Best of B2B Marketing: Get Inspired for 2021 with These Top 10 Content Marketing Posts

Content encompasses nearly everything we read, view, or listen to this pandemic year, and as our CEO Lee Odden said long ago, it's also part of the reason the need for search began in the first place. We're especially proud of the content marketing successes our team at TopRank Marketing have achieved during this topsy-turvy 2020, for a wide-range of major B2B clients. As 2021 draws close, we wanted to share our top content marketing articles of the year — each filled with best practices, research, examples, and the latest trends. We're fortunate to have a wealth of talented B2B marketing professionals contributing to the TopRank B2B Marketing blog — which celebrates its 17th year this month — including Lee Odden, Joshua Nite, Elizabeth Williams, Anne Leuman, Nick Nelson, Debbie Friez, Birdie Zepeda, myself, and Alexis Hall, among others. Collectively this compendium of our top 10 content marketing posts of the year serves as a valuable resource, filled with practical examples and relevant topics for digital marketing professionals from CMOs to copywriters. We hope that you'll find these articles helpful well into 2021 and far beyond. Now, join us as we move on to the top 10! These most popular content marketing posts of the year are ordered by a combination of search visibility and social engagement:

Our Most Popular Content Marketing Posts of 2020:

1. 50 Top B2B Content Marketing Influencers To Follow in 2021 #CMWorld — Lane R. Ellis

In our top content marketing post of the year I share our annual list of the top 50 content marketing influencers to follow and learn from, released during this year's all-virtual Content Marketing World conference. You'll learn new lessons from these 50 content marketing influencers throughout 2021 and into a post-pandemic industry landscape. You can check out all of my posts here, and follow me on Twitter and LinkedIn. [bctt tweet="“@TopRank has a long history with #CMWorld starting at the beginning, with 10 years of speaking and attending along with 7 years of partnering with @CMIContent to develop speaker and influencer content marketing campaigns.” @lanerellis" username="toprank"]

2. Where’s the Marketing in Content Marketing? 10 Essential Promotion Tactics That Drive Results — Lee Odden

Where’s the marketing in content marketing? In our second most popular content marketing post of the year, Lee shares how to overcome content creation imbalances with 10 proven content promotion tactics that have stood the test of time, to make your content promotion a priority. Check out all of Lee’s 2,600+ posts here, and follow him on Twitter and LinkedIn. [bctt tweet="“An imbalance of content creation and promotion is not only frustrating potential marketing performance, but it’s wasting the investment made in creating great content. What good is that great content if no one sees it?” @LeeOdden" username="toprank"]

3. 5 Ways to Humanize B2B Content Marketing — Joshua Nite

What does it mean to "humanize" your B2B content marketing? In our third most popular content marketing article of the year, our senior content marketing manager Joshua Nite shares five ways to help your content make a more human connection with a professional audience by:

• Finding the Emotional Core
• Earning Trust
• Personalizing Efforts
• Embracing Humility
• Designing a Content Experience

You can check out all of Josh's posts here, and follow him on Twitter and LinkedIn. [bctt tweet="“Find the emotional stories that your solution makes possible, and make them the star of your content.” — Joshua Nite @nitewrites" username="toprank"]

4. New Research: How B2B Content Marketers Are Impacted and Pivoting During the Pandemic — Nick Nelson

It’s undoubtedly been a year of much change and upheaval, and in our fourth most read article of the year, our content marketing manager Nick Nelson shows how B2B  content marketing practitioners are responding, and breaks down insightful research from Content Marketing Institute. You can check out all of Nick's posts here, and follow him on Twitter and LinkedIn. [bctt tweet="“It’s a bit ironic that at a time where more B2B marketers than ever have gotten their strategy down on paper, we’re being forced to crumple it up and rewrite it.” — Nick Nelson @NickNelsonMN" username="toprank"]

5. 5 Examples of Effective B2B Content Marketing in Times of Crisis — Anne Leuman

