As buzzwords go, “crowdsourcing” may not be as big as ”social-media” or “mobile apps” but new research show it is one of the most rapidly-expanding trends in our field.

Crowdsourcing represents an epic shift in the world of labor, automation, and information science, one with large economic and ethical implications. Everybody is looking at this trend and wondering, “How big is the market?” “How fast is it changing?” and “Which companies should I be working with?”  So the Daily Crowdsource is beginning to explore some of those questions through original research.

To answer these questions accurately, we took the last three months to perform a thorough analysis of enterprise-grade microtasking vendors and produced a market report.  We chose the ‘microtasking’ sector to start with because it’s one of the two sectors that enterprises can benefit from the most. Here’s what we found:

There are currently six enterprise-grade microtasking providers: Clickworker, CrowdFlower, CrowdSource, Microtask, Microworkers, & Serv.io (aka CloudCrowd).  The earliest of these appeared in November 2005, and the most recent appeared September 2010.

If you’re wondering why Amazon’s MTurk isn’t on the list, it’s because they operate quite differently than the evaluated providers.  MTurk, though one of the largest and most well-known suppliers of microtasks, lacks the quality & validation checks that enterprise clients require.  Although enterprises can develop their own quality-assurance system in Mturk, the value of sophisticated, field-tested algorithms far outweigh the cost increases associated with using one of these other six quality-focused platforms.

The market demand for crowd-sourced work quintupled in 2010 & almost quadrupled in 2011:

Despite being around for six years, the microtasking field was in the testing phase for the first three years.  Several platforms were revamped, relaunched, or finally “released” in 2009.  Client adoption was also slow until 2009 when the first surge in market demand occurred.  Last year, the number of completed microtasks increased 496% over 2009.  The number of tasks completed in 2011 is estimated to increase 355%

These are part of the findings of our extensive report on crowdsourcing trends and research.

Despite this quick growth, the field is still in its infancy.  How quickly it will mature is yet to be seen. Is this growth sustainable?  One clue to this answer is that microtasking has yet to be adopted by many large companies. This rate of adoption is also increasing so 2012 could be another years of explosive growth for this nascent industry.

With the growing importance (and controversy) of microtasking, it’s critical that we start measuring and understanding these trends. This is the first of what I hope will be a series of research efforts to understand this business model.

Have you experimented with crowdsourcing yet? How could you use it?

David Bratvold is the founder of Daily Crowdsource, the #1 site for crowdsourcing news, training & resources. His goal is to educate business professionals on the benefits of crowdsourcing. He will present more of his findings at Social Slam 2012.

“No.”

That’s the short answer to a question that was posed to me in Focus (which seems quieter and more manageable than Quora).  It got my attention because it is a question I often hear in my classes too.  Instead of preaching fear and pontificating about social media as the Second Coming of B2B Marketing, let’s look at this another way.

Social media is growing fast, but it’s no longer new. If social media were such a dominating competitive force that non-users would be threatened with extinction, wouldn’t we be seeing some signs of that by now?

In fact, I am struggling to recall one case study where a B2B company used social media to dominate a market and extinguish a competitor … and I watch for these things.

I really like Eric Qualman’s inventive Social Media Revolution videos — I even show them in my classes some times. But there is one phrase in there that makes me cringe: “The ROI of social media is that you will be in business five years from now.”

Oh puhleeeze.  Let’s see.  Eric’s first edition of this video came out in 2009 which means we are less than two years aways from the Social Media Armageddon.  I don’t know about you, but I’m not ready to change my vacation plans just yet.

Social media marketing can undoubtedly be used in very meaningful and powerful ways but I don’t think it is necessarily a “let’s bet the ranch” investment that is going to transform very many B2B marketplaces.  And let’s not forget the powerful applications for HR, PR, and many other parts of the company. I’m an advocate and think every company should make an informed decision about how these tools integrate with current efforts and can create some new ones.

Yes, it’s big, it’s bad, it ain’t going away.  And I’m all over the value selling perspective. But let’s not lose sight of the fact that a ton of business in this world is still won and lost at the end of a negotiation by the company who is prepared to knock off another penny per unit, especially in these economic times. That can kill a business faster than an inactive Twitter account.

I also think it’s difficult to maintain a sustainable competitive advantage based on a social media strategy. The entry barriers are low and it would be pretty easy for competitors to mimic efforts.

If you’re selling ball bearings to Ford you’re probably not going to tweet your way to long-term success, right?

What do you think?  Are you seeing any non-tech B2B businesses storming the fort with social media marketing successes?

One of the common complaints I hear is that social media marketing doesn’t seem to fit for many businesses … “My customers don’t tweet or read blogs.”

And while that may be true, don’t assume you know where your customers are getting their information, especially if you haven’t checked for awhile. Even in the past few months there has been a cataclysmic shift in the way people obtain and share information.

