Stop Throwing Paint Against the Wall

Posted on 19 April 2013 by Allan Schoenberg

Social media continues to change the way brands communicate with stakeholders. Its introduction into the our arsenal of tactics has provided many benefits, including the ability to share important information, listen to feedback and connect with others. When I speak at events I continue to be impressed with the growing surge and interest from B2B companies in developing programs leveraging social media.

Last summer I introduced my kids to Jackson Pollack...and then we went and had some fun in the garden.

Last summer I introduced my kids to Jackson Pollock…and then we went and had some fun in the garden.

But the easy path to do go down is building a social media program versus taking advantage of social media to be your brand. There is a difference and the earlier method usually results in the cliche of, “Throwing paint up against the wall and seeing if it sticks.” It’s also very one-way — you throw the paint and it doesn’t come back. The only person I can recall who could do this method well and make it work is Jackson Pollock.

There is nothing wrong with experimenting in social media — it’s cost effective, it can allow you to be more creative, you can learn from your experiences and it should be encouraged at this stage. We’ve experimented many times during the last six years and trust me, not everything works. However, everything we do has a purpose and reason in order to tie into our brand and who we are as a company.

Let me give you an example of what I mean. Our latest effort involves Instagram as a recruiting tool and using photographs to tell our history and for people to gain insight into the company. While more brands are using Instagram, we could have easily opened an account and pushed out stock images of graphics and photos we’ve had professionally taken — our paint against the wall approach. But we thought about “why” we wanted an account and “how” it could help promote our company. Our conclusion was that Instagram helps give us a personal touch through visuals, so we wanted to take advantage of that by leveraging our employees to share photos from inside the company as well as people around the world who visit us. Images tell stories and we wanted ours to help humanize and capture the heritage of our brand. We have also integrated our Instagram account with our Facebook page.

No offense to Pollock. He was brilliant and one of my favorite artists, but moving from experimental/one-way “paint throwing” social media into strategic communications is how B2B companies need to think about.

But don’t stop experimenting. Don’t stop thinking about what you can do to leverage social channels and networks. But do think carefully about “why” you want to use them and “how” they can help you. And be patient. B2B communications is not as far-reaching as B2C and it will take time, effort and consistency to be make it work for you.

I did buy the Tate’s “Art in a Box” kit so our next weekend art project may involve Lichtenstein. Stay tuned.

If you enjoyed reading this post you may also want to read the following:

Craft work — what’s your B2B expertise?

Do B2B companies need social media?

Three areas to focus in 2013

What is social media success in B2B… and some examples

Who are your content superheroes?

Social media management

Do most online communities fail?

Other Voices: Ann Handley, MarketingProfs

Posted on 15 April 2013 by Allan Schoenberg

This post marks a milestone for the group at B2B Voices as it is our 200th since we launched four years ago. And to help us celebrate, I was able to convince Ann Handley, chief content officer of MarketingProfs, and co-author of the best-selling book on content marketing, Content Rules, to spend some time with us.

You are clearly very busy. Tell me about how you process information and content.

I try to touch things once (email, social updates) when I can. I’m pretty controlling when it comes to my work, so I don’t outsource well or shortcut much. In other words, this is actually me answering these questions, and not a robot. Surprisingly, huh? (I’m kidding.)

I wish I could say that I have a secret weapon or cool tool that makes me incredibly efficient. But the truth is straightforward: I’m pretty disciplined in my approach, is all. The key is simply staying on top of things, and not getting too distracted while you’re doing so: For example, when I’m writing I shut off email so that the constant alert of incoming mail doesn’t divert me. Otherwise, I’m like the dog Dug in the movie Up. (“Squirrel!”)

There are so many comparisons of B2C vs B2B communications and how B2B seems to lag, particularly in social media. Do you think B2B communications is misunderstood? Or is it just that we are more focused on our work and approach?

I’m not sure whether business-to-business communications is misunderstood, or whether social media is simply misunderstood by B2B companies. I wish more B2B brands used social platforms not just as a way to amplify their content (to repost blog headlines, for example), but as true storytelling platforms. I wished they used them more thoughtfully: As a way to tell a larger story, and express their value and mission.

Here’s what I mean: MarketingProfs is a B2B training and education company, and we’ve found great success in using Pinterest and Slideshare as platforms to showcase our lighter side – through our Marketing Humor board or our presentation about how to ruin your presentation. Those efforts tell a small part of a broader story: We are approachable. We are human beings. We love what we do. We are serious about marketing, but we also think that marketing doesn’t have to be boring. (It shouldn’t be, in fact.)