What is a key factor to successful marketing during a pandemic? "Being helpful," as our senior operations strategist Anne Leuman explores in our fifth most popular content marketing post of the year. In this insightful piece, Anne shows how B2B marketers can infuse more helpfulness in their efforts, including five examples of B2B brands doing content marketing right during the global heath crisis. You can check out all of Anne's posts here, and follow her on Twitter and LinkedIn. [bctt tweet="“The true key to success in B2B content marketing is to always come from a place of empathy. The more you’re able to understand and empathize with your target audience, the more likely you are to surface content opportunities.” @annieleuman" username="toprank"]

6. 5 Steps for a More Powerful B2B Content Marketing Strategy — Lee Odden

How can marketers overcome content attention deficit and stand out? In our sixth most popular content marketing article of the year, Lee shares five helpful steps for building a more powerful B2B content marketing strategy, using:

• Ideal Customer Profiles
• Topics of Influence, Search and Social
• Editorial Plan & Content Mapping
• Content Promotion
• Mining Search, Social & Influencer Analytics

This piece is filled with inspiration to begin intentionally and consistently incorporating influencers, social media and SEO in your B2B content marketing efforts, to reach more customers where they’re looking, with the kind of experiences that will inspire more effective engagement, revenue, and retention outcomes. [bctt tweet="“Creating useful content by itself is not an effective strategy in a world of brand distrust, content attention deficit and the distractions brought by a global pandemic.” — Lee Odden @LeeOdden" username="toprank"]

7. 7 B2B Content Marketing Tactics For Long Term Success — Anne Leuman

What types of content can B2B marketers utilize for driving long-term success? In the seventh most read content marketing piece of the year, Anne shares seven enduring and powerful B2B content marketing tactics for long-term success, featuring the use of content including:

• Blogs
• Social Media
• Influencers
• Podcasts
• Sponsored & Guest Works
• Digital Advertising
• eBooks, Infographics, and Larger Campaigns

[bctt tweet="“For content marketing to be successful, you need those flashy, attention-grabbing campaigns to meet immediate goals. But you also need reliable, consistent, thought-provoking content to compound results over time.” @annieleuman" username="toprank"]

8. Why Content Marketing is More Important Than Ever for B2B Brands — Nick Nelson

In our number eight top content content marketing post of the year, Nick explores why content marketing is more important than ever now for B2B brands, and shares three fine examples of B2B brands going beyond mere talk. By providing ongoing value and propping up your brand values, you’ll see plenty of value in return, as Nick examines in detail here. [bctt tweet="“The challenges our world now faces with the coronavirus pandemic and social justice movement create a unique opportunity for B2B content marketing to make an impact.” — Nick Nelson @NickNelsonMN" username="toprank"]

9. How Authentic Content Builds Brand Trust in Uncertain Times — Nick Nelson

Being there for your audience, and being real with them, presents a key opportunity to strengthen relationships during difficult times. In our ninth most popular content marketing post of the year, Nick shares how authentic content builds brand trust in uncertain times. "Content marketing is inherently a long game, focused on building relationships first and foremost. Right now, the best way to pursue this goal is through authenticity and altruism, in the context of your business and its audience," Nick observed. [bctt tweet="“There’s never been a better time to open up and share real, relatable stories. Everyone is going through something, and it can be comforting to learn how others are dealing with these unique circumstances.” — Nick Nelson @NickNelsonMN" username="toprank"]

10. In Search of Trust: How Authentic Content Drives Customer Experience — Lee Odden

In today’s uncertain digital world, how can B2B marketers double down on building trust with their customers? Rounding our our list of the top content marketing article of the years is Lee's insightful look at how authentic content drives customer experience. To help marketers better understand how brands are winning customer hearts, minds, and trust with authentic content experiences, Lee shares 5 important steps including:

• Accelerating Internal Credibility
• Doubling Down on Customer Activation
• Working with External Influencers to Grow Brand Credibility
• Creating a Content Collaboration Ecosystem
• Optimizing Measurement to Customer ROI

