Individuals that are new to B2B marketing often make the mistake of marketing to target businesses, instead of the individuals within the business. Unfortunately, more seasoned marketers are sometimes guilty of the same blunder. Understanding how best to target and personalize marketing isn’t always easy, and can require additional training and direction from industry experts.
The upcoming MarketingProfs B2B Marketing Forum (October 20 – 23) will help newbie and experienced B2B marketers alike find their way through the clutter to create marketing programs that truly speak to the needs of their customers. We had the fortunate opportunity to partner with MarketingProfs to bring you insights from some of the top speakers that will be presenting at the upcoming conference.
Today we have part two of our MarketingProfs interview series with Uberflip’s VP of Marketing, Hana Abaza. In this interview you’ll learn more about Uberflip’s take on personalized content and some of the B2B companies that Hana believes are MAKING great marketing today.
Making Marketing Magic with Uberflip’s Hana Abaza
What do you believe is the biggest benefit of making personalized content?
I think marketing in general comes down to trying to drive the objectives of your organization. The more you can optimize for individuals, the tighter your messaging will be and resonate with your target customers. At the end of the day, this will also lead to better conversion rates.
If you can start to personalize the type of content you’re showing people, it can lead to better results for your marketing funnel. When we talk about personalized content, what we are really talking about is more than personalizing the actual content assets and more about displaying the right content to the right person. This can also include taking a deeper dive and beginning to personalize the language used to scale on a global scale which can have a huge impact.
The thought of personalizing content for each prospective customer can seem overwhelming. What advice do you have for marketers that are ready to take the first step, but are unsure where to begin?
This is something that I hear a lot from marketers. The key thing to remember is the degree of personalization that you’re taking with your marketing. I like to think of it as a spectrum of personalization. When you’re first starting, you can begin with segmentation of your audience versus true personalization.
So, instead of 1:1 marketing personalization, you’re taking a 1:many approach by segmenting your audience into buyer personas. The more honed your segmenting capabilities and are, the more personalized your marketing will be for that segment. As you continue down the spectrum, you can get more and more personalized.
There are many tools and technology available to help you on your journey down the specturn. Technology has been a great driver in terms of enabling companies to create personalization based on actual data. For example, at Uberflip we use our tool to tailor user experiences for our audience. Looking at the spectrum as a whole helps clarify where you are today, and what steps you need to take to create truly personalized marketing for your audience.
What drives content creativity at Uberflip?
I love this question. One of the biggest things that drives us is our audience and our customers. We are in a fortunate position at Uberflip because we get to market to marketers. That means we are essentially talking to our peers and people like ourselves. We are able to draw a ton of inspiration and creativity from the people that we are actually talking to, connecting with and creating content for. Nothing pleases us more than when we see one of our customers use Uberflip to leverage amazing content. In short, our customers are constant sources of creativity for us.
What are some examples of B2B companies that you think are making killer marketing right now?
There are so many wonderful examples, but I’m just going to list a few. The first one that comes to mind is Slack. They have a great blog, but that only scratches the surface of what they’re doing. Their great podcast is very top of the funnel and awareness focused whereas their blog is more mid-bottom of the funnel while not focusing soley on their product. The other thing I really like about them is that content is not just a function of their marketing team, it seems to be proliferated through their organization and you can see it everywhere.
Catch up on Slack’s podcast, The Slack Variety Pack
Another amazing content company is Unbounce. They have honestly been creating great content since their company launched.
View Unbounce’s library of free webinars, eBooks and more
Wistia is another example of a company creating great content. They take video content marketing to the next level.
Finally, another B2B company I love is, InVision. One of their series profiles designers in a way that presents as part human interst, melded with industry information that people want to know.
Watch the trailer for InVision’s new documentary
I know there are a lot of other B2B companies that are doing great marketing, but those are some of the ones I think are creating killer marketing.
As a marketer, who influences you to be a creative marketing magician?
For me personally I love to draw my influences from outside the technology, business and marketing industries. Often we look too inside the bubble we are in instead of drawing influences and creativity from other industries. Learning other domains actually helps take that creativity and something to meld on. I strive to take lessons and things that I learn elsewhere and implement in what I do now.
What inspires you to MAKE marketing magic?
Part of what keeps us going and really compels us to create great marketing is the amazing feedback that we are getting from our audience and our customers.
The other thing that inspires me on a daily basis is the culture that we have developed internally. A lot of companies are shifting towards a model where marketing is really becoming a central part of the organization and is no longer a cost center, but a growth drive. You’ll see this approach thread through the entire organization and positively impact the customer experience. Being able to have that connectivity and support throughout the organization inspires us to do the best that we can do as a united team.
MAKE Your Own Marketing Magic
Thank you Hana! Your insight and energy are truly motivating for others than want to MAKE marketing magic of their own. For more insight on B2B marketing from some of today’s top marketers be sure to check out the MarketingProfs B2B Marketing Forum, and our next interview on October 12 with Mark Schaefer.
If you’re already planning on attending MarketingProfs B2B Forum, be sure to check out TopRank Marketing CEO Lee Odden’s session, Participation Marketing: If You Want B2B Content to Be Great, Ask Your Community to Participate.
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