of opportunity have long been closed.

Instead of targeting using email campaigns, advertising and cold calling, start attracting people to your website by content and information.
- Targeting is from before the social media era.
- Attracting is from now on.

Outbound marketing: targeting

Since Marketing came into existence, the idea of targeting people or companies with certain demographics or characteristics with the appropriate messages was the rule.
Marketers used and are still using statistical data and analysis to target specific groups of people or people in companies to reach and address to their ideal customer with the most appropriate messages. Pushing the message to people using outbound marketing.

Inbound marketing: attracting

However nowadays people and people in businesses don’t want to be a target any more. Not being targeted by companies.
All people are educated enough to search and find the required information they want. They don’t want to have messages pushed onto them anymore.

Now the era of attracting people has come. You need to attract people with valuable and interesting information.
This is inbound marketing: once the people have found your content, they will retain your company or solution and will address you immediately or again when the requirements or problems are present.

In order to know who visits your business website, you need a service that reveals who they are by company name and if they are really interested.

How do you feel as a marketing target?
Why would you still target potential customers?
Time for change with your time.

The goal of any website is to attract traffic, which needs to be converted into leads.

Is your website acting like a vacuum cleaner sucking in targeted visitors?
Or
Is your website a fishing net catching visitors swimming by your website accidentally?

The vacuum cleaner

Using a vacuum cleaner you will only clean the spots you are aiming at.
A website will dynamically attract visitors who are looking for specific information on your website: exactly those people or companies you are aiming at.
The motor and the fan are the keywords, tags and content of the website.

Still some tiny dust will escape again through the exhaust port of the vacuum cleaner as it is not captured by the dust bag.
The more effective the website is (the bag), only the not interested visitors will leave by website again (exhaust port).

This seems to be happening with our website on the subjects of “Lead generation”, “Customer retention” and “Visitor identification”.

On the Internet many people are searching for a specific solution or to solve a problem.
In certain cases they end up on your website.
The bag collects those visitors that are really interested, just like in the sales funnel.

Although people are looking for a solution, in case of LEADSExplorer which is in the emerging market of Inbound Marketing, they don’t expect a solution that reveals the company names of the website visitors.
Inbound marketing is novel and so is visitor identification using IP (even more novel). Thus it takes a while for people to grasp and understand the solution, the importance and the reach.
The website sucks in a larger number of visitors that are not always immediately interested in our offering due to the disruptiveness of the solution offered. Something which will improve over timeover time as this type of Post-Click Marketing solution becomes more known.

The fishing net

A fishing boat drags his nets through the water. The nets can have large or small meshes for catching a certain size of fish.
If the meshes are very small, all kinds of fish end up in the net.
Moreover the fishing net can be very wide and the fishing boat can sail anywhere: thus less precise than the vacuum cleaner.

In the case of the fishnet, all kinds of people on the Internet will end up on your website for many different reasons.
If your content is very versatile and featuring a lot of content, which comparable with a fishing boat sailing anywhere having very wide fishing nets with small meshes, all kinds of people will visit your website. No focus.
Moreover your website content can be re-used or referenced by many other websites, thus generating all kinds of interest for many different reasons.
The funnel is much less effective as is starts out very wide and quickly narrows to a thin funnel with only a few leads captured.

We believe this is happening with our blog: as it generates a lot of traffic. People come by many different links, bookmarks, references and subscriptions to read the blog. The blog posts are being re-used, bookmarked or referenced on many occasions, thus catching traffic from very diverse sources.

The blog generates a decent amount of traffic, but these visitors are hardly interested in what we are offering.
After reading a blog post, only a few will click on a link to visit the website itself in order to find out about our offerings on lead generation or customer retention.

From the group of people that leaves the blog without visiting the website, only a few will visit the website on a later occasion for investigating about our services. Thus some of them do retain the message concerning our lead generation and customer retention web service.

Conclusion: Vacuum cleaner of Fishing net?

The best is if your website is like a vacuum cleaner, sucking in only those people who are really interested.
A fishnet will catch too many different visitors looking for different solutions or just out of generic interest.

Still every visit to the website is like advertising for our web service: eyeballs. Thus not all the efforts for generating visitors by a fishing net is wasted.

Is your website a vacuum cleaner or a fishing net?