[bctt tweet="“If you want your content to be great, ask your customers to participate.” — Lee Odden @LeeOdden" username="toprank"]

Thanks TopRank Marketing Writers & Readers

Thanks to all of our top content marketing authors for contributing these top 10 content marketing posts of 2020 — congratulations on making the list! Additionally, we publish several marketing influencer lists every year, and we wanted to share them here as a helpful way to find and follow some of the leading digital marketing influencers:

• 25 Top B2B Marketing Influencers To Follow In 2021 #MPB2B
• 50 Top B2B Content Marketing Influencers To Follow in 2021 #CMWorld
• 20 B2B Influencer Marketing Pros to Follow from Top Brands
• 32 Top Social Media Marketing Influencers To Follow

Another helpful resource for B2B marketers to learn about crafting a successful B2B influencer marketing program is our recently-launched Inside Influence series, featuring interviews with top industry experts such as the latest episode with Tim Williams of Onalytica. We published dozens of posts this year specifically about content marketing, and plan to bring you even more in 2021, so stay tuned for a new year of the latest helpful search industry research and insight. Please let us know which content marketing topics and ideas you'd like to see us focus on for 2021 — we'd love to hear your suggestions. Feel free to leave those thoughts in the comments section below. Many thanks to each of you who read our blog regularly, and to all of you who comment on and share our posts on the TopRank Marketing social media channels at Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.

The post Best of B2B Marketing: Get Inspired for 2021 with These Top 10 Content Marketing Posts appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Article Source: http://bathseoexpert.blogspot.com/2020/12/best-of-b2b-marketing-get-inspired-for.html

50 Influential Women in B2B Marketing Who Rocked in 2020

The post 50 Influential Women in B2B Marketing Who Rocked in 2020 appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Article Source: http://bathseoexpert.blogspot.com/2020/12/50-influential-women-in-b2b-marketing.html

Inside Influence 13: Tim Williams from Onalytica on Optimizing B2B Influencer Experiences

In this final 13th episode of Inside Influence where I talk with B2B marketing insiders about what's working and what's not in the world of influencer marketing, our perspective has shifted from B2B brands to the influencers themselves. At TopRank Marketing, we conducted the first in-depth research into B2B influencer marketing which inspired this series and Onalytica recently conducted the first research study of B2B influencers to better understand influencer marketing from their perspective. Any B2B marketer that wants a complete picture for success with B2B influencer marketing going into 2021 and beyond will benefit greatly from both reports:

• The Current State & Future of B2B Influencer Marketing - Onalytica
• 2020 State of B2B Influencer Marketing Research Report - TopRank Marketing

To drill down into the insights around the Onalytica report, I talked with Tim Williams, CEO. We covered:

• About Onalytica as a B2B influencer marketing platform
• Tim's role as CEO at Onalytica
• The current state of B2B influencer marketing
• The impact of COVID-19 on B2B influencer marketing
• Why Always-On influencer marketing is good for both brands and influencers
• How to convince more B2B brands to focus on the experience they create for influencers as much as they do for customers
• Opportunities for B2B companies to leverage both external influencers and employee influencers for marketing
• B2B influencer engagement trends for 2021
• What B2B marketers can do to better showcase influencer expertise in content
• What B2B brands can expect if they hire an agency
• What to be optimistic about with influencer marketing post-pandemic

See the full video interview with Tim Williams in Episode 13 of Inside Influence here: Below is a highlight transcription of our discussion. Tell us about your role and what Onlaytica does Tim: Great. So I'm the CEO of Onalytica and I've always been in social media, sort of marketing communication circles and formally in public affairs. I've always helped build software that helps brands try and influence the influencers who obviously then in turn influence the target audience or the end consumer. That's been my passion. I've spent 20 plus years helping brands communicate their audience better. At Onalytica we have an influence marketing software. We tend to use this in influencer advocacy, employee advocacy, virtual events, account-based marketing, and social selling. Those are these use cases that we help brands with.

I see it as my role to be out there to publish content and to try and lead from the front...listen to what customers are saying and see how technology can really advance the industry.

