Like any new technology people either choose to jump straight in and see what happens or they wait, and watch and see how other are using and benefiting from using this technology. I think the former is fine when you are using the social element of the media to keep in touch with family and friends but I would err on the side of caution when thinking about using the tools for business. Just like a website this is another shop window to your business and anyone in the world can take a peek inside.

Creating a social media strategy should be classed as a Business Transformation function and I would urge any business owner that has say to their staff we must be on Twitter, Linked In and Facebook ASAP, just do it, to stop and read your sites and then you will see why you need to create a plan. Social media is instant and with the ease of a click an innocent message, picture or post can be shared with the world without the consent of the original author. When developing a Social Media Strategy take a look at your competitors, read what they are saying and see what they are posting and decide if this really is an area where you want your business to participate?

Once you decide that you want to get your business involved please remember the plan. Another very important point about developing a presence for your business via these sites is that content is king and even more importantly fresh content is king, so within the job roles of the business you will need to create a plan of content and publication and stick to it, otherwise your presence will diminish and potential customers will stop following and consider other options, maybe your competitor. Make the decision and treat it just like an investment, are you in or are you out and there is no harm in being out at this stage of the Social Media evolution.

I would like to share my social media story: It was late August 2010 and even though I had been in business since February I had not been using twitter for very long. I think I had about 9 followers and one of those was Tom Perry, EMEA Marketing Director, ShoreTel . Tom had been on my target list for a little while and I thought I really need to find a creative way to get a meeting. I was getting to know Twitter and its functionality and I thought I would try out a ‘direct message’. Given you have just 140 characters to get your message across it is a great tool for teaching you to be succinct. It worked and we had a brief exchange of direct messages resulting in a date in the diary. So there it was I had secured my first new business meeting via social media. I met with Tom we had a great conversation and understood how we could help each other and before we knew it, we had agreed two projects together. I am sure meetings of every kind are being set up all over the world via twitter but I just thought I would share my experience as it quite liberating and profitable. 

As technology vendors have both developed and refined their channel marketing strategies over the past few years the need for a refined yet bespoke marketing approach has emerged as top priority. The vendor who manages to encourage, educate and inspire their partners to create and execute joint marketing activities will be the big winner with increased brand awareness plus channel based return in the marketing funnel. Accelerate is a 100% fully funded, managed program of packaged marketing activities and collateral that focuses upon delivering joint sales opportunities. ShoreTel’s Accelerate Marketing Knowledge Series was developed upon the premise of educating channel marketing professionals with the very latest industry ideas, concepts and practises. ShoreTel’s approach is based on developing marketing skills and learning’s from one event to the next with two driving factors; ensuring partners attend all events to aid personal development, and building a community that is both competitive but also able to differentiate themselves (from a marketing perspective) in order to address more of the market. The events were run in November 2010 and April 2011, the agenda being developed collaboratively with some of the best industry marketers e.g. Chris Wilson, Richard Robinson, Ed Weatherall, Lisa Hutt and Richard Bush.

Objectives:

This program had two specific goals: to increase the marketing skill levels of ShoreTel partners while also increasing awareness, consideration and marketing pipeline for ShoreTel via an increased number of joint marketing campaigns.

Target Audience:

ShoreTel’s Accelerate Marketing Knowledge Series was aimed at those people within ShoreTel’s partner community who influence or perform a marketing function. The agenda topics and speakers were designed to appeal to Managing Directors, Sales Directors, Marketing Directors, Marketing Managers and Executives. The agenda items, timings and presenters were deliberately designed to be both compelling and action orientated.

For channel marketers to gain access to the knowledge and learn from the experience of these industry leaders is unprecedented for a technology vendor to offer at no cost to their partners. This important element helped to create a successful set of events simply with the calibre of presenters who also attended free of charge

Results:

ShoreTel had just launched the Accelerate Partner Program in the UK when development of the ShoreTel Accelerate Marketing Knowledge Series began in September 2010. It was always Tom Perry’s vision to create a partner community under the Accelerate banner and provide bi-annual knowledge and action events to drive increased marketing activity through his channel partners. The initial event objective was to get 35 attendees, 25 partner registrations per event plus 10 other participants (Presenters or ShoreTel employees). We received 19 and 21 partner attendees respectively to the November and April events.

