An Excerpt from the article, featured in Marketing News, 11/15/08 Issue:
Frightening economic times can present marketing opportunities, if you know where to look and how to spend smartly. Here's how to do more with less amidst uncertainty... Now is not the time to panic or pull back on the budget reins. It's the time to think about spending differently, and more effectively, making every dollar do the work of two or three or four.
What can b-to-b marketers do? In terms of budget, adjust the approach to how dollars are allocated. Examine the overall marketing budget and determine where existing money can be better spent by moving resources around instead of making cuts.
Since leads translate into sales, consider low-cost, alternative ways to generate solid leads. Remember metrics.
One approach to using dollars wisely in a shaky economic climate is to shift funding away from traditional marketing vehicles that may yield some brand exposure but not as many measurable results and instead invest in technological vehicles.
Vision Solutions, based in Irvine, Calif., recently conducted an evaluation of its existing programs and made a decision to reallocate spending from the traditional marketing mix to new marketing media.
Some print ad spending was rerouted to electronic advertising, and a large amount of trade show funding went to e-marketing. In fiscal year 2007, 31% was spent on event marketing, 20% on print advertising and 11% on electronic marketing. In fiscal 2009, 28% will be spent on event marketing, 10% on print advertising, and 27% on electronic marketing.
"In the past, print advertising just hasn't pulled for us, " explains Vision's Vesely, who is based in Oak Brook, Ill. "It's great for awareness, but very expensive and hard to justify, so I use a heavy dose of electronic marketing for demand generation along with pragmatic PR."
One tool that's proved to be an excellent generator of qualified leads for Vision is from Plymouth, Minn.-based Genoo LLC, a provider of integrated online marketing tools. It's software allowed Vision to easily create a microsite (www.BusinessContinuityToday.com) on its Web site that features an e-book series aimed at helping IT professionals and other executives better understand the issues and technologies that surround the resiliency and recovery of IT systems. Each chapter is written by an industry expert and posted to the site, and the e-book is free to subscribers once they register, which captures lead information.
The software that makes the microsite possible allows the company to manage mulitple points of contact successfully, inexpensively and without a need for IT intervention. The cost per lead is less than a dollar. "Most of my leads are in the $40 range; these come along at less than that, so it enables us to focus on the development of the content without worrying about the complexity or expense of multiple agencies or bringing on IT," Vesely says.
Genoo's tools can automatically mark a lead to show what chapters have been downloaded, for exampled, which then triggers Vision to compose an e-mail inviting the subscriber to read additional chapters or other parameters they set up. The tools also offer Vision measurable return. The company can determine whether a lead results in a sale.
"We can launch an e-mail campaign, nurture responses, study behavior and see who's responding, and apply different offers in e-mail blasts and do some pretty good testing," says Vesely. "I call it a low-risk, high-octane option. It's our No. 1 lead-generation program." In August 2008, for example, the e-book generated 17% of Vision's leads.
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