Then in my role, I'd really just try and listen to the brand. It's a very immature marketplace. It's evolving. So I see it as my role to be out there to publish content and to try and lead from the front. But importantly, listen to what customers are saying and see how technology can really advance the industry. I'm not keen on us just taking a passive look at the industry and trying to sort of build more revenue with customers. I think that technology is often like a challenge and solution for the industry to mature. So I guess I see my role as just helping in whatever way I can to progress and really just help brands connect with influence communities to create inspiring content. You and your team at Onalytica recently conducted a comprehensive B2B influencer research study. At a high level, what is the current state of B2B influencer marketing?   Tim: Well, interestingly, it was off the back of the TopRank Marketing research report. Obviously TopRank are a great, leading agency in the field and producing lots of research and obviously you and I talk about research and have done quite a lot over the past few years. We've done some state of the industry stuff before with brands, but we really wanted to flip it to be able to give a 360 degree view on top of your research to people out there.

[Influencers] do make a big difference if brands are partnering with them in the right way.

I think what was really interesting is that it confirmed a lot of the beliefs in your report that the state of the industry is that influencers do give that third-party opinion. They do make a big difference if brands are partnering with them in the right way. It also showed up a lot of the gaps and a lot of the challenges for marketers on where the industry is going to head and what needs to happen for the influencers to feel like they've got a positive experience.

A lot of the people doing influence marketing now don't have influencer marketing in their job description. It's something that they're just inheriting and running through pilot programs.

I thought it was really interesting. I was very encouraged by the results, the gaps. Some of them do still surprise me with the way some marketers approach influence marketing, but I think that's just natural because a lot of the people doing influence marketing now don't have influencer marketing in their job description. It's something that they're just inheriting and running through pilot programs. I just think it's a natural outcome of people experimenting and I think the learning and the improving is really what we're seeing now. What do you think the impact of COVID has been in terms of the state of influencer marketing for B2B? Tim: In April to May this year I think a lot of influencers were extremely worried, especially the ones that were flying around the world and getting paid a lot of money. They were probably having very lucrative retainers or one-off, gigs with brands and I think that work obviously immediately dried up and they had to pivot their proposition into virtual events. I've seen some influencers do that very successfully now. I think it was a bit of a shock from April to May and I think in terms of the social media consumption and the influencer output on channels like LinkedIn and Twitter, we saw an increase in that social media activity and consumption. I think the biggest change was that we felt that the end consumers of the B2B to C, because everyone's obviously a person at the end of the day, increased.

The appetite for influencers increased in a few months like it would over a five-year period...influencer marketing in B2B has been better for it.

The appetite for influencers increased in a few months like it would over a five-year period. Even though the budgets weren't there from brands because everyone was pausing their budgets, I think the underlying factors have really advanced. So what we've seen is that from July onward, so in H2 of this year, influencer marketing in B2B has been better for it. I think it's almost helped the industry rather than just being too like "marquee event driven" where influencers are paid a lot of money to speak all around the world. The Onalytica research of B2B influencers found several similarities with TopRank's survey of B2B marketers. For example, Always-On campaigns were described as far more successful for both influencers and marketers. You and I understand the reason for that, but how do you explain it to marketers stuck on campaigns? Tim: I always see influencer relations as like there's two parallel strategies. I think there's the content or the events that you're trying to run in campaign mode. Then there's the longer term relationship building and building of great experiences for a campaign that you might run in three or four quarters time. I think that the brands that are starting off and just like activating with a one-off mindset, they just don't put as much effort into the long-term game. So the influencers by default then just invest less themselves because they don't know whether they're going to have anything in the future. So I think it's just natural.

I think that it doesn't matter whether you're just starting out with influencer relations, you can do a few things that make a big difference and build long-term relationships.

