A recent study published on Marketing Charts showed that 23% of top B2B marketers rate their corporate website as their top lead-generation tool, while 41% cite referrals and personal connections. If you're in the former group, a strong analytics and tracking system can help you extend customer lifetime value by identifying up-selling opportunities and shortening the buying cycle. If you're in the latter group, a solid analytics package might just make you change your mind on the value of your web presence. With the use of strong analytics tools, like Google Analytics, you can monitor customer and prospect behaviors to make sure you're getting the most out of your online marketing campaign. Read More

Few things put customers as at-ease with using a brand as a testimonial from another customer. Some studies peg the boost to conversion rates at as high as 200%, though most caution that a 25-50% increase is more likely. With these kinds of numbers, marketers should be leveraging every opportunity they have to add "social proof" to their conversion process, and a good number of them have. According to the Marketing Sherpa Landing Page Handbook survey of marketers, on a scale of 1-5, marketers rated customer reviews a solid 3.5 for effectiveness.The big caveat to the testimonial subject is that as the trust level of the testimonial decreased, so did the boost to the final conversion rate. Trust, when it comes to product and service... Read More

A recent study from MarketingSherpa showed that 68% of B2B companies haven't yet identified their sales funnel, and 76% of B2B marketers don't use any type of marketing automation. When studies routinely show that marketing automation consistently increases conversions and decreases cost-per-acquisition, ignoring this channel is a huge lost opportunity for B2B companies.Having a clear understanding of performance and being able to take away actionable insights is key in making sure your online marketing efforts are leading to quantifiable increases in revenue and profitability. Otherwise, you're letting qualified leads fall through the cracks. Read More

150%. That's the difference in conversion rates between organizations that have thorough strategic SEO plans in place and those that don't. In a report published by MarketingSherpa, respondents that had a detailed process for performing search engine optimization and inbound marketing not only had 2 and a half times more leads than companies that didn't, they also rated the leads they received as being 900% more likely to be "highest quality". In fact, organizations that have a proven process for inbound lead generation have almost completely filtered out low-quality leads altogether. Having a road map for your SEO efforts will radically improve the quality and conversion of inbound leads for your company, and as such it's... Read More

Despite a slow economic recovery, a full 60% of business leaders plan to expand their email program this year, according to a study published by Zoomerang and StrongMail. Not surprising since 67% of participants cited the ability to build strong customer loyalty and retention as the key strengths of email. When economic conditions force contraction or slow growth, it becomes absolutely critical to extend the value of each and every customer you have. We've spent years developing our email services to get the most out of each customer, whether that be by increasing average order size or increasing total orders. Because while focusing purely on top-of-funnel activities will get you more customers, focusing on getting the most out of... Read More