Search Engine Marketing / Pay-Per-Click

B2B Tactics from SES 2007 New York
A summary write-up from the B2B Tactics panel at Search Engine Strategies 2007 New York.

Modern B2B Marketing

Old Marketing, New Marketing, Real Marketing
If "old" marketing is about advertising, and "new" marketing is about consumers, Mike Smock writes that "real" marketing should be about effectiveness.

B2Blogging for five years!
Dave J., the original B2B Marketing blogger, celebrates five years of blogging about how the internet and other changes impact B2B marketing. If you don't read Dave's blog, you should.

The Brand Formula
I generally try to avoid linking to A-listers like Seth Godin since I assume you read those sites as well. But sometimes they say something really good and I can't help myself. For example: "What is a brand? I think it's the product of two things: [Prediction of what to expect] times [emotional power of that expectation]".

Thought Leadership Offers (Not Just for Conversions Anymore)
Making thought-leadership material available confers benefits above & beyond lead conversion, including industry awareness and inbound links, writes Bill Gadless.

Why Free Isn't Good Enough
Jill Konrath writes that B2B buyers know there's no such thing as a free lunch. Everything that's free still requires an investment of time, and a decision (which also takes time). That's why free isn't selling these days. Either something is worth doing or it's not.

The 7 Secrets of a Good Marketing Budget
Some creative tips on aligning your spending with modern marketing trends, from Alain Thys of the Marketing Strategy & Innovation Blog.

Video: The B2B Marketing Challenge
In this video, Peter Spande of TechRepublic explains why marketing to business professionals is a challenge and offers a solution to simplify the process: a marketing funnel.

Video: Fine Tune Your Messaging
The follow-up video to "The B2B Marketing Challenge" in which Peter drills down on the 'marketing funnel' and explains how to map your marketing messaging to it.

Marketers Shave Heads, Salespeople Stay Sharp
Mike Hancock from ViaMetric writes that "Sales is the arrow, marketing is the bow… The two disciplines are supposed to work together. Just like a bow and arrow".

Set it and Forget it Marketing
Ardath Albee of the Marketing Interactions blog writes that Marketing Automation is valuable, but you can't let automation take the personal touch out of building relationships. "Set it and forget it" campaigns play a role, but if you rely too much on it you may lose out on personal interactions.

Never Give Another Lead to Sales
Another post from Ardath: Sales doesn't need leads, they need opportunities. It's no longer enough for marketing to dump leads into the top of the funnel and turn to the next campaign. Marketing needs to move further into the sales pipeline and focus on converting leads into prospects with a higher level of sales readiness.

Sponsored by: B2B Marketing Software from Marketo, now in beta.