I think that it doesn't matter whether you're just starting out with influencer relations, you can do a few things that make a big difference and build long-term relationships. First impressions can last for, you know, 20 or 30 years. I think it's hard, especially when brands are in quarterly budget cycles. Both of us working in global tech a lot and the restructuring is a major challenge because people do move around in roles. So I think everyone gets it, but I think when you show the results of a longer term attitude are better than a short term, then I think that's when people can invest a bit more. We've both talked about the importance of the experience that brands create for influencers and the impact it can have on an influencer marketing program's success. Your research reinforces this in several areas from the need for quality outreach to who does the outreach to quality of the brief. How can we get more B2B brands to treat the influencer experience as important as the experience of the customers we're trying to influence? Tim: I think it's a key area that the industry has to improve on. I think it's about how much input you need to get the output that you're wanting as a marketer. So, if you're having to invest five hours to research an influencer that you don't really know, that you're not quite sure what output they're going to give you, I think there's a disproportionate amount of effort that marketers won't invest in. I think partly, agencies solve that problem, like yours. Obviously you know a lot of the influences and there's sort of the trust of working with them. At Onalytica we built relationships with thousands of influencers and we know the ones that you can trust and there's an element of credibility and time-saving there. I think there's also the ability to get to know someone within 10 or 15 minutes. This is really a technology solution where you can know what books they're going to publish, what motivations they have and what days they like to work. I recall speaking to one influencer at Social Media Marketing World and they told me, "on Monday I write my blog posts, on Tuesday I do my research, on Wednesday I look after my kids and on Thursday I do this," and I'm thinking, "how could a brand approach that influencer and really know what makes them work without hearing it directly from them?"

Influencers also have to make it as easy as possible for people to get to know them and what they want.

So, I think it's a technology solution, which we're trying to solve where if we showcase profiles that show what really drives the passion and motivations of influencers, then brands can quite quickly say, "Oh, there's a great connection with what we're trying to do here." Then they have the confidence to reach out and it doesn't feel like this kind of matchmaking dating where you don't have a clue what they they're actually interested in. It's agencies, technology and I think influencers also have to make it as easy as possible for people to get to know them and what they want. And I think if we all close the gap, then it's going to translate into a better experience for the influencers. Influencers are not limited to industry experts as you know - employee are influential too. What opportunities are there for B2B brands to be more effective at engaging both to achieve marketing goals? Tim: I think this is where the real magic happens for us when we're talking about integrated advocacy. When we talk about employee advocacy, we see them as four segments. We see them as the topics execs which need to show leadership. They need to be out there on social, creating content. There's intrinsic value in what they say in the marketplace. So the execs are part of the employee advocacy for us. The next level down is the subject matter expert. Say, in the tech industry or environment, it might be talking about AI or sustainability or supply chain procurement and any of the important topics that might be driving the thought leadership. So, you've got various different employees that are thought leaders, but maybe not driving as much impact externally for your brand. There's a wonderful opportunity out there. The third segment are sales. So, social selling or social enablement of salespeople as some people like to call it is really important. That's the third category. Then the fourth one is everybody else like your general employees. There's lots of employee advocacy tools to help develop the general employees. What we like to look at is the execs as subject matter experts and the salespeople. To give you an example of what we think works really well, it could be a LinkedIn live session with an external influencer. You might also bring in an industry expert into this who wouldn't call themselves an influencer, but just has really deep expertise in your particular area. And then you could invite one of your subject matter experts internally to be part of that discussion. Now, the subject matter experts might not feel initially comfortable with putting themselves forward, but then they start speaking on a peer to peer level with the external influencers and they realize that they get on, they have a lot in common, they love the subject matter that they talk about. Guess what? That relationship continues on LinkedIn, Twitter, offline, on WhatsApp, like whatever form of communication that they have.

It's really powerful when you can start transforming your content through the voice of your employees and external influencers.