Case in point: Caterpillar.  You probably couldn’t name a more conservative, blue-chip, blue-collar company than The Cat. And yet earlier this year I named their blog community as one of the Top 10 in the world for the remarkable connection they are creating with their customers.

I was fortunate to be able to interview Brian R. Stokoe, Social Media Program Manager for Caterpillar to get some insights into how his team is creating social media magic with an atypical demographic:

Mark: Caterpillar is a very traditional blue chip B2B but seems to be integrating social media as good or better than many consumer-oriented companies. Did the culture of Caterpillar enable this transition to new media, or did new media influence the culture of Caterpillar?

Brian:  It is true that Caterpillar is well-known for having a conservative culture, but the management here has also keenly recognized the sociological changes that have come with new media technologies. Our CEO, Doug Oberhelman, always has his iPad in-hand, and promotes the idea that we need to use technology to make Caterpillar better.

The company also recognized the potential value in social media to connect with our customers. Overall, I’d say the culture has been transformed by the changing world. I’m not sure the experimental nature of social media would have been embraced 10 or 15 years ago. Caterpillar is less reactive and more aggressive than ever before.

Your words “less reactive” surprise me. I think of social media as being a highly reactive platform.

I was specifically speaking about Caterpillar’s use of marketing technologies. We are aggressively using more of the technologies before they become main-stream.  In the past, we would avoid leveraging new marketing technologies until everyone else in the world had demonstrated how to use the tools. So we were reactive.  We are now willing to participate and leverage tools that may still be evolving.

Our techniques for using these tools are always founded in industry best practices. So yes, listening and responding are key in the social media space. The public facing two way conversation is great for us. The Caterpillar brand is built on the backs of great relationships. Social media technologies provides the opportunity to publicly demonstrate our customer / business relationships

Can you describe the major pillars (or platforms) of your social media strategy?

We are recognizing the power of the big three social media platforms — Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube — but we’re also exploring other platforms that are highly used in specific areas of the world. While those are valued external social media platforms, we have also proven the value from the industry blogs and forums that are managed and hosted by Caterpillar.

I’m amazed at the level of engagement you routinely attract on your blogs. It’s quite unusual for a large company. How do you keep company blogs human enough to attract attention like this?

I think the key to our success is putting a face to a name makes a lot of sense in our industries, especially the highly technical and complex industries Caterpillar supports. Credibility is key. The Caterpillar organization is filled with the smartest engineers and industry experts in the world. We want to leverage their expertise and promote the individual’s persona so the reader has a better understanding of who is speaking about a certain topic, and why should they be trusted.

How are you integrating new media with traditional marketing methods?

The organization that I am a part of is called the ”Multichannel Marketing Group.”  As our name indicates, we are driving a culture that views marketing communication through a multichannel lens. It is our directive to consider the objectives of our business and decide how each communication channel should be leveraged to reach the correct audience in the optimal way.

Speaking of organization, how have you had to change the org chart to meet the needs of social media marketing?

Our organization has been massaged a bit to help accommodate the needs being presented in social media. Firstly,”I” am a representation of the organizational adjustment. My position is new and completely dedicated to the strategy and implementation of Caterpillar’s social media presence. Similar to the definition that Jeremiah Owyang and the Altimeter Group defined, Caterpillar is using a Multiple Hub & Spoke organization, where my organization is centrally located, to provide direction, guidance, articulate value, etc.

Our internal business units are working with my group to establish and ultimately take control of their day-to-day social media presence. With this empowerment, comes responsibility. We have to make sure the right people are involved from the business unit to ensure the social media presence is properly managed, maintained, and ultimately feels like a true extension of our web presence and brand.

I’m guessing many of your customers are in an industrial, construction, or farming environment. What special challenges does that present?

Yes, there are interesting obstacles that come with the “industrial”‘ type pf customer.  We have to carefully select the channels we use to interact with our customers. From our perspective, each customer segment needs to be evaluated separately. For example, a customer in the construction industry might spend most of their time on various job sites running their business or operating machinery. This customer might rely on social media channels such as Forums much more so than a Facebook page, because the majority of the time when they are connected, it is out of necessity to ensure their equipment continues working so their business keeps moving. This case also demonstrates the opportunity for mobile solutions. The ability to access the right information quickly is critical.

Sounds like a mobile strategy is key.

Similar to my role as the Social Media Program Manager, we have a person solely devoted to the Mobile strategy. Our paths cross often, but one benefit of leveraging external social media channels is that these tools already have a heavy focus of ensuring the mobile experience is well executed. This is good for companies like Caterpillar, because there is less investment required from our perspective.

From the outside it certainly appears that Caterpillar is on the move.  Internally, how do you measure your progress?

