Frontline Perspectives

’Tis the season for gingerbread and marzipan, but here at MarketSense we bake up new creations all year ’round. As our holiday gift to you, we’d like to share our recipe for persuasion, complete with secret ingredients.

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You may not be surprised to hear that we humans hate losing. But do you know just how much we hate it? The answer is: much, much more than we like winning (and we really like winning). Believe it or not, people subconsciously avoid loss so strongly that — even on the most rational decision-making process — that how the fact is framed can have a drastic effect. Simply hearing the statement framed as a loss, rather than a gain, can change how people respond. Read more »

You may have noticed that we’ve been blogging a lot more these days than we have in the past. It’s easy to let internal work fall between the cracks, as I’m sure you can understand, but we knew our blog needed to be a top priority. We wanted to share more thoughts and gain more followers. Since you’re reading this, it must be working! Read more »

…and hire a customer experience manager.

While this may sound like a play on words, it is a serious problem for many B2B companies today. Think about it: as you read this, your customer service team is down the hall answering calls and e-mails about orders, account issues, product problems, pricing questions, etc., right? Most customer service managers can tell me what percentage of their calls fall into each of these categories and how quickly the team can “resolve” these problems. Customer service is designed to react to each person who raises a hand with an issue. Read more »

As global sales continue to rise for most of our clients, the need to translate (and localize) has become increasingly important. It seems like a daunting and expensive venture. As with most marketing efforts, walking before you run will help you make the right decisions and keep information about your company’s solutions from getting lost in translation.

First, what do your international customers look like? It is not uncommon to find that the size of the company, the titles and functional responsibilities of decision maker(s), and the buying cycles are different from your customers in the U.S. You can’t effectively target new business without understanding who’s buying.

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What Leonardo DiCaprio reminded me about my brain.

First, a clarification on the definition of “creativity” as intended in this post. I do not use the term narrowly, to only describe the work of designers and copywriters. I use the term “creativity” broadly here — it’s what every person (or at least every businessperson) must use every day to overcome the most unique challenges. Read more »

Technology is a funny thing. In some ways, computing technology seems like it’s on this constant ramp-up of innovation, but in other ways, it’s just a big pendulum swinging back and forth between established paradigms.

We’ve gone from main frames and dumb terminals to thin clients and web servers to clouds. All of those technology shifts have been driven by the need to find the best and most efficient balance of centralized resources and distributed processing power. Read more »

Marketing experts have been talking about search engine optimization (SEO) for years. The business-to-business industry understands its importance, but a lot of companies are still missing out on the full benefits of this marketing strategy. Read more »

Recently I shared the good news with a client that some of their work won an industry award.   “Great!” he said to all of us assembled.  Then without missing a beat he asked, “Did it get us any leads?”   Now this client was making a tongue-in-cheek comment that was all in good fun, but it has stuck with me for a few days because I think it’s a great reminder how important it is to focus on the things that really matter. 

There are no shortage of distractions–especially in sales and marketing–but nothing should get in the way of delivering a steady stream of prospects to the pipeline.   With few exceptions, any marketing effort that does not in some way contribute to that goal is quite simply missing the mark.   (And yes, this award winner had strong lead generation ROI).  

So I have to thank my client for giving me the perfect quotable litmus test I’m sure I will ask myself and others for years to come… “Great, but does it get us any leads?”

Consider visual thinking to simplify a complicated sell.

Of the many unique challenges in b-to-b advertising, one in particular seems to come up all the time in discussions with my team and clients alike.

How do we satisfy the need to educate as part of the sales cycle while staying compelling, concise and on the path to close? After all, it is a sales cycle.

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