B2B: Know Your Roles

When providing services such as Search Marketing strategies to large B2B tech firms you will find that there are several levels of management to please (this is the case for many large corporations). With above average sales cycles and the focus to produce quality leads it's important to establish the right metrics to satisfy all levels within the company. It is also important to understand the objectives of each of the stakeholders at the B2B Company as well as their roles/responsibilities within the business. Products and solutions in B2B Tech frequently cost several thousands of dollars, causing the customer to stay within the research phase of the buying funnel for an extended period of time. As a result, success measurements for marketing programs are different for various positions within the organization therefore it is important that you define SEM vendor for a B2B tech CMO would be one who understands the B2B tech marketplace. As we progress a little bit further into the organization we notice the objectives having an increasing tactical focus rather than strategic. The Director of Web Marketing is the person in the organization given the responsibility to find tactical ways to use the web site specifically, to accomplish company goals shared by the CMO and CEO. This person is also interested in ROI but want to see that data at a more granular level. Being involved in the actual implementation of the strategies this person will need to understand factors like resource allocations and ease of implementation. The Director of Web Marketing wants a proven winner within the SEM industry so case studies and research within B2B tech are useful to them. Metrics That Matter When selecting reporting metrics it is important to remember that B2B Tech companies are often lead generation sites and have considerably long sales cycles, however this is not to rule out that these websites could also serve purposes such as customer support or communication. Another consideration is that you should define metrics that are appropriate to each level within the organization because a CEO will not necessarily want to see the same data as the Director of Web Marketing. Metrics that are important to the CEO are very high level and include things like revenue and market share. Revenue is difficult to measure through regular web analytics because it is hard to calculate revenue on a B2B lead generation site whose leads are often closed after a long sales cycle. In this case a third party solution like Siebel would be best to extract the data out of and present to the CEO. Siebel provides the ability to analyze and measure revenue/leads for both offline and online marketing efforts. Market Share also requires a third party solution and in this case I recommend research to help them make their decisions when you are making site marketing recommendations. Tag: Bookmark murdok: Manoj has been working in the search engine marketing industry since 2002. He started out as a software developer but now provides in-depth web site analysis using web analytics.

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