birddog

Building Social Influence in B2B Marketing

There seem to be 2 notable benefits to growing social influence. People pay you to talk, and they give you free shit. Both offer a degree of comfort for the future.

I seem to have done a lot of talking in the last few years. Talking, writing books, talking about the writing and then talking some more. I’ve talked about Waterloo Bridge and pastries a fair amount in that time, but mainly I’ve been advocating the new social imperative for B2B brands in a rapidly changing digital economy. I’m not the first of course and hopefully won’t be the last. Only recently the very delightful Jo Porritt at Crowd Media drew my attention to The Cluetrain Manifesto which said pretty much everything I believe in – 12 years ago.

Yet while the written word holds meaning, the spoken word appears to hold value. It’s a reflection of our increasing video consumption in the digital age that I’m being asked to wave my arms, shout and stamp my feet in front of a live audience. My ‘performance’ is recorded and distributed to a wider audience internally and/or externally. Some people, including my clients, recoil from video, “Ooooh, no, I’d never do that. I’d be terrified… you never know who might see it… does my bum look big in this…?” etc.

I see it as an opportunity. I can reach many instead of the few. I can communicate the passion and personality of the brand and maybe, just maybe, if the message is ‘real’ it won’t feel like I’m banging my head against a brick B2B wall quite so much. Oh, and I get paid, which is nice. I admit that wearing makeup is still a bit of a challenge…

The free shit is nice too. Because of my growing ‘social influence’, I’m apparently the right kind of guy to talk about stuff. I deliberately avoided the word ‘promote’ there, because I don’t get paid for it. If someone sends me crap, I put it in the trash and tell the world it’s crap. If it’s something relevant to me or my audience and it’s good – I want to tell the world. Some digital ‘gurus’ are constructing a whole career around that very model. In my mind however, it’s just human nature. We talk about stuff – good and bad – and people listen, or don’t.

Someone sent me an email the other day. It might have been relevant, I don’t know because I trashed it. I simply don’t read cold emails anymore. By contrast, someone at Trend Micro visited me to deliver, explain and install a product called SafeSync that he wanted my opinion on. I’m glad he did, because it’s bloody brilliant. SafeSync copies all your computer files to the cloud, automatically distributes them to all your mobile devices, secures them as back-up and keeps them all in Sync. It’s ridiculously easy to use, quicker than Dropbox and cheap as chips. Yes, there’s still iCloud, but maybe Apple shouldn’t rule the world completely. SafeSync is a very good product. There is an SMB offering that suits me just fine so I’ll be rolling it out across the business. The ‘free trial’ model is as old as the hills, but the guy at Trend specifically selected me as an ‘influencer’. He wanted me to write about the product, not simply buy it. Double whammy then – I’m writing about it and buying it.

And that is how business will proliferate in the social economy. People connected to networks and networks connected to other networks. The people make the decisions and their communities hold influence. Businesses can serve up their offerings, but they are no longer the sole authority. Business brands would do well to remember their audience – how to connect to it and how it operates in a connected world. Oh, and carry an eyeliner. Always carry your eyeliner.

Scot McKee
Managing Director
Birddog Ltd.
+44 20 7323 6666
Twitter: @ScotMcKee
LinkedIn: http://uk.linkedin.com/in/scotmckee
Book: http://amzn.to/mOUKOH

Turdy Brown Trousers – B2B Marketing Conference 2011

I ponced around on stage giving a keynote presentation at the annual B2B Marketing conference recently. I swung my arms around and splattered the front row with spittle and grew increasingly red in the face as I tried to convince congregated worthies of the need to accelerate adoption of digital and social marketing practices. I can’t be certain, but based on the cheering, a certain amount of swooning and riotous applause, I’m calling it a win.

I called the presentation, ‘Turdy Brown Trousers’. It was perhaps a little unconventional. But then again, the whole point was to demonstrate that conservative and traditional communications in B2B are failing, while the opportunities for digital and social development are huge. Doing nothing will surely be the death of many business brands. Hopefully, I gave the audience several reasons to consider the state of their trousers.