If you think about that one example and you amplify that through all of your workforce, your employees are the biggest asset that any brand has. It's really powerful when you can start transforming your content through the voice of your employees and external influencers. That's what we describe as the kind of dream integrated advocacy model. In terms of actually making that happen, because some brands have 300,000 employees and across different business units, markets and languages, obviously it's a massive transformation change. But I think if you look at them as different segments, you can activate them in different ways, that's a really, really powerful operation. B2B brands engage with influencers in different ways from event activations to content collaborations to advisory councils. What engagement trends are you seeing going into 2021? Tim: I think you touched on something really interesting. The advisory role as an independent analyst is often a bit of a hidden fact within the marketplace. I know a lot of influencers that were asked to create some content, but then suddenly they've started writing strategy documents for really large brands about how they should tackle certain challenges or innovation within the marketplace. They're kind of ghost writing a lot of the strategy of companies.

The advisory role as an independent analyst is often a bit of a hidden fact within the marketplace.

I found that really interesting and shocking because I thought that it was the actual company that was writing their own strategy, but then it was an influencers actually shaping that. But I thought it was really cool because some of these influencers have so much experience that they're taking on different personas. I do think that's something that is changing. And I think that when we talk about influencers a lot of people think that we're talking about just the professional influencers that work on a paid basis and they're on a retainer sometimes. They're great at creating content and they've got big social networks. We see that this is a much larger community of people from industry experts that would never call themselves influencers: the independent analysts, advisors, consultants. Then you've got the events speakers, key opinion leaders in the industry. That's where things are evolving.

I don't think people are in love with the word "influencer".

I don't think people are in love with the word "influencer". I think it's got a really bad rap from the B2C industry.  I think that influential experts is more where we're trying to go, but there's, there's many different personas. So I think how brands are leveraging the different personas and who owns it as a brand is really the cause of key trends going forward. Content is most often the output from influencer collaboration but subject matter experts are not always expert content creators and many B2B brands are not really pushing the boundaries of effective content formats either. What can B2B marketers do to better showcase the expertise of the influencers who have collaborated? Tim: I think it's a really good question. Some of the influencers are content creators and they're specialists at that. So actually having an influencer interview some of the subject matter experts is one way in which brands haven't leveraged that enough, I don't think. It's interesting who should interview each other because you see both forms of that.

People are fed up of advertising...people are just not in the mood for product being pushed down their throats.

I think that the trend that we're seeing is that people are fed up of advertising. They're fed up with brand generic messages. There's just so much content even since the pandemic. The content has spiraled even more so. I think people are just not in the mood for product being pushed down their throats. I think the subject matter experts are the people that can personalize the content and I think that brands are investing in the platform to help develop the social profiles of the subject matter experts. I've seen a big increase in investment into that. I don't think there's any shortcuts. I think it's about enabling them to feel comfortable maybe in video, like sitting down in a more traditional way, but then translating that into social bite sized video content.

Subject matter experts have the expertise, they just don't know how to translate that into wonderful sort of social communication channels.

I know that you do a lot of interactive and visual content. I think the subject matter experts have the expertise, they just don't know how to translate that into wonderful sort of social communication channels. I think that's the job of marketers and communications professionals to be able to connect those two together. I don't see any magic wand. I don't know whether you've got any ideas or what you see from TopRank. Well, this is a problem we solve every day for companies. When a brand does make the effort to invest in high quality content from industry experts or industry influencers, they can take that content and make something the contributors will be proud of. Something so good it will inspire them to want to make it even more successful.   Tim: Yeah, I completely completely agree with that. And obviously the end customer is what we're all working to influence and impress. I think that the activation of subject matter experts comes down to behavioral psychology of whether they want to develop their profiles, what their fears are and how to motivate them. I think what has changed is that a lot of topics execs or subject matter experts traditionally speak to 20 people in a room or 200 people or 10,000 people in a marquee event. Now they're seeing that they can actually speak to 20,000 people every week through social.  I think that  takes a couple of examples to really get through. So they have that light bulb moment and I think marketers and communications professionals, if they can help them switch that light bulb on in their heads, then suddenly they will invest a bit more effort into the content that they put out on social. What are you most optimistic about when it comes to influencer marketing? Tim: I think one thing is personalized, relatable content. I have a massive passion to just break out of the boring B2B into the inspiring, personalized content. But to be able to do it in a way that doesn't feel hard. I am very passionate about bringing technology to solve problems. And I know that there is friction - it seems easy. Like we can just pick up the phone to five influencers, create some content and then a couple of weeks later, you should have some great content and it can be that easy. But in reality, some brands take three or four months and struggled to get to that outcome. So what I'm passionate about is the quality of content to improve. And from a technology standpoint, we want to try and reduce the friction so that people can create this content. And it seems not as easy as paid media and hitting a button, but it doesn't seem like it's too much effort for them to start off. To connect with Tim, you can find him on Twitter and LinkedIn. Be sure to check out our previous Inside Influence B2B Influencer Marketing show interviews:

