B2B Nation

In this episode of B2B Nation, we talk to Todd Grossman, CEO of Talkwalker Americas, about how brands can effectively track the conversations that matter to them on social media.

This space used to be called social media analytics, then it was called social media listening. Today, it’s often described as “conversational intelligence,” and it delivers a detailed analysis of what is being said about a brand across social media platforms.

As Todd explains, Talkwalker’s technology can analyze social media platforms, podcasts, blogs and more. Its reporting goes deeper than vanity metrics like shares and likes. It includes details on who is taking part in online conversations and analyzes the sentiment of the discussion.

We also talk about the future of social media and social audio, the disinformation problem and Todd’s favorite productivity tools.

Episode Guide

3:22: How social media monitoring evolved into conversational intelligence

5:04: Examples of conversational intelligence in action

7:39: The type of reporting that conversational intelligence delivers

9:15: Battling disinformation on social media during the pandemic

11:42: The effects of disinformation and toxicity on social media

13:57: How do social audio and Clubhouse fit in?

15:30: What will be the popular social media conversations one year from now?

16:49: What are Todd’s favorite tools and applications?

In this episode of B2B Nation, we talk to Lindsay Tjepkema, CEO and co-founder of Casted, about using podcasts as part of your content marketing strategy.

If you’re considering launching a podcast for your B2B brand, or if you want to improve the podcast you’re currently creating, Lindsay has some tips for you. Our conversation covers how to create a compelling podcast for your audience, as well as how to make your show an effective part of your content marketing mix.

Episode Guide

1:44: Lindsay’s first “podcast moment”

3:48: What explains the sudden popularity of the podcast format?

6:20: How did podcasts fare when people weren’t commuting?

7:50: What’s the state of the branded podcast world?

11:50: How do podcasts stack up against other content formats?

15:14: Dealing with objections to podcasts as a marketing tactic

20:49: What do B2B listeners want to get from podcasts?

23:00: How do you choose a host for your B2B podcast?

26:25: What is Lindsay’s favorite tool, the one she can’t work without?

In this episode of B2B Nation, we talk with Eli Schwartz, a growth advisor, SEO expert and author of the best-selling book Product-Led SEO, about his approach to search engine optimization and digital marketing.

The concept of product-led SEO is a significant departure from a lot of the books and advice focused on organic marketing. Unlike content-led SEO, which focuses on keyphrases and content creation, product-led SEO begins with the idea of the product and experience your business wants to offer to its customers.

Eli says if there’s one thing he wants marketers to learn from his book, it’s that SEO needs to be treated like any other marketing channel. It should be judged by its return on investment. And if the effort your organization puts into SEO isn’t leading to an increase in sales, then it’s not a tactic worthy of your resources.

Episode Guide

2:19: What is product-led SEO?

7:00: The importance of brand SEO

7:53: SEO is a marketing channel

9:42: SEO funnel awareness and optimization

13:02: Overlooked and overvalued SEO practices

14:54: The lost art of linking

17:05: More on brand SEO

18:41: What is the biggest message of Product-Led SEO?

21:38: Tools for tracking your organic channel

22:53: Thoughts on Google’s Page Experience Update

28:16: How would this conversation sound if we had it one year from now?

32:57: What is Eli’s favorite tool that he can’t work without?

37:30: Why is SEO advice needs to evolve

For many people, a successful career doesn’t always lead to career happiness. There are a number of explanations for this disconnect, including ultra-driven and ambitious personalities, Imposter Syndrome and the feeling that you and your work are unnoticed or under-appreciated.

In this episode of B2B Nation, we talk to Terry McDougall, a former corporate marketer who today runs her own business as an executive and career coach. Terry is also the author of Winning the Game of Work: Career Happiness and Success on Your Own Terms.

Terry’s goal when working with her clients is to teach them to shift their mindsets and learn new skills so they can enjoy more success with less effort.

Episode Guide

2:24: Motivations for moving from corporate marketing to career coaching.

5:40: The impact of our own high expectations.

10:50: How to overcome Imposter Syndrome.

16:13: Balancing career and personal happiness early in your career.

17:52: The three ways to add value in the workplace.

21:07: What is the life that you want? How do you get it?

23:12: The connection between remote work and career satisfaction.

29:47: What does Terry miss most about corporate marketing?

32:14: What is the one tool you cannot work without?

On this episode of B2B Nation, we talk to Tracey Fudge, founder of The Thrive Agency, about the level of noise in B2B marketing and whether all of the information being created and data coming back to marketers is generating significant value.

