content marketing


Content Planning is Easy, If…

‘It’s hard coming up with content ideas.’  That’s a common refrain from businesses who get all fired up about content marketing and then falter.  Sound familiar? It’s a bigger problem than just marketing communications. It probably means there are some fundamental issues in your business you need to deal with urgently. ‘We could do something …

Marketing Messages and Persuasive Language – All About Perspective

Marketing messages are elusive so-and-so’s. You want to put your business out there, but you also want to draw the right people in. You want to engage and you need to persuade. How to find the right balance? And how do you find the right language? Faced with the dilemma, faint-hearted B2B marketers revert to …

Know Your Buyers, Embrace Uncertainty and Stop Playing at B2B Marketing

How much do we know about our buyers? In the world of B2B marketing every buyer has a different journey. The length and complexity of that journey will have some kind of proportional relationship with the cost and complexity of your product or service. This is where I should really invent a scientific-looking formula and …

Profitability and Marketing Strategy – Are They Aligned?

How will your business be earning the most profit – not revenue – in three years’ time? What products or services will be your biggest income earners and who’ll be buying them? Not easy questions. Without a crystal ball you can’t know the answers. But you should have working assumptions about relative future profitability – …

Why Demand Generation Is a Dangerous Myth

Demand generation seems to be the hot topic for B2B marketing. Here’s why I think it’s a misleading and dangerous myth to pin your business growth hopes on (and what you should focus on instead). In case you’re not familiar, demand generation is the belief that a content-driven approach can ‘create’ demand for your products …

Is Educational Content Worth the Effort?

I was involved in a fascinating discussion around the role of educational content in marketing on LinkedIn recently. The poster’s view was that people won’t be researching specific products or solutions until they’re actively in the market. I agree with this. It’s hardly controversial. People won’t want to hear about solutions if they don’t know …