What’s your biggest pet peeve when it comes to marketing?

How much time do we have…? Here are two:

1. People who don’t walk the walk.

2. Brands (and people) who speak Frankenspeak instead of using the language of actual human beings.

If you were advising a client and they could only use one social media platform what would you recommend and why?

I get this question a lot from people. But often the unasked question there — the question inside that question, if you will – is: How little can I get away with doing? Here’s the thing: Social media represents a rich opportunity to market in a whole new way. It’s not a task or channel, it’s a mindset.

I’d advise them to forget about social networks, and to focus instead on content. It’s more useful to focus more on creating great content for your prospects and customers (published regularly through a blog or similarly flexible content management system) and focus less on specific platforms. That can come later. Focus on your message and story first.

Data. More data. And more data. What do marketers need to think about when it comes to metrics and evaluation?

There’s no magic data elixir that applies to all businesses. If there were, I’d bottle it in beautiful packaging, set it in a velvet-lined box, and drive around the country, trading it out of the back of my car for ounces of gold.

It’s more important to figure out what marketing metric matters to you: It might be sales, but it might be something else, too: Customer engagement or sharing metrics, or the length of time between a lead generated and a sale. In other words, it depends.

But at a high level, look at your lead generation, sales, and sharing metrics. Those are ones that will give you a pretty solid sense of how well your marketing is driving business.

We’ve seen a real evolution of how people interact, communicate and share information in the past five years. What strikes you as the most relevant change for B2B companies during this time?

I’ll share the change I like best: I love the way that some B2B companies are embracing social media and content for what it is: An opportunity to connect in unprecedented ways with people who they are selling to.

I especially love it when I see B2B companies take that opportunity to lighten up a bit. I wrote about a few of those companies on American Express’s OPEN Forum recently. (The OPEN Forum platform itself is also a great example of a B2B company embracing the opportunities inherent in social media and content, by the way.)

What’s the biggest challenge ahead for communicators?

A big challenge for forward-thinking communicators in 2013 is how to produce the kind of messages and content that truly engage. While most companies understand the notion that they need to be producing content, many are still producing drivel. Producing enough content, and producing the kind of content that engages, are still major challenges for B2B marketers.

Think of your marketing through this lens: Is this marketing truly useful? Will my customer thank me for it? I believe that last question is the Holy Grail for marketing. It’s what I hope all companies aspire to, and it’s a fundamental theme that I focus a lot of my work around.

Finally, it was good seeing you, so when are you coming back to London?

It was so great to see you, too. I love London! Soon, I hope!

If you enjoyed this post you may also enjoy some OtherVoices:

R “Ray” Wang on customer engagement

Michael Pranikoff, PR Newswire on B2B digital communications

A Q&A With Jeannie Walters, Founder, 360Connext

A discussion with Mark Ragan, Ragan Communications

A brief interview with Kipp Bodnar, publisher at SocialMediaB2B.com

Craft Work: What’s Your B2B Expertise?

Posted on 2 April 2013 by Allan Schoenberg

It seems we continue to reap the rewards as marketers of the latest digital improvements — from dashboards to metrics — but that doesn’t mean we can instantly do our jobs better. There remains a deep level of expertise and skill that needs to be honed and improved in order to do any part of marketing communications well. Whether you are in web design, media relations, sales, advertising, app development or any other function in the marketing mix, we admire and look up to the people who seem to continuously create winning campaigns.

Like all good skills, developing a real craft or expertise is difficult and takes time. A craftsman knows that you learn from mistakes, you need to take risks, and you need to continuously practice and develop your knowledge.

It takes a lot of time, patience and perseverance to make your craft succeed.

So even though we watch and apply new forms of technology to help us advance our brands, there are areas where some stand out from others. Some of you may call this differentiation, but others call it expertise or skills or leadership. Here are some areas where true craftsmanship can come into play for B2B communications:

Content Management: More and more we are being asked to use content to differentiate our brands and stand out through the massive amounts of information online. Mastering the art of craftsmanship around content can make a big impact for B2B companies. Where the expertise lies is bringing it all together to find the right opportunities to develop content around news, issues or trends and then deciding how to present that content via blog post, infographic or some other distribution method. Tools like Visual.ly can help but sometimes it comes down to more than just choosing the right resource; it’s about having the right vision and integrating the message, visual and distribution. Content can be an exceptional way to make your brand and company stand apart from the competition but the true skill is making this happen consistently and over time. Doing this takes a lot of focus and someone who is connected to many parts of your organization, from customers to management to the people in sales and beyond.

