Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Our blog has moved!
Sunday, May 17, 2009
What social network do you prefer?
We look forward to generating the results and helping you determine which social media site is best for you.
Friday, May 8, 2009
Jump on the social media bandwagon
Social Media has become the highest growing mediums for marketing worldwide. Here are some of the increased benefits to integrating a social media plan to your marketing schedule:
- Increase company reach by thousands
- Generate awareness for your firm
- Save time and money by cutting back on travel and making "virtual" connections
- Drive new leads through social promoting
- Develop relationships through adding a personal touch to your blogging/tweets/updates/etc.
If you're new to the world of social media, we find that a great place to start is through linked in, twitter, or facebook. However there are an abundance of other sites that are becoming cluttered and confusing for the new social media explorer. The question of "how much is too much" is constantly being asked as companies continue to try to take a piece of the online social pie.
If you have implemented social media into your world of marketing, you probably have an opinion on what works best. Let's share in our experiences... what social media sites do you find drive the most leads, awareness, and overall reach?
Friday, May 1, 2009
Webinar - Campaign Best Practices
Generating success from your marketing campaign involves a number of steps. Yet even with the most successful campaign planning, campaign execution, and lead generation, some campaigns just happen to generate more results than others. But what makes these campaigns stand out so strongly from the rest?
Join us May 27th for a 30 minute lunch and learn as we explore campaign best practices that will guarantee higher return on marketing investment (ROMI).
Title: TSL Marketing - Campaign Best Practices
Date: Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Time: 12:00 PM - 12:30 PM EDT
Space is limited.
Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/751139507
After registering you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the Webinar.
System Requirements
PC-based attendees
Required: Windows® 2000, XP Home, XP Pro, 2003 Server, Vista
Macintosh®-based attendees
Required: Mac OS® X 10.4 (Tiger®) or newer
Thursday, April 23, 2009
TSL Marketing is hiring
TSL Marketing Business Development Specialist
Our Business Development Specialist will create Business to Business opportunities and is comfortable communicating with clients and senior executives at various companies nationwide. This is a perfect position for someone trying to acquire experience in sales and marketing. It is also a great fit for someone looking to build a career with a growing organization.
Experience:
- 0 to 5 years experience in lead generation/sales
- 5 to 20 years experience in lead generation/sales for Sr. Level Positions
Education:
- Associate or Bachelor degree (Information Technology and Marketing major/minor a plus)
Skills:
- Excellent communication skills, both verbal and written
- Comfortable on the phone
- Solid phone etiquette
Other:
- Ambition to move up within a fast growing company
- Excellent work ethic
- Motivated to learn new things
Full time TSL employees have a wide range of benefits:
- Healthcare
- 401K
- Paid Time Off
- Career Path through sales or management
If you are interested in applying or learning more about this position, please contact me at tdonnelly@tslmarketing.com
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Economic downturn hits IT budgets
Friday, April 10, 2009
Lead Generation - what works?
• Conductive to a partnership model than a “vendor” relationship
• Reduces the risk of low quality leads thus providing higher return on investment
Thursday, March 12, 2009
The truth about B2B Blogs - are they worth it?
- Change it up - don't always blog about the same boring stuff. Have fun with your blog, throw in cartoons, change around your topics, and above all make it personable.
- Incorporate more than one blogger - we all have different writing styles, different experiences, and different views on business. Incorporating this into your blog is extremely beneficial as the blog will become more of a company community than a one person show.
- Listen to your audience - Blogging is only successful if you have an audience. This is why you want to be sure that you listen to your audience and blog about what they are interested in. When you have a comment, respond to it, and then blog about it (if it is topic worthy). The more you listen, the more your blog will be read.
- Don't get too "business" in your blog - a blog is about personality. Don't be afraid to express yours. When you are all about business and selling, your blog will loose it's personal appeal. Too many companies are out there trying to promote themselves through sales methods. Take a step back and think about what you want to say, then say it without selling it. A blog should not be used to generate leads (that just comes as a bonus).