We’re still evolving but we do have a dashboard of the metrics we want to track.  This dashboard is intended to demonstrate a funnel of activities, starting at the high-level metrics (Gross Views, Connections, Audience Engagements…) then leading into more tangible metrics (Referrals & Conversions). What we find is that these tangible metrics must be customized by each group — because the business objectives are not always the same — while rolling up into larger buckets of corporate objectives. One other self-serving set of metrics we are tracking is our own engagements. These are gathered to ensure we are keeping our channels fresh and maintained

Looking out to the next 12-18 months what changes out there excite you the most about the social web?

I am excited about the location based social media tools (Foursquare, Facebook Places, Gowalla, etc…). We are still figuring out how to best leverage these types of tools for Caterpillar and the Cat Dealer network, but the potential is high as the concepts become more mainstream. We are also excited about the growth and use of social media technologies emerging from a global perspective. Our customers are in every corner of the world. As the social media technologies mature and become widely used, we are ensuring that Caterpillar’s presence is strong everywhere.

Well, there you have it. Quite a success story.  What are your reactions to the case?  Brian might answer some questions in the comment section if you want to address a question or comment to Caterpillar directly.

In a social media world filled with questionable research and lightweight infographics, this is research we can really use. I’m proud to be able to provide an advance summary of this report to the {grow} community.

Here is the report summary of data from more than 1,000 European B2B purchasing agents.  What are your main take-aways from this research?

The dominance of ‘traditional’ online

Despite the rising popularity of social media, “traditional online” channels of supplier websites, search and emails are those most used by buyers.

68% of buyers said they consulted supplier websites, while 65% used search engines to find the information they needed to support their purchase decision. The use of social media channels such as Twitter, LinkedIn, blogs and Facebook all grew (Facebook, in fact, doubled in popularity from 2010 to 2011) but they are still much less frequently used than the ‘traditional online’ methods. Of course, this does not prove that social media is on the wane. A Google search frequently leads to a link provided by a social media network even if the buyer does not start there.

The youth factor

Splitting the data between under-30s and over-30s shows the inevitable tendency of younger buyers to use the newer channels — the under-30s were three times more likely to use blogs to help them select suppliers, for example — suggesting that social media usage will only increase as one generation gradually succeeds the other. But in the short term, it would appear that investing in SEO and websites should still command the lion’s share of the marketing budget.

A growing hunger for information

Comparing results from last year shows a significant growth in the number of information channels used by buyers. This is a clear sign that we are moving from the traditional outbound marketing model [where we used to broadcast information in the hope that some of it would stick] to an inbound model [where buyers choose what information they need and go and find it themselves online]. This means that there is a greater appetite for information – and therefore a greater burden on the brands to create more content of all kinds, in order to satisfy this hunger. It is clear that companies with a structured, considered programme for creating whitepapers, videos, blogs and the like are going to be the ones more likely to appear on buyers’ radar as they do their online research.

Are webinars coming of age?

One of the most dramatic change in behaviour will interest marketers who run their own events, because we have seen the proportion of buyers who used offline events when seeking purchase information fall dramatically. Last year, one in three buyers attended an event as part of their information gathering; in 2011 that proportion had almost halved to just 18%. This was accompanied by – although not necessarily caused by – an equally marked rise in the use of online events or webinars. One in ten buyers used this channel last year; in 2011 that rose to 27%, almost a threefold increase

There could be many reasons. But it is reasonable to assume that buyers are getting more used to webinars and that brands are creating many more of them. But perhaps the most interesting observation is that this is a classic case of digitisation; of digital technology creating a version of something that is utterly distinct from its offline counterpart.

But this is only part of the picture. In terms of influence, webinars do not come close to real events, which were rated as the most influential information source across all buying stages with 46% of buyers giveng them a rating of 9 or 10 for influence.

A two-tier Europe?

One of the improvements of this year’s Buyersphere Report was to include and compare the responses of 500 business buyers in France, Germany, Benelux and Italy. B2B brands are increasingly operating on a pan-European basis and we need to understand cultural and behavioural differences.

These differences emerged most strongly when we looked at the social media information sources used. In Germany and the UK, 48% and 46% of buyers respectively used social media tools during the buying process; this compared to just 22%, 26% and 35% of French, Benelux and Italian respondents. The use of traditional online, by contrast, was consistent across all five, varying only between 88% and 93%. In the UK, 16% of buyers used Facebook at some point in their research, compared with only 5% of Benelux buyers.

Attitudes to sharing

Another fascinating insight was the attitudes towards forwarding information. While tools like Twitter and Facebook are very efficient at quickly spreading information through friend networks, they are not the preferred options. Only 9% said they used Facebook “very often” to share professional information, whilst 27% used the company intranet and 44% used email with the same level of frequency.

