Why You Should Be Your Company’s Next CEO

First came the inventors and founders, fueled by steam and created with cast iron, changing society from agrarian to industrial. Then came electricity, steel, and oil and the rise of the company, followed by the move from analog to digital. Now we’re at the start of the fourth industrial revolution; a revolution that’s being powered by data.  And who’s in control of data? The marketers. We are sitting on the intelligence of a size and nature unparalleled in the commercial world. This is what is powering the revolution, and we’re in charge of it.

Who Runs the World?

Some might suggest that marketing has been secretly running the world for years but, conspiracy theories aside now is the time for marketers to step up and start running the companies we know so well. The fourth industrial revolution is our time. Because, as Klaus Schwab (who coined the term fourth industrial revolution) says, customers are “increasingly at the epicenter of the economy, which is all about how customers are being served.”

Schwab also founded the World Economic Forum, which has created The Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution to develop policies that deal with, among other things, the impact of AI and machine learning, blockchain, and the Internet of Things. In other words, just another day in the office for the modern marketer. Add to this the fact that our job is to know our customers, and that in this revolution the economy is no longer only about selling things, and it’s increasingly clear that we’re leading from the front. This changes everything.

Leading From Marketing

At one point, you had to be from one of the practical, quantifiable arms of a business to get to manage it. Salespeople rose to the top because their contribution to the business can be clearly measured. Logistics people became CEOs because you can see the benefits of this type of thinking to the future of the business. Financial types got there for, well, obvious reasons. But marketers? Marketers, less so. It used to be tricky to prove marketing’s worth and the generalized perception of marketing that manifests itself in statements such as, “what is marketing, anyway,” “isn’t it a bit like advertising but not on TV,” and “there’s no such thing as bad publicity, so how hard can it be” confirms a lack of understanding. Not anymore.

Marketing as a Measurement Center

We can measure the impact of marketing and, like the economy, marketing isn’t only about getting people to buy things. More than ever, it’s about understanding the customer and the immense complexity of the world they, and we, inhabit and engaging with them to create lasting relationships.

In his new book, Engage to Win, our own fearless leader, Steve Lucas, says the CMO needs a new title: the Chief Engagement Officer. Steve believes both the CEO (Chief Executive Officer) and the CMO must carry the title of Chief Engagement Officer as they need to work towards a common set of engagement goals and eat, sleep and breathe engagement with the customer.

CMO for CEO 2019

All of the above is why the CMO is now the natural choice to become the CEO, and the opportunities for the truly fearless marketer are greater than ever. Marketing has become the most rounded of all the commercial professions, the one that works closest to the boundaries of technology and the one that knows the most about the customer. In fact, I’d argue that marketers probably know more about the companies they work for, and their customers, than any other employee. And that doesn’t even touch upon our understanding of the technology that underpins the revolution, technology that is key to the new economy.

To succeed means being bold and, yes, being fearless. The pace of today’s Engagement Economy is dizzying, rapid and elemental, faster than the rise of the steam locomotive or the home computer. Marketers cannot afford to wait for the opportunities to come to them; we must have the confidence to push forward and up. But with our understanding of and access to data, and the breadth of our experience, we are uniquely positioned to guide our organizations—and to give our customers exactly what they want. Be fearless in your ascent. Nothing is stopping you.

Join Us

We’d love to meet you and share our stories of marketers fearlessly pushing upward by capitalizing on the advantages afforded by the engagement economy. Join us at this year’s DMEXCO, one of the most influential gatherings of leading thinkers in the digital economy, and explore how technology, business, and social trends enable marketers to drive strategy and take the lead. We hope to see you there.

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Incorporating Email Personalization in Your ABM Strategy to Boost Engagement

Today, email is not just about promoting your brand offerings. It is about giving your subscribers and customers a personalized and relevant experience and creating accessible emails to reach out to each and everyone, including people with disabilities.

The email address is an asset that needs to be used thoughtfully. Gone are the days of batch-and-blast emailing; email marketing is about delivering value to the subscriber.

While email personalization is about sending the most relevant emails to your subscribers at the most suitable time, account-based marketing (ABM) focuses on targeting the most relevant audience to market your brand. Email is one of the most powerful marketing channels, and by combining personalized emails with ABM strategy, you will be able to boost engagement and get the desired results.

In this blog, we’ll take you through the ways to build a successful ABM strategy by incorporating personalization into your email campaigns and its benefits.

Why Should You Use ABM for Your Email Campaigns?

ABM focuses on creating and executing highly-targeted and customized campaigns to address the needs of each individual set of accounts and their decision makers. Email marketing, when aligned with ABM, can help garner better results. Using ABM in your email campaigns will help you to understand each target account’s priorities and needs, and add value to their business.

Here are the benefits of implementing an ABM strategy in your email campaigns:

Targeted Approach

ABM targets specific groups of accounts that share similar business needs, challenges, and firm demographics. Therefore, instead of marketing to a large group of people, it markets to a specific list of prospects. This helps in determining whom to address while creating email campaigns for a particular B2B business.