Real-Time Monitoring. The world online is moving in real-time and this is no different for B2B brands than it is for consumer brands. Having the skills to know who to monitor and keeping on top of news and information is critical to various aspects of an organization. While is may seem obvious that this is something that needs to be done, the act of actually doing it can be an art and a skill in running down various content across multiple platforms. This also means you need to develop alerts, set aside monitoring time and learn to constantly adjust and refocus your attention. It becomes even more challenging to make all of this information relevant, which is where the next skill comes into play.

Metrics. More and more data is coming our way and it’s up to someone to not only find the critical connection points, but also wade through a lot of useless information. Knowing what activities or events trigger engagement and understanding qualitative and quantitative data results are increasingly becoming vital marketing and communications skills. For decades we’ve been able to rely on a few forms of metrics and measurement, but that has all changed as social media and digital content have turned information to “always on”. And knowing how to separate the “eyeball” metrics from the “influential” metrics that matter to your campaigns and brand is not easy. In addition, more and more solutions are being introduced, which may or may not help. The key skill here is knowing what to look for, where to find it and then interpreting it to both management and marketing.

Voice. How do you speak as your brand? Do you inject humor? Do you use social media for customers service? Does your social media align with your other branding and marketing efforts? Deciding how and what you post reflects on your brand and this is no easy task as you have to explain images, limit the use of characters and decide what audience you are speaking to online. Having a common voice in a global organization can be extremely difficult as you manage cultures, languages and offerings among a variety of stakeholders. But knowing what your brand represents and its key attributes can help guide the tone and focus.

Connector. While many crafts focus on content, one key skill is the ability to network. With B2B sales cycles longer and generally more complex than B2C, relationships really do matter. Social media allows so many people to gain access to others in your organization and beyond that you can become very good at playing the ultimate connector of people. There can be a clear advantage for you and your organization to bring people together — buyers and sellers — via social media and beyond, and people who network well know how to connect the online and offline worlds.

If there was one B2B skill you could add to this list what would it be and why? Let us know in the comments.

If you like this post you may also want to read the following:

Do B2B companies need social media?

What drives your B2B strategy?

What is social media success in B2B… and some examples

Who are your content superheroes?

Social media management

Do most online communities fail?

Are you ready for a real-time B2B world?

Do B2B Companies Need Social Media?

Posted on 22 March 2013 by Allan Schoenberg

This question was posed to me by Paul Gillin for a Q&A I did with him for BtoB Magazine. There are a number of ways to define the word “need” but it is a good question for companies to begin when they think about starting or expanding social media.

The mistake and trap B2B companies get into is the idea that social media should equate to sales. While the ultimate goal of communications should be to help drive revenue, there are many ways that social media can be used that are just as critical to a brand. Without getting into the tactics of how to do social, here are three ways to think about how social media can build on a company’s efforts.

Don’t get so focused on social media to help sell that you can’t see the forest for the trees.

Recruiting. Recruiters and job seekers more and more are turning to social media to look for a job. Because of this, they are trying to follow and discover more about your company. Whether you use social media to directly recruit employees or not job candidates are researching you online to learn more about you and to decide if they want to be associated with your firm. In addition, tomorrow’s leaders of your organization have grown up with social media. They too are looking online and deciding if they should work for you or your competition.

Crisis communication. When something goes wrong with your organization people more and more are turning to social media for the news or to see what people are saying. In addition, if you are focused on media relations remember that news stories about a crisis will quickly spread online. If you are there to respond as quickly as possible you can learn to leverage social media to your advantage.

Education.Think of your social channels as an extension of your website and event activities. Using social media for brand awareness to celebrate your wins, promote your news and talk about what you are doing can make a difference as you work to build on your brand.

Don’t get into thinking that social media is just about sales. There is more to using these channels than just a sales tool and you need to help your management and sales team understand that your group of stakeholders is much broader than just customers. We continue to see ways that social media is changing the way we consume and communicate information, as B2B brands we need to be listening and a part of these streams and discussions.

If you enjoyed this post you may also want to read the following:

What drives your social media strategy?

Blogging isn’t supposed to be easy

How Well Do You Know Your Social Network? Probably Poorly

Five lessons learned after five years of B2B social media

Do most online communities fail?

Still pitching to use social media?

What drives your B2B strategy?

Tuning into your industry

SXSW: We Still Need to Get Together in the Real World?