But how willing are users to share their own data? Marketers often agonise over whether to allow their content to spread freely or to use it to generate leads by insisting on a data capture form. The Report suggests we should tread carefully, with 55% of buyers discouraged ‘very’ or ‘fairly’ often from downloading content by the content owner’s insistence on data capture. There were geographical differences here too: 22% of UK buyers said they were discouraged ‘very’ often, compared to 10-12% in Germany, France and Belgium.

If you would like to download the free Base One research, you can find the report at:  www.b2bmarketing.net/buyersphere11.

What are your conclusions from this interesting report?

“I am forbidden to use it,” he said. “The company is trying to figure out what to do, but in the mean time I feel like the world is passing me by.”

This is not an unusual situation. Regulated industries like banks and healthcare have to pay attention to the legal ramifications of how they share information.  Still, I think they are missing a bigger opportunity by not exploring how social media can be used on a very personal and human level.

I asked Jeff: “Does your company forbid you from attending a business networking meeting?”

“No.”

“Do they keep you away from going to a chamber of commerce function?”

“No.”

“Then what’s the difference? This is just another business networking opportunity. You don’t have to sell, you don’t have to advise. You don’t even have to identify your employer. Why not just be yourself and meet cool people and learn from them. Who knows … they just might turn into clients some day.”

This got Jeff’s attention. He was interested enough to enroll in one of my college classes and from that point on he has been on fire with this stuff, exploring several strategies to connect with people in meaningful new ways. And it’s working!

This is what most businesses — even regulated ones — miss. Social networking is not about B2B or B2C marketing.  It’s P2P — person to person. And isn’t that what personal services is all about?

If you are expected to grow your business through time-consuming live networking meetings or expensive advertising programs, doesn’t it make sense to unleash the powerful, cost-effective potential of the social web … before your competitors do?

In addition to the networking opportunities, there are several ways businesses like financial services and healthcare can employ social media within their industry regulations:

Social as a PR initiative. There are many ways to use social that avoids privacy issues. Why not apply social to your PR efforts? JPMorganChase has been able to help over two million Facebook fans focus on the good the organization is doing by engaging users its Chase Community Giving page. A Knoxville medical practice effectively used an eBook and video contests to build awareness for their services … and eventually get clients in the door.

Connection through education. A big part of marketing for financial and medical practices is education. Why not use social as an extensions of current efforts?  Vanguard took a leap this year by launching a Twitter handle and a Facebook program that embraces engagement within regulatory limits.  Morningstar is appealing to investors by providing a series of blogs (“Real Life Finance”) and forums where investors can learn and compare their portfolios right on the Morningstar website.

Mobile on the rise — Forget about social. What about the next wave — mobile?  Mobile is going to have a huge impact on banking, and it’s almost impossible to watch TV or Hulu without seeing a commercial for the latest mobile banking offering.  In a recent survey financial services is dominating other industries in term of iPad use (36.8%). While some financial services professionals take tablets into the field as a sales tool, Google and Bloomberg have developed apps for professional or individual investors to keep track of the market.

Customer service – Neither banking nor medical are known for their efficient processes or paperless service features. There must be some ways to copy what other industries are doing to use social to cut waste, reduce paperwork and streamline service. Chase Bank in New York is allowing customers to deposit checks by uploading a snapshot of the check on their cellphone.

Geo-location — I am the Foursquare “mayor” of my local bank branch. When I walk through the door, the tellers announce “Hello Mr. Mayor,” or “The Mayor is in the Building.” I must say, I enjoy walking into that bank.  As mayor I’m still waiting for my free money, but in the mean time, the bank is creating an emotional connection with me. Isn’t that remarkable?

Many customers, patients, and investors expect you to be there. Not participating sends a strong message and leaves a practice vulnerable to competitors. It’s becoming expected and preferred method of communication by many constituents.  Ignoring physician review sites such as Vitals.com, HealthGrades.com and RateMDs.com won’t make the comments go away.

Those are a few ideas but I’m sure there are many more.  How are you seeing regulated industries such as banking and healthcare use social media effectively? ]]> http://www.businessesgrow.com/2011/05/03/finding-social-media-success-in-regulated-industries-like-banking-and-healthcare/feed/ 61 http://www.businessesgrow.com/2011/04/29/8-big-ideas-to-drive-b2b-buzz/ http://www.businessesgrow.com/2011/04/29/8-big-ideas-to-drive-b2b-buzz/#comments Fri, 29 Apr 2011 10:02:58 +0000 Mark http://www.businessesgrow.com/?p=9317 A guest post from {grow} community member Joe Chernov:

I’ve been running in word-of-mouth (WOM) marketing circles since, well, since such a circles existed.  Yet despite the existence of an active industry association and a cluster of WOM-related innovative companies, we, as an industry, still haven’t produced something elemental — a repeatable, measurable model for B2B word of mouth.

Why? B2B is a unique beast.  For one, a company typically buys the product, which reduces an individual’s visceral drive to applaud (or pan) the purchase.  Also, our social groups tend to be a patchwork of people from all corners of our lives, not just work associates, creating fewer opportunities to “buzz” professional products than there are for consumer goods.

