What is holding back the B2B market from adopting MAPs?

A recent article in DemandGen report suggests that Marketing Automation Platform (MAP) vendors may suffer a dip in their revenues from a market valued at $325m in a recent analyst report in 2011 because the 50% growth this represents over 2010 has again been driven by the high-tech industry. As Raab states: "The market itself has to expand rapidly if those vendors are to grow quickly.”


What, we should ask, does this say about other B2B industries? Does this just reflect the willingness of the technology industry to quickly embrace new technology in general? Or have other B2B industries yet to be convinced of the merits of marketing technology? Maybe they are confused by the speed with which things have been moving - is automation about email and landing pages, SEO management, social networking, measurement or gibing Marketing something to plug into Salesforce.com? Or all of the above? Raab's report should help with dispelling some of the claims and identifying where some of the major platforms perform best.


I got my hands dirty with marketing automation, with a US software company as long as 5 years ago when they implemented Eloqua. That's a long time for other industries to stand on the sidelines. One reason more risk-averse industries may not yet have implemented the type of change programme needed to implement marketing automation must be that they are unconvinced by the ROI data. If automation was an 'open-and-shut-case' then surely everyone would be doing it!


Have the vendors oversold the benefits of their solution and under-played the cost, training and process changes required to get results? It can be a little difficult to know, since often there is no benchmark data available with which to compare improvements. In my experience, buying a system is often the beginning of Marketing to study its navel, not the end. Maybe MAP implementation will follow the CRM model where stories of failures are legion.


I'd be interested in hearing your opinions and examples of successful adoption of marketing automation outside high-tech industries.

B2B Marketing Automation Continues its Inexorable Rise

Yesterday, DemandGen reported that Marketo has signed up 700 customers in two years, grew 315% in 2010 and has now set its focus on enterprise customers, as well as its traditional SME base, with its first $1m win. This would seem to put it on a collision course with Eloqua, who has increasingly been focused on the small-to-medium size companies as it has ramped up its European operations.

This announcement follows closely on the heels of last week’s story that Eloqua is preparing for IPO, having ‘held briefings with various financial analysts and public investors about the future of the business’ and hopes to secure a $400m - $500m evaluation.

Both of these stories confirm analysts’ expectations – and my Blog predictions for this year – that marketing automation amongst B2B companies has come of age and is going to experience significant growth and consolidation, as evidenced by acquisition of Unica and Aprimo last year.

Inbound Enters the Fray

Meanwhile, in support of some contentions made in my last couple of Blogs on ‘funnel management’, Hubspot , with its “Get Found, Convert, Analyze” mantra is getting greater recognition and bringing metrics to SEO and social networking activities that tie them into the Eloqua/ Salesforce worlds, which are still primarily about outbound nurturing and engagement. This is where the future lies I believe.

Last year, I was using Hubspot for web tracking and enhancement, social networking tracking and optimising keywords. However, I was still using Blogware from Compendium for enterprise blogging, because of its expertise in publishing effectively to Search sites, Linked-In etc; and Vocus for press distribution, social networking; with Eloqua and Salesforce at the back-end. ‘Overkill’ do I hear you cry?

This ‘best-of-breed’ approach acknowledges the need for good publishing platforms for different channels (web, social media, email offers etc) combined with a ‘quantify it’ approach to managing each stage of the buying cycle, through tracking and reporting. I see the current platforms (and don’t even get me started on the free tools available for Twitter publishing/ tracking etc.) continuing to embrace a broader set of channels for tracking purposes - but we are still some way off a single solution for publishing, tracking, analysing and reporting on all digital and off-line channels throughout the whole buying cycle. Maybe we will never get there.

I’d really like to hear who you are using for what, so let me know who your favourites are and why.

Next time, I’ll look at the content challenge that this poses for all of us as marketers become publishers, as well as analysts and accountants.

Focus on Marketing Metrics: should we be doing more?

I was inspired by a great Blog from Mashable to look at some of the current thinking on Marketing measurement. Prashant Suryakumar, who wrote this article makes the point that:

'There are no “best practices” for measuring a successful social media campaign. Crowd behavior is dynamic and context-specific, and it is difficult, if not impossible, to build a “one size fits all” solution.'