Relevant and Appealing Emails

Since the target group is fixed, marketers can create relevant content that appeals to each of them. This helps in creating specific and appealing emails that have higher chances of engagement than generic emails. Personalized and targeted email campaigns improve click-through rates and conversions of your email marketing campaigns.

Easy Tracking of Metrics

Since ABM campaigns help to send relevant content that focuses on the quality rather than quantity, there is less data that needs to be tracked. It is therefore much easier to measure metrics and performance for ABM campaigns as compared to regular campaigns.

Improved ROI

ABM targets the biggest and most superior groups of accounts with personalized content that is most likely to drive conversions. It is, therefore, the most popular campaign that delivers the highest return on investment for any B2B business.

Aligned Sales and Marketing

ABM involves an equal contribution from both marketing and sales. It includes targeting specific accounts, engaging them, and generating revenue from them. For this, the marketing team needs to work closely with the sales team to make the campaign successful.

Steps to Build Personalized Emails for a Successful ABM Campaign

Your marketing automation platform can help you in creating and executing your personalized email campaigns.

Here are the steps to build a successful ABM campaign with personalized emails:

Step #1: Identify Your Target Accounts

The first and most fundamental step to create an ABM strategy is to identify the target accounts, determine their relevance and importance, and link them to your organizational goals. You should have a clear idea of what type of customers you need for your business. Build a list out of your most relevant target accounts and study the anatomy of each of them. Find out the key decision makers in the organization and build a strategy to approach them.

Step #2: Collect All Necessary Data

The more data you have of your customers/target accounts, the more efficiently you will be able to personalize messages. Collect data such as their business needs, interests, their role in the organization, the type of products or services they are looking for, and other personal information to deploy personalization in the emails that you send them.

Step #3: Segment the List

Once you have identified your target accounts, it is time to segment them into various groups to send specific messages. Segmentation is a vital part to create personalized and targeted campaigns. Segment the accounts based on their role, gender, business needs, and interests. This will help you in crafting only relevant content and targeting them to the right audience.

After putting efforts to identify relevant prospects, the last thing you want is to provide them with the same email experience as everyone else on your list. Creating personalized emails will provide your target accounts a unique experience, engaging and converting them into leads and customers.

Step #4: Create Personalized Content for Specific Target Accounts

To craft personalized content for your emails, you need to determine the key pain points of your target accounts and address their problems and demands. Send newsletters, blog posts, infographics, whitepapers, or any other form of content that will help your prospects in addressing their specific business challenges and needs. Track their behavior on your website and send automated emails based on their actions.

Here’s How Email Personalization Is Set up in Marketo

Marketo allows you to use data tokens to personalize newsletters by including the subscriber’s name in the subject line or the body of the email, as well as use images or graphics more relevant to your industry or business. Below you’ll find a step-by-step guide to creating a personalized email using Marketo.
 1) Create a New Program

To do so, log in to Marketo’s Marketing Programs and click on New Program.

You will see the control panel with four areas of action: Audience, Email, Schedule, and Approval.

 2)  Define Your Target Audience

For this, you have two options in the Audience tile: either import a new list or edit a smart list to create the target audience.

For example, we choose from the smart list by clicking on Edit Smart List, which opens the following tab.
Next, from the list on the right pane, add filters by drag-and-drop and set the condition. Here we have set filters for State and Job Title.

You can add as many categories and filters as you need to target.

In the Audience tile, you will be able to see the number of people to whom the email will be sent and the number of people who have unsubscribed or been blacklisted.

 3) Create an Email

By clicking on the New Email option in the Email tile, you’ll be able to choose from the different options of templates in the template picker window.

 4) Add Personalization Tags

Once your template is ready, insert token tags to personalize. To do this, click on the insert token button for the From Name, Subject Line, and Email Content.

5) Set the Token Name and Default Value for Each

For example, for personalizing the subject line, set the token name as and the default value as Hello Friend! In case the token value is not available, it will fetch the default value and display it.

6) Personalize with Dynamic Content

For this, click on the desired section in the email content and select Make Dynamic in the Settings option.

Now, select the segments for which you want to show dynamic content and save the selection. You can add different segments for different content sections.

7) Save and Schedule 

Next, you’ll need to save and schedule the email by selecting the send date and time at the Schedule tile. That’s it! You can activate a triggered campaign using a smart campaign and track the performance of your email. The goal of your emails is to present your business as the most suitable solution by sending them resources they are looking for. By sending personalized content to them, you will draw them to use your business’ services and products.

Step #5: Promote the Content on the Right Channels

Once you have created the right content, it is time to channelize and send it efficiently. Choose the right medium to send your message. All businesses are not active on all mediums. For example, social media and traditional advertising might not be suitable channels for the CEO of a company; an email would be the right medium to communicate with them. The distribution time is also an important factor to consider. You need to figure out what channels and time are best suited to get the desired results out of your ABM campaign.

Step #6: Analyze Data and Metrics

Analyzing the performance of your campaign is as important as running it. By studying the metrics, you will get insights into which content worked in engaging your target accounts and which one needs tweaking. As you begin to learn what content engages your target group, you will be able to refine your content to get better results. The data will help you in making the desired changes and guide you in improving the overall success of the campaign.