As a result of the calibre of presenters, content and the exclusive offer made at the November event, ShoreTel agreed to fund and develop 7 new joint marketing campaigns. In addition to these activities ShoreTel identified and agreed to fund another 15 joint campaigns after the recent April event. Therefore ShoreTel have over 25 joint marketing campaigns agreed and underway in the UK channel as a direct result of the ShoreTel Accelerate Marketing Knowledge series

The ShoreTel Accelerate Marketing Knowledge series gives the partner the knowledge and the courage combined with a generous 100% funding offer to take a chance and create a ShoreTel joint marketing campaign that demonstrates the true value of partnership.

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According to Wikipedia PR is a field concerned with maintaining public image for high-profile people, commercial businesses and organizations, non-profit associations or programs. Furthermore PR can be used to build a rapport with employees, customers, investors, voters, or the general public.Almost any organization that has a stake in how it is portrayed in the public arena employs some level of public relations. There are a number of PR disciplines falling under the banner of Corporate Communications, such as Analyst Relations, Media Relations, Investor Relations, Internal Communications and Labor Relations.

This definition sounds appropriate only for large multinationals with thousands of employees.So what about the smaller companies how can they benefit from using PR and what can they do to get started? I would recommend that business leaders look at all the relevant industry awards that are generally available to enter free of charge, for example the Comms National Awards taking place in October. They have missed their opportunity this year but there is always next year.

It is best to take the time to read the criteria for entry and then ensure that the submission answers all the minimum requirements to at least have the opportunity to become a finalist. This is where business could employ an external resource that specialises in creating award winning entries but this will cost. If the entry is then shortlisted as a finalist in one or a couple of criteria the business will receive the relevant notification plus earn the ability to use a finalist’s logo as awareness of the achievement so far. At this stage the business has still not incurred any costs (if they have written the entry in house) plus they have the ability to create a press release or customer newsletter story featuring the finalist nomination and presenting the finalists logo. This is all very simple PR.

Now just imagine the business chooses to enter say six award events over the course of 12 months and is lucky enough to be named finalists at each event.They now have the basis of six press release ready to send out to their customer and prospects both celebrating the fact they are finalists but also showing both audiences that they can sell and deploy award winning solutions plus that they should be shortlisted for the next available technology solution project.

As a real life case study I was recently commissioned by Steve Rasmussen at siptel to create, write and present at the finals at the National Sales Awards in London, in the Technology Implementation Project of the Year category . Siptel are already winners of six industry awards not bad for a company only in their 6 th year of operation. As part of the follow up plan, when siptel win on November 2 nd we will work with Avaya’s PR team to write a vendor endorsed press release that will be published via Avaya’s worldwide network, and there you have the no cost PR model.

So remember PR does not have to cost anything, just your time, dedication and discipline to complete the simple tasks but reap the big benefits of increased awareness for potential customers. All the very best to this year’s finalists of the Comms National Awards, please ensure you tell the world about your achievements.

Increasingly across many industries marketing departments or individuals are being asked to deliver more by their business leaders but with no increase in headcount or budget. In this type of scenario this FMC solution works best as the vendor or partner can benefit from employing a third party to deliver the required project or projects to a date and within a specified budget. They do not have to waste time and budget with recruitment.  All they have to do is spend the relevant amount of time, ideally face to face but in some cases over the phone briefing the consultant on the project deliverables.

I have delivered on a contract with Brocade as part of their EMEA Marketing team from February 2010 through to July 2011. I started working in the field marketing team focussed upon the Tier 3 countries Belgium, Switzerland, Spain and South Africa. I then managed the EMEA Demand Generation function from June through to November delivering both ‘Brocade is Now’ and ‘Brocade One’ campaigns into UK, German, France and Middle East. My current project is to manage the Field Marketing Function within EBG North region, Benelux & Nordics. 

While in the Business to Business (B2B) world telemarketing is making a resurgence as an essential tool in the modern marketers marketing mix. Telemarketing as one essential element in planning an integrated marketing campaign can really help drive up the return on investment  (ROI) for selected activities. Targeted messaging, lead generation, appointment setting and even event registrations are all tasks that can be accomplished via a well planned and executed telemarketing campaign.

