By Nader Ashway.

If you’re in a business that sells to other businesses, you know how difficult it can be.  Whether you’re a small business or a global enterprise, the daily challenges of communicating can add up to quarterly headaches and annual recalibrations.  But if you’re marketing as actively as you need to, then some simple rules can help.

For much of my career, I’ve been involved with businesses that need to convince other businesses to engage.  From media companies to industrial businesses to distributors and exhibitors, I’ve seen the challenges of articulating compelling messages that resonate and drive response. B-to-b marketing is indeed a unique discipline, and it has rules that its consumer counterpart cannot even imagine having to navigate.  However, that doesn’t mean that it has to be cold, or impersonal or the mother of all sins:  boring.

Here are a few do’s and don’ts when it comes to formulating business-to-business advertising or other marketing outreach:

DO talk to a PERSON
Despite what we may think about business-to-business marketing, we’re still in the persuasion business.  And it’s critical to talk directly to one person, understand his or her needs, promise him or her benefits and build a case for your product or service.  You can’t do any of that to “an organization.”

DO be willing to SELL
A fair amount of b-to-b advertising approaches will highlight some random case study about Bob, of Company Y, who increased productivity 400% while using Solution X.  No call to action, no contact name, no direct connection.  Now, in fairness, not all b-to-b advertising has to be direct response, but it should have an articulated point of view, and should clearly define what the value proposition is through some means.  It should sell in whatever way works best for your brand and in whatever way makes it easiest for your prospect.

DON’T run a competitive ad unless you can back it up with verified third party data.
Your opinion of your competition means nothing unless there’s a tangible difference to your prospect.  It’s okay to establish a clear difference between your brand and competitive offerings – but if you’re just beating your chest over a nominal difference in features, you’ll coming out looking mean.  And nobody wants to do business with a meanie.

DO use a strong CTA
Someone I admire very much constantly reminds me of the phrase “don’t ask, don’t get.”  While I’ve just said that all b-to-b advertising doesn’t have to be direct response, the best business conversations do include an appeal to interact.  So propose a demo.  Ask for the call.  Heck, ask for the business!  But do it in a way that makes the prospect’s life/business/daily challenges easier, and then ensure that at the end of the road, things get even brighter! Remember the important lesson that hope is not a strategy for success.

DON’T be afraid to be emotional
Regardless of the “professional” nature of b-to-b, every buying decision – whether it’s technology, or information or industrial steel – is an emotional process.  The CEO, or the CTO or the procurement manager of a municipality still has to “feel” good about your offering, your pricing, your service guarantee.  Don’t abandon this core principle.  It could mean the difference between getting a response or not.

DO be visually arresting whenever possible
Advertising, in my opinion, is one of the most powerful forces in global business. We have the opportunity to persuade and entertain using interrelated words and pictures.  Many executives agonize over the words, (because we all have opinions, whether or not we can articulate them,) but leave the pictures to an afterthought (because not everyone is a visual thinker or an artist.)  When you can be visually arresting (in print or moving pictures,) you can elevate the corresponding language to a level that the words alone could not have achieved.  Sure, use a chart or a graph to visually demonstrate, but make sure it’s designed to delight as much as it is to inform.

DON’T be blah
As mentioned above, it’s important to talk to a PERSON.  Unfortunately, a lot of b-to-b advertising tries to sell to the whole organization, or a department or an executive team.  But the only way to do that is to use generic, bland, SAFE language.  I’ll remind you that generic, bland and safe do not compelling advertising make.  Be excited!  Be visual.  Dramatize the benefit.  Claim the highest possible ground for your brand and then differentiate the snot out of it.  Get out of techno-speak for techno-speak’s sake…start using hard-hitting language that proves you understand the prospect’s challenges, proves your product or service can meet and exceed those challenges, and proves that choosing you will make that singular prospect feel empowered, excited and engaged.

Nader Ashway runs a small New York City agency called The Ashway Group and he is very interested in this whole marketing thingy:  how it works, how companies use it, (and sometimes misuse it,) and how we can all do the thingy better.  He hopes you enjoy, and if you do, please go to marketingthingy.com

“Transformation: Now & Next” was the theme of the BMA’s Go and Grow event in New York late last month. Speakers at the conference tackled many facets of the transformations swirling throughout B2B marketing, ranging from changes in customer engagement to the rise of “Big Data.” How B2B marketers can harness these transformations is likely to effect whether they can command larger budgets and have a bigger impact on the goals of their organizations.

The conference, which took place at The New York Academy of Sciences, drew more than 250 people from the marketing, advertising and media sectors.