Posted on 8 March 2013 by Aaron Pearson

How ironic that 25,000 digitally connected interactive pros have to fly to Austin each year to network with each other and find out what’s new, right?

Actually, it’s not ironic at all that SXSW Interactive should be so valuable to them, and it’s worth understanding why as we consider the continuing value of customer events and trade shows in the B2B marketing mix.

SXSW Interactive Opening Party 2012 – Credit: JoJo Marion

Lee Rainie and Barry Wellman point out in their excellent book, Networked, that research shows we are actually seeing more friends offline at least once a week. Moreover, heavier Internet users appear to be the ones most significantly increasing the number of friends they see in person. The Internet and social technologies do not replace in-person meetings. Rather, they reinforce relationships and create new relationships that must be strengthened by at least the occasional in-person meeting. Otherwise, those ties remain weak.

Meanwhile, virtually every study I’ve ever seen shows the most influential source of information in B2B purchases comes in the form of word-of-mouth from people the buyer knows and trusts. The more we can strengthen and reinforce the relationships within our customer communities and from our best customer advocates to other people, the better off we’re going to be! (Assuming, of course, we have an awesome product or service that’s generating said advocates.) It’s the power of our audiences talking to each other, not just brands talking to audiences.

Bottom line: Creating and activating a strong customer community means using periodic live events – organized for networking and engagement – to grow strong relationships, and then sustaining them with smart social media engagement strategies the rest of the year.

B2B Voices @ SXSW

Posted on 6 March 2013 by Aaron Pearson

Kate and I will be down in Austin the next few days with 40,000 of our close personal friends to see what’s what at that SXSW Interactive thing. I’m going to be paying particularly close attention to the conference from a B2B point of view of course. (Follow me on Twitter!)

I’ve noticed that although social media has been a hot topic now for a few years, it seems like it’s becoming more disruptive to the status quote just over the last few months. For example:
• Increasingly we’re incorporating paid into our traditionally earned media focused campaigns. It’s now the norm.
• Agency roles are getting all mashed up. The client doesn’t care what you call yourself but only whether you can be effective at helping them grow audience engagement.

Instagram Co-Founder Kevin Systrom interviewed by TechCrunch Co-Editor Alexia Tsotsis at last year’s SXSW Interactive Conference. Photo by Carlos Austin

• We’re getting better access to the website analytics we need to understand how our communications programs are changing who comes to the website and what they do when they get there.
• We’re measuring success not just by the volume of mentions but on the nature of conversations.
• We’re getting far more analytical and tech tools are becoming more sophisticated.
• Brand journalism is absolutely exploding.

In addition, we (as an industry) are also shifting conversations beyond just “new ideas” to changing business processes and organizational structures within agencies and within client marketing and communications teams. This change management focus is a natural function of moving beyond pilots and tests to full scale program and campaigns.
So that’s the lens through which I’ll be looking at everything down in Austin. Stay tuned!

Three Things B2B Communicators Can Learn from the Olympics

Posted on 5 October 2012 by Allan Schoenberg

One of the benefits of living in London was the opportunity to attend and be a part of the Olympic events. We were fortune enough to attend three events and my oldest daughter’s school spent a full day at the Paralympics. While attending the athletic events was a great experience in and of themselves, we were also caught up in the ongoing festivities. In fact, my son last night pulled out his Olympic athlete trading cards to tell me stories from the summer and how his favorite athletes performed.

Are you going for the B2B gold?

Witnessing such an amazing global event has made me think about some lessons learned for B2B communicators. Here’s are three key takeaways I’ve made from being so close to the Olympics.

Make one event a truly unique experience. Every four years pundits think that the opening and closing ceremonies will never be as good as the last. Whether you watched the ceremonies live, on television or followed the stream on Twitter, these events proved to be amazing. So how can you take your trade shows or executive events more memorable? Not everyone can hire the Pet Shop Boys or Spice Girls, but you should consider choosing one event each year and go “all in”. If it’s done properly, your customers will notice the investment you’ve made in them — time and money — and they will be talking about it online, at the water cooler and with others in the industry for some time.

How can you leverage Social Media: Social media should rarely be a standalone communications activity. The Olympics demonstrated how using social media can be used to leverage photos, news stories and service updates. While none of our organizations can compare to the size and attention of the Olympics, the lesson to be learned is that content matters — visuals tell stories sometimes better than words; news shared across multiple platforms can reach your audience, and inviting others to participate and share on your social platforms. We rethink these strategies constantly and so should you.