So my ‘Top 8 Tips’ for planning and running a successful telemarketing campaign are…

Companies such as  Astute  or  Tangible Results  can help advise businesses of any size how telemarketing can help increase responses for their marketing campaigns. Remember, a successful telemarketing campaign is dependent on the quality of the target data.

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Direct mail can take many forms and in the large part is a cost effective channel to reach a target market but if you need to repeat the exercise or you send to a large and old database you are wasting your time and your budget. To gain maximum cut through DM needs to be highly targeted, segment your data, and I particularly like high end direct mail plus personalised direct mail. Like a mobile device that is set up with the targets details or a book printed with the targets name on the front, I think they are simple yet powerful DM pieces. I also believe that personalisation gives the recipient a greater desire to open the dm piece and read the contents, a) because it is nice to see your name in print and b) if they got my name right it might be worth reading their message. As a marketer that is what we are trying to achieve, to illicit a response from a target market that has the desire to purchase the product or service thus the call to action then needs to be strong enough to get us to the next level of response.

E-mail is a very cost effective and quick channel to market. With email you can achieve instant results, like opens and click through, which are great internal statistics to provide to support the launch of a campaign. Be aware of the relevant data protection laws and the opt in; opt out criteria that needs to be adhered to with email campaigns. Please ensure you work with an agency or database supplier that is regulated or a member of a recognised marketing body in the UK, like the DMA or IDM. Emails are easy to send but also easy to delete, where as a direct mail piece has a longer life in the hand of the target.

Telemarketing is an excellent marketing practise and can gain the best results as part of an integrated marketing campaign. It can also be used to clean data, invite people to register or confirmation participants for an event. I think the investment in TM will draw the best ROI when the campaign is planned and TM is used to follow up on the DM piece in the same language and message as the DM or Email piece, this providing both continuity and relevance to the target receiving the DM and the phone call. Plus you must think of the agent, make their job a little easier by trying to warm the target up for a call on the product or service in question. The call centre agent is a great testing ground but it also can be unforgiving, so plan the campaign and brief all the elements of the campaign to run like a smoothly greased wheel and then you should get the results you have promised the sales teams. 

I will be the first to admit that marketing has changed an awful lot since I left Swinburne University of Technology www.swinburne.edu.au with my Marketing Degree in hand back in 1996. We did cover services and international marketing but not cover complex subjects like digital business communication and social media strategy (because they didn’t really exist), I say complex because these subjects can be interpreted in may different ways depending on your business and your need to embrace this new wave of communication with customer, partners and the industry.

New graduates coming into the workforce will of course have a good grip on digital communication and social media from their personal life experiences, in some instances they will choose their future employers based on the companies grip or acceptance of digital communication and social media. The difference will be the way these communication mediums are used for business need to be treated differently. At the same time we need also to ensure the seasoned marketer also has access to the latest training, to keep them current and effective in their current their roles or to gain the knowledge and experience to move into newly created roles within their companies.

Digital business communication and social media creates opportunities for businesses on all fronts, just ask your peers or other business owners about their experience with social media and see if it has helped their business, has it created any revenue? To help understand the enormity of the social media landscape check out this website: www.fredcavazza.net , you can see the landscape and the platforms and I bet there are names you will never have heard of but they exist and someone is using them otherwise they would be listed.

So the landscape is huge, the world wide web is permanent, anything published is available to most people around the world so this business of digital business communication and social media needs to be taken seriously. Therefore training is vital for the development of employees but also to allow them to check out the competition and pick up ideas for other companies in other industries and from people they may never come across and the most important element it will teach them the basics and the discipline required to make these communication mediums work for your business.

My final word of advice that if within your business or role as a marketing professional you actively use digital business communication and social media but you don’t have an agreed and published (internally) process or strategy, stop now, and develop a strategy, it will focus the purpose and objective of the activity and will bring your business better results in the long run. 

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In my column for May I explore the concept of marketing as a managed service specifically for smaller resellers. Please add your comments and thoughts once you have read the articles. I have many more marketing based subjects to explore and observe.

