Read the full article published at Wall Street Journal:  CEOs Get Ready to Spend Again by DANA MATTIOLI

Latest findings in neuroscience suggest that our brain starts to feel something even before we have the chance to formulate a thought. And often that gut feeling is based on the emotional tag of the memory. If we had a positive experience in a particular situation, we tag it as a positive emotional experience and tend to base our future decisions on that.

For executives, the implications are clear – if gut instincts will by default play a role, then it is best to learn, how to make sure that these instincts are helping to make the right decisions. In order to make calculated and appropriate decisions we have to follow the process of vetting the instinct against the 4 test outlined in the article published by McKinsey Quarterly “How to test your decision-making instincts” by Andrew Campbell and Jo Whitehead .

Claire Huang from Bank Of America discusses this in a Forbes article “CMOs: Market With Heart And Mind“.

By all official indications, the Great Recession has very likely ended. But as marketers, we know better than to interpret this to mean we can pick up right where we left off prior to the steep economic slide. Many consumers have readjusted their budgets and some continue to cope with concerns about the security of their jobs. Even those who have not been directly touched are still anxious about the future. Things that once mattered to our customers no longer seem so important to them. That’s why we have to reconnect with them in a way that reflects their new reality.

That fact is made very plain in the results of a recent Edelman Trust Barometer survey. Consumer’s trust in business, which hit an all-time low in 2009, is up 18% in 2010. But it’s a more fragile trust than before. When asked to rate the factors most important to the overall reputation of a company, some 80% select “has transparent and honest business practices,” and “is a company I can trust,” moving those factors slightly ahead of “offers high-quality products or services.”

Continue reading at “CMOs: Market With Heart And Mind“.

Here is an excellent article from Firas Raouf, OpenView Venture Partners.  In his article Demand Generation Process – Science not Art he classifies the process in overlapping layers as such:

“A robust demand generation process must have the following basic foundations:

• Segmentation – start the design of your process by defining the one or two segments that you’re focused on. Segments can be customer profile based, industry based, geography based or use-case based. Pick one segment to target at a time.  And dive DEEP into it.
• Persona Development – create highly specific personas within each of your targeted segments.  A minimum set of personas would be the Influencer, Buyer, User, and Decision Maker.  For each persona, develop a detailed profile, including a made up name, picture, and a detailed assessment of that persona’s work day/week and pain points.
• Message to the Persona – create targeted messaging to each persona, by segment. Targeted messaging goes directly after the persona’s pain points.
• Segment your lead database – make sure that your lead database is constantly being refreshed to reflect the persona and segment of each contact. This ensures that all your touches to each contact are highly targeted around the persona pain points and messaging.
• Multi-touch campaigns – create multi-touch workflow of campaigns to the lead database and leverage different messaging as a lead engages with previous campaigns.
• Score your leads – start with a simple scoring system then use regression analytics to create more complex scoring. The simplest score profile can be created by asking the sales team: “what is the profile of a lead that would get you excited about calling it.”  The key to any lead scoring system: Sales MUST understand it, agree to it and buy in on it.
• Qualify, qualify, qualify – don’t send leads to Sales until they have been properly scored and qualified. Depending on your volume of leads, sales cycle time and deal size, consider implementing a tele-based lead qualification process prior to engaging Sales.
• Automate the Process – invest in a marketing automation tool. But only AFTER you have designed and validated your process.  This in turn drives the need to provide significant technical and operational support to the process.
• Leverage expertise: there is an emerging set of service providers that are specializing in demand generation consulting.”

I recently had a discussion with a non-marketing professional who reminded me that many of his colleagues do not understand what integrated marketing is.

For these 2 reasons, I thought this topic worthy of a blog posting. To succeed in a Demand Generation 2.0 world, integrated marketing is an absolute must.

Without looking up (or linking to) any other definition of integrated marketing, let me define integrated marketing based on my own experience.

What is it?

