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40 years and 14 cents

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I found a book titled “Modern Industrial Marketing” on Amazon. Published in 1972. Price: 14 cents. Clearly not in very high demand. I bought a copy.

After skimming it, here’s what has changed in 40 years of industrial marketing:

Then: “We have a factory. We make widgets. Let’s work hard at marketing the widgets we’ve chosen to make.”

Now: “We have a factory (or can find one). Let’s only sell widgets that we know customers want and find ways to get smarter about the type of widgets we sell.”

Technology continues to compress the time and effort needed to get smarter about what we sell today and should sell tomorrow. Use the web, mobile tools, CRM, big data and the resulting business intelligence to develop only the widgets that customers want. Widgets that don’t harness these insights are destined to sit on a shelf and sell for less. Like for 40 years and 14 cents.

Never empty-handed

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If you’ve spent any part of your career in B2B sales and marketing, you know that the most unsettling thing you can hear back from the field is…silence.

Tell us we’re spot on. Tell us we’re off base. Even if the news is bad, it’s progress…at least we have the obstacles in focus.

  • “We lost the bid? Take this short survey about what we can do better next time.”
  • “The decision is on hold because the ROI is not clear? Let’s apply this selection tool and calculate the exact benefit.”

Alternatively…

  • “You’re awarding us the project? Let me shoot a video of you explaining why.”
  • “You’re a repeat customer? Let’s quantify your actual savings to date.”

Mobile technology simplifies collection of feedback from the field and turns anecdotes into action. Provide tools to your sales team and they will never come back empty-handed again.