Benefits of Combining ABM and Email Personalization

Creating relevant and personalized content that addresses the specific needs and challenges of your target accounts is the most vital tactic of an ABM campaign. More so, combining personalization with ABM in emails yields the following benefits:

Deliver a Personalized Experience

When your business goals and target accounts are predetermined, it is easier to strike the right chord. By tracking the behavior and interest of the decision makers at each of your target accounts, you will be able to provide them a personalized experience. This will increase the chances of turning them into customers.

Accelerate the Buyer’s Journey

Personalized, contextual, and relevant email content increases the chances of conversion. When your target accounts receive content that speaks directly to them and addresses their challenges, they are more likely to use your products and services. When they receive suitable solutions for their problems, they will advance faster in the buyer’s journey.

Get Insights into Individual Customer Data

When you have a limited and more targeted set of people to address, the tracking is more accurate. You will be able to have a detailed analysis of your email campaign and insights into each individual customer/prospect’s data. This will help you in further making changes and optimizing your campaign strategy or content.

Wrapping Up

ABM is a powerful marketing method which when combined with email personalization will yield you great success in your business. Use this deadly combination in your email campaigns to stay focused on the right business goals and get maximum conversions.

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The True Value of Becoming a Certified Marketing Automation Expert

Will getting a marketing automation certification help advance your career? Will you make more money? Promoted faster? What is the quickest way to get certified? I’ll answer these questions and more in this blog post.

Supply and Demand

Are recruiters and hiring managers looking for certified marketing automation experts?

Marketing automation certifications are among the premier skill qualifications in the MarTech industry. This certification showcases marketers who demonstrate in-depth knowledge and skills with a marketing automation platform. Exams are usually proctored (no cheating!) and are sufficiently challenging to even the savviest of technology marketers around the world. Experts are commonly required to renew their certification on a regular basis to ensure a high standard among experts.

In an era where more than 6,829 MarTech platforms proliferate the landscape, talent agencies are forced to search for top talent in a space where the demand far outpaces the supply. “When we find a candidate who is certified in marketing automation, we are thrilled,” says Stefana Valentino, who manages a recruitment team for FRG Technology Recruitment. “Not only does it mean they are proficient working within the platform, but it usually means they are involved in the ecosystem and community.”

Hiring managers are also starting to look at certification as a key differentiator when choosing the candidate to contact. Many claim to have “marketing automation experience,” but certification sets you apart. Increasingly, marketers are expected not only be strategic but to roll up their sleeves and build complex marketing programs.

Taking Control of Your Career

Certification doesn’t just showcase your competency in a leading marketing automation platform. It also gives some insight into the kind of marketing professional you are. “It’s great to see marketers with marketing automation certification” comments the lead hiring manager at a high-growth software company. “I like to see someone who invests in learning and who enjoys the challenge of testing his or her skills on a daily basis.”

Challenging yourself to learn new concepts and powerful marketing automation techniques demonstrate your willingness to take control of your career path. While many can learn and pick up skills on the job, it is the marketer who studies her profession and continues to improve that will be far ahead of the crowd.

Not to mention—hard work pays dividends. A survey conducted by MarketingOps.com set out to correlate marketing automation certification and years of experience with better compensation. You’ll be happy to know that marketing automation experience DOES boost your earning potential as reported by MarketingOps.com.

Certification Matters at Every Stage of Your Career

I tell marketing leaders who are asking about certification: “CMOs should have allocated budget for certifications and training.” Some benefits are obvious—others not so much. A team of highly-capable marketing automation users can bring forth unique perspectives, work with agility, and can be more focused on details. You can complete more work in less time and operate in a more efficient manner with addition marketing automation experts.

From a recruitment perspective, Stefana puts forward “we encourage clients to pay for certification, as it’s important for an organization to invest in their employees’ education, as it will undoubtedly help the organization grow and evolve their marketing automation efforts.”

From an executive viewpoint, studying for certification helps leaders fully grasp the core areas of excellence in marketing automation. This also makes them much more relatable and informed when guiding marketing operations.

Set the Goal

If you are looking at getting a marketing automation certification, I recommend giving yourself at least six months. This can be challenging if working with a marketing automation platform is only part of your job description. Set up quick sessions with internal and external experts to find out how they use marketing automation. Keep in mind that your mission should be to drive business results for your company, and to use marketing automation to overcome obstacles and accelerate better financial outcomes.

During this six-month period, study the recommended guides and best practices, and continuously evaluate and improve your marketing programs and campaigns. A healthy mix of academic study and hands-on field application will lead you on the right path to mastery.

Beyond Certification

When you finally have a coveted marketing automation certification under your belt, the time certainly merits celebration! However, you should think of this as only the beginning of your marketing automation journey. The best and highest paid marketing professionals are always learning, connecting, and innovating. This would be the perfect time to network and compare notes with internal and external colleagues. Seek out local user groups, meetups, online user forums, or connect with experts and thought leaders.