• Episode 1: Rani Mani, Adobe - The Value of B2B Influencer Marketing
• Episode 2: Garnor Morantes, LinkedIn - The Power of Always-On Influence
• Episode 3: Ursula Ringham, SAP - Behind the Scenes with Influencer Marketing Operations
• Episode 4: Janine Wegner, Dell Technologies - Thought Leadership and B2B Influence
• Episode 5: Jen Hotlvluwer, Spirion - Award Winning B2B Influencer Marketing
• Episode 6: Amisha Gandhi, SAP - The Power of Mutual Value for Influencer Marketing
• Episode 7: Pierre-Loïc Assayag, Traackr - Maximizing Marketing ROI with Influencer Technology
• Episode 8: Srijana Angdembey, Oracle - How Influence Creates Better B2B Customer Experiences
• Episode 9: Brian Solis, Salesforce - How B2B Influence Adds Value to Business Customers
• Episode 10: Ryan Bares, IBM Systems - Growing Influence Inside B2B Brands with Employees
• Episode 11: Marshall Kirkpatrick, Sprinklr - Elevating B2B Content with Influencers
• Episode 12: Paul Dobson, Citrix - The Secret Sauce of Influence: Authenticity

To better understand what hundreds of the top B2B marketers are doing to succeed at influencer marketing, including case studies featuring SAP, LinkedIn, Monday.com and Cherwell Software, be sure to check out the 2020 State of B2B Influencer Marketing Research Report:

The post Inside Influence 13: Tim Williams from Onalytica on Optimizing B2B Influencer Experiences appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Article Source: http://bathseoexpert.blogspot.com/2020/12/inside-influence-13-tim-williams-from.html

Happy Holidays from the Team at TopRank Marketing

2020 has been a uniquely challenging year for marketers the world over, yet the difficulties have served to bring us together in new ways, and as we enter the holiday season all of us at TopRank Marketing bring you special wishes for health and happiness. For all of us this has been one of the most challenging years in history, and as each of us works hard to meet the hurdles that 2020 has thrown in our path, we can take pride in what we’ve accomplished despite the difficulties that none of us could have envisioned a year ago. The trust our new and long-time clients have continued to place in us has allowed us to reach record levels of client retention, and for this we are very thankful. Our team has pulled together and we’ve added major new B2B technology industry, global telecommunications and IT firms as clients. We’ve also continued to expand and grow partnerships with existing clients such as LinkedIn, SAP, monday.com and many more. This unique year has reminded all of us just how important communities are — communities of clients, associates, influencers, executives, our fellow B2B marketers, as well as our local communities here in Minnesota — and we wish you all a joyous holiday season and a very happy new year ahead. We’re also continuing to grow and hiring in many roles. Take a look at our careers page for a full list. During this pandemic year TopRank Marketing has continued to take a stand both locally and as a part of our global community of marketers — efforts we will continue into 2021 and beyond, as our CEO and co-founder Lee Odden shares in a message for the new year.

