Highlights:

• Increase your rep, distributor, or reseller sales by supporting them with abundant sample products and stories behind those parts.  Make sure they have up-to-date collateral. [4:40]
• Videos of the manufacturing process in action are also helpful for distributors to share new processes with the end users. [6:00]
• Those manufacturers who give better support to their distributors get more attention which can translate to more sales. How about a regular sales phone call with your distributors to keep them up to date? Ask your distributors what they need! [7:30]

• Joel's one wish from manufacturers - "Place more emphasis on the digital aspect of marketing. Get with the digital marketing age." [11:00]
• Joel is proud to represent the Millennial viewpoint and advocates the digital processes throughout manufacturing! [13:00]
• Here's what Joel sees his manufacturers doing for marketing support, some are using email, some are experimenting with social media like Twitter and LinkedIn. [16:00]
• Big opportunity for manufacturers is to support their distributors by providing educational material beyond the product and company manufacturing. This would get the attention of distributors and will very likely get you more distributor sales from your reps. [18:50]
• Manufacturers - put together an educational webinar and produce it for your distributors and their customers. Joel shares some great ideas off the top of his head. [21:40]

Interview Questions:

Question 1 – Joel, you represent several manufacturers.  How would you describe excellent marketing and sales support and contrast that with inadequate or poor marketing and sales support from the manufacturer? How much does your perception of the support affect where you put your daily and strategic efforts?

Question 2 –  If you had one marketing support (or sales support) wish that could be granted, what would you wish for from your manufacturers? Follow up with why did you choose that?

Question 3 –  Let’s talk specifically about marketing.  Of those manufacturers who do provide marketing support, what specifically are they doing to support you? Are any of your manufacturers or have you heard of any others who are supporting distributors with educational content like webinars, ebooks, white papers?  (content besides company and product information)

Question 4 – What is the one thing a manufacturer could do for you and for any other distributors out there that would inspire you to put more effort into selling their products?

Challenge Question –  This week I’m repeating our challenge question from last week because it is from a distributor of manufactured products.  The question comes from the St. Louis area, a distributor of manufactured products, process instrumentation devices. “I’m the owner of a manufacturer’s rep company where we sell to various manufacturing companies. It’s getting tougher to get their attention these days and we seem to be fighting over the lowest price more often than not. Lately, the first and last call we get is for a price quote. We’re pretty good at pitching the product, but it’s not working so well lately. How can we position the company as a premium supplier by sharing expertise?

• Define your differentiation and unique value to your customers. You can use educational content to differentiate.
• Pitching the product is not a good way to differentiate. In fact this is a straight line to being perceived as a commodity.
• There's value in reliability, price is rarely the top concern in a purchase decision.

Takeaways: 

1. Make sure sales and marketing are aligned and on the same team.
2. Don't do marketing and sales the same way as everyone else in the industry. Look outside of manufacturing and see what they are doing for innovative ways to differentiate your sales and marketing activities.

Guest: Tom Repp, Owner and Principle of The Repp Group

Tom and I made these predictions back at the end of December. There's only 2 months left this year, how are we doing so far?

Tom Prediction 1 -  In each mfg. sector there will be one company that will emerge as brand leader by virtue the fact that they hired a marketing evangelist that knew how to leverage the web for brand awareness & lead generation. [3:20]

• Tom also talks about the idea of content saturation to get first page results on the SERP.
• Manufacturers who embrace this idea and develop educational content will emerge as winners in their markets while others may languish and, perhaps, even perish.

Bruce Prediction 1 - The idea of increasing sales by sharing expertise will start to accelerate.  I’m starting to see it more often. For example, manufacturers will catch on to the power of producing useful, helpful content that is about the problems of the people in the target audience and not so much about themselves. [8:30]

• Bruce cites CMI research that demonstrates a high usage of content marketing. Manufacturers who adopt this concept will beat the others, but the train is leaving the station. Now is the time to get on board and start sharing expertise.

Tom Prediction 2 - Manufacturers will budget & hire digital marketers rather than another traditional sales person. [11:15]

• Manufacturers will understand that they get higher ROI by hiring a digital marketer than by hiring a sales person. Marketing must lead the engagement where sales works on the lower funnel. This is another reason for the huge opportunity because most manufacturers will not catch on to this secret.
• Check out Tom's blog post "Fire a sales person and hire a marketer".

Bruce Prediction 2 - Manufacturers will start to realize that they can gain significant advantage by shifting their mindset from sales oriented to marketing oriented go-to-market model. Their buyer’s behavior has changed. Buyers want to learn and self-educate first.  This is a paradigm shift that will get significant traction with manufacturers during 2017. [16:00]

• Is there a stigma attached to the term "marketing" or a preconception for the marketing function?  That will change.
• Teach first, pitch later.

Tom Prediction 3 - Millennials will start to take over buying decisions and also ownership (i.e. off spring) of many of these industrial companies...thus accelerating the shift to online branding and marketing. [20:15]

• Millennials are telling their parents and grandparents in family owned manufacturing business that getting on board with a digital marketing mindset is a must for survival.