Are you certified in marketing automation or considering it? Let’s keep the conversation going in the comments.

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3 Up-and-Coming Social Media Platforms to Watch in 2019

The age of Myspace is long gone. People claim Twitter is dying. Facebook is under scrutiny by the government, and Instagram has quickly become overrun with advertisements, scams, and an algorithm to overcome. As a marketer, it’s up to you to know what’s out there in the digital world, what your competition is doing, and how you can utilize the tools and technology available to reach your customers and prospects where they are. In this blog, we’ll explore three up-and-coming social media platforms.

1. Vero

Alternative to: Instagram

Overview:

Vero is the main contender to the digital media sharing behemoth known only as Instagram. This app allows for easy sharing of movies, TV, music, books, places, photos, and links. This opens up the “collection” to help build a better profile of the individual. It is an excellent tool for artists who want to release their own art and share it with others. Also, there are no ads on Vero. Only content. And speaking of content, you can set who you share your content with through four options: close friend, friend, acquaintance, and followers. This opens up our virtual socializing in a way that mirrors real life privacy. I believe this is a simple but sweet improvement that will bring Vero a solid customer base.

My Thoughts on the Platform:

I have been using Vero for about two months now, and I have to say that it has incredible potential. The app opens with a feed view of posts. It is divided at the top starting with a “search” function to look up other users and content within Vero. The next button over is a “dashboard” which will show your photo, connections, followers, and has links to your posts, requests, and settings.

The next section is my favorite as it is something Instagram does not have: collections. You can divide your posts into photos/videos, links, music, movies/tv, books, and places. The next tab is notifications, and then there is a chat section for all of your friends. I love the fact that you can determine who sees your posts with a swipe of the finger. The ability to create and share in unique ways makes me believe this to potentially be the next phone social media king.

Takeaways for Marketers:

Without the ability to advertise, this would be a tool that would be used as a research and discovery platform. With it, you could uncover what matters to your broader customer base or seek inspiration for a new campaign. Don’t underestimate the power of browsing to spark your creativity.

2. Musical.ly

Alternative to: Snapchat/Vine

Overview:

Coming in from the Eastern Hemisphere, this Chinese built app is structured to replace Snapchat. Musical.ly differs from Snapchat in that it focuses on 15 seconds to 1-minute videos. Also, you can choose soundtracks to accompany the video and use different speed effects and filters. Using Musical.ly, you can also create shorter videos called “live moments,” which are essentially GIFS with music. Users can also “remuse” sounds created by other users and interact with others through “Ask a Question,” “Duet,” and “Best Fan Forever” features.

My Thoughts on the Platform:

Musical.ly opens into a feed of videos. You can swipe up to go to the next video or click the heart on the right to like, click the chat button to leave a comment, and hit the arrow button to share via other social media channels, email, or text. In addition, most videos are enhanced with songs; users can find the same song used in other videos by hitting the spinning record on the bottom right. At the bottom of the app are Home, Search, Add New, Notification, and Account buttons. Overall, Musical.ly is a great alternative to Snapchat and Vine as it has a more connected community and more features to edit your videos. I recommend it!

Takeaways for Marketers:

With new ways to edit short and snackable videos, Musical.ly can offer additional opportunities for social media marketers to create new and exciting videos to engage their audience.

3. Steemit

Alternative to: Reddit

Overview:

What in the world is the obsession with upvotes? And how many buckets of “likes” does it take to buy a Ferrari? What I’m saying is, if you’re creating so much content then why aren’t you getting paid for it? This is the question that the individuals over at Steemit are attempting to solve with their new social media platform. It is run on the Steem blockchain with STEEM cryptocurrency. This stores the content in an immutable blockchain ledger and rewards users for their contributions with digital STEEM tokens.

Here are the ways you can earn STEEM tokens:
Posting: By sharing your posts, you can gain upvotes from community members. Depending on the upvotes you receive, you may get a portion of the “rewards pool.”

Voting and curating: If you discover a post and upvote it before it becomes popular, you can earn a curation reward. The reward amount will depend on the amount of Steem Power you have.

Purchasing: Users can purchase STEEM or Steem Dollar tokens directly  using bitcoin, Ether, or BitShares tokens. They are also available from other markets and exchanges including Binance, BitShares, Bittrex, BlockTrades, Changelly, GOPAX, HitBTC, Poloniex, Shapeshift.io, and UpBit.

Interest: STEEM tokens that are “powered up” to STEEM Power (SP) will be considered vested interest into the company and will earn the user a small amount of interest in the form of additional SP. To unlock SP and convert all or parts of it back to STEEM, you have to start a “Power Down” process; this moves 1/13th of the STEEM Power back into Steem (which is spendable) per week over 13 weeks.

My Thoughts on the Platform:

Steemit is one of those grand ideas that might be a little before its time, but only time (and money) will tell. The idea that we could gain money from posts and upvotes is incredible, but it is also limited by its lack of customer base. A partnership with an already established platform such as Reddit or Facebook could help gain a robust support/marketing system.