Yet despite these challenges there are several fundamentals that are sure to generate WOM buzz … even for B2B marketers.  Here are eight big ideas:

1.    Make promotions sharable.   Running a contest isn’t inherently WOM, nor is starting a Facebook page.  But creating a contest that inspires participants to pass along the promotion (especially on social channels) is WOM.  Group buying (Groupon, LivingSocial) and group messaging (Beluga, GroupMe) are red-hot categories.  Why not group referring?

2.    Point of service is the new point of sale.  In his aptly titled book, Word of Mouth Marketing, author Andy Sernovitz talks about the importance of point-of-sale as a WOM trigger.  It’s the moment when the brand/consumer relationship is consummated.  Since the buying process in B2B markets is more protracted (what IS the point of sale?), that same intimacy doesn’t necessarily arise when the contract is signed.  Instead, it shows up at the point of service – the moment the user’s need is the greatest. Rackspace recognized this opportunity and built a major Web hosting brand on the simple principle that unconventionally fast support yields unconventionally chatty customers.

3.    Speed doesn’t slump. Being quick to comment has always been a vital ingredient of public relations.  But the social web rewards speed disproportionately.  For example, respond first on Quora and your answer is 60% more likely to be talked about than others’ answers, regardless of quality.  WOM, guaranteed.

4.    Make your content share-worthy.  Of course your content should be valuable and timely.  But that’s no longer enough to ensure it spreads. Your content has to compel people to share it.  Think about any of HubSpot’s “Grader” widgets.  It’s impossible to grade your social presence without urging your friends to do the same.

5.    Think: Spheres of influence. BzzAgent CEO Dave Balter coined this term after his company ran a WOM marketing program aimed to persuade business travelers to switch to an upstart airline.  Balter found that it wasn’t the executives who generated the most buzz, but rather their administrative assistants. Turns out, those who booked the travel reaped the biggest benefits. In other words, don’t forget to consider the messenger when you craft your messaging.

6.    Do the unexpected.  Rackspace exhibited at this year’s SXSW Interactive event (their booth staff donned fake “sleeve” tattoos to poke fun at themselves for being the big B2B player at the hipster conference).  Salesforce.com shocked the B2B world by bookending the Superbowl halftime show with television ads, an unconventional move for an enterprise SaaS company.  Doing the same things in the same places ensures the same people will talk about you.  New venues yield new conversations.

7.    “Consumerize” your enterprise application. Yammer and Chatter make internal communications feel like a Twitter client.  37signals makes project management feel like an iPhone app (come to think of it, the company actually offers a Web app).  For our part, Eloqua is trying to make B2B marketing feel creating a PowerPoint deck with our Eloqua10 product.  Nobody has ever celebrated doing chores, so the more your products can feel like recreation, not vocation, the more WOM you’ll spur.

8.    Own an issue. Tap into something customers care about — an issue.  Think of Radian6 and “listening.”  The company and the cause are synonymous. Own an issue that you care deeply about, and you’ll unearth more opportunities for WOM than your products ever could.

These are just a few of the can’t-miss ways to increase buzz for your B2B business.  If they can be effective techniques for CRM, lead management, and infrastructure companies, then they certainly can work for your organization as well.

This is a difficult topic for B2B but ripe with opportunity. What do you think?

Joe Chernov is the VP of Content Marketing for Eloqua, a revenue performance management company, and the co-chair of the WOMMA ethics panel.

You’ve probably heard the term “content marketing.” You’ve certainly heard of social media. How do these two trends fit together in your sales and marketing plan?

Here’s a method you can use to determine where content and social media fit into your online sales strategy.  Let’s start with your good ol’ sales funnel.  These vary somewhat by company, but here’s a typical B2B sales funnel showing the steps a customer typically experiences:

Once you’ve documented your sales funnel, look at the customer touchpoints where your website is important. Your website is usually the hub of your online strategy. Determine where the user is likely to interact with your website.

Next, look at where content can provide a good touchpoint. Remember that content can be distributed allowing the customer to discover it in their own online contexts. Assuming you can reach customers at the various points in the sales funnel, where can content add value?

In this case, content could be valuable in the early stages of the sales funnel, to make customers aware that there are solutions to their business problem. It can also be useful when customers are trying to get buy-in for a purchase, doing detailed research, and during the demo or trial process.

Now, let’s see where social media/social interaction can play a role in the sales process.

Online social contact, not surprisingly, can be helpful at all stages of the sales funnel.

Now you know where the different elements can contribute to the sales process. Let’s look at how they can contribute–keeping in mind the basics:

Compared with content and websites, social engagement is obviously the most personal type of online contact with a customer. It often takes the form of a conversation. Your website, on the other hand, is the least personal form of contact.