Integrated marketing (also referred to as Integrated Marketing Communications or IMC) occurs when every activity and communication within a marketing organization is a part of, and blended with, a larger plan or superset plan over a specific product, solution, topic, audience, target, message, etc. To understand this, let’s first describe the major segments of a marketing organization. I’ve also included a high level list of their charters (which is not meant to be a complete list):
a) Corporate marketing – branding, messaging, corporate events, analyst relations, public/media relations, website, SEM, collateral, success stories, etc.
b) Product marketing – product requirements, product positioning, product launch, messaging, targeting, product collateral, etc.
c) Demand marketing – lead generation, events, seminars/webinars, trade shows, targeting/segmentation, SEO, social media, analytics, etc.
d) Channel marketing – co-marketing with partners, partner promotion, partner events, partner collateral, lead generation, etc.
e) Field marketing – field support, lead generation, targeting/segmentation, local trade shows/conferences, local events, etc.

As we can see, many marketing activities can overlap. For example, demand generation, channel marketing and field marketing can all execute lead generation. Likewise, adjacent activities can be performed by different parts of marketing. For example, SEM can be handled by Corporate Marketing while it’s ‘brother’ activity, SEO, can be handled by Demand Marketing.

This is why integrated marketing is important. If an organization does not integrate their activities across the whole of marketing, we see multiple messages, gaps in messaging and targeting, duplication of efforts and most importantly – a substantial increase in marketing’s failure rate.

Why Integrated Marketing

As a first step, let me provide an example of what integrated marketing is not. I once worked with a client who focused their demand generation budget on 3 product lines, which we will call Product A, Product B and Product C. All marketing activities for Product A and Product B were integrated – perhaps more by accident than by design – so that the message to media, customers, marketplace and analysts was consistent (e.g., ONE message) and the branding, website content, positioning, targeting, lead generation, partner management and field marketing were all aligned.

Product C was a different story. Product C was developed by Engineering who thought it was a good product but unfortunately, it did not fit in with the company’s message or target audience. It solved a completely different business problem for a completely different audience. In spite of this, Sales viewed Product C as a tactical revenue opportunity, dedicated 3 full time sales representatives and required Demand Marketing to run lead generation activities. Corporate Marketing was not supporting any activity over this product line other than requiring the Product Marketing Manager to independently develop web page content, presentations and collateral without any oversight to ensure brand or messaging consistency.

The results? The team barely generated leads and the cost per lead was way out of line in and of itself and compared with the other product lines – over $9,000 per sales lead – 300-400% higher than the cost of a sales lead for Product A or B.

There are books written about how to integrate marketing but let me just add a few sentences as to what integration looks like.

An integrated marketing approach includes a Go-to-Market (GTM) plan that incorporates and aligns all marketing activities and assigns tasks and timelines across the ‘whole of marketing’ in an organized, self-supporting way. It identifies the 3-5 key marketing themes for Product C and articulates the key message(s). It includes a plan to approach the analyst’s and media as an initial step. It also includes a plan to (a) align the website and collateral with the themes, (b) publish press releases and articles and (c) create a “buzz’ in the marketplace. It identifies one or more ‘compelling events’ (e.g., product launch, major conference/show, webinar series, industry event, etc.) which demand marketing can use as a centerpiece activity for lead generation campaigns (not isolated lead generation activities).

Marketing integration is fun because a relentless focus on it will generate results. If you agree (or if you don’t agree), I welcome your comments.

Other relevant links:

What is Integrated Marketing?
The Adoption of Integrated Marketing is Essential….
Behold! A New Marketing Concept

Here are 7 tips to help you be successful interacting with customers in a successful Demand Generation 2.0 environment. These tips are designed with a DG 2.0 philosophy in mind – that is, these tips take an ‘outside-in’ view of what Marketing should do. To keep our focus personal, let’s call our prospect/customer “John”.

What Does John Want From You?