Takeaways for Marketers:

A monetized content competition powered by cryptocurrency? This platform could have huge implications for marketers if a partnership with an established platform occurred. And it poses an interesting question: would marketers need to begin buying ad space with Steemit tokens or government regulated currency?

The best part about being a marketer is being a part of the ever-evolving technological advancements that this world has to offer. With the opportunity to innovate at every turn and constant product development happening, there is great potential for marketers to engage their audience in new and exciting ways.

Are there any other up-and-coming social media platforms that I missed? Tell me about them in the comments.

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5 Steps to Creating Personalized Content Experiences for ABM

It’s something you may not even realize, but as a consumer, you’re getting served personalized experiences left and right. From your Netflix recommendations to your suggested Spotify playlists, nearly everything we interact with online has some kind of personalization attached to it.

Until recently, this high level of personalization has existed almost exclusively in the B2C world, and it’s really only been within the past couple of years that personalization in the form of account-based marketing (ABM) has blown up for B2B marketers. It’s no longer a tactic, it’s a tried-and-true strategy. So much so that some organizations have nearly abandoned more traditional approaches because of the success they’ve seen from ABM.

But when I get the chance to talk to fellow marketers about it, one of the things I hear time and again is that actually creating those highly personalized experiences is sometimes easier said than done.

To help, I’m going to share five steps that your marketing team can take to start creating personalized content experiences to reach and engage your target accounts.

And I promise it’s going to be pretty painless.

1. Identify Who You Want to Target

The first step to any account-based marketing strategy is figuring out who your target accounts are. Who do you want to see your personalized experiences once they’re ready? This will require some alignment between your marketing and sales teams, and will also mean that you should take some time to think strategically through your ideal customer profile.

You’ll probably want to consider:

• Firmographics: Account size, number of employees they have, their location, sector, and industry
• Technographics: Technology the account uses, and their level of technological maturity
• Sociographics: The account’s business challenges and their priorities

Taking these factors into consideration will help you strategically target accounts that are the right fit for your solution, and not to mention, will be a better use of your budget, and lead to more conversions.

2. Determine the Right Level of Personalization

Your level of personalization depends on the type of ABM approach you decide to go with. And if you’re not familiar, there are a few. The image below is a great visual of the levels of investment you’ll need for each.

Image by ITSMA

One-to-One: This is what the majority of people think of when they hear ABM. With one-to-one personalization, marketers are creating and executing highly customized programs for individual target accounts. Because it’s at the top of the pyramid here, one-to-one ABM is usually the most personalized and requires the most research, but can also have the highest return.

One-to-Few ABM: This approach is similar to one-to-one, but it’s applied to small groups of accounts. Usually, this small cluster shares similar challenges or characteristics, so you’re able to keep the bulk of the approach the same across these few accounts while lightly personalizing.

One-to-Many ABM: This is your scalable ABM solution. It’s where you’ll really need to lean on tech to personalize your marketing campaigns for potentially hundreds of target accounts.

3. Organize Your Content

Take a look at the content you have—how much of it can be leveraged to create engaging experiences for your target accounts? Instead of creating more content for the purposes of ABM, see what you can leverage that already exists. What blog posts have you written that CMOs would care about? Which of your ebooks would engage someone in the healthcare industry? Take questions like these into consideration, and use this content to build customized streams to distribute to your target accounts. (I’ll get back to this in a minute).

My team at Uberflip created this content audit template for you to use to help track what content you have and how it’s performing, which can help you decide what to include in your ABM outreach.

4. Decide Which Channels You Want to Use

Once you’ve decided who you want to target (and the appropriate level of personalization), it’s time to actually get your personalized content experiences in front of your target accounts—without scaring them away.

These are the most common distribution avenues:

• Email
• Paid ads
• Direct mail
• Social
• Sales email outreach

Remember that each of these outreach methods can be tailored for the various levels of personalization. As an example, one-to-one personalization might be a bit too much for social media (if a Facebook ad has my name in it, I’m probably going to say no thanks), but could be great for personalized email outreach.

5. Engage Your Target Accounts at Scale 

Now we’ve gotten to the fun part. It’s time to put everything you considered in steps one to four into action and actually create and serve up your personalized content experiences.

One of the most common ways to do this is by creating custom landing pages that feature content tailored to one, few, or many. Terminus does a great job at this. You’ll see they are targeting a specific account, have included content that speaks to what they offer, address their business challenges, and have included a headshot from the sales rep to make the outreach feel a little more personal.

I’ll say this: If an email, or an ad, or a social post sent me to this stream, I know that I’d be more compelled to engage with it over a generic product or landing page.

When you break it down into small steps, creating personalized experiences for your target accounts really isn’t all that hard. So, I encourage you to go out and try these strategies and see what your team can do. Because maybe, as marketers, we aren’t as far away from the Spotify-level content experiences as some may think.

What is your content strategy for ABM? I’d love to hear about it in the comments.

