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If you look at the data from the survey, you will see that marketers believe their website is the leading source of leads and that 80% of marketers believe they are NOT maximizing their efforts there.As I like to say:  “you got them into the store (aka website), now what?”  The next step for marketers who are doing the right things with inbound marketing, lead nurturing, and such as optimize conversion when they get them to the website.

I am shocked that in this day and age: 27% have 8 or more fields.

Ardath: In your opinion, what is the biggest reason that B2B websites fail to generate demand?Craig: There are two reasons.The first is the propensity for creating brochureware.   Many websites are still boring, corporate, sterile, etc.  In today’s world, content needs to be arresting and provide buyers with something they actually want to read.  As well, design and usability is very important to the user experience.The second is conversion, plain and simple.  You have to decide what you want your website visitors to do on a particular page, etc.  If it is to register for something, then optimize the experience for the registration.   Most websites are not the great at that.

  Social media participants contribute very little to conversations. Research from the Online Community Research Network shows that fewer than 10% of people in online communities ever say anything. And fewer than 2% take a leadership role in starting conversations. Therefore, if you want compelling and relevant content – it’s critical to have a content leader or practice who can think like a publisher and develop a strong editorial calendar.

  ITSMA research shows that 66% of buyers seek information themselves rather than waiting to hear from providers. They seek that information through search. 79% of C-level executives do at least three searches per day. They are more likely to encounter your content through search than through the social media channels themselves.

The bottom line: Organizations (and B2B marketers) need to focus on content, thought leadership and engaging B2B tech buyers in channels where they go to consume information.

26% of average marketing budget is spent on content marketing, with 3.5 dollars spent on distribution for each dollar spent on creation.  Do the math and that means 5.8% of the average marketing budget is spent on creating content.

To put all this in perspective, license fees for marketing automation software are usually 1% to 2% of the total marketing budget.  In other words, content will cost several times more than software when most companies deploy a marketing automation system (and distribution costs will outweigh them both).

Social media is about relationships, so it requires you to engage in two-way conversations and participate consistently. Social media is real time, so you need to be monitoring the conversations and taking action on them in real time. Social media enhances and amplifies other channels, so it cannot be used in a silo.

To generate demand from these conversations, you want the engine to identify those people who are potential buyers in the discover phase of their customer life-cycle so that you have already started a relationship with them and created brand preference when they enter the explore phase.

Cloud wary, yet hopeful. Buyers see cloud computing as a major disruptive technology wave with many benefits, forcing them to re-think their IT landscape

Self-reliant, yet dependent. Buyers are pushing salespeople out of the early stages of the buying process with search, industry influencers, their peers, and social media, yet they demand strong relationships

Short on time, yet content hungry. Time-constrained buyers maintain a robust appetite for relevant content, but they want it packaged and delivered on their terms