Late last year LinkedIn changed its algorithm, signaling a pivot in its business strategy and taking a dramatic shift. The question is, why?

Has LinkedIn come to the realization that other social platforms are increasingly coming after business (especially small business) or is it their advertising model they covet?

The truth is, LinkedIn needs growth. Revenue growth has slowed to 9% in 2023 and 2024, driven mostly by premium subscription and talent solutions.

And new growth looks like advertising, and lots of it. The old free “networking” platform is quickly transitioning to becoming an ad platform.

The Change

Many users of the platform will tell you they saw a dramatic decrease in their engagement metrics at the end of last year. According to Richard van der Blom and Just Connecting’s Algorithm Insights Report 2025, overall organic reach has declined 50% over the last year in hope of connecting content with the right audience…quality over quantity.

LinkedIn’s AI-driven ranking systems now resemble those of platforms like Instagram and TikTok, meaning you are more likely to see content coming from less creators, and more from creators you engage and/or connect with. Compared to the past which was more balanced towards professional relevance and interest.

Just as the other platforms mentioned have created content “rabbit holes” to dive into, those same content holes are being created in a quest to drive deeper engagement. Where it was once believed that LinkedIn favored organic content creators, it’s now fully on the side of the content consumers.  For businesses, this change (unless you have a broad following) means that little of the content that you are sharing on your corporate page will make it through to your audiences organically.  In fact, according to a report, organic corporate page content showing in a LI feed has now fallen to 2% in 2024.

The Big Push for Video

What is increasing is video. Lots of it. The use of video increased by 69% in the past year according to the Algorithm report and Daniel Shapero, LinkedIn’s COO who stated that viewer time has increased by 36% year-over-year.

To continue the push to video, LinkedIn has now built a staple of 50+ B2B influencers to promote it. They’ve signed business partnerships with well-known content creators, like Steven Bartlett (The Diary of a CEO), Guy Raz (How I Built This), and Allie K. Miller (AI Business), to make more video content for the platform. Anyone want to guess why?

If you guessed ‘to sell more advertising’, you’re correct. Mr. Shapero also stated that advertising revenues saw significant growth in the quarter, and they see video as a great way to extend business reach.

What Does it Mean for Business and Paid Social?

The first question…is LinkedIn an important media channel for your business? If so, then the second question is, what is the goal? What is your expectation – do you see it as an awareness or demand generation channel?

If it is the latter, you may find the new direction frustrating. LinkedIn pushes video mostly for reach and impressions. And, as I mentioned in my last post, LinkedIn posts and promotions are very difficult to connect to business impact metrics. You may be better off investing in LinkedIn’s Sales Navigator.

If the goal is awareness, then you are in luck! Here’s what you need to do in order to align with the new direction.

• Ramp up video – Identify thought leaders who are camera ready to use for short form videos. Candidates should be subject matter leaders and not salespeople.
•  Videos should be vertical in format and under 1 min in run time.
• Shift budget from promoting posts on your LinkedIn corporate page to higher performing thought leadership ads sponsoring videos.
• Posting video should be done by the person featured and reshared by the corporate page…and hopefully, employees within your organization.
• Focus on storytelling. Personal stories perform best. Go easy on the selling.
• Link your metrics to track performance from impressions to form fill or website visit.

Will it Work?

LinkedIn says that the changes have been made in an effort to bring more of the content consumers want by mining engagement data. By doing this, it is restricting the organic reach of content creators. And that organic reach drove results, according to The Social Shepherd, 77% of B2B marketers said that organic content and engagement produced the best results.

Now those creators will be ones who will be buying the ads. The question is, can they create the quality and style of content that will fit the new advertising vehicles, like Thought Leadership ads.

Will LinkedIn influencers be effective? If you don’t have the inhouse talent to build a following you may consider “renting” one. But, a business audience is very different from a consumer audience. Will LinkedIn influencers be creditable enough to move an audience to take action?

All good questions that we’ll watch play out over time. In the short-term ad revenue will grow, but in the long run, will it adversely impact user experience? One thing is certain, you will see more sponsored content, especially from LinkedIn, on your feed.

I don’t knock LinkedIn for making the pivot. TikTok owns small business retail and Instagram is coming for corporations. Business buyers are consumers and have been programmed to prefer video on social feeds.

Users of “free” platforms also get that is a price to pay for usage, but will this pivot drive users to spend less time on it. Currently, 16% of users check in daily for an average of 1 minute and 17 seconds, according to The Social Shepherd.

