Internet marketing and social media predictions for 2013!
It is that time of year again where we try to predict the future and look forward to all of the social media and Internet marketing for B2B companies for 2013. These are not pie-in-the-sky predictions, but based on observing how B2B companies have adopted social media over the past year. When we look back at 2013, we will see a banner year with explosive growth in B2B social media. In many areas there will be continued gradual growth started in 2012 or earlier. If you have your own predictions or you disagree with ours, please let us know.
What should your company do in 2013 that is different for social media and Internet marketing? That is the question that most businesses are hopefully starting to think about now In December 2012.
This is not a shot-in-the-dark exercise, but one based on observing how B2B companies have adopted social media over the past year. I believe there’s going to be a whole new convergence of social media and Internet marketing like never before.
Video marketing is going to be huge, Twitter is going to have a more prominent role in companies who never used to before and connecting with your clients or your potential clients via social media is good be critical for companies who want to see explosive growth in 2013.
1. There will be huge growth in using social media for lead generation. Companies who realize that social media is a unlimited gold mine of leads and the ones who focus on learning how to use social media to generate leads will be the winners in 2013.
Social media, including LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook will provide new and lower cost opportunities for B2B companies to generate leads, and the adoption of this continues to be slower than social media advocates would have you believe. Many B2B marketers still struggle to get the mechanics, tools and resources in place to build a robust social media lead generation program. More B2B companies will see success in generating leads with social media, and the ones who take it to the next level will be the serious winners in 2013.
2. B2B CEOs will remain on educated and skeptical about social media.
It amazes me that so many large companies still have not jumped on the Internet marketing and social media bandwagon. I can’t tell you how many companies who generate $30-$40 million a year. Still haven’t embraced Internet marketing, social media, and using their website to market their companies in a robust way. The disconnect between B2B marketers and their CEO about the value and application of social media will remain. Just like with the adoption of social media lead generation, there will be slight improvement, but it will not be a banner year. Many CMOs have seen the light, but there is not enough evidence from inside and outside the organization to convince the CEO. They will need another year of the pain of higher cost and inefficient lead programs before shifting to more cost effective social media marketing.
3. The rift between B2B companies creating new content on a regular basis and updating their websites and those who don’t will widen greatly.
Remarkable content will continue to distinguish B2B companies from their peers and competitors. Marketers who have mastered the art of blogging, ebooks, visual content and video storytelling (YouTube) will forge stronger relationships with prospects, customers and advocates, while those who don’t will get left behind. Customer expectations will drive this disparity even more in 2013. So get on the content bandwagon and also start creating YouTube videos and having your own channel on YouTube.
4. The skills of B2B marketers will expand as content gets more visual
It, not just storytelling and interpreting data, but the new world marketers who will write their own tickets in 2013 are those who have a graphic design or photography background. It’s going to be all about connecting with your clients in new ways never thought before. For instance one company, started tracking clients who spent between three and 500 dollars by looking them up on Twitter and Facebook. By following what they were talking about, they learned what was important to them, and then did something extraordinary for them like buying them an autographed jersey of their favorite football quarterback on eBay.
This $350 investment in a client who only spent between $300 and $500 and it ended up with $100,000 order. The smaller explosive platforms like Pinterest and Instagram have driven up the importance of visual content, but Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn have all continued to incorporate rich media into their platforms. Marketing communication is no longer just about great writing. Look for fewer words from top B2B marketers and eye-catching visuals that promote compelling offers.
5. Data becomes more than a buzzword
B2B marketers who really understand the data components of their social media efforts in 2013 will be more valuable than ever. Google analytics is an important part about reading the data that is coming in to your website, but not only the data. It’s also about how you interpret it. This is not about better measurement, but about compiling data to gain better insight into customers and prospects. This kind of data mining and interpretation gives marketers a more holistic view of social media profiles and activities, which lead to smarter and more informed actions. Google analytics now offers social media metrics tracking in their platform, which is a truly amazing thing.
6. The role of marketing automation becomes clearer
Sometimes B2B marketers need to say the name of their tools out loud to understand what they do. “Marketing Automation.” Say it again. “Marketing Automation.” You didn’t just say, “Sent spammy emails.” Expect to see better use of marketing tools in 2013 as B2B marketers do more than set up email drip campaigns, but unleash the full power of these tools to automate repetitive activities or other things that computers do better than people. I just discovered a phenomenal tool that allows me to really analyze the Backlinks coming into a website to figure out which ones are good Backlinks and which ones are bad Backlinks. Until now Google didn’t penalize you for having bad Backlinks, but with the Google Penguin and panda updates. Now they do. Once you find out which ones are the low-quality or bad Backlinks you can use the Google
disavow links tool to tell Google to disavow or disregard the bad links which can dramatically increase your rankings that might have been good before.
7. Mobile Strategies Catch Up to Reality and responsive design.
As each mobile device is released, it sells more than its predecessor. This will continue in [2013] and we will get closer and closer to the day the mobile web dominates B2B site traffic. B2B companies are on course to develop their mobile strategies so they can move forward with their customers. This takes me to the next huge thing in 2013, which is responsive design.
Responsive design is designing your website or upgrading your website with cross browser and cross platform integration. That means your website will show up looking the same way in every major browser, Internet Explorer, Firefox, Google Chrome, Safari, and also all of the mobile devices such as android and iPhone. If every B2B marketer took their smart phone out of their pocket and suffered through their own website, this really would drive the creation of mobile-friendly sites.
8. B2B Marketers will determine relevant social media metrics
Overall social media adoption hinges on better and more appropriate metrics. Websites that can track and provide these metrics will become more and more relevant and important in 2013. Lots of B2B marketers are still measuring vanity metrics or optimization metrics and reporting them as results. The tactics of increasing your reach to drive in more leads will become more and more important.
9. B2B Marketers will get addicted to social media ads
B2B marketers will explore additional ways to build their audience and drive traffic to their lead-generation landing pages. Not only do social media ads fit this bill as a new tactic, but these ads will be less competitive and more cost-effective than pay-per-click (PPC) ads throughout 2013. Facebook ads, LinkedIn ads, as in other social media platforms will change as more marketers start using them, but they will be regular part of the tool set before that happens.
10. Email usage will grow as B2B marketers struggle to generate leads with social media
As customers and prospects continue to click on email offers, B2B marketers will keep sending them, but with diminishing returns. This is still interruptive marketing, while social media acknowledges that the customer or prospect is in charge of the relationship. The majority of companies still don’t have any kind of email offers or sign-up forms on the front page of the website. This will become more and more important in 2013 as the top of mind aspect that having a autoresponder solves will be crucial in 2013.
There is still a tremendous amount of work for B2B marketers to do in 2013, but we know you can do it with planning, remarkable content, marketing and sales alignment and executive buy-in.
I am putting on a training Webinar for all of this Jan 10th and 11th 2013.
It's normally $429 but is on right now for a steal of a deal.
So there you have it, once again if you want the full list and all the information please contact me I be happy to help you ,have a great day.
Allan Fine
The Executive Edge
403-246-7386