(1) John wants to easily find (discover) you when HE needs you. Hence the importance of good brand recognition, a good SEO/SEM strategy, a good website, good media relations, etc.

(2) John wants to be educated about who you are and what you can do to solve his business problems at HIS pace. Hence the need for collateral and nurturing demand generation activities, webinars, seminars, trade shows, conference participation, press releases, articles, a good web site, on-going analyst relations, etc.

(3) John wants you to listen to him and know him. Hence the need for social communities, blogs, Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, etc.,

(4) John wants to be valued, respected and treated like an individual. Hence the need for enticing John’s collaboration and thought leadership ideas through social communities, blogs, Twitter, Facebook, survey participation, user/focus groups, etc. Also important is the need for segmentation and personalization.

(5) John wants access to you when HE needs it. Hence the important of a world-class call center, good customer support, customer-focused sales representatives and a good customer experience program.

(6) John wants to be happy and have a positive experience and the kind of relationship that HE wants to have. Hence the need to establish a customer reference program, customer service surveys, developer’s sites, social communities, user groups, etc.

(7) John wants to be successful. Hence the need for good product, good customer
support, demonstrated ROI and a good customer experience.

It is my opinion that if you keep these 7 tips in mind as you develop your marketing charter and plans going forward, you will keep your eye on the ball.

1. Collaboration inside the organization > This is the use case that has the largest footprint – and is currently the most prevalent use of social media in the enterprise.  The widespread deployment of this solution is likely because intranets and knowledge management systems were key IT initiatives over the past 10 years as companies started to drive internal organizational efficiencies, and as a result, expanding these wins further by employing social media technologies was certainly the least expensive and lowest risk approach for organizations starting to make forays into enterprise social media realm.  While it is the low-hanging fruit, and certainly offers indisputable advantages to the enterprise, this is also the use case that is most difficult to measure in terms of value, ROI, or tracking results.
2. Brand management, development and tracking > A quick aside – “Brand” is a highly misunderstood term even by marketers.  It is not a company’s logo, signage, taglines etc.  Nor is it what the enterprise wants to project about itself.  The brand of an enterprise is what people (customers, employees, media, etc.) believe about the company – and the values, image and attributes that they, as a collective, confer upon the enterprise.  While I can’t get into a more detailed discussion of “brand”, I felt a clarification on brand was critical to this discussion on social media.  Tracking, managing and developing one’s brand is perhaps the most obvious and valuable use cases for social media for the enterprise.  “Listening campaigns” that follow the “chatter” about the company in social networking forums such as Twitter, LinkedIn, Google, Yahoo, etc. are very important in understanding what the real brand perception is.  This in turn enables the enterprise to address issues, and manage, control and steer its brand.  For this reason alone, this area is going to be one of the most popular and critical areas where companies will invest in social media initiatives.
3. Demand Generation 2.0 > Given the economic headwinds, and the overall recessionary climate, deploying a successful demand generation campaign via social media has enormous benefits.  Besides the obvious potential for driving incremental revenue, a demand gen campaign will result in increased net market-share (at the expense of competitors), an automatic positive impact on the corporate brand, and greater traction with core constituencies such as customers, key employees, partners and the media.  Also, the natural outcome of a successful demand gen campaign would be an increased propensity to fund and extend the enterprise social media initiative to other solution areas that may be less easy to measure.  Companies such as Zappos.com, Dell, and Amazon, to name just a few, are shining examples of how to social media-based demand gen can be a phenomenally profitable initiative.  This particular solution area is the new frontier in enterprise social media – but I expect this area will get a lot of interest and focus as businesses grapple with economic challenges, and seek more innovative ways to counter that downturn.
4. Projecting thought leadership and domain expertise>  Closely related to the earlier discussion on brand development, the use of We 2.0 tools such as blogging, micro-blogging (Twitter, Yammer etc.) and rich-media and wikis (audio and video podcasting, interactive web sessions, etc), moderated community forums etc. enables the enterprise to educate its audiences in the areas of its expertise.  This ultimately serves to establish the organization as a domain- and subject-matter expert, and thought-leader in the market, resulting in downstream benefits such as driving demand.
5. Improved Service Level >  A more tactical use of Web 2.0 technologies is their use in offering a more timely, richer and more complete service level to customers, partners, suppliers, vendors, employees, etc.  Examples of such initiatives include sophisticated sales agents, automated technical support, employee self-service etc.