Let’s also keep in mind that the platform was built and grew by catering to recruiters and job seekers. Can it balance the need for revenue growth while staying true to its original charter?

It’s a big bet and only time will tell. TikTok goes the clock…

The post LinkedIn Wants to Be the TikTok of Business: Will it Work? appeared first on Carbon Design.

In today’s economic climate, losing a customer isn’t just disappointing—it’s potentially devastating. Yet many businesses miss the early warning signals until it’s too late.
I’m experiencing this firsthand with one of our vendors right now. The relationship is deteriorating, and I can see exactly where things went wrong. Don’t let this happen to your business. Here are the critical warning signs to recognize and address immediately:

1. Service Deterioration

When service quality stumbles at the start and never recovers—or worse, begins strong but steadily declines—customers notice immediately. This often stems from internal turnover or stretched resources, but regardless of the cause, clients can sense when they’re no longer a priority. Remember: consistency is as important as quality.

2. Communication Breakdown

Poor communication compounds service issues and accelerates relationship decline. Worst of all is attempting to cover problems with transparent excuses—this damages trust far more than the original issue. The solution is straightforward but crucial: honest, proactive communication can salvage even troubled relationships.

3. Eroding Trust

If your customer begins questioning your expertise or experience, you’re facing a five-alarm fire. Once trust evaporates, recovery becomes exponentially more difficult. This warning sign demands immediate intervention—schedule a candid conversation about expectations and reset the relationship before it’s unsalvageable.

4. Subpar Deliverables

Sometimes the sales team sets impossible expectations, creating a delivery gap from day one. Other times, businesses overreach beyond their core competencies. Either way, consistently disappointing deliverables will end relationships. Focus on excelling at what you do best rather than attempting to be everything to everyone.

5. The Toxic Team Member

One underperforming team member can poison an entire customer relationship. Don’t retain problematic employees simply to fill a position—they consume disproportionate management resources while actively damaging customer relationships. Make the difficult staffing decisions before they cost you valuable clients.

6. The Preemptive Reset

Sometimes the boldest move is acknowledging when you can’t meet expectations. Proactively addressing shortcomings—even suggesting a pause in the relationship—demonstrates integrity and preserves future possibilities. A temporary revenue hit is preferable to a permanently damaged reputation.

The Path Forward

Customers don’t make switching decisions lightly. When a vendor is deeply integrated into operations or fulfills a critical function, transition costs are substantial. This reality often creates a window for relationship recovery—but only if you recognize the warning signs and act decisively.

Use this opportunity to genuinely improve your service delivery. Not only might you save the relationship, but you’ll also remove the constant weight of knowing you’re underserving a client—a burden no business owner should carry.

The post Are You About to Lose Your Customer? Warning Signs You Can’t Ignore appeared first on Carbon Design.

As previously published on 7/11/24 in MarTech

Did you know that you have your own intent data, you don’t need to buy it. If you are executing campaigns, especially in existing accounts you have data that goes much deeper than what you could buy. 

You just know where, and how, to look for it. Once you find it you will realize that what has been sold, or said, to you about “signals” isn’t exactly true. 

As marketers, we’ve been told that there is a connection between a “signal” of a prospect seeking information with their interest in your company or product.  That a response to an offer made could imply they’re “in the market to buy”

This is how Zoominfo describes intent data based on signal strength.  

• “Derived intent signals are a mix of first-party and third-party signals. These offer insights into behaviors that indicate interest in a company, such as ad engagement, web activity, topic engagement, and technology use.”

As a result, we have a tendency to think of this as a MQL. But this is where things break from reality. Again from ZoomInfo:

• “Identify interest: Purchase-intent signals help identify which companies are actively researching your solution before they fill out a form on your site or engage with your sales and marketing teams.”

This is simply not true, it’s an assumption. Let me break it down, unless you understand a buyer’s personality, which would give you real insight into their behaviors and motivations, and you are able to observe this over time, you can not assume that they are “actively searching” for what you are offering because they have ‘purchase intent.” 

We have found only a small percent (5-10%) of cases where this is true, and we have evaluated engagement and intent data across 7 industries and thousands of interactions. When you look at your own data you will find the same thing. 

Given the fact that 5% of your targeted audience is in a buying cycle at any one time this would make sense. But what is more interesting is what is in the 95% of data that you aren’t analyzing or buying. 