Friday, March 6, 2009
Information Technology (IT) Trend Report for 2009
- IT purchases are expected to grow to $616 billion in 2010 for a 7.5% increase from 2009 sales.
- Software spending is expected to grow 3.4 percent in 2009
- Gartner recommends the top 10 ways to save and do more with less
- SaSS is growing at a rate of 40% annually
- Highlights on the top trends for IT spending (where the money is being spent)
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Top 5 Marketing trends for 2009
Affordable multi-touch campaigns
Trends and statistics for 2009 marketing
How to optimize your landing pages
Market to a mass media and still save
Effective social media planning
For more information, please contact Tara Donnelly at:
Email: tdonnelly@tslmarketing.com
Phone: 617 753 9124
Monday, February 16, 2009
Marketing Operations - tracking your ROMI
When starting your marketing operations plan, here are some basic steps to get you started in marketing more effectively.
- Track Return on Marketing Investment (ROMI) Any and all marketing tactics should be tracked in order to determine it's effectiveness. You can track your ROMI by use of a marketing dashboard with marketing automation programs; however if you do not have access to these programs, a simple spreadsheet will suffice. Tracking ROMI should (in the least) contain the following: cost of tactic, time for implementation (cost of internal team), leads generated, conversion rates for leads, proposal stage, and closed/won revenue. By keeping track of these numbers, you will quickly learn which tactics generate the most leads, and more importantly, which tactics generate the most sales.
- Develop Dashboards Most CRM tools have dashboards that can be created in order to track your ongoing marketing and sales activities. In these dashboards you can track lead conversions (by sales reps), marketing leads generated, sales goals, and top marketing tactics as some examples. If you do not have access to dashboards within your CRM tool, these can also be created via spreadsheets (though this can often be time consuming). For more information or ideas on how to custom create company dashboards, contact us.
- Marketing Lead Conversion One of the best ways to measure campaign effectiveness is through lead conversion rates. This should be tested by assigning leads to (at minimum) 3 different sales reps from the same marketing tactic. After a few weeks/months, tracking what leads convert, which sales reps are converting them, and how long the conversion rate takes, you will have not only an idea of how successful your marketing campaign was; but also which sales reps have the highest conversion rates, and what the average lead lifecycle time should be for that particular tactic.
- Lead Lifecycle Management Tracking the lifecycle of your leads is a crucial part to marketing operations. When leads are not tracked, it is easy for them to slip through the cracks and potential sales could be lost. Some successful ways in tracking leads are to create a lead lifetime with your sales team that is attainable. Based on your marketing conversion rates, you will soon be able to determine what the average lead conversion rate should be. For example, if you are able to determine that a lead should convert within 90 days, than your lead lifetime should be 90 days. If after 90 days a lead does not convert, the lead then goes back into lead nurturing for marketing or gets assigned to a different sales rep. Sales should also have an average per contact touch ratio to determine how many times a prospect gets reached out to within the 90 day time period.
- Campaign Management When starting your marketing operations plan, you should always make sure you manage your campaigns from start to finish. This encompasses setting up a marketing schedule and managing tactic launch dates, close dates, and multi-touch marketing efforts. This will help assure that your marketing efforts will stay within your monthly/quarterly budget and also drive consistent leads for your sales team.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
How to go-to-market as an IT firm in 2009
- Software Providers 15%
- SaaS 31%
- ERP Services 8%
- Outsourcing 38%
- Offshoring 8%
- Know how you can save your customer time and money - There is a very strong renewed focus on measuring cost and how cost will affect the current IT budget within organizations. If your product does not have a strong argument for cost savings, you will most likely be pushed to the sidelines. When going into any marketing or sales pitch, be sure you know your customer and how you will help them save!
- Know your target audience - With the state of the economy, more organizations have restructured so that the CIO and CFO are more aligned. As IT is one of the largest expenses in an organization, the CFO is now looking to the CIO to find ways to cut costs and save more money. Furthermore, if the CIO is able to make a strong argument for certain solutions saving money, a purchase could potentially be made. Therefore, make sure your message speaks to both IT AND Finance.