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Why You Should Be Your Company’s Next CEO

First came the inventors and founders, fueled by steam and created with cast iron, changing society from agrarian to industrial. Then came electricity, steel, and oil and the rise of the company, followed by the move from analog to digital. Now we’re at the start of the fourth industrial revolution; a revolution that’s being powered by data.  And who’s in control of data? The marketers. We are sitting on the intelligence of a size and nature unparalleled in the commercial world. This is what is powering the revolution, and we’re in charge of it.

Who Runs the World?

Some might suggest that marketing has been secretly running the world for years but, conspiracy theories aside now is the time for marketers to step up and start running the companies we know so well. The fourth industrial revolution is our time. Because, as Klaus Schwab (who coined the term fourth industrial revolution) says, customers are “increasingly at the epicenter of the economy, which is all about how customers are being served.”

Schwab also founded the World Economic Forum, which has created The Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution to develop policies that deal with, among other things, the impact of AI and machine learning, blockchain, and the Internet of Things. In other words, just another day in the office for the modern marketer. Add to this the fact that our job is to know our customers, and that in this revolution the economy is no longer only about selling things, and it’s increasingly clear that we’re leading from the front. This changes everything.

Leading From Marketing

At one point, you had to be from one of the practical, quantifiable arms of a business to get to manage it. Salespeople rose to the top because their contribution to the business can be clearly measured. Logistics people became CEOs because you can see the benefits of this type of thinking to the future of the business. Financial types got there for, well, obvious reasons. But marketers? Marketers, less so. It used to be tricky to prove marketing’s worth and the generalized perception of marketing that manifests itself in statements such as, “what is marketing, anyway,” “isn’t it a bit like advertising but not on TV,” and “there’s no such thing as bad publicity, so how hard can it be” confirms a lack of understanding. Not anymore.

Marketing as a Measurement Center

We can measure the impact of marketing and, like the economy, marketing isn’t only about getting people to buy things. More than ever, it’s about understanding the customer and the immense complexity of the world they, and we, inhabit and engaging with them to create lasting relationships.

In his new book, Engage to Win, our own fearless leader, Steve Lucas, says the CMO needs a new title: the Chief Engagement Officer. Steve believes both the CEO (Chief Executive Officer) and the CMO must carry the title of Chief Engagement Officer as they need to work towards a common set of engagement goals and eat, sleep and breathe engagement with the customer.

CMO for CEO 2019

All of the above is why the CMO is now the natural choice to become the CEO, and the opportunities for the truly fearless marketer are greater than ever. Marketing has become the most rounded of all the commercial professions, the one that works closest to the boundaries of technology and the one that knows the most about the customer. In fact, I’d argue that marketers probably know more about the companies they work for, and their customers, than any other employee. And that doesn’t even touch upon our understanding of the technology that underpins the revolution, technology that is key to the new economy.

To succeed means being bold and, yes, being fearless. The pace of today’s Engagement Economy is dizzying, rapid and elemental, faster than the rise of the steam locomotive or the home computer. Marketers cannot afford to wait for the opportunities to come to them; we must have the confidence to push forward and up. But with our understanding of and access to data, and the breadth of our experience, we are uniquely positioned to guide our organizations—and to give our customers exactly what they want. Be fearless in your ascent. Nothing is stopping you.

Join Us

We’d love to meet you and share our stories of marketers fearlessly pushing upward by capitalizing on the advantages afforded by the engagement economy. Join us at this year’s DMEXCO, one of the most influential gatherings of leading thinkers in the digital economy, and explore how technology, business, and social trends enable marketers to drive strategy and take the lead. We hope to see you there.

The post Why You Should Be Your Company’s Next CEO appeared first on Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership.

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Why You Should Consider Launching Your Product on Facebook Live (And How to Do It)

People love to watch other people do stuff; it's ingrained in our DNA. It's why most of us enjoy people watching in the park or going to the latest blockbuster movie. Facebook and Instagram have taken advantage of this quirk in our genes with their live video streaming features.

Brands who live stream appear more approachable and real. Unlike TV commercials, live stream feeds feel more authentic as it shows the human side of a company. It's why more businesses are incorporating Facebook Live into their marketing strategies.

Benefits of Live Streaming on Facebook

• Boosts your audience numbers: An event streamed live on a platform like Facebook or Instagram is capable of reach millions of people worldwide. It also gives users a chance to participate in or attend an event they would otherwise have missed.

• Cuts down on cost: You don't need an expensive camera, a fancy set or a video editor when you go live on Facebook. And since you can host an event anywhere, even in a hallway, you can cut down on travel and rental expenses as well.

• Real-time audience interaction: Consumers react more positively to “face to face” interactions. During a Live feed, the audience can send questions that the host can answer on the spot. Brands can also build trust with clients because of the transparency they show during these engagements.

• Drum up excitement around product launches: Businesses can generate hype for a product launch on Facebook. These raw and real videos can harness the excitement you'd feel when opening a gift or seeing an event start.

How to Launch Your Product on Facebook Live

Give people an inside look.

Everyone is curious about what happens behind-the-scenes. Pull back the curtains on your business and give viewers a chance to know the real people behind the brand. Give your audience a quick tour of your office or show the tools or equipment you use. Doing this will help viewers understand you better and it's a great way of building trust.