Here’s what you need to know about to analyzing your own engagement data

First, pull data from your sales and marketing systems at the account level. We’re often so busy executing we rarely have time to look at what has happened in the past. You’ll want to pull 12 to 18 months of engagement data based on the length of the sales cycle.

Pull data on 10 accounts to start. They could be the 10 biggest or most important (based on pipeline value) accounts. Here’s what you’ll want to look for in the data. 

• Engagement over time – this is an important metric because it’s a measure of mindshare you have with a buyer/contact. Look for how they have engaged with your outreach over the past 12 to 18 months. Is it a “burst,” for example, a C-level engages multiple times in a month or is it “consistent” – a couple of engagements over a longer period of time. 
• Engagement time – how much time did they spend with whatever was offered. Was it millisecond or seconds?  This will help you understand their level of engagement. Are they glancing at what was sent or did they dig deeper?
• Engagement frequency –  did they hit one thing multiple times in one day, and over a period of time? This may be an indicator of them forwarding information to others. And it gives you insight into who might be the “router” of information inside of the account. 
• Engagement offer – what are they engaging with, e.g. what offer or outreach. Are they looking at webinar invites, new case studies, reading the newsletter, etc. Having 10 accounts will give you real insight into what content really matters. 

This insight will help you understand if the audience is interested in your brand, solution, or just what was offered. 

Most times, it will be just the offer. But that’s a great insight because it allows you to narrow down your activities to the things that really matter to your audience. What content offers really do is they open a window for a salesperson to be viewed as valuable. It doesn’t tell you if the target is in a buying window or in a certain part of the buyer’s journey, unfortunately. 

Giving the sales organization insight into how, and what, audiences are engaging with enables them to focus on starting a relationship. Through a better understanding of why people are doing what they are doing, it gets to their real motivations. The signal becomes insight. 

For example, did they look at your upcoming webinar invite or user conference?  How many times did they look at it? How many emails related to those events did they open? Did they attend the event? If they didn’t, you now know they were interested. 

This creates an opportunity for the salesperson to offer an on demand version of the webinar or maybe a free pass to next year’s event. They’re building a relationship based on interest, not jumping to selling a solution where they have shown no real interest in pursuing. 

And that is what is in your 95% of the engagement data that doesn’t get analyzed. It tells sales who to spend their time with, and how to start a relationship, that one day could become a new customer. 

The post Why B2B Marketers Get Their Signals Crossed appeared first on Carbon Design.

By Scott Gillum
Estimated read time: 3 Minutes

Want to take your ICP’s to the next level? Try using personality based marketing to understand corporate cultures.

Here’s why. Above are 2 SaaS companies in the martech industry. Our client is selling to the same buyer in each company. But the company situations are vastly different.

The first company is growing aggressively and has a corporate culture that is full of “Dominate” personalities.

The second company is under attack and has lost significant revenue and market share during the last two years. The corporate culture is skeptical, given the prevalence of “Consciences” personalities.

So what does all this mean?

First, it impacts the positioning of the value of your product.

Second, it helps you identify the right set of the sales and marketing assets.

In company 1, you position the value of the offering to help scale growth.

You communicate that through case studies with ROIs. Given their “dominant” culture, they are heads down operators so use relevant case studies that align, as closely as possible, to their situation.

In company 2, you position the value of the product on what it can do to drive efficiency.

This is a company fighting for its survival. It needs ideas on how to improve operations. As a result, use cases showing potential cost savings (business cases) are most important.

And given the culture, use data and research to support the use/business cases which is essential for building credibility in selling to an organization like this.

Before you even speak to a buyer you can understand the environment in which they operate. It allows you to create a connection — optimism for company 1, empathy in company 2.

ICP’s are not just an acronym, they’re people. Decisions are influenced by emotions. Motivations cause decisions, and personality dictates both.

The more you understand this the higher the likelihood of getting engagement, interest, and a decision. It’s a 1, 2 punch.

The post Corporate Cultures appeared first on Carbon Design.

As previously published on 6/28/23 in MarTech

By Scott Gillum
Estimated read time: 5 Minutes

What if they are wrong? 

When responding to questions about AI replacing humans in certain roles, most ‘experts’ claim that AI will replace some jobs, but will be a much more valuable tool for augmenting human intelligence and ability. 

In all of the hype associated with this latest technology wave, an important trend is occurring across industries that could significantly change the impact of AI – the retirement of the knowledge worker.  