One consensus among the various presenters at the conference: B2B marketers need to toss out their old playbook and establish a new one for the digital age, focusing on data, marketing services and social media channels.

Katharyn White, VP, marketing, global business services at IBM Corp, who moderated a panel on customer engagement, referred to IBM’s 2011 Global CMO Study.

The study, which took the pulse of more than 1,700 CMOs, “found four things that we believe are most important to our profession and that we’re the least prepared for,” White said. The four items are: data explosion, social media, growth of channel and device choices and shifting consumer demographics.

Transformations: Now & Next featured a panel discussion on customer engagement. From left to right, Katharyn White, VP of marketing and global business services at IBM Corp.; Sandra Zoratti, VP of marketing, executive briefings and education at Ricoh; Roberto Masiero, CTO/VP of ADP and Tim Suther, chief marketing and strategy officer at Acxiom. PHOTO CREDIT: DOUG GOODMAN

White said the fulcrum for the four elements is customer engagement. “Each of us as an organization need to understand our customer as an individual,” she said. “Our expectations are not based on our best experience in an industry, but our best experience. So we come with those expectations in the B2B world as well.”

With data playing an increasingly pivotal role in understanding each individual customer B2B marketers need to develop closer relationships with their IT counterparts, White said.

“What data do we have and what data do we need? How will we blend that internal and external data, the structured and unstructured, the real-time [data], the ability to listen, to really impact change, to better understand that individual,” she said.

Sandra Zoratti, VP, marketing, executive briefings and education for copier company Ricoh, stressed that B2B marketers could learn from B2C companies when it comes to customer engagement.

“I look at companies like Starbucks and American Express who are designing their brand and culture by having the conversations with customers who actually help design the products and the brand,” said Zorrati, who is the co-author of “Precision Marketing” (Kogan Page). “Those companies are creating ecosystems that involve partners and their customers.”

Taking a page from the consumer crowd, Ricoh has started to develop “small, high-touch events” that are established by using the company’s social conversations and tapping into external data.

“We analyze that data and then touch those customers by hosting events, where we can actually have a conversation and ask them to help design what we’re providing as solutions,” she said.

Tim Suther, chief marketing and strategy officer at technology company Acxiom, said that the most salient change in customer engagement has been the shift in power from brands to customers.

“Your product, its price, its availability, satisfaction with what people say about, is readily available and that has changed the dimensions in terms of the relationships between brands and customers,” he said. “The effects of that have been, frankly, kind of devastating.”

He added that, despite the decline in customer loyalty, many brands have yet to tap into the full potential of data. “And this in an era where we can reach out and touch consumers in more ways than we ever could before, so why is that?”

Part of the problem, he said, is alignment. “Often times, companies get caught up in the rapture of ‘customer love, of course we love our customers,’” he said. “But, you’ll find that it isn’t always consistent with how the organization makes money.”

He added: “There are other ways to make money other than loving your customers. I know that sounds odd for a marketer to say that. But you can always have the cheapest price, you can be everywhere, you can have the best mousetrap. Organizations often run into trouble when they’re not authentic with the way they set out to make money.”

By Wendy Marx.

If you haven’t noticed, it’s a new world today for B2B marketers who have no choice but to reinvent themselves and their organizations. That was the resounding theme of a recent BMA (Business Marketing Association )-NYC event titled Transformation: Now & Next Event, a jam-packed, high-energy conference that in itself demonstrated the new vibrancy in B2B marketing.

As Eduardo Conrado, CMO of Motrola Solutions, put it to the BMA-NYC audience: “B2B marketing is evolving so fast there are no textbooks out there to help us.”

The very pace of change, however, is not making the life of the CMO easy. A global IBM study of more than 1,700 CMOs published in October 2011 laid out the issues in bold terms: CMOs have failed to keep up with the changes in the marketing environment, especially with the explosion in data, social media and channel and device choices along with changing consumer demographics.

Given the new demands, how can B2B marketers succeed?

The BMA-NYC speakers suggested 4 steps B2B marketers can take to meet today’s challenges:

• Focus on the customer. While that might sound like a cliché, the fact is that many companies are not very good at doing so. The ones, however, that get it, have an edge. Or as Katharyn White, chief marketing officer of IBM Global Services, said, “Those companies that understand the customer are outperforming their peers.” Tim Suther, CMO and chief strategy officer at Acxiom, underscored the need: “The shift in power from brands to customers is the biggest change; it’s fueled by enormous amounts of information. It’s changed the relationship between brands and customers.”

• Move from promotion to education. At many B2B companies that means becoming a content marketer. “Banners have to be replaced by more native content,” said Linda Boff, global executive director, digital, advertising and design, at General Electric, adding that “transformation for GE has meant becoming more of a content marketer.”

