The world has changed in the last two years, and the one thing everyone agrees on is that it’s not going back to how it was anytime soon. In a paper only just published, McKinsey has called it “The New Normal” – a fundamentally different business environment.

This watershed moment has left many B2B marketers high and dry, so we’ve decided to take an in-depth look at what has really happened, what the new world order means for marketers, and what you should be doing about it. Over the coming months, this blog will feature 5 major articles, with accompanying downloads, to help you to adapt to this brave new world:

1. What happened? What’s wrong with what we used to do? Why isn’t it working any more? There’s a growing call for a new style of marketing, and the impetus to make a change for good, but where’s this coming from?
2. What’s still working in this post-watershed marketing environment? Which marketing models and techniques are bearing fruit? From provocation propositions to adaptive campaigning models, we separate the babies from the bathwater.
3. What’s new? A look at the trends that will shape our industry over the coming year. We’ll be looking at the best B2B examples out there and taking inspiration from some unexpected places.
4. Working with sales. In the post-watershed world, a closer relationship with sales is imperative. How can you integrate with them, solve the data challenges and work out lead targets? We investigate the rise and rise of account-based marketing and bid marketing techniques.
5. Structuring to deliver it. Finally we take a look at how B2B marketing departments can gear up to deliver in a post-watershed world. What will the B2B marketing department of the future look like and what can you do now to get a head start?

Sign up now via RSS or email (top right hand side of this blog) to receive these articles as soon as they are published. If there’s anything you’d like to see covered in this Watershed Series then let me know by adding a comment underneath this post.

You’re an IT Director in financial services. Or the Head of e-Delivery in the public sector. From our decision-maker research, we know that you receive around 30 supplier marketing emails every day (without even considering more regular spam emails) – and probably find barely a quarter of these to be relevant.

It’s a sign of email’s growing popularity or even over-use in isolation from other activities (as a more ‘measureable’ and ‘cost-effective’ digital channel) and of some common mistakes being made in how it is used.

We recently reviewed a year’s worth of emails sent out as part of wider relationship, lead generation or thought leadership programmes. The key conclusions are presented – and illustrated with examples – in a paper available to download here.

What’s in the document?
- 10 tips to consider at the tactical level. If you believe that you are communicating with the right people about something that should be important to them, but are failing to see the results you need, then the chances are that these tips will help. Issues in email execution – like when to go for beautifully designed html versus personal-looking text – are absolutely critical.
- And stepping away from the tactical, the document also puts a narrative around the whole email story – its place in wider programmes, what the audience likes and dislikes, considerations around testing, and the need for exceptional content.

For me, the single most important advice the document has is about creating simple steps for the audience.

No-one ever signed an outsourcing contract after reading an email – so rather than trying to lay out the complete case for the deal, the email has to have a clear and realistic action it asks the reader to take. This could be nothing more complex than a compelling case for why they should click through to read a document that positions you as a thought leader on the subject. Or it could make a proposition for them to arrange a first workshop with you (something more personal than a ‘healthcheck’ offer – do you have a recent business case from a deal with a similar client? Have you got research that you could share with them?).

This idea of creating emails with a realistic call to action (one you would feel comfortable writing in a personal email to someone you wanted to meet) applies to both planning and execution of email programmes. At the planning stage, it means mapping out the call to action, audience journey and key messages. And when it comes to execution, it is why emails are potentially the very hardest job facing any copywriter today. Hopefully this document goes some way to solving the challenge.

We interact with a lot of B2B IT marketing departments at The Marketing Practice. And we’ve noticed that the very best ones have a number of things in common. Here they are, and over the next few months, will be researching and testing this theory by interviewing the best in the business, to see if it holds water. It will then form the basis of an e-book available from this blog.

Please add your comments from your own experiences, if you’ve seen great marketing departments – what do they do that makes them great? Which areas are common amongst them? Do you agree with this list, or are there other areas that need to be included?

1. Sales alignment
a. Lead generation engine and lead generation optimisation focus
b. Strong joint data strategy between sales and marketing
c. Co-ordinated bid support & account-based activity
d. A genuine customer intimacy
e. Excellent product/service knowledge throughout both teams
f. Campaigns that push leads along at all funnel stages

2. Flagship programmes
a. Compelling programmes that people can march behind the banner of. Each builds and develops from the next
b. Programmes with strategic impact and tactical value – that get done on time, every time
c. Visionary, engaging, gives confidence to the business, customers and prospects
d. Paints a picture of the future

3. Insider status
a. Know the customer & their market(s) intimately and can wield the power that knowledge brings
b. Have detailed end-customer knowledge – can feed back and proliferate changing market needs
c. Thought-leadership around making it better for the customer (ie know what they want psychologically to do their job better)

4. CEO stance
a. Runs marketing department in same way best businesses are run
b. Marketing A players, a blend of staff, contractors, agencies that work in harmony rather than competition- a flexible resource model – plus all playing to their strengths
c. Has a network of peers within the industry
d. Strong ROMI focus – an uses ‘investment’ rather than a ‘spend’ model