Customer service goes a long way. One of the brightest spots for London during the Olympics was the overwhelming kudos given to the City for the great service and help from its volunteer staff. Focusing on customers does make a difference and it’s the simple things. Do you respond to their inquires in a timely fashion? Does your staff go the extra mile at trade shows to be helpful? Do you reach out to them with new ideas? How do you share news and trends with them? Look at some of the best brands you admire today — B2C and B2b — and I bet you they almost all have a “customer centric” approach to their business. What are you doing to make that part of your firm’s culture?

If you enjoyed this post you may also want to read:

A rundown of B2B news from Social Media Week

What drives your social media strategy?

Tuning into your industry

Social media management

Blogging isn’t supposed to be easy

Other Voices: A Discussion with Michael Pranikoff of PR Newswire on B2B Digital Communications

Posted on 21 August 2012 by Allan Schoenberg

Michael Pranikoff (@mpranikoff) and I met a few years at a PR Newswire event when I participated on a panel he moderated about social media (NOTE: Full disclosure, I am a client of PR Newswire). Since then, he and I have remained in close contact and he is one of my main resources for digital thought leadership. With so many changes happening in the past five years, and so many more on the horizon, he agreed to answer a few questions and participate in a discussion for B2B Voices. As the Global Director, Emerging Media, Pranikoff is constantly on the move consulting with clients and I am indebted for his time. Our Q&A follows, which I hope you find useful, and by all means please add your questions for him in the comments.

Q: You’ve been at PR Newswire since 1998. I won’t ask you if the newswire is dead, but because of services like Twitter how is the newswire evolving?

A: This is a great question. I personally don’t believe that any one channel of communications trumps another form of communications. There are different audiences for each channel – which is probably why there are so many channels on the television today. However, not all channels are created equal. The newswire itself is just one of many channels that are out there, but it’s a channel that has predominately been used and viewed as one of the most trusted sources that are out there.

We’ve all been witnesses to countless hoaxes that go across Twitter and other social channels that have little or no vetting process. I’m not saying that the newswire industry has never been susceptible to a hoax before, but there are multiple security steps that are taken to protect the integrity of the content that is syndicated over PR Newswire. Trust is a very important aspect that we try to protect with our clients everyday – our clients that use the wire as a channel to officially communicate and syndicate their content; and our clients such as news organizations, bloggers and search engines that use, take and index our content for audiences.

Twitter is still a very valuable channel and we are now using Twitter (and Weibo in mainland China) to help the content of our clients be more accessible than ever before by their current and new audiences. If you are asking if Twitter will replace the newswire, I don’t believe so – just as Television didn’t kill radio. Will it change the way we operate…it already has. New channels afford new opportunities to reach new audiences.

Q: Our focus on this blog is B2B communications. What challenges have you found that B2B companies experience that B2C companies have mastered?

A: B2B companies have a unique position in trying to communicate their messages and engage their audiences. Social channels can be a big challenge. For instance, a semiconductor company can rarely use a Facebook page to successfully run contests that get thousands of entries; ask audiences to create tons of content and post; and even use a social network to distribute coupons that are going to have clients flocking to purchase their products. It’s also hard, but not impossible, for a B2B company to have and exhibit personality with their brand. So, sometimes B2B content can come off as stuffy.

B2B companies have to work harder to successfully use their channels and show the ROI of those channels. However, I don’t think that B2B companies even need to use all the same channels as B2C companies. Sometimes, they can spend less time worrying about likes and fans and spend more time in creating content that is really going to lead to a greater and deeper engagement and opportunity than a lot of B2C companies can. B2C companies can sometimes be broad with their messaging, the more focused that a B2B company can be with their content, the better.

Q: And on the flip side to that question, what have B2B companies done well that B2C companies should pay attention to?

A: B2B companies have some advantages over B2C companies, and that is the ability to create very focused content and engage audiences in a very different way than B2C companies can. For instance, B2B companies can engage their audiences deeper with content such as case studies and white papers – which many B2C companies have a hard time doing.

However, today we are seeing B2B companies use some of the tactics that were thought to be the domain for B2C companies – such as creating really involved and engaged communities. This is something that B2B companies can have an advantage with because they are trying to create authority around a topic – and that topic tends to have something to do with a profession. Most people today are spending a good 8-10 hours a day invested in their jobs / profession. We are eager for information and content that will help us to achieve more. B2B companies like Dell, IBM, Microsoft and others are creating very focused Communities that are engaging audiences at levels that many never thought about. There are even very specially focused and thriving communities such as one for a specialized profession such as an Oncology Nurse (www.theonc.org).