Friday, February 6, 2009
Target Marketing - why research is essential
- Basic psychographics: What are their values, what do they like, how does the product fit into their lives, how do they go about their daily routine, how do others influence them, what are their personalities, attitudes, lifestyles.
- What are their motivations and unmet needs? - How do they think and feel about the products they use and buy?
- What do they think/feel/use the product/service? - To what extent are they aware of the brand - Do they know about the brand's special features, qualities - Do they understand how the product/service works - Do they understand the brand's superior qualities - What is their attitude toward the product category - What is their attitude toward the specific brand - To what extent do they like or desire the product or brand - Do they trust the brand to deliver the promised benefits - Do they have a preference for this brand - What image or personality do consumer's associate with the brand - What do consumer's feel the brand essence is
- What are they guided by (one of the three orientations as follows)
- Principle Oriented - guided by abstracts, idealized criteria, rather than by feelings, events or desire for approval by others.
- Status Oriented - these consumers look for products and services that demonstrate their success to their peers.
- Action Oriented - these consumers are guided by a desire for social or physical activity, variety or risk taking
Friday, January 30, 2009
Finding a new job during a recession
Monday, January 19, 2009
One thing your prospects should know: Is your pipeline leaking?
Alaska has an almost 800 mile pipeline that connects Prudhoe Bay to Valdez, AK. What if a leak formed in that pipeline? If 700,000 barrels of oil left the oil field in Prudhoe Bay and only 500,000 barrels arrived at the Gulf of Alaska, due to a leak somewhere along the pipeline, you can bet several folks in Valdez would be quite anxious. Now why is that same anxiety not felt by sales and marketing organizations with the same results coming from their "sales" pipeline?
Companies of every size are guilty of having leaks in their sales pipelines, from SMB entities through to the fortune 100 companies. In every case the problem is the same, the sales and marketing organizations are not properly aligned and the sales teams focus on immediate opportunities. This style of sales pipeline management will usually allow a company to stay afloat and enable management to meet quarterly and annual goals, but it will disallow the entity from realizing substantial revenue increases. This flawed approach throws dollars away in lost opportunities when that dropped prospect buys from a competitor, and though the wasteful processes and necessary rework in an attempt to re-qualify.
How do you fix a leaky pipeline? The wrong answer would be "with duct tape". Do you really think duct tape will keep the oil flowing properly to Valdez? The proper fix: The pipeline would need to be drained, depressurized and the leak found and the broken parts replaced. This will have costs associated, and could mean downtime in the operations, but once back up and running the repair would pay for itself within hours.
The proper fix stands true for a sales pipeline. Although sales activities need not cease, analysis of the internal processes is required to define the location of the leak. (Where are the prospects falling out?) Once this is understood, create an improvement plan. The next two steps are commonly where I have seen the biggest mistakes, execution and control. The plan is in place now it must be executed. Plenty of ideas and plans are laid on boardroom tables each day, some are chosen to commence, but very few are properly executed. And finally, any good marketing plan will have a control plan. Without this last step you are destined to be right back in the same position with a leaking pipeline. A control plan is put in place to assure that future problems are detected early. If a weakness is discovered in the pipeline, immediate action can be taken before it develops into a leak.
In conclusion, your company has spent real dollars to uncover prospects, and your team has spent real labor hours developing them. Don't let those dollars go to waste over such a fundamental flaw. Take a hard look at what enters your pipeline, what activities are happening to add value and pull them along, and what is coming out the other side. In another article we will discuss further the concepts and strategies around value adding activities that will more efficiently progress prospective customers through the pipeline.
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
TSL Marketing joins Twitter
Click Here to follow TSL Marketing on Twitter
So what is twitter anyway? To the untrained "follower," twitter seems like nothing more than a silly and inconsequential way to waste time online. However, the more I got involved in twitter and what it brings to the table, the more I began to realize the value add that this social network prevails.
What makes this social media site difference than the others is that it is solely based on streaming updates. You can connect to colleagues, friends, prospects, clients, and groups by simply "following" their feed. Once you decide to follow a "tweet (fancy word for update)," you will be sent updates as often as the twitter tweeter submits their feed. Some great ways to use twitter in a corporate setting:
- Point your followers to your landing pages: If you have a live or online event, white paper, or really any marketing tactic to promote, here is another way to generate leads without spending any marketing dollars.
