Originally Posted in FierceCMO: http://www.fiercecmo.com/story/top-5-b2b-marketing-predictions-2015/2014-12-16
Written by: Tequia Burt
It's that time of year again when jingle bells—and 2015 prediction lists—abound. I've looked into my crystal ball and am predicting five B2B marketing trends for next year. One thing that unites all these predictions is the increasingly important role connected consumers have in driving B2B business. So, sit back, relax and enjoy FierceCMO's top five 2015 predictions.
1) Content marketing will become more accountable. We all jumped on the content bandwagon last year, but now we're wondering if all our efforts are really worth it. A Forrester study from earlier this year found that 85 percent of B2B companies are just not seeing the business value of content marketing. The main reason B2B marketers aren't successful in content efforts is that they have no idea how to engage their customer. That same Forrester survey found that B2B content marketing failed to retain customers or win their long-term loyalty because it focused on the company's needs rather than the clients'. B2B marketers have realized this and next year will be all about long-term relationship building rather than short-term deal closing by providing relevant, useful content to clients. This content can serve to highlight how a B2B company's product/service will make their targets' lives easier—or maybe not. Another survey from the Economist Group found that while 75 percent of business executives said they use content to "research a business idea," 93 percent of B2B marketers develop (unsuccessful) content that's directly connected to selling a product or service and 75 percent said product/service mentions are a frequent part of their content strategy. B2B marketers will began to get that it's not all about them at some point next year.
2) Mobile-first strategies will (finally) take hold. I know, I know. This is a prediction you've seen before, but B2B marketers have yet to crack the mobile nut. A survey from Marin Software released just yesterday found that less than a third of digital marketers said creating unified customer experiences across devices is a priority. This is a case, however, where customers are going to have to force the issue. In the U.S., 171.5 million people (71 percent) own smartphones; the number climbs even higher (85 percent) when it comes to millennials. At this point, having an effective mobile strategy is no longer a luxury since everyone's customers live on their smartphones. The problem in B2B is that marketers still treat mobile as an afterthought; 2015 is going to be the year that B2B marketers will began to bake mobile in from the get-go.
3) Customer service will increasingly be under the purview of marketing. This was the year when some colossal customer service failures popped up on everyone's radar. Who doesn't know about tech journalist Ryan Block's customer service call from hell with Comcast? Poor customer service can reflect negatively on your brand (just ask Comcast) and create mistrust between you and your customer. One good lesson from a recent Message Systems survey is for the marketing department to make sure it does not overlook customer service. The report found that 32 percent of customers connect with a brand for nonemergency customer service issues. That means those folks manning the phones, help desk and mobile/social customer service channels may be the people who are in contact most with customers. Further, a Salesforce Marketing Cloud survey found 66 percent of B2B and 52 percent of B2C clients stopped buying after a bad customer service interaction, which makes good customer service at B2B companies even more of a priority. B2B marketers will make sure those customers get that good experience next year.
4) CMO/CIO relationship will become tighter. B2B marketers have more technology than ever at their fingertips to help them court their target audience. Ad tech companies are consolidating at a rapid pace and promoting new cloud-based automation platforms. Even new predictive analytics companies are popping up to give marketers the ability to prophesize if—and when—customers will buy. Gartner has forecast that there is so much interest in these marketing tech platforms that digital marketing budgets will increase as investments in ad tech rise—the research firm said 51 percent of companies plan to boost spending on digital marketing by, on average, 17 percent. Of course, all of these ad-tech companies claim to offer solutions that can be used without IT help, but inevitably as marketing tech budgets get bigger, so will the IT department's involvement. There might even be some attrition from IT as tech pros move over to the marketing department in 2015.
5) Sales enablement will be key. Poor sales guys and gals. 2014 was the year they realized that their tried-and-true tactics were no longer working on prospects and customers. Today's empowered, connected B2B buyer does most of her research online and won't contact the sales team until the end of the process—or at all. According to a study from Demand Gen Report, 41 percent of B2B buyers wait until the last minute to contact sales. Some even eschew your sales team altogether and purchase through a third-party vendor. So what does that mean for marketing? It means giving sales stale leads is no longer enough. With all of that high-powered tech at their disposal, marketers can now help sales better understand their target and provide personalized, actionable intel. Nobody knows the voice of the customer like marketers and next year they need to deliver that info to sales to help pre-, during and post-meetings.