This audience has been warned before that it needs to change policies and practices. It’s the speed of change (or lack of it) that is the current cause for concern. I wanted to demonstrate that the social opportunity was… ‘real’. Other presentations on the day focussed on what has happened in the past. Or they asked the audience to participate in the present. My interest was the future potential for the audience. It was a high risk strategy – not something that B2B is exactly famous for, but hey, someone’s got to do it…

So I announced on stage that although I had a captive audience, my real interest was the extended B2B audience outside of the room – i.e. The rest of the B2B world. For my business message to carry any real weight I had to reach more interested people – and I was going to do it, live, as I gave my presentation. I unsheathed my iPhone and told the crowd I was going to take its picture and tweet it.

At the end of my 15 or 20 minute presentation, we’d have a look at how many people I’d been able to virtually draw into the room and we’d track progress thereafter. They shuffled nervously in their seats. Nevertheless, on the count of three I made them all wave their arms in the air and duly tweeted the photo.

15 minutes later, when I’d quite finished reigning brimstone down upon the audience, I asked the Editor of B2B Marketing to reveal how many people had viewed the photo. “Um… it’s 25,” he said. I was a little disappointed – I was hoping for 100. Then, a voice from the back of the auditorium shouted, “Hit the refresh button!” Joel duly refreshed his screen and said, “Oh yes, sorry, it’s 289.”

In 15 minutes, one photo put more engaged people in the room than the entire marketing activity to promote the conference. By the end of the day, the number of views had reached over 600. Less than a week later the views were over 1,000. The figures are still climbing if you’d like to check.

The market has changed. Your B2B social audience is real, engaged, fast, responsive and growing. I needn’t have worried about the risk of tweeting that photo. What was there to lose? Nothing – I believe in the crowd. By contrast, the brands that continue to ‘wait and see’ risk losing everything.

Below, you’ll find the slide deck and accompanying live audio recording from my presentation. Enjoy.

Turdy Brown Trousers | Scot Mckee | B2B Marketing Conference by Birddogb2b

Scot McKee
Managing Director
Birddog Ltd.
+44 20 7323 6666
Twitter: @ScotMcKee
LinkedIn: http://uk.linkedin.com/in/scotmckee
Book: http://amzn.to/mOUKOH

Risk-Averse B2B Brands

I met an old school friend for frothy coffee the other day. He’d been promoted to “Global Director of Risk for Bleedin’ Everything”. I asked him what, for the feeble minded, that actually meant. He said he was, “Tasked with assessing and reporting on the actual and perceived risks to the business of internal and external influences.” My, my, I thought. That’s heavy. So I asked him to give me an example. He said, “Well, it could be assessing the risk of anything from the potential flooding of one of our facilities in the Philippines, to hiring you.”

Naturally, I gave the Philippines the bum’s rush and asked him to explain why I might be a risk to his global multi-billion dollar enterprise. Lil’ ol’ me? Surely not. He said that in a recent meeting my name had been mentioned and, to his surprise (and secret delight I’m sure), everyone at the table had not only heard of me, but had a very firm opinion as to my suitability for the role of brand guardian to their business. “You’re a bit like Marmite,” he said. “Some thought you were a loose cannon, some thought you were full of shit and some thought you were a heaven-sent genius.”

I was of course flattered to be the subject of such polarity of opinion, but I would be lying to suggest that the perceived ‘risk’ associated to my engagement didn’t leave with a little bit of sick in my mouth. Had I gone too far? Were my opinions too extreme? Was my pathological need to drive creative change in B2B marketing limiting business opportunities? In short, was I just too risky to engage?

We discussed the matter of risk for a while. My friend pointed out that ‘vanilla’ is the nation’s favourite flavour of ice-cream and that ‘beige’ is the most popular colour. His role was to assess and reduce risk – his business decisions were made based on ‘least impact’ and I would do well to remember that.

“And that…,” I told him, “…is why we can never work together.” He looked a little upset – as if I should bow to the commercial imperative of corporate engagement and offer assurances of conformity.

“Low-risk, low-impact brands are everywhere. They’re the majority.” I said. “There are Marketing Directors who wrap their brands in a beige blanket and tuck them up safely every night. There are agencies that prosper on their perennial ability to deliver ‘meh’. Most of their brands will survive and even grow simply by being… benign. But where’s the satisfaction in that? Where’s the benefit? How does that make a difference?”