Surely we have all heard of ‘Paretos Law’ whereby 20% of customer brings in 80% of the revenues. We can easily adapt this statement to be relevant for vendors and partners i.e. 20% of partners will bring in 80% of the revenues. So why is there a need to look beyond the contents of the company Partner Relationship Management (PRM) system or partner database or excel list in the partner response teams. Vendors have the information at their fingertips, or more than likely, within a finance database system that will help any business to identify their top 20% who contribute to most of their business. 

Armed with this information I would be willing to predict that some vendor sales leaders will be surprised partner names that is produced by finance, on the actual list of commonly referred to as a point of sale report. I will go a step further too again predict that within this list would be a good number of loyal partners. So what do I mean by a loyal partner.

A loyal partner is a channel partner that only sells one vendor solutions, with a given market such as ‘voice’. They are a company that is actively promoting the brand of one supplier in order to make the sales cycle quicker and create a more streamlined experience for the customer. They should also see benefit from the accrued marketing funds, increased in points towards certification and in theory a better all level relationship with the vendor.

So why do truly loyal partner usually get so badly treated by their chosen vendor? Why is there this inevitable roundabout of the search for channel nirvana for the $10 million partner within 12 months? What is a loyal partner worth to a vendor and can that worth be truly identified within a global channel partner program? Imagine if this loyal partner only contributes $1m year on year, will they receive all the vendors’ attention that they deserve? I would back 5 to 6 loyal partners to deliver the $10 - $12 million required rather than back a newcomer to deliver $10 million from a standing start, but vendors still choose to chase the big money partner.  

I don’t understand why some vendors are looking outside their own channel to solve the problem of …how can we get more revenue?  I will give you the answer go and work with your loyal partners, that will immediately give you increased revenues and the only cost is time and energy…oh and maybe a few drinks once you get the P/O from the customer to celebrate the deal. Reward loyalty!

In this day and age of many sales led businesses vying for the best talent available in their market the compensation model for non quota bearing people needs to change. If a business wants to grow revenues while developing their employees which is what I have heard from all the Human Resources departments in business where I have worked. If they want to promote a positive environment where individuals are working together as a team rather than against each other then more attention needs to be given to performance based pay arrangements.

Over my years of working in multinational vendors I always found it frustrating to know that my dedicated and professional team of marketers who had help contribute to many sales, as we track ROI and CRM systems are only eligible for the worldwide group nominal bonus scheme. Where are the 3x kickers for getting a 200% attendance at a customer event from the database the team nurtured over the past 12 months? Where is the achievers club for getting 20x net new CEO’s of target accounts to a breakfast seminar where the sales leaders just need to turn up or spending 100% of partners JMF funding in a given period. Business is not just about sales it is about relationships and performance.

HR leaders need to stand up and make a case to balance the business. Reward loyalty, hard work, professional and passion or risk losing your highest performers to companies that embrace a new method of compensation for a non sales person.

In an article by  Michael Alter  he outlines seven incentive pay best practices:

* No. 1: Reward Individual Achievements:  A companywide program with a shared goal * No. 2: Find Relevant Goals for Every Employee:  Motivate staff that are not in the sales department * No. 3: Create Rewards for Teams of Workers:  Team motivation can add to increased productivity * No. 4:  Communicate, Communicate, Communicate:  Keep the staff informed about the levels of performance and the interest will remain in the program * No. 5: Measure Results Mindfully:  Flexibility in measurement is another key to the success of the program * No. 6: Empower Your Workers to Be Successful:  Give your employees empowerment to succeed in the program * No. 7: Cash Isn’t Always King:  Ask those involved what would be the most appropriate rewards to offer

If what I say is true then why do so many marketers in large or small, global or local businesses not create a plan with a clear set of objectives or metrics before they agree to commence a marketing project or even before they start working on a given project? The excuse I hear most often is that …”I don’t have time to plan and I just need to get it out the door and the plan is all in my head”. This may be all and well if no-one asks about the reason you choose this campaign over using your time and resources on other activities. In this day and age I am sure those that hold the purse strings in your business will want to see a business case for investment and a prediction of the results that you would hope to achieve, commonly referred to as  ROMI . I know vendors will certainly want to see a return on investment business case before they will approve a request for BDF or MDF.