We need to look no further than the last wave of intelligent technology – the “internet of things” (IoT) to see the impact. 

The term ‘Internet of Things’ was coined in 1999 by  computer scientist, Kevin Ashton. While working at Procter & Gamble, Ashton proposed putting radio-frequency identification (RFID) chips on products to track them through a supply chain.

“Machines talking to machines” started rolling out in early/ mid 2010 making their way into manufacturing, precision agriculture, complex information networks, and for consumers in a new wave of wearables. 

Now, having about a decade of experience of how IoT has impacted certain industries and markets, perhaps it can give us some interesting insights on the future of AI. 

In 2010, Cisco launched the “Tomorrow Starts Here” IoT campaign at the time when communication networks were transitioning from hardware “stacks” to software development networks (SDN). 

The change meant that in order for carriers to expand their bandwidth, they no longer needed to “rip and replace ” hardware. They only needed to upgrade the software. This transition began the era of machines monitoring their performance and communicating with each other, with the promise of one day producing self healing networks.

Over this same period, network engineers who ushered in the transition from an analog to digital began retiring. These experienced knowledge workers are often being replaced by technicians who understand the monitoring tools, but not necessarily, how the network works.  

Over the last dozen years networks have grown in complexity to include cellular, and the number of connections has grown exponentially. To help manage this complexity, numerous monitoring tools have been developed and implemented. 

The people on the other end reading the alerts see the obvious, but have a difficult time interpreting the issue, or what to prioritize. The reason is, the tool knows there is an issue but is not smart enough yet to know how to fix it or if it will take care of itself. Technicians end up chasing “ghost tickets,” alerts that have resolved themselves, resulting in lost productivity. 

The same thing is repeating itself in marketing today. As one CMO told me; “I can find people who know the technologies all day long, but what I can’t find is someone who thinks strategically. Ask a marketing manager to set up the tools and run a campaign and they have no problem, but ask them to write a compelling value proposition or offer for the campaign, and they will struggle.” 

It’s easy to get sucked into the tools. AI generators are really intriguing and can do some amazing things. But based on what we have seen, the tools are not smart enough to fully deliver on their promise…yet. 

Here’s the warning from IoT – as tools become more knowledgeable, the workforce operating them is becoming less. It is leaving a knowledge gap. As that knowledge is transferred from worker to machine, we need to ask ourselves what we’ll be left with. Will there be enough experience and expertise in our workers to know if what comes out of the machine is accurate, factitious, or even dangerous. 

In a recent WSJ article, Melissa Beebe, an oncology nurse, commented on how she relies on her observation skills to make life-or-death decisions. When an alert said her patient in the oncology unit of UC Davis Medical Center had sepsis, she was sure the AI tool monitoring the patient was wrong. 

“I’ve been working with cancer patients for 15 years so I know a septic patient when I see one,” she said. “I knew this patient wasn’t septic.”

The alert correlates elevated white blood cell count with septic infection. It didn’t take into account that this particular patient had leukemia, which can cause similar blood counts. The algorithm, which was based on artificial intelligence, triggers the alert when it detects patterns that match previous patients with sepsis. 

Unfortunately, hospital rules require nurses to follow protocols when a patient is flagged for sepsis. Beebe could override the AI model, if she gets doctor approval, but faces disciplinary action if she’s wrong. It’s easy to see the danger of removing human intelligence in this case, it also illustrates the risk associated with over relying on artificial intelligence. 

AI will free us from low value tasks, and that is a good thing, but we need to redistribute that time to better developing our people, and our teams. The greatest benefit from these game changing technologies in the business to business environment will be realized when we combine equal amounts of human intelligence with machine intelligence.

The post Artificial Intelligence + Human Intelligence = Success, or is it Artificial Intelligence – Human Intelligence = Failure? appeared first on Carbon Design.

By Scott Gillum
Estimated read time: 5 Minutes

Imagine adding one of the world’s greatest artists to your creative team. Or, how about saving time and money on creative brainstorming by starting with a first draft to inspire the team. How about creating dozens of creative concepts in the same time it currently takes to develop a handful. 

Intrigued?  This is the promise of AI creative engines for B2B marketing. And with that possibility, could it also help make B2B marketing as sexy and exciting as B2C advertising?