While the use cases above are the most widespread and popular deployments of social media in the enterprise context, there are numerous variations and specialized instances of how they are used by business.  I always find it of great value to start with the basic understanding that social media is ultimately nothing more than a highly sophisticated and effective manner for people to exchange ideas, information and content – and given that foundation, one can conceive of addressing and improving almost any challenge that involves interaction among people.

For one to truly understand and harness the potential of Enterprise 2.0, it is key to understand the underlying paradigm of Web 2.0.  Web 2.0 is simply the natural next step in the evolution of the web.  But I would like to think of this evolution as almost a big leap forward (almost a mutation!).  Whereas Web 1.0 was essentially a universally-accessible static-content publishing platform, and the next step forward (think of it as a Web 1.1 to 1.3) was adding core transactional capabilities (such as shopping carts, payments processing, etc., – primarily driven by the growth of e-commerce), Web 2.0 is a major leap forward.  Web 2.0 enables individuals to become contributors – thereby allowing for the web to tap into the expertise, knowledge, tastes, opinions, and talents of a large community – while preserving individual identity and role.  Web 2.0 is about enabling the “aggregate-individual”.

How does the Aggregate-Individual impact an enterprise?  Here is a very simple way to look at this – from a business enterprise’s standpoint, every customer, partner, analyst, executive and employee is an individual – and beyond their narrow interactions with that enterprise, they are interacting and contributing to the pool of knowledge (POK) on a continual basis.  This means that each individual that touches the enterprise in any capacity impacts the POK associated with that enterprise.  This is the social marketplace.

Above all else, this social marketplace has the greatest impact on one of the most critical assets of an enterprise – its brand.  For many, the concept of brand has a narrow definition – associated with the visual aspects of the company’s identity, and the message that the company is pushing out to the market.  In reality, your brand works exactly the opposite – the company’s brand is no more than what the world outside (the market, customers, employees, partners etc.) confers upon you (the enterprise).  It’s all about what others think of your company that forms your brand – regardless of what you’d like that perception to be. The social marketplace and workplace impact the brand of an enterprise immensely.  Participating and controlling (to the extent possible) the dialog on the company’s brand is clearly critical.  Additionally, “listening” to the “chatter” on the company helps address widely-shared concerns and issues with the company’s products and services.  Such a listening campaign can also enable the enterprise strategyby finding areas of opportunity and unmet need.

Implementing effective social marketplace strategies offers many other areas of value.  These include enabling and educating the channel and partner ecosystem, reaching out to new and hard-to-target markets, and enabling the virtual enterprise – the ability of the enterprise to extend its reach and influence well beyond its areas of physical presence.

An equally important facet of the social web revolution is the potential for enterprise efficiencies facing inwards – focused on employees – and commonly referred to as the Social Workplace.  In this context, one of the most path-breaking and previously unrealized benefits of the social media paradigm relates to an harvesting of enterprise knowledge latent within the organization.  Employees have areas of expertise that is largely untapped – studies have determined that most businesses utilize no more than about 10% of the total knowledge available to them internally  – and the ability to tap into this well of internal knowledge, expertise and skills, uncorks a tremendous asset for the company.  Indeed, the sheer monetary value of this asset can alone be extraordinary.   Variations of this concept include areas such as Corporate memory, and internal brand development.

Finally, with the increased focus on corporate message, governance and transparencies, the Social Workplace enables more efficient compliance.  These compliance capabilities fall into two broad categories – “soft compliance” i.e., internal compliance to conform with corporate message, policies and guidelines, and “hard compliance” – compliance with regulatory rules and requirements.