Starbucks used this strategy in its 2016 National Voter Registration Day. They broadcasted the event live as company representatives walked around the park. They also introduced and talked to people who volunteered in the event.

Draw in viewers from other platforms.

One of the best ways to launch a product or start a new channel is to through the “cheap seats” route. You start by going live on Facebook and encourage viewers watching on other platforms like YouTube, Instagram or Snapchat (considered the cheap seats) to move to your page in order to see the comments.

To make things more exciting, you can also go live on the other platforms during a break from the mainstreaming feed and invite viewers to join you on Facebook.

YouTube entrepreneur Chris Ducker used this tactic to promote his book launch party.

Provide a preview of your upcoming product.

Giving your audience a sneak peek or a preview on what's coming next will drum up excitement and make them feel special. Show a trailer for an upcoming webinar or go live and show your staff brainstorming about a new product.

Tough Mudder is a great example of how to do it. The organizer streamed Coach T. Mud showing participants their training course. Seeing what they would be experiencing got more people interested in signing up.

Use video bots for show notifications.

Take advantage of Facebook's live video bots and use them to interact and encourage your audience to subscribe to your show. You can do this by asking viewers attending your live feed to type a specific word in the comments if they want to receive notifications. You can also create a URL for your video bot and encourage your audience to click on the link to sign up for notifications. This strategy gives you control on who can see your posts since it's your viewers themselves who told you they want to be notified about your show.

Get live customer testimonials.

Tap a loyal customer to talk about your product or company during a Facebook Live event. A lifestream approach to get engaging and natural flowing testimonials from customers are a very effective way of marketing your product. Meet up with a customer and hang out with them. The informal setting and relaxed mood can go a long way to getting your audience to warm up to your pitch or new product.

Facebook Live is an excellent platform to launch a product or show your customers and prospective clients what your company is really about. Take advantage of the numerous strategies you can employ to get people interested in your launch. Live stream a launch party with a celebrity or conduct a real-time Ask Me Anything session. Seeing what's happening as it happens can drum up interest and build customer trust.

The post Why You Should Consider Launching Your Product on Facebook Live (And How to Do It) appeared first on WebProNews.

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Incorporating Email Personalization in Your ABM Strategy to Boost Engagement

Today, email is not just about promoting your brand offerings. It is about giving your subscribers and customers a personalized and relevant experience and creating accessible emails to reach out to each and everyone, including people with disabilities.

The email address is an asset that needs to be used thoughtfully. Gone are the days of batch-and-blast emailing; email marketing is about delivering value to the subscriber.

While email personalization is about sending the most relevant emails to your subscribers at the most suitable time, account-based marketing (ABM) focuses on targeting the most relevant audience to market your brand. Email is one of the most powerful marketing channels, and by combining personalized emails with ABM strategy, you will be able to boost engagement and get the desired results.

In this blog, we’ll take you through the ways to build a successful ABM strategy by incorporating personalization into your email campaigns and its benefits.

Why Should You Use ABM for Your Email Campaigns?

ABM focuses on creating and executing highly-targeted and customized campaigns to address the needs of each individual set of accounts and their decision makers. Email marketing, when aligned with ABM, can help garner better results. Using ABM in your email campaigns will help you to understand each target account’s priorities and needs, and add value to their business.

Here are the benefits of implementing an ABM strategy in your email campaigns:

Targeted Approach

ABM targets specific groups of accounts that share similar business needs, challenges, and firm demographics. Therefore, instead of marketing to a large group of people, it markets to a specific list of prospects. This helps in determining whom to address while creating email campaigns for a particular B2B business.

Relevant and Appealing Emails

Since the target group is fixed, marketers can create relevant content that appeals to each of them. This helps in creating specific and appealing emails that have higher chances of engagement than generic emails. Personalized and targeted email campaigns improve click-through rates and conversions of your email marketing campaigns.

Easy Tracking of Metrics

Since ABM campaigns help to send relevant content that focuses on the quality rather than quantity, there is less data that needs to be tracked. It is therefore much easier to measure metrics and performance for ABM campaigns as compared to regular campaigns.

Improved ROI

ABM targets the biggest and most superior groups of accounts with personalized content that is most likely to drive conversions. It is, therefore, the most popular campaign that delivers the highest return on investment for any B2B business.

Aligned Sales and Marketing

ABM involves an equal contribution from both marketing and sales. It includes targeting specific accounts, engaging them, and generating revenue from them. For this, the marketing team needs to work closely with the sales team to make the campaign successful.

Steps to Build Personalized Emails for a Successful ABM Campaign

Your marketing automation platform can help you in creating and executing your personalized email campaigns.

Here are the steps to build a successful ABM campaign with personalized emails:

Step #1: Identify Your Target Accounts

The first and most fundamental step to create an ABM strategy is to identify the target accounts, determine their relevance and importance, and link them to your organizational goals. You should have a clear idea of what type of customers you need for your business. Build a list out of your most relevant target accounts and study the anatomy of each of them. Find out the key decision makers in the organization and build a strategy to approach them.

