B2B marketing

The feedback on Consumer Marketing 2019 is rolling in: Attendees loved our focus on the direct-to-consumer (DTC) challenger brand trend, why consumers are responding so positively, and how traditional brands can learn from these up-and-comers. In fact, the audience was so engaged with the content and speakers that questions kept coming in long after the […]

On Monday, Publicis Groupe officially announced its plans to acquire marketing services agency and loyalty provider Epsilon-Conversant from Alliance Data Systems for US$4.4 billion. We predicted this acquisition months ago, since IPG’s purchase of Acxiom and Dentsu Aegis Network’s (DAN) purchase of Merkle left Publicis as the only holding company without a significant data management […]

In 2003, Fred Reichheld, who was by then a partner at Bain & Company, introduced a way of measuring how well an organization treats its customers. This metric also assessed how well a firm generates relationships worthy of loyalty. Sixteen years later, most businesspeople recognize this metric as the Net Promoter Score (NPS). Mr. Reichheld […]

At Adobe’s marketing conference, the company focused on content and experiences as the key differentiators for brands. Watch my video summary of the event that explores these key themes. Questions or comments? Find me on Twitter. Forrester clients: Set up an inquiry.

When was the last time you answered a phone call from a phone number you didn’t recognize or opened an email from an unfamiliar sender? Like, never? Same here. The sad truth about most modern marketing tactics is that they’re too cheap and too easy. When anyone can do it, everyone will — which also […]

Here at Forrester, we love all things music. Each office floor has a different musical theme, and all the rooms are named after popular musicians of the time. It’s not uncommon to have a team meeting in Guns N’ Roses or an afternoon phone call in Jackson Browne. So it seems natural to think of […]

I’m bringing this topic to the top of your inbox, so to speak, but not (just) because I’m self-promotional. Lack of alignment really does continue to plague B2B sales and marketing organizations. Last year, I began to explore this challenge with analytical methods front and center. My hypothesis: B2B marketers and sales can use a […]

Ah yes, anyone suffering from a chocolate hangover? Or an excess of corny romanticism? Let’s face it, we all love “love” — but with Valentine’s Day a week behind us, the last thing you probably want right now is more advice on relationships. Before you toss aside some of that abundant advice about personal relationships, […]

B2B marketing data provider DiscoverOrg announced on February 4 that the company is buying ZoomInfo. Our snap analysis is this is a smart move that shakes up the market and bolsters DiscoverOrg’s position in it. ZoomInfo has successfully leveraged its traditional strength as contact data specialist to build out a comprehensive data-as-a-service platform that now […]

Only 16% of CMOs are responsible for leading the execution of their firm’s digital transformation. Now is the time to rethink your role. Too few CMOs actively lead or are deeply involved in digital transformation. CIOs, COOs, CXOs, and CDOs have filled the gap but don’t represent the voice of the customer or bring the […]

A long time ago, Peter Drucker, a man whom Businessweek once called “the father of business management,” wrote: This was written a long time ago — a few years before I embarked on my long career as a B2B marketer. I can attest that for most of that long career, I didn’t feel like the […]

When account-based marketing (ABM) burst onto the scene in 2015, it was positioned by a number of vendors as the death of traditional marketing. And while that controversial approach might have been great for creating buzz and drawing attention, it created significant confusion for the mainstream B2B marketer. It’s taken a couple of years to […]

In 2013, Doug Kessler and the crew at Velocity Partners published “Crap: the single biggest threat to B2B content marketing” — a work of thought leadership genius that I still tell marketers to read today. In just 50 PowerPoint slides, Velocity Partners explains why the current deluge of marketing “content” won’t serve buyers and what you […]

Like most people, I consider November a good time to start thinking about the clean slate that a new year brings. There is lots of room to reflect on one year and get ready for the next one with a bit more, well, “resolve,” so to speak. I’ll be an all-around better person, for sure — […]

Many attendees of our B2B Marketing 2018 Forum remarked how the energy was high and the focus was driven — the marketing and sales leaders who joined us in Austin were on a mission to overdeliver on business expectations for their practice and figure out how to manage the conflicting priorities that 31% of respondents to […]

Customer experience (CX) was at the forefront of CMOs’ minds in 2018. They shifted ad budgets (under siege thanks to trust and transparency issues) to even more technology and CX initiatives. Good news: The focus is creating more emotionally resonant and useful brand experiences such as Disney’s MagicBand. Bad news: The competitive advantage these experiences […]

Maturing Into A Horizontal Channel Management Platform Aligned With CRM and Marketing Automation Channel and alliance leaders are known to be good jugglers. With the average partner program containing over 90 distinct components, encouraging channel growth while mediating conflict is a complex undertaking. Partner relationship management (PRM) connects the dots between partner planning, recruitment, onboarding, […]

Forrester’s customer experience Forums are in their 10th year — from our first one in 2009 in New York, they’ve grown and spread to San Francisco, London, Singapore, and other cities around the world and have become yearly destinations for CX pros far and wide. CX Europe 2018 is just 12 days from now — Tuesday and Wednesday, […]

Personas and journey maps have become key tools for the modern marketer. As my colleague Lori Wizdo expertly explains: It is the job of marketing to guide the buyer through the buying journey. Becoming a journey marketer is essential in this digital age. (Lori can help you get there — check out her workshop at our upcoming […]