He goes on to make the point that there is a lot of data points that can be captured in social media, but not all of them are relevant and that metrics need to be divided into those that identify influencers in your community, those that help businesses understand engagement and the conversations that are being had (reputation) and finally those that show how social media is impacting the business holistically. As he says: 'Measuring the impact of increased chatter for your brand might not always translate to more revenue for the business. Measuring cause and effect between buzz, branding and sales might show different dynamics for different product groups.' For me, this is the crux of the issue - how does social media activity impact the bottom line? Understanding this better will be the challenge for 2011. For an indication that certain social networking tools, specifically Blogs, can drive identifiable inbound leads, check out this Blog from Tiecas, which quotes Hubspot data - and which chimes with my own experience.

Funnel Management and ROI

However, while social networking measurement may be the subject de jour we should not forget that measuring any returns from Marketing is still a minority sport. According to a report quoted on DemandGen that I tweeted a couple of weeks ago (@j_ceri), the Sales Lead Management Association (SLMA) 'found that 64.9% of BtoB marketers cannot track ROI, while 58% do not qualify inquiries prior to lead distribution.

When respondents were asked if they track marketing ROI, only 14.6% said they do it within the SFA/CRM system.'

Marketing still has a long way to go to transition to a more accountable function that can demonstrate its impact on the business in financial terms. The focus on marketing metrics, process, data and analytics has to increase in 2011 - if only to enable a successful introduction of marketing automation (for more details on the current state of play check out this report).

There is now no end of content from vendors on why marketing measurement makes sense, how to do it, how to automate it and so on. Technology marketers should check out the content from Bulldog, Hubspot and Eloqua in particular.

Let's get in the driving seat of identifying the revenue we drive in 2011 before the CFO forces change on us. You may be surprised at the good news contained in the data and how it can be used to defend against Sales' claims of 'not enough leads'!

Thoughts on 2010 for B2B Technology Marketing

It's that time of year: time to reflect on what became of 2010 and look forward (hopefully) to 2011.

For the B2B marketer, particularly in technology markets, 2010 seemed to be significant for three things:

1. the coming of age of the marketing automation platform
2. the rise and rise of social networking
3. the broad usage of terms reflecting a focus on marketing outcomes rather than activity

Marketing Automation

With the acquisition of Unica by IBM, followed by the recently announced acquisition of Aprimo by Teradata, a period of consolidation has started in the marketing automation market, reflecting a growing maturity and use of these tools in day-to-day marketing campaigns. Adding Unica to the analytics and reporting capabilities of Cognos and Coremetrics, IBM is seeking to provide integrated sales and marketing platforms which focus on metrics and data to provide real-time customer intelligence in the pursuit of revenue growth. Eloqua launched Version 10 of its leading platform for B-to-B marketing automation, completely redesigning the interface and workflow usability and opening the door for traditional Marketing campaign managers to catch up with their digital campaign cousins.

Social Networking

2010 may be seen as the year of social media. Twitter has released figures showing that 50 million tweets are sent a day across its network (compared with an average of 5,000 just 3 years ago). Facebook meanwhile boasts half a billion users of which half on average are logged on per day. My search on LinkedIn came up with over 670,000 English-language groups - there is definitely an appetite for sharing information. It remains to be seen how effective these media are in influencing B-to-B sales. Even more difficult will be assigning ROI to social media channels, when they become just one of many customer touchpoints.

Marketing ROI

Marketing performance management (MPM), Marketing operations, Revenue performance management (RPM) - these and many other terms have more frequently entered the marketing lexicon in 2010. The one thing they have in common is a focus on identifying the financial returns from expenditure on marketing. This recognition of the need to justify Marketing's contribution to the enterprise based on it showing a healthy return on investment is an idea that seems to have come of age in 2010. My good friend Jim Lenskold wrote the book on this back in 2003 so it is good to see companies embracing marketing metrics, underpinned by contact databases and automated marketing platforms, to show that each dollar invested can show a $4, $5 - or whatever - return. 'Can' is key here of course because this isn't easy - you have to measure the right things, often over a long period of time and processes and data need to be carefully monitored to ensure that the information needed to support the metrics is gathered consistently. As we know, even getting Sales to complete a few fields in the CRM system is difficult, so full visibility of marketing returns may be impossible. But the journey is beginning and 2010 showed that it is becoming the responsibility of more people, often in senior positions, to take the first steps.