• Redefine the definition of expert. For example, at Forbes.com, an “expert” can be a journalist, an academic, or a brand. The consumer, according to Lewis DVorkin, chief product officer at Forbes, doesn’t care who is providing the information as long as contributors are transparent and provide great information. At LinkedIn, it means a shift from people simply connecting with other people to people connecting with insights. “Are we getting the right information to people to make them more effective?” asked Daniel Roth, executive editor of LinkedIn. LinkedIn, according to Roth, has two million company pages, and 70 percent of the people following companies expect to get insights.

Connect emotionally with your advertising. It’s not enough in your advertising to lay out the facts. You need to make an emotional connection, according to John Patroulis, chief creative officer at BBH. Ultimately, that’s what engages your audience.

How are you reinvigorating your B2B marketing? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Wendy Marx is President of Marx Communications, marxcommunications.com, an award-winning B2B Public Relations agency known for turning companies and executives into thought leaders. Follow her on Twitter @wendymarx.

Watch this video of Eduardo Conrado, BMA’s Chairman, for the benefits of joining the Business Marketing Association both professionally and personally.

Business Marketing Association of New York Celebrated the 30^th Annual ACE Awards, Recognize the Best in Business-to-Business Creative.

Best of Show Awarded to Digitas for American Express “Small Business Saturday”

NEW YORK, April 19, 2012 – The Business Marketing Association of New York’s 30^th Annual ACE awards presentation, held last night at the Edison Ballroom in New York City, honored the year’s top business to business (B2B) creative campaigns and executions. The premier showcase for creative excellence in business marketing, the ACE Awards was bestowed on agencies of all sizes, as well as top corporations from around the world including places as far as Taiwan.

The awards were co-presented by Danny Gregory Managing partners Executive Creative director of McGarry Bowen and Nicola Morris VP Corporate Strategy VERIZON Business. The keynote speaker for the evening was John Seifert Chairman and CEO OGILVY & MATHER North America.

The coveted “Best of show” award went to DIGITAS for it American Express OPEN Small Business Saturday campaign.

Doremus New York and San Francisco won 5 first place awards and 12 awards overall for Corning Glass.  SteinBrand+Partners won 13 first place awards for a variety of companies. OgilvyOne Taiwan won first place for Direct Marketing- Single Mailer and The Barbarian group won 1^st Place in Integrated Marketing Campaign $250,000 -$1mil budget for General Electric. Best print campaign $250,000 and over was won by OGILVY & MATHER for IBM. JPMorgan won awards for Collateral Single Brochure and Content Marketing, Doremus won 1^st place in Video for “Corning A Day Made of Glass. Frog Design won 1^st place in Website –Corporate Brand under $500,000 for Bloomberg. Mobium of Chicago, Campbell-Ewald of  and Bader-Rutter of Wisconsin also won multiple first place awards.

The ACE Awards are the preeminent forum for showcasing and honoring the best

B2B work in the industry. In an increasingly competitive and ever-evolving environment, innovation and creativity go hand in hand for any successful marketing endeavor and we are honored to acknowledge the best.”, said Ned Clausen, BMANY Executive Director. Thanks to our 18 judges, our sponsors for helping to make the 30^th Annual ACE Awards a great success.

This year’s Ace Awards had 56 categories ranging across the spectrum of marketing communications including, Broadcast TV, Broadcast Radio, Integrated Marketing Campaigns, Public relations, , direct marketing, event marketing logo design, mobile marketing, taglines, video and website design.

Sponsors for the 2012 ACE Awards were LINKEDIN, PALLADIN and VERIZON (venue and trophies), and the SteinBrand+Partners for creating the ACE Awards marketing campaign and promotional support by BtoB Magazine, Forbes and The Wall street Journal.

During the week of April 23 the Micro Site for the ACE Awards Ceremony Winners will be up for all to see.

About the ACE Awards

The Business Marketing Association of New York’s Annual ACE Awards are the premier business-to-business marketing awards competition recognizing the year’s top creative campaigns and executions on a global basis, the inspired talent who conceived them and the agencies and clients who have successfully elevated brand and driven demand. For more than 30 years the BMANY has bought together the industry’s creative elite in what The NY Time sad columnist Stuart Elliot hailed as “one of the industry’s best creative awards”.

About BMA of New York

The BMA of New York is a local chapter of the International Business Marketing Associatio, whose mission is to serve the professional development needs of those involved in the business-to-business marketing continuum. The New York Chapter is committed to providing relevant and timely programming that serves the needs of the business marketing professionals. Find out more about our history, our goals, educational opportunities and events at ww.bmanyc.or

By Nader Ashway.