B2B companies are increasingly embracing principles around Content Marketing to help reach and engage current and new audiences. While good content is not easy or cheap to create, it’s much more cost effective and less expensive than broad based advertising that so many B2C companies feel forced to engage in with increasingly smaller returns for dollars spent.

Q: We are clearly moving from an analog to a digital world. This means as communicators we have the opportunity to create our own content. How has this shift made its way into the minds of communicators?

A: This is definitely true. However, I would say that the paradigm of POEMS (Paid, Owned, Earned, Media…and Shares) is shifting and blurring. Blending the techniques today is achieving greater results than relying on one form alone for all messaging. It’s also blurring the way the marketing, advertising, public relations and investor relations teams are working. Today, I think it’s figuring out what the overarching messaging is about, and then using the different disciplines / channels in the organization to nuance the message for different audiences, all while still staying true to the message.

The other changing aspect from analog to digital is the speed in which we have to operate and communicate. It seems as if we are always on. If that is true, then listening is more important than ever and we have to be nimble and quick in our organizations to be able to truly embrace the ideas around Agile Engagement. The ability to quickly listen, analyze, create or curate new messages, target that message, promote and syndicate and then directly engage and interact with our audiences is critical. Then the process starts all over again while we analyze what worked, what didn’t work and find ways to improve the process and message is truly what makes embracing the digital and agile process.

Q: What have you noticed from your work outside of the US? Do services like Weibo and RenRen matter more and if so how?

A: Outside the US, there are many markets where different social networks thrive – mainland China is not the only place, but probably the place where this plays out most because of access. In many places outside of the US, I have noticed a much quicker pace to embrace mobile. However, it’s not always on a mobile device like a smart phone or iPad. For instance, in Africa, the feature phone is still alive and well and giving access to information and commerce like never before.

Now, as many differences as there are in places around the world in how messages are communicated, one thing that I have found still matters for B2B companies is making sure that their content can be easily found by their audiences. Some like to say that search is dying, but I believe that search is stronger and more important than ever. While Google is not number one everywhere in the world – most of the world searches using Google. Therefore the importance of making sure that our content is easily searchable plays a big importance for B2B companies and how they are communicating. Even in China where Baidu rules, Google is still the number one search engine for the business community (at least that’s what I found when I was visiting China earlier this year).

One thing to note, Weibo is not a service on its own. A Weibo is basically the term for Microblog and within mainland China, there are four major Weibo services (Sina, Sohu, Tencent also known as QQ or Qzone, and NetEase) vs. just the one Twitter Microblog services in the US (although within corporate America it could be said that there are internal competitors such as Yammer and Salesforce Chatter).

Q: New services like Instagram and Pinterest are making digital media a very “image centric” medium. How have B2B companies grasped this concept?

A: One thing that we have known for a long time at PR Newswire is that when an image or any multimedia is distributed with a release, the release gets more views and more engagement on average. The push for “image centric” content is forcing companies to think more about how they will visualize a message. This is not always easy to do right.

Services like Instagram and Pinterest can be a lot of fun. However, I am not convinced that these will be very successful channels for B2B Companies. For one thing, I have not seen data yet that really shows that these channels are helping to make the images shared on them more search friendly. I’m not a naysayer and I do think these channels can be successful for some, but I don’t believe that most B2B companies are going to find these channels to be very successful channels in leading to business.

Companies should embrace the idea that they have lot of great data and that finding ways to visualize this data can be successful in helping to find and engage new audiences. There has been a deeper push for companies to use infographics, but many companies have a hard time doing this. My advice to companies is to keep it simple and try to not cover more than 1-3 distinct data points in an infographic. I have seen too many infographics suffer from too much data – just like a press release that is trying to cover too many topics. I like to embrace the KISS principle – Keep It Short & Simple (however, some people like Keep It Simple Stupid).

Q: In closing, offer us some words of wisdom that we as communicators need to think about.

A: My final thoughts are that we need to think about our content online today like laying breadcrumbs down to help our users and audience to follow a path. Be directive with content and let people know where they are supposed to go next. Finally, connect your channels together to help cross promote your content. We don’t need to use every channel in the world, just those channels in which we know is going to help our audiences find our information and the path to where they should be going next.

If you enjoyed this post you may also want to read the following:

StockTwits and PR Newswire partnership

Are you ready for a real-time B2B world?

Blogging isn’t supposed to be easy

How do you fill your B2B content cup?

Why LinkedIn’s Company Pages Now Matter More

What drives your social media strategy?