Step #2: Collect All Necessary Data

The more data you have of your customers/target accounts, the more efficiently you will be able to personalize messages. Collect data such as their business needs, interests, their role in the organization, the type of products or services they are looking for, and other personal information to deploy personalization in the emails that you send them.

Step #3: Segment the List

Once you have identified your target accounts, it is time to segment them into various groups to send specific messages. Segmentation is a vital part to create personalized and targeted campaigns. Segment the accounts based on their role, gender, business needs, and interests. This will help you in crafting only relevant content and targeting them to the right audience.

After putting efforts to identify relevant prospects, the last thing you want is to provide them with the same email experience as everyone else on your list. Creating personalized emails will provide your target accounts a unique experience, engaging and converting them into leads and customers.

Step #4: Create Personalized Content for Specific Target Accounts

To craft personalized content for your emails, you need to determine the key pain points of your target accounts and address their problems and demands. Send newsletters, blog posts, infographics, whitepapers, or any other form of content that will help your prospects in addressing their specific business challenges and needs. Track their behavior on your website and send automated emails based on their actions.

Here’s How Email Personalization Is Set up in Marketo

Marketo allows you to use data tokens to personalize newsletters by including the subscriber’s name in the subject line or the body of the email, as well as use images or graphics more relevant to your industry or business. Below you’ll find a step-by-step guide to creating a personalized email using Marketo.
 1) Create a New Program

To do so, log in to Marketo’s Marketing Programs and click on New Program.

You will see the control panel with four areas of action: Audience, Email, Schedule, and Approval.

 2)  Define Your Target Audience

For this, you have two options in the Audience tile: either import a new list or edit a smart list to create the target audience.

For example, we choose from the smart list by clicking on Edit Smart List, which opens the following tab.
Next, from the list on the right pane, add filters by drag-and-drop and set the condition. Here we have set filters for State and Job Title.

You can add as many categories and filters as you need to target.

In the Audience tile, you will be able to see the number of people to whom the email will be sent and the number of people who have unsubscribed or been blacklisted.

 3) Create an Email

By clicking on the New Email option in the Email tile, you’ll be able to choose from the different options of templates in the template picker window.

 4) Add Personalization Tags

Once your template is ready, insert token tags to personalize. To do this, click on the insert token button for the From Name, Subject Line, and Email Content.

5) Set the Token Name and Default Value for Each

For example, for personalizing the subject line, set the token name as and the default value as Hello Friend! In case the token value is not available, it will fetch the default value and display it.

6) Personalize with Dynamic Content

For this, click on the desired section in the email content and select Make Dynamic in the Settings option.

Now, select the segments for which you want to show dynamic content and save the selection. You can add different segments for different content sections.

7) Save and Schedule 

Next, you’ll need to save and schedule the email by selecting the send date and time at the Schedule tile. That’s it! You can activate a triggered campaign using a smart campaign and track the performance of your email. The goal of your emails is to present your business as the most suitable solution by sending them resources they are looking for. By sending personalized content to them, you will draw them to use your business’ services and products.

Step #5: Promote the Content on the Right Channels

Once you have created the right content, it is time to channelize and send it efficiently. Choose the right medium to send your message. All businesses are not active on all mediums. For example, social media and traditional advertising might not be suitable channels for the CEO of a company; an email would be the right medium to communicate with them. The distribution time is also an important factor to consider. You need to figure out what channels and time are best suited to get the desired results out of your ABM campaign.

Step #6: Analyze Data and Metrics

Analyzing the performance of your campaign is as important as running it. By studying the metrics, you will get insights into which content worked in engaging your target accounts and which one needs tweaking. As you begin to learn what content engages your target group, you will be able to refine your content to get better results. The data will help you in making the desired changes and guide you in improving the overall success of the campaign.

Benefits of Combining ABM and Email Personalization

Creating relevant and personalized content that addresses the specific needs and challenges of your target accounts is the most vital tactic of an ABM campaign. More so, combining personalization with ABM in emails yields the following benefits:

Deliver a Personalized Experience

When your business goals and target accounts are predetermined, it is easier to strike the right chord. By tracking the behavior and interest of the decision makers at each of your target accounts, you will be able to provide them a personalized experience. This will increase the chances of turning them into customers.

Accelerate the Buyer’s Journey

Personalized, contextual, and relevant email content increases the chances of conversion. When your target accounts receive content that speaks directly to them and addresses their challenges, they are more likely to use your products and services. When they receive suitable solutions for their problems, they will advance faster in the buyer’s journey.

Get Insights into Individual Customer Data

When you have a limited and more targeted set of people to address, the tracking is more accurate. You will be able to have a detailed analysis of your email campaign and insights into each individual customer/prospect’s data. This will help you in further making changes and optimizing your campaign strategy or content.

Wrapping Up

ABM is a powerful marketing method which when combined with email personalization will yield you great success in your business. Use this deadly combination in your email campaigns to stay focused on the right business goals and get maximum conversions.

The post Incorporating Email Personalization in Your ABM Strategy to Boost Engagement appeared first on Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership.

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