At the same time, social media tends to be the least self-promotional. It’s generally frowned upon when companies promote themselves strongly on social media. It’s perfectly acceptable to promote your business and your products on your website, however. It’s both expected and accepted.

Given these caveats, here’s how you might try to leverage content and social engagement in your sales process:

Awareness. At the top of the funnel, you can be present in communities where customers are talking about their business problems, and use social media and content to make them aware that products and services exist. Of course, that means walking the line of self-promotion. You need to be a little more hands-off and neutral when informing customers through social media and content.

Early research. At these early stages, you can try to move the customer to your website through both social communications and content. You use both social contact and content to give basic information about your products and services, the kind of information a customer at this stage of awareness can best benefit from.

Buy-in and short-listing. When the customer is getting buy-in to make a purchase, you can provide support and information. You can develop content that provides data, arguments, case studies, or executive summaries the customer can share with decision-makers. The idea is to specifically target the decision-maker and provide content developed for that person, who may not be the same as the person who discovered the content. On the social side, you can be present and responsive, answering questions that arise.

Likewise, at the short-list stage, you can be available to answer questions, direct the user to appropriate information, and otherwise assist in that decision.

Research and demo. Obviously, the research stage is one that can benefit from a rich set of content and strong social connections. One goal may be to encourage the customer to try the product. If the user demos or downloads a trial version, you can be available to answer questions, provide support, and address any problems. You might want to develop supporting demo content or data sets for specific verticals or roles.

Purchase. Of course, you want to be available before and during the purchase process to make sure it goes smoothly.

That’s how you can use the sales funnel as a way to evaluate the role of content and social media in your sales process.

Of course, there are other tools to use as well, and lots of work to do after this. You’ll need to research your audience and segment them, in order to develop targeted content and social offers. You’ll need to update the website to support these touchpoints, at a minimum creating landing pages to support your content and social strategy. Ads and email may be added to the mix. Etc.  However, identifying these customer touchpoints and the methods you’ll use to integrate content and social media can provide a solid start to your planning and form the basis for your work.

P.S. If you prefer to consume your content via video, here’s a video tutorial of this post:

Neicole Crepeau is a partner in Coherent Interactive, which specializes in web, mobile, and social media design and implementation for small and mid-size businesses. You can read more of her original material at her blog, Coherent Social Media or on Twitter where she is @neicolec.

By Stanford Smith, Contributing {grow} Columnist

There’s a peculiar paradox in the social media world.

Take a look around and you will see creative individuals kicking butt and taking names.  They are writing amazing content, organizing humanitarian aide, even toppling autocratic regimes.

These pioneers are accomplishing extraordinary objectives with very little resources.  They don’t have a multi-million dollar war-chests or legions of eager staff at the ready.

All they have is passion and a mission.

So, here is the peculiar question.

Why aren’t Corporate Blogs leading the way?

After all the corporate titans do have a multi-million dollar war chests.  Corporate CEOs can enlist the best and brightest to tackle any problem.  Gargantuan PR departments can spread their message to every corner of the globe.

For the most part, the social mouthpieces of these giants, their blogs, represent the worst blogging best practices.

I suspect that  “traditional advertising” is to blame for a corporate blog’s dismal performance.

Traditional advertising prioritizes speed, packaging, and efficiency over passion, culture, and voice.  As a result, most blog becomes a hollow placeholder for the marketing department, saddled with big logos, promotional advertising, and the ubiquitous zero comments counter.

Corporate Blogs Must Do Better

The road to readable and usable blogs is actually shorter than corporate chieftains may think. In fact, almost any corporate blog can benefit by taking these 3 Key Steps:

Step #1: Tell Product Experience Stories

Storytelling will always be the best way to communicate. Customers and prospects are hungry for simple stories that show why a product or service matters to them.

Mom wants to hear about other mothers who are trying to get their kids to brush their teeth.   The IT manager wants to know how a backup storage product protected important data after a catastrophic flood.  The overworked and time starved husband will take notice of a short story about how other husbands used technology to never miss an anniversary or school play.

Smart companies will search through their testimonials and customer service feedback to create and post these stories.

Step #2: Practice Bar Stool Writing

Most corporate blogs sound like a college term paper.  The passive, four paragraph, diatribe that dominates corporate Word documents has no place on a blog.

Instead, try what I call, “Barstool writing”.

Think back to the last time you shared a drink with your best friend.  During that conversation, you probably recommended a movie, a book, or new dance club. I’m sure your recommendation was straight-forward, benefit-focused, and conversational.

Write your blog posts with the same approach.

Speak directly to the reader by imagining that you had to read your post to them at the bar around drinks.  Delete anything that sounds unnatural, forced, or “corporate”.

Do this and your blog will instantly exude a deeper level of authenticity and relevance.

