B2B Marketing Blog

I’m sure avid readers of this blog are well and truly aware of what marketing is all about.  I’m sure a lot of you live it and breathe it on a daily basis.  However, what I want to delve into today are business activities that many people don’t consider to be marketing, but are in fact crucial to your companies marketing success.

Marketing is something that happens in every transaction, communication, and action.  That customer support call, that’s marketing.  That invoice you just sent out, that’s marketing.  That email to a supplier, also marketing.  And yes, the way employees talk about your company to their family and friends is marketing.  Marketing is your company’s actions in their entirety, its the sum of everything that you do.

So the next time you’re dreaming about what to sponsor, how to get your message out, or feature your service, perhaps the best thing to do is to look inward and make sure you’re doing all the little things right.  A great product or service is itself the best marketing of all.

Are you really listening to your customers? Quite often we’re so busy with the day-to-day work around our businesses that we don’t stop to really take in what our customers are actually telling us. More often than not we’re listening with a bias towards our current issues. This is completely natural. However, to be Customer Centric; throw aside your personal thoughts, issues, desires and really listen to what your customer is saying. Be fully focused on their agenda. Questions to ask yourself; What is their life like? What are their challenges? What helps make them succeed? What are they really telling you about your product or service?

You’ll be amazed by the depth of understanding you’ll get. You will more clearly see the value your product or service is bringing to someone. You may even start to see patterns emerge in a particular subset of customers, perhaps even in a whole vertical market space. You may just find that competitive edge you’re looking for. Strangely enough, all you had to do was to listen, well, really listen.

Listening is a key skill for everyone in the organization. It is crucial to make listening a part of organizations communication protocol.  It should not be limited to just marketing & sales but should spread across other departments such as product and support. There are so many benefits, that listening skills should even be part of your hiring strategy! Because of the benefits of Listening, many smart organizations are actually training employees in listening skills. For all the advanced tools and plethora of ways to communicate these days, sometimes its the simple things that matters – just listen.