Tracey has a background in corporate sales, and she came to the realization several years back that almost everything she was taught about sales and marketing no longer applied in today’s environment. Instead of holding sales conversations whenever prospects needed information, people were self-educating using available online resources. As a result, the number of online resources increased dramatically, and continues to grow at an exponential rate. The challenge now is trying to stand out in all of the noise.

Episode Guide

2:00: Why the sales and marketing tactics taught in the past no longer apply.

6:35: What types of content are people engaging with?

8:47: Does a background in sales help improve your marketing?

10:45: What do businesses really mean when they use the term “value”?

14:45: Tips for marketing in the very noisy social media space.

17:26: Have marketers figured out how to make sense of the data their work generates?

21:00: How has the pandemic affected B2B marketers?

23:53: Authenticity in marketing has never been easier.

26:00: What might this conversation sound like one year from now?

27:50: What is one tool you simply cannot work without?

In this episode of B2B Nation we talk to April Dunford, a product positioning expert and author of the book Obviously Awesome. April shares with us the story of finding her niche in product marketing, the methodology she uses to help create positioning as outlined in her book, advice for businesses and marketers looking to create a new category and more.

April didn’t set out to enter the world of product marketing. In fact, she didn’t set out to do marketing at all. But early in her career, she was put in charge of marketing a failing product and had every intention of ending its life. Before she could do that, however, she found six customers who said they loved the product -- they just didn’t use it as it was intended. And so began a career focused on properly positioning products for the market to ensure they succeed.

Episode Guide

2:24: How did product positioning become your niche?

5:31: Common mistakes marketers make with product positioning.

7:43: The danger of falling in love with your idea of what a product is.

10:57: Do you really want to create a new category?

20:29: A new category creation success story

22:30: The signs your product positioning is weak.

24:15: The product positioning methodology outlined in Obviously Awesome.

31:38: How do you get the various teams in your organization on board with your positioning?

In this episode of B2B Nation we talk with Ajit Sivadasan, who leads online sales for Lenovo across B2B and B2C in 35 countries. Ajit’s role allows him to bring a unique perspective on the convergence of B2B and B2C buyers.

As Ajit tells us, the old way of segmenting and identifying customers into B2C and B2B buckets is no longer applicable. In our digital world, an IT executive might buy a personal device on Monday and data center solutions on Wednesday, and marketers and customer experience professionals need to understand these tendencies in order to succeed.

Our conversation also touches on digital transformation at Lenovo, the essential skills marketers will need in the coming decade and more.

Burnout is becoming an increasingly popular topic one year into the global pandemic. More than half of marketers say they have felt the effects of burnout in the past year, according to one survey. And many of the prospects marketers are trying to reach are also suffering from burnout, making them less receptive to marketing messages.

In this episode of B2B Nation, we talk to Rob Bogue, co-author of Extinguish Burnout: A Practical Guide to Prevention and Recovery, about what burnout is and how we can work to overcome it in ourselves and in our teams.

In this episode of B2B Nation, we talk to Georgia Watson, an award-winning sales enablement expert from IBM, and Aimee Dunn, who handles the sales enablement function here at TechnologyAdvice.

Our conversation touches on the essential skills for sales enablement, whether it matters where the sales enablement function resides and the importance of marketing and sales enablement alignment.

Sales enablement roles can vary significantly from one organization to another. The role can sit on different teams, such as marketing or sales, or it can stand on its own. Sales enablement pros can come from varied backgrounds, such as learning and development, sales or marketing.

The core responsibility of sales enablement, however, is often the same: to ensure B2B sales teams understand the often complex products they sell, the value proposition for prospects and how the products help customers meet challenges and reach their goals.

What can B2B vendors, especially software-as-a-service (SaaS) vendors, learn from the way people buy bed sheets online?

People in the market for bed sheets can go online and get thousands of search results for bed sheets from the major names in e-commerce. Large online retailers get strong search results in part because they replicate their product pages thousands of times, if not more, so they look familiar to search engines.

Conversely, there are thousands of SaaS vendors in the market, but they each create their own product pages and sell their applications differently. This can work against their search engine optimization (SEO) because the crawlers haven’t seen these pages thousands of times.

In this episode of B2B Nation, we talk to Geoff Atkinson, the founder and CEO of Huckabuy, which develops software to help vendors make their sites easier for search engines to read. Geoff got his start in B2C marketing at Overstock.com. And what he’s seen four years into his B2B experience is that many of the tactics and strategies from B2C are helping him grow his B2B SaaS company.

Think about it: when software buyers start their buying process with a search engine query, complete most -- if not all -- of the buying journey online, and do their best to avoid phone calls, they’re acting quite a bit like a B2C shopper who is buying bed sheets.

In this episode we discuss: