Finally, Global Certification for B2B Services Marketing

For many years, B2B marketing was seen as the poor relation to B2C. No B2B marketer needs to be convinced of the intricacies of developing meaningful and lasting relationships with customers, especially when buying decisions are so dispersed and achingly long. But the wider marketing world has not always understood this.

One place where this gaping chasm between B2B and B2C is quite apparent is in the availability of a formal marketing certification.

As our profession has matured, the need and desire for agreed standards and approaches have increased. But while there are many generic marketing certifications, almost all are focused on B2C. And when B2B is included, it’s usually from a product rather than a services perspective.

The ITSMA Board Kicks Butt and Takes Names

It was this lack of formal standards that stoked up discussion among ITSMA’s European Advisory Board members last year and led to the development of the joint ITSMA/Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM) Professional Diploma in Marketing for Business Services and Solutions. As representatives of global IT services and solutions organizations, the board members felt that there was a need to professionalize B2B marketing.

It was universally agreed that the standard to be attained was that of CIM’s Professional Diploma in Marketing, an internationally recognized qualification in best practice marketing (albeit consumer-focused). All that needed to be done was to make it relevant and identifiable to marketers of business services and solutions—no easy feat.

As discussions progressed, ITSMA members Fujitsu, Steria, and Tata Consultancy Services signed up as foundation members of the program, committing some of their most senior marketing resources to work alongside ITSMA and CIM on the development of the global B2B services marketing program.

24×7, Global Access to Course Materials

The result is the ITSMA/CIM Professional Diploma in Marketing for Business Services and Solutions, with templates, case studies, and articles specifically focused on the B2B services and solutions profession.

To address the global nature of many of the organizations in this industry, the program can be delivered using a combination of online learning and face-to-face workshop days. When required, the face-to-face days can also be delivered via virtual classroom, enabling geographically dispersed members of the marketing team to attend the same course and achieve this recognized standard together.

Philip Oliver, Executive Vice President Marketing, Fujitsu, said, “I firmly believe that the introduction of this course will benefit the IT industry as a whole and gives us a real opportunity to professionalize B2B marketing.”

The ITSMA/CIM Professional Diploma in Marketing for Business Services and Solutions will begin in September 2010. For more information click on ITSMA/CIM Professional Diploma.

Why (and How) Mobile Will Matter to B2B

The smartphone is the first truly personal computer, one that easily crosses over between home and work. This is why mobile will become an important part of our marketing, whether we like it or not.

Of course you know that the iPhone and iPad are popular because of the way they look. The smooth contours and the shimmering black glass bezels make the devices look more like something out of a Swarovski store than a Best Buy. They bring out our primitive attraction to the bright and shiny.

They also bring out another primal drive. When you look at the iPhone or iPad screen, you see beautiful little jewel-like icons beaming at you from beneath the glass. The iPhone and iPad aren’t just jewels; they are jewel cases for our collection app jewels. And these jewels bring out our hunter-gatherer instincts just like any other collectable, from Beanie Babies to giant balls of string.

We Are All Collectors

The real breakthrough here isn’t the device itself, but the model for collecting the apps that we keep inside it. The iTunes model (which BlackBerry and Google’s Android have already copied, so don’t think we’re just talking about Apple here) lets us do everything that feels good about collecting:

• It’s social. We show off our apps to our friends and share our reviews in the app store.
• It’s low risk. Apps are cheap so we don’t worry much about buying them—or the possibility of losing them. Better yet, the apps update themselves without crashing our systems.
• It’s fun. The app store is structured simply and clearly so that browsing is easy.

The popularity of the App Store model means that marketers considering creating mobile device apps have a difficult battle ahead to penetrate our target audience’s app collections. There’s just so much great stuff out there competing for business users’ attention. For example, there’s a free app that gives you voice directions to your destination. Another free app lets you convert your spoken words into written emails. These are tough acts to follow.

Mobile Apps Must Connect to Something Larger

While it may be possible to build an outstanding standalone app that wows your audience, the chances are similar to an individual seed’s chances of surviving to become a mature oak—really slim.

We have to think about how mobile can be like the tender shoot that sprouts from the well-established tree if we’re going to compete effectively.

But first we need to establish the reason for going mobile. We can’t simply create an application that links to static website content, for example. Mobile doesn’t magically make static content exciting.

There has to be a purpose behind adding mobile. At ITSMA, we see four main reasons for doing it:

• Help. The classic B2B mobile applications have been internally focused, giving maintenance people access to service information while they are out in the field. Is there a reason for you to offer whatever help you give to customers through mobile? Could your salespeople benefit from mobile access to a sales enablement application that gives them advice in the field for helping customers?
• Location. The addition of GPS chips to smartphones makes it possible to use people’s location as a driving force behind the mobile application. Right now foursquare is the Twitter of location. People like it, but they’re not quite sure what to do with it or how it can be used for marketing (and making money). One possibility is to use location at your events so that attendees can find each other or share schedules and information. But Twitter and foursquare already do that, so again, you need something more within the app than just the location feature.
• Continuity. Do you have situations in which customers and prospects feel they might miss something by being disconnected from you even for a short while? An example of this is user groups. I can see techies catching up on technical issues while they have some down time at an airport.
• Notification. Is there any aspect of what you do that customers would want to be alerted about the moment it happens?

Mobile Marketing Case Studies

The mobile screen’s small size makes mobile a natural for visual content. But even as the iPad relaxes those size constraints, the craving for immediacy won’t change. Inevitably, it will drive us back to our roots as visual storytellers. And that is important for marketers. Increasingly, we will have to deliver our messages in a multimedia mix that communicates that we are a part of the community.

Two of our recent case studies show examples of how B2B marketers have used mobile as shoots from a tree. Xerox Global Services (XGS) built a mobile application as part of Competipedia, its internal sales tool. It’s a wiki-based tool that salespeople can use to find and share competitive intelligence. The mobile app that hooks into Competipedia is justified because XGS’ salespeople often need information while on the road (help) and can use competitive information as soon as it is available (timeliness).

Meanwhile, IT services and consulting firm CSC built a tree trunk called WikonnecT that is a B2B online community for the insurance industry. CSC added a mobile shoot to WikonnecT because its community is so vibrant. CSC has been building the complex software that runs the processes of big insurance companies for decades, a kind of enterprise resource planning (ERP) for insurance. CSC is making its software development processes transparent within WikonnecT; for example, people can argue about and lobby for new features at any time and CSC responds within the community. As a result, there is a vitality to the conversation that satisfies the continuity and notification requirements for mobile.

As you can see, Competipedia’s and WikonnecT’s success in mobile depends on having the center of gravity for the applications be outside the mobile apps themselves.

We expect that this is one way that mobile will play out in B2B. Companies will use it as a lever to improve and extend collaboration in their communities.

How have you used mobile in your marketing so far?

Do You Have a Formal Process for Services Development?

Over the years at ITSMA, we have seen an increasing formalization of the services development process, which sounds like a good thing.

And past ITSMA research says that it is. We found a correlation between services marketing performance and services development formalization. High-performance services marketers follow a formal services development process.

As companies have formalized their services development, they have also moved to centralize responsibilities for it. Centralization of services development has been driven by the globalization of services and the emphasis on integrated marketing communications strategies. IT services providers are striving to achieve global consistency in services offerings, capabilities, and positioning.

But it’s healthy to ponder whether all of the centralization and formalization are really having the desired impact. For example, is formalization shrinking services product development timeframes? Does productizing services by putting them through a formal development process increase the chances for success, or does it create cookie-cutter services? How does formalization affect creativity and innovation?

Many companies are realizing that ad hoc services created in the field can be costly and difficult to deploy on a larger scale. However, these services can represent a tremendous opportunity if they can be further developed or refined centrally with attention devoted to market and competitive analysis, resource requirements, marketing and sales strategy, and so forth.

Given the poor odds of success with new product and services introductions, it is very important to find ways to minimize the risks of new services development. ITSMA believes that a well-designed services development process helps weed out the less-worthy services product ideas and strengthen the ones with greater potential.

Perhaps the most important factor in designing a successful services development process is keeping in mind that it must be different from the typical product development process. Services development is more complex and sophisticated than product development. Therefore, to be truly useful, a formal services development process must be designed specifically for services. A formal process that does not recognize the unique needs of services development will be more harmful than helpful.

The factor that most sets services apart is people. Customers go through a process when receiving the service, and their needs will evolve as they accumulate experience with the service provider’s processes.

This deeper involvement with customers is one reason that some services providers are critical of a more formal services development process. They argue that the spontaneity of responding to customers’ needs will be lost to the process, with its gates and approval requirements. Furthermore, the formal process can stifle creativity, resulting in a portfolio of me-too services. These are certainly dangers if the new services development process lacks flexibility or if adherence to a process takes on more importance than the goal of creating winning new services. The process must be a means to an end.

At ITSMA, we think the best services development process is one that balances gut feel with formal process through flexibility.

But what exactly does that mean? A flexible services development process takes into account the fundamental forces driving services product development. These elements will help determine the timeframe available for getting the individual new service to market and, in turn, will decide how the services development process should be applied. These include:

• Types of new services products
• Impetus for new services development
• Technology requirements
• Capacity and competence requirements
• Process and infrastructure requirements

Each of these new service parameters will influence the path taken in the services development process and will form a foundation for designing flexibility into the process. The inputs to the model will determine the outputs that directly drive the level of detail in analysis and planning of the process followed.

Even if the new services development process is designed with built-in flexibility and is subordinate to the goal of achieving innovation, there will be times when a formal development process is altogether inappropriate. At these times, it may be best for gut feel to take over.

But beware! Sometimes the rigor of the formal process with its evaluations and checkpoints can save a lot of time and money. Some marketers believe so much in their gut feel that they take a chance. They ignore the research or rationalize the results. Even with the best marketing strategy and tactics, you can’t make a bad idea good.

Perhaps the primary benefit of a structured services development process is the multiple built-in steps for objective opportunity assessment. The process takes the emotions out of decision-making. However, if you decide that some services development initiatives are better handled with an unstructured process, proceed with this one very important caveat: do not work in isolation. Make sure you have access to peers who can act as a sounding board for your ideas. Keep the process unencumbered, but seek outside input.

ITSMA members can download a new ITSMA Tool, How to Create a Services Development Process, which describes the elements of a successful services development process in more detail.

Research Results: Marketing’s Role in Social Media Leadership

The leadership of social media has fallen to marketing. However, marketers are not the only ones who should be using social media. Subject matter experts (SMEs) can talk to customers through social media channels, HR departments can use social media for recruiting, internal teams can use it to collaborate on new ideas and improvements, and companies can handle customer support with it. The entire organization needs to start leveraging and getting involved in social media, and marketing needs to lead that effort.

Many marketers already understand this intuitively. According to our recent Social Media survey, 68% of marketers said that they are the catalysts for social media usage in the company. Additionally, another two-thirds of respondents said they are responsible for identifying the appropriate subject matter experts and assigning them to engage with their target audience and influencers in the online conversations that are happening online.

However, if marketing will truly be the catalyst for social media in the organization, many things will need to change. To be effective, you must define new processes, roles, and competencies for marketing and play a large role in leading social media for others inside the organization.

ITSMA has identified five major areas that marketers must focus on to lead the rest of the organization effectively:

• Research on your target audience and their social media behavior, as well as research on these new channels
• An idea and content engine that will help the new demands for content and help the SMEs with their online conversations
• New roles for marketing, such as a director of content and a community manager
• Governance for social media, including formal policies as well as councils for collaboration and best-practice sharing
• For all employees involved in social media, training on the tools and strategies for using these channels

To learn more about the ways that marketers need to lead in social media, look at the archive of our online briefing Why Marketing Must Be the Catalyst for Social Media—and How to Do It or look at our social media survey report.

Ask ITSMA: How Do We Take Our Social Media Strategy to the Next Level?

By Chris Koch, ITSMA

Each month, ITSMA receives a number of queries through Ask ITSMA, a resource designed to give members a quick and easy way to get insight on important services and solutions marketing questions they face. In this column, we will publish some of our favorite questions, along with excerpts from our replies.

Q: We’re past the beginner’s stage of social media. We have programs in place but wonder how we can take things to the next level in terms of engaging our audience.

A: As we discovered in our ITSMA social media survey, integrating social media into the rest of your marketing strategy is critical.

One of the most successful ways to integrate social is through events. Social media can be an inexpensive (the tools, anyway) way to engage with your audience before an event and to provide a bridge that connects to the next event, through an online community, for example. We’re hearing that event participants are often eager to keep talking between events, especially since most happen just once a year.

Marketers also use social media to drive their audience to their Websites, where they can track activity and begin the lead management process. This is important because measuring social media in isolation yields little information that the business will be interested in. The business is looking for leads and conversion into sales. You measure that by creating a lead management process that encompasses everything you do in marketing, from events to social media.

	Do you have a sales or marketing question? Visit Ask ITSMA to access our experience, insight, and research results.

Services Marketing News

How to organize marketing, why you shouldn’t take technology out of the CIO, IBM shows off through social media, and CA has a new service for tracking opportunities.

• Why you shouldn’t take the technology out of the CIO.
• Why we need to rethink computer security: young employees view social media as a right.
• Social media engagement lags in B2B.
• IBM has an iPhone app for the US Open Golf Championship that shows off its technical abilities.
• CA taps new service to track opportunities.
• Six types of marketing structures: which one looks like your organization?
• What we can all learn from I Can Has Cheezburger: speed, flexibility, failure.

For up-to-the-minute services marketing news, follow ITSMA on Twitter: @itsma_b2b.

Upcoming ITSMA Events

Integrating Social Media into the Marketing Mix?
Roundtable
September 14, 2010
London, UK

Sales Enablement & the Changing Buying Process
Briefing
September 2010
London, UK; Texas, and California

New Partnering: Innovative Strategies in Collaborative Marketing
Roundtable
September 2010
Boston, MA

ITSMA’s 17th Annual Marketing Conference
The Year of Marketing Transformation

November 2–3, 2010
Charles Hotel, Cambridge, MA

Register by July 30 for a $400 savings!

Over the past few years, marketing has weathered quite a sea change: budgets have dwindled, new tools have emerged, offerings have changed, the industry has morphed, and power has shifted. Join us as we hear from industry experts and marketing leaders about the Year of Marketing Transformation and what we as marketers need to start doing to be seen as true business leaders. Top B2B marketers will offer their perspectives, and recipients of the ITSMA Marketing Excellence Awards will share their winning practices. Attendees can also sign up for one-on-one meetings with an ITSMA expert or associate during the conference. Get more information and register: http://www.itsma.com/events/2010-conference/.

To view all events, please go here.

ITSMA Featured Research

ITSMA Online Survey: Integrating Social Media into the Marketing Mix and the Business
Social media have value on their own, but they should also be used to complement other marketing channels, such as events, whitepapers, and Websites. In this report, ITSMA examines how B2B marketers are leveraging social media channels in their marketing strategies.
Read the ITSMA social media survey

Services Marketing Budgets and Benchmarks: 2010 Budget Allocations and Trends
This report delivers a detailed look at the state of the services marketing profession as it exists in early 2010. It provides data on services marketing budgets, budget allocations, and marketing priorities from a range of companies across the technology and consulting industries.
Read the ITSMA Services Marketing Budgets and Benchmarks report

Recent ITSMA Thought Leadership

Why Marketing Must Be the Catalyst for Social Media
In ITSMA’s recent social media survey, we found that in most organizations, marketing is the catalyst for social media being used by others in the company. In this online briefing, ITSMA’s Chris Koch and Katie Espinola will examine marketing’s role as the catalyst and offer case studies from top B2B technology companies.
View Why Marketing Must Be the Catalyst for Social Media

Globalizing Marketing: How to Sync Headquarters and Field Marketing
Globalization is making it more important to maintain an effective localized touch with field marketing. Marketers must differentiate between the marketing processes and content that can and should be centralized, and what must remain under local management. In this Viewpoint, Peter O’Neill, VP and Principal Analyst, Forrester, explains how marketers can localize while they globalize.
Read How to Sync Headquarters and Field Marketing

CSC’s WikonnecT: How to Build a Thriving Social Media Community
Private online communities are the holy grail of social media in B2B. ITSMA research shows that B2B buyers’ most valuable sources of information are their peers—nothing else comes close. Providers that can facilitate that peer connection have an unparalleled opportunity to build trust and loyalty with prospects and clients. In this ITSMA Case Study, we discover how CSC successfully navigated the challenges of social media with WikonnecT, a B2B online community for the insurance industry.
Read CSC’s WikonnecT: How to Build a Thriving Social Media Community

Xerox Global Services’ Competipedia: Using Social Media to Enable the Sales Force
Social media tools expand the possibilities of competitive intelligence by driving collaboration. In this ITSMA Case Study, we show how XGS used social media tools and principles to develop Competipedia, a wiki-based tool that salespeople can use to find and share competitive intelligence on a secure, easy-to-use Website.
Read Xerox Global Services’ Competipedia

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