2011: more of the same?

I won't run the risk of making any predictions for 2011. While I believe the 2010 trends, above, will continue and be reflected in the skillsets required of marketing professionals, the fact that technology is playing a greater part in marketing execution also makes it more unpredictable. The mobile channel, location-based marketing and other factors may also leave a more significant mark in the forthcoming year.

Whatever happens, have a good one!

Marketing Leadership in Changing Times

Marketing is experiencing unprecedented change. From Social networking to Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Marketing Performance Management (MPM). How it responds to the challenges of the digital age on the one hand and the calls from the C-Suite for accountability on the other, may be a defining moment in its quest to be regarded seriously as an investment and not just a cost of sale.

Is it time for Marketing to subject itself to the kind of scrutiny that other functional disciplines have faced for decades and begin to recognise its need to show a legitimate ROI?

Marketing ROI Not Just Tactics

If Marketing is the 'voice of the customer' then it must show that it can truly align marketing tactics to the strategic imperatives of turning customer demand into profit. In high-tech, marketing continually competes for attention with R&D - who make the products - and Sales - who sell them. R&D know that they need to 'package' 'price' and 'promote' their products (marketing tactics). Sales like trade shows, sales aids and the web site - the 'shop windows' of their trade.

But these are just the costs of 'doing business' - no one is really clear, in my experience, what the true ROI of Marketing is: how to measure it; how much to spend; whether PPC is 'better' than Twitter etc. The smoke-and-mirrors of marketing will remain that way unless Marketing itself shines some light (excuse the mixed metaphors) on what we do.

Marketing Metrics Drive Accountability

When the annual budget round comes along, Marketing needs to have a case to present to the CFO that demonstrates why the budget should not be cut; or, indeed, why it should be increased, for example, from 6% to 8% of revenue.

Metrics need to be established for demand generation tht are tracked through to sales revenue using marketing automation/CRM systems such as Eloqua and Salesforce,com. Metrics for intangibles, such as brand awareness and brand value are harder to establish, but again need to be agreed and reported against. These metrics should be part of the CMO's dashboard.

Is Marketing ready to stand up and be counted? The digital age presents the opportunity - we need to seize it.

Integrating Marketing with Salesforce to Track Results

Long time, no post...!

Apologies to all (two?) of you who have been hanging on my every word and are therefore disappointed that it's taken me 6 weeks to post another update. Life gets in the way.

Talking of which, I have just completed a new configuration of Salesforce with my ever-reliable support team at CRM Technologies and it has brought back to me the many times I have helped Sales to define their processes, created screens and fields to support them and then wrestled with data flows and marketing processes to ensure the front-end of the pipe and the back-end were in synch.

'But doesn't Salesforce take care of all of this?', I hear you cry. In a word, 'no'. Where CRM/SFA etc implementations have failed, it is because insufficient time has been spent on thinking through the basics:

• What is our sales process?
• How do we measure its effectiveness?
• What pieces of objective data do we need to collect to determine how healthy our pipeline is?
• How will we use this data for forecasting purposes?
• Where will it come from and how will it be maintained?
• What is a 'lead' and at what point does it become an 'opportunity'?

Luckily we implemented Eloqua and tied it into Salesforce back in July, so this was merely a change in the sales process prompted by new management and an acceptance (probably) that this time, perhaps we should actually use the system consistently after we've set it up as planned. As a result, it was a relatively short process, but even so it has had a big impact on Marketing - our lead scoring model, the Web form questions and how they are served, as well as the metrics delivered via the Salesforce dashboards. Why? Well, because a change in Sales process goes to the heart of things for Marketing: including what kind of leads we are delivering; how long and for what reason we nurture leads; what success looks like (what we are measuring).

If ROI, accountability and impact - ie. measurable results - are the watchwords of B-to-B techmarketing in this digital age (comments please!) then processes, systems, data and metrics have to replace the 'spray-and-pray' approach in marketing communications planning.

In other words, joined up thinking about Sales and Marketing drives joined up processes and systems. If Sales in your company are those slightly scary guys whose meetings you have to attend once a month to describe the marvellous campaigns you're going to run, only to find that all they want is 'more leads' then it's time to understand their world a little better!