Bruce Prediction 3 - Social media use a a tactic or channel for manufacturers (B2B) will decline in 2017. [22:30]

• Two big problems with social media; it's hard to prove attribution to social media and getting attention with social media is pay for play on all major channels.
• Manufacturers will start to realize that the resources they are pouring in to social media just isn't paying off.

Takeaways:

• Tom's takeaway - here's a way to get proof. Type in the word 'allintitle: (your keyword)' to see the results of your competitors websites.  If the number is under 10,000, then if you build content around those keywords you can get your company on page 1 of the search engine results within weeks.
• Bruce's takeaway - Before any of the manufacturing marketing predictions can happen for your company, check in on your fundamentals of marketing. If you don't have a proper, full marketing plan, step back and get it done. It will pay off big-time for your business and it will help advance your marketing function within your manufacturing company.

Question 1 –   Let’s talk about this perception that marketing has no return or that it is impossible to measure the return of a marketing investment. What is your take on that perception? (with a slant to the B2B manufacturing sector)

Question 2 –  How do you define and calculate return on investment or ROI for the marketing function? What are some metrics manufacturing marketers should be tracking?

Question 3 –   Could you share a success story with the audience about a B2B manufacturer or a B2B company who was able to successfully measure ROI and what were the positive outcomes to the business and the marketing department as a result?

Question 4 –  Let’s imagine a manufacturer or a marketing director at a manufacturing company out there listening. He has 1 or 2 people on his staff, not much budget and when times are tough, marketing is the first place where budget gets cut. What are some initial steps he could take to start to prove a return on the marketing investment, change the perception of marketing as a black hole expense and even begin to position marketing as a direct source of revenue?

Challenge Question –  This week our challenge question comes from a robotics manufacturing company in northern Indiana. Here it is “I’m a VP marketing at a mid-size manufacturer and I have a strong passion for marketing by educating our customers to help them solve their problems. I’m new here and I’m having trouble getting buy-in for a content marketing strategy that is not completely about the products. I have 2 questions; how can I break through the culture barrier that says we can only market by pitching the product?  Second, how long does it usually take to prove the concept of content marketing?”

• A company that designs, builds and manages aquatic experiences was faced with a challenge of gaining awareness in an expanded market and a perception of offering a commoditized product. [3:30]
• John shares his framework for approaching a lead generation project. The goal was to become top of mind for cities who are interested in building or managing a pool facility and generate qualified leads. [5:30]
• John talks about the content assets that were used for the lead generation aspect of the project. [8:45]
• John describes how he worked with the client to define the audience [10:45]
• Here's how they decided what content to use, how it was important to the chosen audience and what pain point the content addressed. [15:45]
• John talks about using social media, FaceBook, LinkedIn and others, for a highly targeted audience. [20:00]
• Re-targeting can be a powerful tactic to gain awareness in the lead generation case study. John explains how it works and why it's fo powerful. [22:50]
• "The results were huge!" Cost per lead was only $25.50 per lead which is pretty good with a total spend of around $6000 and a 700% increase in net new leads. [25:00]
•  Counsilman-Hunsaker is the company, here is the link to the case study.

This podcast deals with the sometimes contentious relationship between manufacturers and their channel partners. Learn how you can get more sales from your channel partners.

Guest: Debbie Pierce, CEO Nitromojo

Highlights:

• Sometimes trying to decide exactly who the manufacturing customer really is can be confusing for manufacturers. [4:00]
• The most successful manufacturers have great communication, visibility, and transparency with their channel partners. Lack of transparency can cause fear on both sides. [7:10]
• An automated feedback loop can be a huge benefit for attribution and sales projections. [9:50]

• The 'where to buy' section of the website is a big black hole where sales attribution information disappears and a huge opportunity to for connecting to the end buyer. [16:00]
• The tri-lateral model changes the old linear model to a circular model that keep channel partner, end user, and manufacturer all in the loop. [23:00]
• Action steps for getting started with a better channel partner sales strategy: [25:50]
  1. Modify your website to capture those end buyers who visit the 'where to buy' page or other lead generation activities such as a trade show.
  2. Develop and implement an end customer feedback dialogue that provides actionable results.

On this episode of Manufacturing Marketing Matters, I’m joined by Randall Laveau. Randall is the marketing practice lead at Sales Benchmark Index (SBI).

In this conversation, Randall talks with us about strategy vs tactics or how tactics sometimes masquerade as a strategy. The importance of a strategy in the marketing plan is crucial. Randall explains how understanding your market will influence your strategy. There is a relationship between strategy and execution. Strategy is doing the right thing. Execution is doing things right. You will also learn the importance of using metrics and analytics to communicate with management and request additional resources to see results from the marketing strategy.