The big story of this year will be the widespread adoption of AI creative tools. Chat GPT is just the beginning. Expect to see agencies widely embrace AI for all types of creative – not just content. Open AI’s CEO, Sam Atlman, sees the “greatest application of AI for creative use,” not in replacing blue collar jobs as many had predicted.

After experimenting with AI tools for the last couple of months, you may be interested to know that I totally agree with Sam’s statement. In fact, the image used for this blog was created using Jasper’s AI image generator.

I selected Salvador Dali as my inspiration, acrylic paint as the style, the context of creating an exciting and bold prediction for the future, out pops the image you see. There were almost endless options of possible combinations that could be used from  style to mood, and everything in between. 

Rather than these tools being  utilized to replace people, they have the potential to be incredibly useful tool sets that in a sense,  may serve as an “inspiration engine” for creatives. The potential for increase in productivity is huge!

In fact, think of the possibility of having a famous artist inspire the creative team. Instead of replacing people, you’re gaining access to an incredible talent pool that would otherwise be impossible. Talk about shaking up the world of B2B that has a tendency to lean on technical language and images of products.

The creative process is nothing if not iterative. Imagine how fast the team can play around with concepts by using AI content generators to create first, second, and third drafts that are then edited and approved by a human as final copy. 

Consider the time saved by having a designer build the exact image they want, rather than scanning Getty Images for hours on end. Oftentimes, just getting started creates a delay. Working off an AI generated first draft could accelerate the process – at least, that’s the hope. 

Now the warning. It is very easy to write long form and short form copy using AI tools, especially for digital ads, blog posts and emails. For B2B marketers, this could mean that there is an easily accessible cornucopia of content to blast out to prospects. Please use these tools judiciously. 

The assumption that more content equals more engagement is incorrect. Relevant content is closer, but it still requires insight and strategic thinking, which you will not find in AI tools. The new generation of AI generators  is very powerful, in particular, with the coming release of GPT-4 and the advancements made in language modeling. 

 The tools still require time to learn and understand how to best utilize their power and get the output you  desire. There is, however, a learning curve – it is not as simple as input and output. There are numerous variables that need to be refined or manipulated by humans in order to achieve  a quality output. The expression of “crap in, crap out” still holds true. 

Agencies and companies  who carefully consider experimenting with these new tools  will now be better off in the long run as technology continues to advance. And here’s another warning based on our learning in young marketing using technologies, they are not the goal. 

It’s not enough to only know how to use the tool, you still need to think creatively. AI generators can be great tools to aid the creative process, don’t let them become the process. 

They don’t become a threat for replacing humans if you understand how to use them properly. And no, I didn’t use an AI content engine to write this blog…or did I?

The post AI Enabled Creative Inspiration Engines for B2B appeared first on Carbon Design.

As previously published on 9/9/21 in The Drum

by Scott Gillum
Estimated read time: 5 Minutes

I went for a bike ride on a trail that I’ve traveled many times but have avoided lately because of the ‘Covid crowds’.

Taking off in a southern direction on the 10-foot-wide path, my focus was on the bike computer between the handlebars. As typical, I was locked in on my speed and spin rate. Knowing the scenic path along the Neuse River well, I put my head down and focused on my performance.

That was until I ended up in a parking lot. Trying to piece together where I was and how I got there made me realize that I didn’t notice any of my typical landmarks, which then caused a bit of a panic.

Pulling my phone out to unravel the mystery, I discovered that the focus on my performance put me two miles past my usual turnaround spot. After figuring out the situation, I decided to keep my head up on the return.

As I pedaled back, I noticed that a scenic overlook, which served as an important landmark, had been expanded and recently landscaped. The biggest surprise, which was somewhat startling, was a 100-yard clearing of trees for the expansion of a housing development not more than 30 feet off the trail.

The scenario I just described is not unlike what happens with our audiences during their workday. They step on to the 10-foot path that is their job in the morning and travel it like a well-worn trail to their usual destination.

Their computers narrow their focus and attention even more, just like my bike computer. It’s a heads-down routine that often makes them oblivious to changes all around. This creates an opportunity for us to discover new insights that enable us to redefine our position and messaging that gets their attention.

A ‘locked-in’ mindset makes us vulnerable to bias and blind spots. The longer someone has been in the job or industry, the more likely they are to believe they know ‘the path’. The brain seeking to reserve ‘brain power’ moves routine tasks to a part of the brain that requires little cognitive energy. This is the reason I ended up in the parking lot on a trail I thought I knew well.