Step #3: Feature Real People

People make blogs work.  Stock art, logos, campy illustrations, and fancy typography corrode the blog’s voice and saps its passion.

Whenever possible, use real faces to complement your posts.  Customers want to see the people behind the corporate curtain. This may be difficult in traditional marketing cultures, but it’s essential for an effective blog.

Think about:

1. Take a photo of your customer-service department and using it to write a post about your top 10 customer-service win’s.  Remember – use real stories that emphasize your product’s benefits. You can expand this technique to other departments too.
2. View company events as opportunities to share your culture with your customers.  Include pictures and video to show off your people.
3. Get your vendor’s and strategic partners into the act.  Consider letting them guest post on your company blog and insist that they include a photo or video of their team.
4. Don’t isolate your CEO.  Your CEO is the standard-bearer for your culture and represents your voice in the community.  Model your effort after Tony Hsieh, Zappos CEO, and encourage your CEO to write about your company’s values and vision.  Note: Seriously question having a blog, if your CEO isn’t willing to champion it.

What’s Standing In Your Way?

I’ve helped dozens of companies with their blogging efforts. Every one of them has expressed concern and outright fear about taking the mask off their corporate blog.  They are afraid that their customers would doubt their professionalism or quality.

In every situation, they were wrong.

Their sincerity, openness, and real-world authenticity separated them from their competitors.  Customers appreciated their no-spin approach.  Vendors and suppliers understood their brand on a deeper level.

In the end, their blog became a strategic asset for their business rather than a marketing eyesore.  This new way of approaching their customers seemed peculiar at first but delivered results.

It will do the same for you.

Do you agree?  What are the challenges you face with injecting life into your corporate blog?

Stanford Smith is a hopelessly addicted angler, father of 3 hellions, and the wild-eyed muse behind PushingSocial.com. Follow him on Twitter to get his latest unorthodox tips for getting your blog noticed and promoted.

On a scale of 1-to-5, with 5 being a requirement, which items are most critical to a great blog post?

• Great Title
• Image
• Introductory Paragraph
• Content with facts, figures and links,
• Call to Action,
• RSS Feed,
• Social sharing options

Boy that is a tough one … and my answer might surprise you.

First, any company blog should be aligned with your marketing objectives and those will vary company to company. But to keep things simple, let’s say the over-arching goal of every post is to get the thing read!

Here is my take on it, more or less in order …

1. Great headline (Rating: 5.0) — You are fighting through a lot of noise, a ton of competing content and SEO tricksters trying to push you to the bottom of the reading list. Sometimes the only thing that will save a blog post is a great headline. Bloggers agonize over headlines and still rarely get them right. They have to be accurate, descriptive, attention-grabbing, and short enough to tweet.  Many people will never get to your content unless you grab them by the throat with your headline.

2. Insanely great content (5.0) – You want people to return to your blog over and over. Fight to never disappoint them. Being original, consistent, and compelling is hard work. An acronym I use with students is RITE — Your blog posts should be Relevant, Interesting, Timely and Entertaining.

3. Social sharing (4.0) — I know this will surprise a lot of people, but hear me out! After the headline, the next thing that usually grabs attention is the number of times it has been tweeted. So of course having a sharing option is important if you want your post to be read widely, but the social validation of having a few tweets at the top is also a crucial psychological reinforcement that says: “this is a post that should be read!”

4. Introductory Paragraph (3.5) – I am a big believer in stating what you have to say and get on with it. Don’t waste people’s time or make them work to find the value in the article. Overall, keep your articles short.

5. RSS feed (3.0) – I learned a painful lesson last year. Most people don’t even know what an RSS feed is!  I was confounded why my subscriptions weren’t increasing at a faster rate. Once I changed the prompt to “email subscription,” instead of RSS feed, it took off like a rocket.

6. Image (3.0) — There are plenty of great blogs that don’t have images. There are plenty of great blogs that also diminish their appeal through a poor use of over-used stock photos. I use illustrations as a way to capture attention and entertain but I don’t think it trumps content.

7. Call to Action (1.0) — This low rating may also surprise some folks. Here is my logic. Your readers are absolutely sick of being sold to and marketed to. Certainly it is OK to discuss new products and services in a helpful way but if readers feel they are being pushed into something every time they come by, they’ll stop coming. Give them content that is useful and helpful and the business relationships will take care of themselves.

Now here’s the FUN part!  What do the {grow} readers think?  What would YOUR scorecard look like?

Brent Pohlman oversees the blogging duties at http://blogmidwestlabs.com and submitted this question through the recent B2B blogging webinar I provided through MLT Creative.