This week our guest expert Marcelo Prado and I discuss the huge importance of digital marketing for manufacturers. It is really a matter of survival. Those manufacturers who are willing and able to build their go-to-market strategy around the digital world will win, those unable or unwilling will become extinct. Marcelo shares the why and the how.

This week we talk all about branding strategy for manufacturers. Is it worth the time and effort? Chris Wirthwein shares his experience and answers the question with some 'yes' and some 'no'. In short, a strong manufacturer brand can be a huge advantage if approached from a customer centric approach. Listen and learn if you should pursue branding or just let it die.

Highlights:

• "Brand" is what you have and "branding" is what you do. Brand is a perception of your company. Branding is the things that you do that affect those perceptions. [4:20]
• Consider owned, earned and paid media for branding activities. Chris recommends emphasizing the owned type. [10:10]
• Interesting idea; what your sales people say to customers and prospective customers is owned media. Your employees could even be considered as owned media. [12:00]
• It's important to understand the difference between the corporate brand and the product brand. [14:50]

• Chris' book, The People Powered Brand, talks about the 5 foundations of a people powered brand: [18:20]

1. Consistency
2. Credibility
3. Desirability
4. Uniqueness
5. Do-ability

• Poor brand alignment can cause a lot of problems including recruitment of talent, the value of a company and profit. [21:20]
• Chris comes to the conclusion that branding strategy is not dead for B2B manufacturers. Branding is, indeed, an opportunity to gain competitive advantage. [30:50]

Most manufacturing websites are pretty poor. Sorry, but it's true. Typically, they are focused on describing the company and the products with little regard for the website visitor's problems or needs. The good news is that 90% of your competitors' websites are just as bad, so you have a big opportunity to take a leading position and usurp the search traffic. Tim Doyle talks about how to build a top performing manufacturing website in this week's podcast.

Guest: Tim Doyle, VP Sales at TopSpot

In this episode, we discuss the power and potential of LinkedIn for lead generation in manufacturing organizations. Bill Sterzenbach from Upward shares ideas, suggestions and real stories about how you, the manufacturing marketer, can and should use LinkedIn for lead generation; more qualified leads, higher conversion rates and a full sales pipeline.

Guest: Bill Sterzenbach, Partner at Upward Brand Interactions

Highlights:

• There seems to be a bias against social media, therein lies a huge opportunity for the industrial enlightened. [2:50]
• LinkedIn is a place where professional go for growth. [5:50]
• 62% of B2B marketers find LinkedIn to be the most effective way to engage with their target audiences. The people who get the most benefit are those who understand the people who make up their target audience. [7:00]
• It's about people talking to people more than a brand talking to an audience. [9:30]
• Bill shares a case study about Parker Hannifin and Caterpillar are using LinkedIn well and having had great success on LinkedIn. [12:20]

• Here are three things you can do right now to have better success with LinkedIn: [15:20]
  1. Put in a practice to get more followers and set an objective.
  2. Post at least weekly on a regular basis.
  3. Use your internal team to help promote the channel.
• Learn about how paid or sponsored content works on LinkedIn. [19:10]
• It's a good practice to use both pay-per-click and LinkedIn sponsored content. [25:40]
• Get out there and do it badly, don't wait until it's perfect to start. [26:50]

Interview Questions:

Question 1 – Let’s start of broadly and talk about social media in general. How should manufacturers view social media when it comes to their business development? Is it table stakes in this day and age? Is it a good way to grow awareness? Is it a waste of time?

Question 2 – Let’s zero in on LinkedIn. Rather than assume everyone knows what it is, would you first share, what is LinkedIn? How does it work? Real example of how a manufacturer might use LinkedIn…

Question 3 – Sounds like it could be a pretty powerful business development tool. Suppose there is a manufacturing marketer out there listening, they have a LinkedIn company page, but aren’t doing much with it. What are 3 things they could do right away towards using that page for business development?

Question 4– I know LinkedIn offers paid advertising. How does that work? A couple of examples would be great.

Is there one ad type you recommend over others? (which one and why that one?) Is it for everyone?

Challenge Question: Send in your challenge question!

This week our challenge question comes in from New York, a manufacturer of industrial gases. Here it is, “I’m the VP Sales and Marketing at a company that manufactures and delivers industrial gases. I listened to your podcast a couple of weeks ago about sharing content to differentiate. Would that work with a commodity like Nitrogen or Oxygen used in an industrial environment? If yes, could you throw out a couple of examples on your next podcast?”

• Helpfulness is a great differentiator for commodity products. In a survey, purchasing and buyers will choose a company offering helpfulness over all others. The larger, more premier companies value helpfulness most. Better customers value service on the front lines and all around helpfulness. Use social media to prove your brand is helpful.
• TOMA + credibility + reciprocity = differentiation and bigger market share

Takeaways:

• Set some goals for your social media program.
• Get buy-in from stakeholders.

Offer from Bill and Upward - free lunch and learn in person or via webinar.  Prefer if you can bring at least 20 people. Fill out the form here and request to learn more about LinkedIn.