As a result, we can bring new insights to this audience. Typically, there are three fertile areas to explore:

1. The unknown. This is the typically the hardest to discover, but the most powerful.
2. The underappreciated. What has changed that makes something known more impactful or significant?
3. The undervalued. What are they missing that may be impacting their success, their mission or their customers?

Depending on our audience’s personalities, some of these areas are more impactful than others.

For example, on the way down the path I kept my head down and focused on my performance. This very much aligns with a personality type that is career driven. We can gain their attention through messaging that alerts them to something ‘unknown’ down the path.

If that audience segment only focuses on one or two things that they believe drive their business or performance, like my speed and spin rate, what can you tell them about the importance of understanding another factor?

What is on their ‘path’ that they may be missing, like a parking lot two miles from the usual turnaround spot? What ‘unknown’ is just over the horizon that may impact their success?

On the return journey, my behavior was like another key audience that is constantly scanning the horizon for new things to share with others. They will be looking for the changes to establish ‘landmarks’ to share, like me telling a neighbor who also bikes the trail about my discovery of the construction area.

This audience segment seeks and brings new information into the organization. They’re not as focused on the ‘path’ as much as they are on what is happening around it. As a result, that typically leads them to sharing information highlighting the undervalued or underappreciated.

In both cases, the new information I gained will change my behavior and will cause me to act, which is the goal of marketing. The new construction will disrupt my biking experience. In the future I will avoid that section of the ‘path’. I also now have a new appreciation for checking the distance traveled, and occasionally picking my head up to determine where I am along the trail.

Buyers ‘lock in’ every day at work, and a message right in front of them on the well-worn path will not disrupt. They’ll ride over like a bump on the trail. To capture their attention, search off their beaten path and over the horizon. It’s what they don’t see, or realize, that matters – because no one wants to end up in a parking lot.

The post 3 Pathways To Accessing ‘Locked-In’ B2B Mindsets appeared first on Carbon Design.

by Scott Gillum
Estimated read time: 3 Minutes

Episode 5: Getting Sales to Buy Into Inbound Marketing with Special Guest, Matt Stevens

Supporting Sales with Inbound Marketing.  Matt Stevens, former head Digital Marketing at Gartner and CEB, faced a significant set of challenges in building out an inbound marketing engine that would deliver sales. Scott and Matt discuss how he was able to get the sales organization to accept Inbound Marketing as a solution to increase their productivity and make quota.

For more tips on marketing, business, and thinking differently delivered directly to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletter at www.carbondesign.com/subscribe.

The post Supporting Sales with Inbound Marketing appeared first on Carbon Design.

By Scott Gillum

“Who invited marketing to the sales pitch?” It was said in passing, and intended as a joke, but the marketing team got the point.

The comment was made in a recent messaging workshop. The head of sales expressed his frustration at the messaging being developed by marketing. His point — there was nothing different. It sounded like the same sales pitch they had been giving customers for years.

He was right, and it got worse. Marketers were sending the message to the same audience, creating even more reason for buyers to tune them out. Good marketing, as we all know, should help open doors for reps, not close them in their faces, which is what was happening.

The Situation

The company was in the ingredient business. Similar to an OEM, their ingredient went into a part that was a component of a product bought by customers. Their additive had been on the market for 10 years and as an “ingredient” had few unique selling features. Its value was defined by how it was used further down the value chain. Keep this in mind while as you continue reading.

As a regulated additive, sales reps spend much of their time helping parts manufacturers understand how, and when, to use the ingredient. Despite this knowledge, parts manufacturers were reluctant to increase its use…growing share in existing customers was difficult and converting new buyers to use it was challenging. They had “pigeon-holed” the ingredient for only certain uses.

Unlocking Value to Create Demand

Making things even more difficult, the company relied on the part manufacturer to convince the product maker to add their ingredient. The reality was, the part maker only used the ingredient when it was required by the product manufacturer. In other words, the part maker was taken orders from the product company and building to specific requirements. Once that was defined no amount of sales or marketing was going to change that fact.

This reality became the tipping point for turning our interest to the product maker and the end customer. The “ah-ha moment” struck on day two when, using the Challenger Marketing approach, the team discovered that end customers were not aware of a potential risk that could impact their business, as much, or more, than the risk they were currently addressing.

Messaging the “Value” to the Value Chain

By getting into the heads of the end customer we were able to determine that their existing mindset exposed their business to a much bigger risk than what they realized. Using secondary research, the team put together a compelling data backed story that was built on insight (the unknown risk). That insight would then be messaged in different ways depending on where the story was being told in the value chain.  