We’ve all heard a lot about brand guidelines, and how vital they are to the marketing success of your company.  And in most cases, this is quite true.  A strong brand structure can provide an incredible level of connective tissue between your company’s product or service and the consumers you have and, most importantly, those you hope to reach.

And while a lot of care and thought goes into brand development and brand representation, in some cases, we can overdo it.

Before we get into that, let’s make sure we’re clear on what brand guidelines are.  Many companies entrust their brands to experts to develop guidelines as to how the brand behaves, what it says, what it does, (in some cases what the company produces,) and very importantly, how that brand is represented visually and verbally across the landscape of media in which it may appear.

These guidelines, especially the visual and verbal ones, can get very specific and very detailed regarding how the brand (and the logo, or taglines or images) is reproduced and presented for public consumption.  If you’ve never seen a brand guideline handbook, it’s a cross between a diary of a madman and the exactitude of an aerospace engineer’s drawing book.  In some cases, they can be hundreds of pages long, and stipulate everything from specific color swatches to negative space to how NOT to reproduce the various design elements.

Ultimately, it’s a usage document, in that it instructs anyone responsible for pushing the brand out into the world exactly how the brand should be represented.  (This is true even if the brand is a person!)  All in the name of the venerable core objective:  consistency of perception.

However, this control issue can sometimes become, well, a control issue.  In many instances in my work with brands that my firm hasn’t created, we’ve been saddled with guidelines that have actually gotten in the way of – even obstructed – clear and consistent communications.

In one instance, we were working with a company who (inexplicably) had an extremely long, multi-word URL.  When creating a Facebook application for this brand (targeted to suburban soccer moms, by the way,) we suggested using capital letters to help guide the reader along.  Imagine this url:  thecompanyyoushouldvisitinyourtown.com.  We suggested TheCompanyYouShouldVisitInYourTown.com for clarity.  Our client came back and said “our brand guidelines instruct us to NOT use capital letters in the URL.”  When we reminded them that it was simply easier to read with the caps, (especially online in about 10pt type,) they pushed back.  Hard.  The brand guidelines were scripture, and were not to be messed with.

In another instance, we were working with an important media company whose brand is very well recognized in the consumer marketplace.  In designing a microsite that demanded a rich color background, (ironically, for consistency with the print campaign,) we opted to knock out (make white) their logo, just as we had done in print. Knocking out was acceptable according to their brand guidelines, but not in digital applications.  So it was okay to trust printers to knock out the logo using ink, but not okay to use never-bleed pixels for the same brand representation.  Strange.

The reason I highlight these examples is because they were actually attempts to arrive at either clear(er) or more consistent communications between the brands and their intended audiences.  We were (we always are) striving to make it easier for the consumer to interact with the company, not the other way around.  But the brand guidelines were so stringent, these simplified communications were overlooked for standards that could not possibly have recognized these interactive objectives.

Don’t get me wrong – there ARE guidelines that are un-crossable. Stretching or tilting the logo is a no-no. Swapping out colors is a no-no-no.  Going off script is a no-no-no-no.  Inserting a new tagline is a triple-dog-quadruple-no-no. We’re clear that some lines shouldn’t be crossed.

Because it is important to have a voice.  It is important to have the brand represented consistently across all touch points.  But when adhering to your brand guidelines, we also have to consider: would it HURT the brand if you drop-capped a URL?  Would it HURT the brand if you didn’t honor the standards to the letter?  If crossing the line a little means engaging the consumer a little more, then maybe it’s time to consider a little tiny brand rebellion.

Go to marketingthingy.wordpress.com to see more articles by Nader Ashway.

New York—Telecommunications company Sprint Nextel Corp. was recognized today by the Business Marketing Association of New York City as its Communicator of the Year, in recognition of its “Biz 360” marketing campaign aimed at small and midsize businesses. Click here to see photos of the event.

“It encompassed the age-old balance of heart, science and media,” said Andrea Molette, director-media and corporate marketing at Sprint Nextel, of “Biz 360.” “The campaign tries to understand all the relevant ways to connect with this target market, develop a creative plan with creativity and then execute it.”

Sprint debuted Biz 360 in August as a tailored communications package featuring phones, applications and support directed at small businesses. Molette also recognized Sprint’s agency, Mindshare, New York, which developed the Biz 360 effort.

“It’s about treating our business owners with the same rigor as consumers,” Molette said. “It’s all about connections—asking what the business owner needs and how wireless communications enhances their commerce.”

“BMA’s Communicator of the Year award is given in recognition of outstanding b2b marketing communication that advances a general appreciation of the power and contribution of b2b marketing today,” BMA President Ned Clausen said.