On my deathbed, and on principal, I’d like to think that my time had been spent searching for maximum impact (even if it’s not always achieved, or achievable). The prospect of a life spent in B2B marketing being ‘average’ is too depressing to contemplate. Every business brand should start with truly radical aspirations. You can always soften the position later, but if you start from a position of safety, when will you ever take the risk needed to make a real difference? So ‘Marmite’ is fine with me. As long as there is just one B2B brand seeking change, we’re in business.

And on that note, the heaven-sent genius wiped the milk-froth moustache from his top lip and left. Principles upheld. And still full of shit.

Scot McKee
Managing Director
Birddog Ltd.
+44 20 7323 6666
Twitter: @ScotMcKee
LinkedIn: http://uk.linkedin.com/in/scotmckee
Book: http://amzn.to/mOUKOH

The Yellow Lines | B2B Marketing Awards Finalist 2011 | Best use of Social Media

Social Media Campaign for Cobalt Telephone Technologies | RingGo

Pitching Digital – The Line in the Sand

I have had cause to proposalate in the last few months. Proposalation is the line that, as an agency of repute, one draws just before dropping one’s drawers and taking it up the Mohave Desert. The ‘before’ part is an important distinction. Pitching is bullying in my mind and so it simply won’t compute. I hate dedicating the resources of the agency for no reward – we have clients who pay for such a service and there isn’t a credible reason I can give those clients for making them pay, and yet give others the same service for free, or ‘speculatively’, or for the ‘potential opportunity’, or however the hell you try to justify it. It’s simply unacceptable.

So, now that that’s clear, what have we got left? Well on the basis that the prospective client has equally staunch views on ‘sampling the merchandise’ and requires more than a lifetime of credentials, case studies, awards and testimonials because, you know, what if overnight you suddenly start delivering shit…? Well, that’s where the agency can proposalate – write a proposal, show an ankle, but whatever happens, keep the drawers firmly in place.

And so I have proposalated for the last few months – with mixed results. On the plus side, almost every client proposal has been approved and progressed towards something wonderful. On the down side, almost every prospect proposal has met with anxiety, procrastination and a nervous twitch.

I’ve learnt a few things in the last few months. The first, and probably the most important, is that in a difficult economic climate and in a rapidly evolving digital space, the trust of an existing client is far more valuable than the potential riches of an uncertain prospect. There are brands that are willing to embrace digital change and those that would prefer to produce the same old, same old in the vain hope that it might work this time (even if it didn’t work last time). No matter how compelling the proposal, nothing changes the basic fear of the unknown.

The digital space for B2B brands is currently one of chance – the chance to change, to do things differently, to evolve. The vast majority of the work that I am currently proposing simply hasn’t been done before. There are no case studies, there are no measures or benchmarks. That’s quite a hard sell for the traditional B2B prospect. Actually, it’s pretty difficult for an existing client, but the at least client has trust. The measures are therefore not what has been achieved for other clients, but ‘how much do you trust me?’ We’ve never done it, you’ve never done it, no one’s ever done it… but it’s cool isn’t it? Trust me. Spend some money on it and let’s see what happens… Like I said, a hard sell.

So I’ve learnt that I’m wasting my time speculating on prospect proposals. Digital brand strategy and delivery is too risky for the majority. Those closest to accepting and embracing change are already our clients so it makes sense to focus on them. They will become the case studies that the other laggards eventually follow.

It makes no sense to continue to educate the market in the art of the possible when the market makes little tangible investment in that process of evolution. They’re interested in it alright – it’s the interest that simulates the proposal in the first place. They’re even excited by the potential – “incredible… that’s amazing… can we really do that…?” Well, actually, no, you can’t, because you’re not prepared to pay for it and I’m getting tired of telling you while you jack-off in the corner.

That leaves a few, a happy few, a band of brothers. Whichever way I look at it, it’s still a hard sell. And so I’m going to stop proposalating. I have better things to do. For a start, I have some needles in a haystack to find. They’re out there, but I’m no longer going to try to write a proposal to find and convince them. Once they’ve narrowed their options, they’ll find me. We should all draw a line in the sand. Not in the Mohave Desert though.

Scot McKee
Managing Director
Birddog Ltd.
+44 (0)20 7323 6666

Follow Scot on Twitter

31/01/2011
Additional/Related information: Fast Company – The Future of Advertising