For the end customer, the story and message highlighted the value of protecting their customers and employees. The product manufacturer message to customers emphasized (with research and data) the risks and the potential business impact of inaction. The parts manufacturers received a message about the potential opportunity to double their business based on the new use of the product at the customer location.  

Shifting from “Push” to “Push and Pull”

The biggest impact was the organization shifting its strategy from “pushing” their product through the part manufacturer to creating “pull” from the demand side. Marketing shifted its research efforts to the end customer to build a “use case” highlighting how to address the formerally unknown risk. Sales, backed with a solid business case of how to double revenue, realigned its focus from the part maker to the product manufacturer.

How to Apply this Approach to Your Organization

• Schedule a two-day working session with representatives from sales, marketing, and the product group.
• Prep everyone to leave their “company hat” at the door. The session is intended to have you think like the end customer. (e.g. How they think about their business, customers, competitors…not your product, service or brand).
• Map in detail the go-to-market model.
• List the reasons why the end customer buys the product or service. What “job does it do” for their business. This will require some research about the customer’s business. Do this in the session or have it ready ahead of time. Try to understand the customers mindset. This isn’t about why they should buy it from your partner or organization.
• List the reasons why resellers or distributors buy the product from your organization (assuming you’re the manufacturer), and so forth back through the chain. Be brutally honest, for example, if it’s because it’s the “cheapest” then call it out.
• Define the value added in the GTM model at each step starting with the customer working back from right to left in the model. Typically this is done from left to right.
• Ask what are buyers missing at each step in the value chain? What should they know but don’t? This is the opportunity to develop a new insight and messaging.

Unlocking good insight isn’t easy. Coming out of the meeting you will have to continue to refine it. If you haven’t asked, and answered, “so what” at least five times you haven’t gotten to the core. If that doesn’t work, give me a call.

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The post Unlocking Growth by Learning How to Message to the Value Chain appeared first on Carbon Design.

A few weeks ago, I participated in an interview with CEB‘s new Marketing Solutions group. The focus of the article, as they described it, was to “understand what it takes to have a healthy client-agency relationship.” 

The article was published in their July monthly newsletter to members. CEB was kind enough to allow me to share an excerpt of the article with my readers (see below).

We asked agency leaders from key partners in CEB’s recently launched Marketing Solutions* effort to answer the question “What key relationship-building steps do clients most often overlook?” Below you’ll find our curated list of top overlooked steps: 

• Make Sure They “Get It”: No matter how well the agency knows your industry, there needs to be discipline on both sides, ensuring the agency invests time getting to know your business, customers, brand, and the expectations of key stakeholders. 
• Keep the Creative Spark Alive: Saying “no” too many times or being too directive can kill a client/agency relationship. You’re looking for a fresh perspective, not a passive, tactical partner. Challenge your agency to do at least one wildly strategic or creative thing for you each year, something that might even make you a bit nervous. 
• Be Constructive: Creative teams invest time in understanding a clients’ issues/objective and then brainstorm on possible solutions. Keep in mind that it’s not what you say, because agencies need your input, it’s how you say it. First be complimentary, what you like, and then give notes. 
• Don’t Miss the Magic: Too often RFP’s are focused only on qualifications and price. The real magic in an agency relationship is how well you work together. Be mindful of the way your teams will work together—and bring out the best in each other—that will really make a difference. 
• Understand Limitations: A good creative campaign can change perceptions about your brand, products, and even service capabilities. However, it is the burden of the organization to deliver on the “promise” being communicated. Be realistic of what your agency partners can and cannot solve for.
• Agency’s Ability to Help You Bust Internal Silos: Assess agency candidates for their understanding of key partner functions (like sales, service or operations) and their ability to help you bring those other partners into creating seamless customer experiences.
• Agency’s Ability to Disrupt Your Customers: Winning marketing efforts disrupt what customers think, believe, and assume about themselves (not about you). Bottom line: pressure test your agency’s empathy—the ability to go deep into how customers think about themselves and their own world.

Additionally. CEB is now providing execution support on B2B go-to-market messaging and content creation. They’ve partnered with select agencies, like gyro, to offer engagements that help create messaging and content that reflect the latest insights from CEB’s B2B buyer and best practice research If you’re interested in learning more, send me a note.

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