Ultimately, the entire social web paradigm is all about tapping into the participation of the individual – and thereby enabling the aggregate message.  The ideas discussed above are where the most compelling values are being seen for the enterprise – clearly, as these competencies become more mainstream and widespread, we’ll find increased variations and adaptations to these concepts.

No area is more critical to a business enterprise than demand for its products and services in the marketplace and thereby enabling revenue growth.  Indeed, enabling market demand has always been the holy grail of business – but enterprises today are faced with a completely new realm of challenges and possibilities – all brought about as a result of the evolution of these new paradigms.  Continuing to drive sustainable and accelerating demand in this new world requires newer skills and capabilities – and many of the practices from even a few years ago are no longer effective.  This is DEMAND GEN 2.0

Let’s examine these Demand Gen 2.0 challenges and opportunities in more detail.  Three fundamental forces affecting virtually all business are noteworthy – Virtualization, Super-Specialization, and Social Media.

VIRTUALIZATION – Businesses are getting increasingly virtual – geographically, functionally, and organizationally.  Many of today’s organizations are dispersed across multiple locations, indeed, the trend of having more and more critical staff working or located remotely is accelerating.  Companies are realizing that technology enables them to hire top talent without being constrained by their place of residence or location.

Even more intriguing and impactful is the trend to virtualize from a functional standpoint – essentially outsourcing.  Maintenance and staff functions are being increasingly outsourced to vendors – these include marketing, demand generation, legal and tax functions, human resources and benefits management, finance functions, payroll, IT support, maintenance engineering etc.  Companies are realizing that virtualizing these administrative and maintenance functions enables them to dedicate more resources, energy and focus to their core competencies and business.

Of particular interest is that companies find that outsourcing their demand generation enables them to save significantly on costs while at the same time having a far more accountable and productive demand gen engine.  It also enables them to migrate their sales organization to more skilled individuals that are focused on closing deals, as opposed to “wasting” their valuable time on prospecting / building the pipeline.

SUPER-SPECIALIZATION – Broad business specialization is not a new trend at all – it’s been around forever.  However, we are talking about extreme specialization – each industry vertical is not being split into very fine sub-verticals and sub-sub-verticals – and businesses are competing in those highly-niche domains.

The driving force behind this level of super-specialization is once again technology.  Technology has enabled companies to extend their market reach globally – meaning that they have access to far bigger markets.  However this also means a dramatic increase in competitive pressure – and businesses are responding by differentiating themselves based on their expertise in increasingly defined and niche areas.  As we will discuss in the next paragraph, the social media paradigm has become a powerful tool for teams that want to project and market their product, services or domain expertise – and thereby build a strong brand.

Given this growing trend of super-specialization, demand generation gets even more critical and challenging.  The demand generation engine needs to account for brand integrity, critical on-target messaging to the marketplace, and always maintaining the very delicate balance between driving a broad market demand while at the same time ensuring that that market’s needs can be served successfully and profitably.

ENTERPRISE SOCIAL MEDIA – Among all the trends affecting businesses over the last year or two, none is perhaps more powerful than the social media paradigm.  At a fundamental level, what social media enables is very seamless and effective collaboration and idea-exchange between a community of individuals, teams or businesses.  The rapid adoption of social media and networking technologies and applications into the business enterprise has started to have radical impacts on how business is getting done.

Social media offers businesses a new and powerful medium to propagate their business.  Starting from brand development and management, to driving thought leadership and subject matter expertise, collaborating with various different constituencies of the enterprise, and leading into demand generation – enterprise social networking is a extraordinarily powerful tool to drive demand for any enterprise.

These three trends discussed above are subjects of far-more detailed study and discussion.  These three trends combine together to radically alter and create a new landscape for demand generation for businesses – and it is for this very reason that we believe that we need to look at Demand Generation 2.0 – as a generational evolution of this critical enterprise function.