I was on my way to lunch, sitting on New York City’s midtown 6 train. An oddly-dressed woman with a funny hat and a large backpack motioned for me to take my headphones off. Oh great, another one from the loony bin– pretend you don’t see her. She gave me a face that said, “you’re […]
When we first started Cardwell Beach, I had never worked at an agency before, nor was I even close to a great salesperson. Mike Beach always said a few things right from the very start, none of which I fully comprehended at the time. We were recently in the car on the way back from […]
At this point, if you’ve been on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram in the past two weeks you’ve likely seen a friend or family member take the ice bucket challenge to support ALS (Lou Gehrig’s Disease). Viral marketing is still much more art than science, but some common threads run through most successful viral campaigns, whether […]
“The worst sin in sales is not to lose a deal, but to lose a deal slowly.” – John Barrows. There is a lot of wisdom in these words, both from a sales and marketing perspective. It is obvious in sales that time is literally money, and more time spent chasing bad deals means less time for […]
Download our customizable org chart template here. Building a marketing organization from the ground up is no small feat. What capabilities do you need on the team? Where is the dividing line between roles? Should your team be top-heavy or bottom-heavy? The answers to these questions depend on the type and size of business, […]
Despite the fact that almost every business relies, at least in part, on the global supply chain and 24/7 access to their partners, some businesses are still hesitant to work remotely with marketing agencies. The reasons for the misgivings vary. Some businesses point to “time-zone concerns” while others mention “comfort level.” Regardless of the specific […]
Providing great customer service doesn’t set you apart from the competition; it’s cost of entry. People now expect ease of use with every product, application, and service. If customer service is an area in which you’re lagging, improving it doesn’t necessarily require structural changes to your business. Small changes to your process or procedures can […]
Prospective clients probably trust that you have solved a few problems — maybe even a few within their industry. They’ve seen your relevant case studies accompanied by a few well-known company logos and testimonials from clients that are happy to vouch for your abilities. But prospective clients want more: they want to know that you […]
No marketer has ever met a technological innovation he couldn’t ruin. Perhaps the best example is the QR code. Used for years in auto manufacturing in Japan, QR codes exploded with the rise of smartphones. Intelligent marketers saw an opportunity to drive people toward unique and focused online experiences; not-so-intelligent marketers saw an opportunity to […]
When coming up with ideas for a new web or mobile technology, it’s important to ask, “Why hasn’t someone else built a successful business out of this already?” With 7 billion people and counting, it is highly unlikely that no one had the vision or imagination to conceive the same idea. There are really only […]
70% of CEOs are dissatisfied with how marketing and sales are working together. Speculating about the cause is fun, but trying to fix it is a better use of our time and the focus of this post. The notable differences between what’s expected from a B2B sales and a B2B marketing department are pretty straightforward. Sales […]
Here are 4 simple, powerful guidelines to spark disruptive ideas for your tech-service hybrid: increase speed, reduce price, increase access, and dumb it down. It’s easy to forget Disruptive Innovation isn’t just a buzzword, it’s a practice rooted in science. Harvard Business professor Dr. Clayton Christensen spent 15 years uncovering the patterns that led to […]
Why isn’t more sales enablement happening? I see groups on LinkedIn with 10,000+ members devoted to talking about it. Every client, technology vendor and consultant agrees that sales enablement is a great idea. Over 1800 people attended Forrester’s Sales Enablement Forum and sat through Scott Santucci’s “State of the Union” style address on sales enablement. But literally not […]
This is not an April Fools’ joke: B2B marketing executed entirely in-house almost always goes wrong. Even if your in-house marketing team already has the proper mix of marketing specialists (artists) vs marketing generalists (managers), it’s still risky to execute marketing initiatives solely in-house. Here’s why: Your clients don’t pay you to get emotional An agency’s clients explicitly […]
It’s taken a long time, but B2B is finally ready to embrace digital. No longer do clients accept B2B brands “walking in with their shirts untucked”— a sloppy disarray of Power Points made by individual sales reps, a website that spouts company features, and an array of brochures designed by various moonlighting college students. The […]
When I was in the technology world, there was a strong emphasis on product; it was the heart and soul of everything we did. Now that I have a macro perspective on tech startups trying to sell to the CMO, VP of Marketing or agency partners, I realize the emphasis on product is confusing. Tech […]
A perplexing attitude drives a subset of B2B business leaders who compete to see who can spend the least on marketing. The idea is they will pour 110% of their efforts into selling, and ignore marketing completely. One-dimensional optimization never works. Let me explain. I took my now-fiancee to an amusement park several years ago. […]
Most CRM systems are structured from the seller’s perspective. They include milestones like “first meeting” or “proposal delivered.” While those are useful metrics for management to forecast pipeline revenue, they’re not particularly useful metrics for your sales reps, or more importantly for your customers. Here’s an example of where critical information slips through the cracks: […]
Why Didn’t B2B Start Marketing Sooner? I doubt I need to make much of a case for the fact that most B2B marketing is less than stellar. You probably work at a company. When was the last time someone tried to sell you something and you said, “Wow, their marketing was incredible!” I’ll guess basically […]
There are multiple stakeholders who need to get value from your CRM system. First, management needs visibility into the sales pipeline. Next, sales teams need to know how close their buyer is to making a purchase, and what they can do to get prospects to the finish line. Third, marketing needs a way to understand […]
Talk with our experts and find out how much we can achieve working together.