- Follow everyone who follows you: A great way to build your twitter network is to follow the people who choose to follow you. As you start tweeting on a consistent basis, your social media stream will reach higher levels and you will be able to build your network substantially.
- Tweet about your blog: You can submit a tweet that links back to your company blog. This will begin driving more traffic to your website and also drive more interest to your blogging network.
- When there is nothing to tweet about, say hello: The point of twitter is to get your name and company out in the open. When you find that you may be at a loss for what to say in your updates, go ahead and say hello. The point of twitter (from a corporate standpoint) is to promote your company, this is often done by just showing your company name and continuing to build your network.
- Follow follow follow: Finding the right person to follow is a great way to generate research and learn more about what is happening in the current market. Many companies that use twitter successfully don't use it just to promote their company name. If there is an article of interest or a topic of relevance that would benefit their network, it gets tweeted. This is why when you choose to follow people or companies, follow those that you think you can learn from and benefit from in the future.
Monday, December 29, 2008
What impact will the current Economic Crisis have on IT Budgets
From your perspective, how will the economic crisis impact your strategy from a Marketing perspective? What will they have to do differently and/or proactively to adapt and overcome?
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Why Lead Progression is so important for 2009
- Update your CRM and assign tasks to yourself - by updating a customer relations management database, you will be able to determine when the last conversation was placed as well as when the prospect has requested a future follow up. By simply assigning a task to yourself after logging your first conversation, you will assure that any future conversations will not be lost.
- Nurture your leads through multi-touch campaigns - regardless of where your prospect is in the sales cycle, you should maintain a monthly or at least bi-monthly campaign to stay in touch with your prospect universe. This is typically done best via email.
- Hire an outside firm to help drive leads into the sales cycle - Many companies, including TSL Marketing, offer services that help move leads along the sales cycle. This way, your sales team can continue to work on closing deals while your outside firm works on moving leads along the sales pipeline so that they do not slip through the cracks.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Marketing in a down economy
- Web 2.0 – 48% of B2B marketing indicated that they plan to increase marketing activities to include Web 2.0 and social media plans to their budgets.
- No change in telemarketing – while telemarketing is still an old-fashioned way of generating leads, the budget for telemarketing is hardly seeing a change. 18% of B2B individuals in fact indicated that they plan to increase telemarketing spend.
- Email to your house list – There is a 48% increase in email when the email is sent directly to your house list. Make sure you have a proper email marketing campaign in place and that it is focused on the pains your customers are facing.
- Renting a list is a bad choice – With the talk of quality over quantity, it is no surprise that renting a list has become a lost cause. Marketing Sherpa found a 43% decrease in budgetary spend with outsourced lists (from a 3rd party source). If you need a new list, plan on spending more money and go for a quality list that you can keep than renting one for a quick one-off campaign.
- Events are down – Travel costs have risen so much in the last year that there is a 57% decrease in budgetary spend regarding event marketing. Take our advice… plan a webinar instead.
- Direct mail –With email marketing and Web 2.0, it was only a matter of time before direct marketing became almost extinct. With a 52% decrease is marketing spend; you may want to think twice before sending a post card.
- 41% of organizations have seen a significant lengthen in the sales cycle
- 27% of organizations have a lower average purchase per person
- 25% of organizations have a lower number of new customers per month
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Marketing Sherpa - Special $600 Savings - Increase and Nurture B-to-B Lead Generation with Proven Techniques and Strategies from the Real World
Click here for more information on this special
Event Dates:
San Francisco, October 26-28, 2008
Boston, October 5-7, 2008
This 5th Annual MarketingSherpa Summit offers:
- 19 all-new Case Studies
- Latest Research on B-to-B marketing
- Training Day for Landing Page Optimization
- Special $600 Savings brought to you by Genius
This offer ends September 30th, be sure to act fast to receive $600 in savings and information that is priceless.