Every marketing department should have a set of objectives to help them to grow and also to develop their products or services. By creating a plan and actually writing everything that relates to the product or service down you can quickly understand where best to utilise your time, energy and resources. Setting objectives will help focus the department on a specific aim in a given period of time to achieve a certain and goal and to increase motivation to reach that goal that has been set.

There are many acronyms that you can use within marketing but a simple one that can be used to help set objectives is SMART. And smart objectives are:

* Specific – What is the aim or actual target of the project? 15 leads a week? * Measurable – You should measure everything that relates to this project to see whether you are meeting the objectives or not, e.g. Inbound Calls or Web Hits or Appointments * Achievable – Can you actually reach the target given what you have available? I.e. Budget * Realistic – Do you think realistically you can achieve the objectives that you have set? * Time – What is the timeline to achieve the set objectives? One week or Six months?

There are many helpful websites you might like to research on this subject like  Business Link

This process is not exclusive to marketing it is used for all types of project management and other business disciplines. I just wanted to ensure that people were aware of the term and could start to implement it into their business processes to make their marketing more planned, targeted, objective led and ultimately more successful.

A couple of courses into the schedule and I am amazed at how many channel sales / marketing people that I have talked to recently who do not have a marketing plan in their business, or at least a plan that is written down and agreed with management. I would hazard a guess that most business leaders / owners would not dream of not creating a business plan or a sales plan, so why not have at least a very basic marketing plan. Furthermore I discovered through a few carefully guided questions, if the partners do say that they have a plan it is very organic in the sense of it is understood but not written down so they can change it regularly. I would call that more tactical than strategic.

Planning is crucial to the success of any business or even marketing activity or endeavour. It is also a part of the course where I have been most surprised, in the sense that I thought it was a given that in order to justify spending budget as a marketing department you would need to create a plan, with at the very least targets and ROI objectives.  This plan with marketing goals would then need to be presented and approved by management before any spending commenced.

With this in mind I just wanted to reinforce the need for Strategic Marketing Planning and one of the best ways that I have summed it recently is with the aid of The Direct Marketing Guide © 1998, published back in 1998 by the recently rebranded The Institute of Direct Marketing www.theidm.com

The nine major benefits of a good strategic marketing plan

Once you have digested the first part and then come to write the plan please use these six simple steps.

The six qualities of a good strategic marketing plan

If you work in a channel partner and have influence in the marketing function for your business please remember these simple words; planning prevents, poor performance. 

A roundtable can be as basic as conducting a meeting around a table. There is also those that are facilitated either usually by an independent party like a journalist or marketing consultant. Many marketing event and publishing companies offer them as part of an editorial package or they can be organised with the help of more independent parties who can be employed by the vendor to ensure the session flows on time, everyone gets a say and all the relevant covers points are covered. There is nothing worth than a partner taking time out of their business to come and sit around a table and either be preached at by the vendor for the most part or be beaten to the punch by louder and more obnoxious partner.

There are many different formats that a roundtable can take and it is really up to the organiser to choose what is most appropriate for the desired outcome. There is the ‘Simple Agenda’ approach whereby the facilitator moderates the conversation to ensure the group keeps to the agenda and time to ensure all points and covered, minuted and action assigned. ‘Game of Two Halves’ whereby the facilitator will spend one or two hours with the partners only, to understand any grievances, issues plus examples of both. After a break the vendor representatives are invited back into the room to face a series of the partners questions, guided by the facilitator and also listen to the horror stories and then hopefully offer a response or action to the get those issues fixed for the next meeting. I must point out these sessions also offer up the opportunity for the partners to provide positive feedback to the vendors, especially about account management or other heroes within the business, it is not just a bloodletting session for the partner to walk away feeling a sense of release. The other format is ‘Open Season’ whereby the facilitator has both the partners and the vendor in the room with an outline of possible discussion items. The advantage of this format is that the partners can get an instant face to face answers to their points as opposed to the previous format whereby they have to wait until the second half of the session to get answers and explanations from the vendor.

Currently I facilitate partner roundtables for Avaya in the UK for Platinum & Medal Partners in London, Manchester & Edinburgh. The sessions have ranged from audiences of 40 to 10 Avayians and Partners depending on the time or location. Already both Avaya and the partners have seen improvements from these sessions.