We have an extraordinary opportunity today! Thanks to Christina Pappas, a blogger with Zmags.com, we’re going to dissect her blog as a case study!  Christina came to me with this familiar question:

I joined my company in September of 2010 and one of my “missions” was to start and maintain a consistent blogging schedule.  I am posting regularly (at least 1x per day) and am sticking to themes that my audience would relate to.  But I cannot reach two goals: getting subscribers and getting comments.  We have 2,500 customers and only 170 blog subscribers. Why such a big disconnect? Why am I creating great content for no results?

OK, let’s start digging into the problem! What do you do when your blog is in the fog?

I’m a data guy so first let’s look at the some numbers.  Here are the page views of the blog B.C. (Before Christina) and A.C. (After Christina):

There are two obvious trends we can observe. Christina has had a dramatic impact on this blog, and something really weird happened in December to cause a big drop.

What happened over the holidays? The company has no idea. I have seen that kind of crazy data from Feedburner before but usually Google Analytics is pretty solid.  Any opinions?

Let’s look at the blog itself.

The blog design is clean, attractive, and easy to navigate. The content is relevant, timely and well-written. The headlines are strong and Christina generally punctuates her text with sub-headings and graphics to capture attention and add visual appeal. Overall, this is a strong blog.

How is Christina promoting the blog?  In a conversation with me she reported that she is:

• Commenting on relevant customer and industry blogs
• Engaging with potential readers on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and a monthly eNewsletter.
• Worked to get her blog posts syndicated on other sites. One of her posts received 2,000 views.

The company has also retained an outside company to try to advise her on ideas to drive more readership and comments. The consultant recommends she take two steps:

1) Cut the number of posts she is writing from five to two and spend the extra time promoting the blog.

2) Create specific industry-specific customer “personas” and tailor posts to each persona over a period of time.

OK, the blog doctor is IN DA HOUSE!  (Where is my theme music?) What should Christina do?

1) Exercise patience — First, let’s put this in perspective. Christina has increased page views on the blog by more than 100 percent and subscriptions by 28 percent in four months. Take a bow, young lady!  Building a company blog is painstaking work. Be patient and tell your management not to panic. It will be OK. You’re on the right track. If you’re still stalled six months from now we can review, but for now, let’s stay the course … with a few tweaks!

2) Goals and strategy — Everything starts with strategy.  All we know is that the goal is to increase comments and readership … but why?  Goals should reflect the target behavior you are trying to change or influence.  So I have to ask — why is getting a comment a goal?  How does that move the needle for your company?

Getting comments on a company blog is extremely difficult. For example, GE has one of the best B2B blogs in the world, with dozens of people contributing to it.  They get about two comments a month. So I think you need to seriously re-evaluate whether “comments” is a realistic and desirable goal. The engagement may be taking place outside of the blog.

Remember that there are many important business benefits of blogging even if you have very few comments. Don’t overlook SEO benefits, PR opportunities and other valuable benefits of your content.

3) Where are your customers? As I look at your blog, there is very little that has to do with direct customers here.  Where are the articles about your customers?  Case studies? Successes? Best practices? Pictures?

When I was a young PR guy, my boss made me work the midnight shift at our plant for two weeks. Why? Because I was writing a newsletter, those were my “customers,” and I had to understand them. I think Christina should follow some sales people around on calls for a week, maybe two.  If that’s not practical, talk to them on the phone. Find out what the customers love, what they hate. What do the WANT to read about? What questions do they have? Answer them in blog posts. Just asking your customers about the blog will make them INTERESTED in your blog!

One of the best way to get customers to engaged is to feature them IN your blog. Make your blog a customer celebration.

4) Where are your employees? Don’t overlook the opportunity to get employees engaged and excited about your blog. Feature them too.  Also, it’s time for Christina to ask for their help. There is this issue called social validation that I discuss at length in a post called Building Social Media Momentum. In short, customers are more likely to join in on engagement and comments if they see they’re not all alone on your blog. Ask your fellow employees to support you and “prime the pump” with tweets and comments.

5) Where are you? There are two conditions that usually drive comments on corporate blogs 1) involving customers and 2) having a single, strong personality write the blog. Christina is doing a good job with the content but is not putting much of her personality into it. I recommend putting Christina’s picture out there on the blog some place. Let people know who is behind the blog. That should make a difference with engagement!

6) Where’s the sizzle? The blog has the beef but it needs a little sizzle. What can Zmags do to shake it up and grab attention? How about a contest? A blog-only special? Video? Humor? A celebrity guest blogger that your customers would recognize?

Now, about those consultants. The quality of the company blog is solid.  Christina seems to be handling the 4-5 posts a week easily but dropping back to 3-4 would not hurt much.  Personally I would scrap the persona idea at this stage. Just talk to your customers. Get to know them. That’s a lot more fun and effective than following a script.

Well, that’s my take on it. What does the community think? What would you do if you were Christina? What did I miss?

Many thanks to Christina Pappas and the management of Zmags for allowing me to dissect their blog with no strings attached. Christina submitted this question through MLT Creative’s blogging seminar.