As Lane has mentioned, despite incredible challenges and uncertainty in the business world during 2020, our team at TopRank Marketing has been able to achieve many of our most ambitious goals. I know that many companies, including B2B marketing agencies, have not been so fortunate. I am thankful for the trust, loyalty and advocacy of our clients, the attention and engagement of our community and the continued opportunity to do the kind of work that inspires people. As 2020 comes to a close, I believe there are tremendous opportunities in 2021 to create more certainty, trust and growth. To help marketers realize these opportunities in the new year, we will continue to publish content on this blog that aspires to provide the kinds of ideas, insights and inspiration to achieve marketing and business success that we've relied upon ourselves to serve some of the top B2B brands in the world. We'll also continue to focus both on the effectiveness of our work and the meaningfulness of it as we serve the kinds of B2B brands that can really make a difference in the world. I wish readers of TopRank's B2B Marketing Blog the happiest of holidays, hope and success in 2021!

TopRank Marketing Wishes You the Happiest of Holidays

We’re incredibly grateful for each other, our wonderful clients, subject matter experts, and friends we’ve worked and grown with this unique year. From our marketing family to yours, Happy Holidays!

The post Happy Holidays from the Team at TopRank Marketing appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Article Source: http://bathseoexpert.blogspot.com/2020/12/happy-holidays-from-team-at-toprank.html

B2B Marketing News: Top B2B Investments For 2021, LinkedIn’s New Company Product Pages, Adobe’s CX Report, & Google’s 3D Search Content

B2B Businesses More Likely To Keep Third-Party Ad-Tracking Secrets From Customers 72 percent of B2B firms say they acknowledge ad tracking and don't inform customers, compared to some 58 percent of their B2C counterparts, according to recently-released survey data. The report also noted that B2B firms were twice as likely to rate third-party ad platforms as having done a good job of explaining how data is being used. MediaPost LinkedIn Adds New 'Products' Tab on Company Pages to Highlight Specific Products LinkedIn (client) has launched new product highlighting features to company pages on the platform, in the form of a products tab, allowing digital marketers to augment products with testimonials and customer endorsements, along with noting an additional forthcoming services marketplace feature, the Microsoft-owned firm recently announced. Social Media Today IAB 2021: Media Buyers Focus On Performance, View Data Privacy, Ad Tracking As Top Challenges Ad buyers have shifted focus to increased performance, while replacing the information formerly gathered by tracking cookies has become a top challenge, according to recently-released report data. Digital media will account for 71 percent of budget totals, according to the Interactive Advertising (IAB) report. MediaPost Reddit Announces New Partnership with Moat to Provide Third Party Verification on Ad Metrics Social news aggregator and discussion platform Reddit has announced integration with Oracle Data Cloud’s Moat service, a move that seeks to bolster Reddit’s campaign performance metrics as it courts a greater presence of B2B firms. Social Media Today Report: Americans Are Optimistic About 2021 59 percent of U.S. adults said they never want to hear the term “new normal” used again, according to recently-released survey data. The report also showed that consumers are seeking stability, and are ready to continue embracing the new technologies that have seen increased usage during the pandemic. MediaPost Top best practices for standout customer experiences in 2021 A continuing fine tuning of customer experience strategy will see brands playing greater roles in the lives of consumers, with particular success coming to brands that take a stance on corporate social justice, according to subject matter experts in a recently-released Adobe survey examining the evolving role of CX. CMO by Adobe Google releases Google Ads Editor v1.5 Google has offered new insight into a previously unannounced Google Ads Editor update, which has brought a more robust feature set to Google’s popular ad editing utility, the search giant recently announced. Search Engine Land As MarTech Spending Looks Set to Rise Again in 2021, Ease of Use Remains A Key Factor 2021 will see marketers increase spending on marketing technology, with ease of use, costs, customization, and the insights delivered among marketing and sales professionals’ top considerations, according to recently-released survey data of interest to digital marketers. MarketingCharts Google Search Streamed 3D Content Including Cars Google has offered a glimpse of streamed 3D content within search results for certain mobile users — an example of the type of new advertising format opportunities marketers may be increasingly optimizing for in 2021 and the coming years. SEO Roundtable Some B2B Firms Saw Revenue Increases Because Of COVID-19: Study Nearly one in five B2B firms said they will record revenue increases of at least 25 percent during 2020, with some 61 percent attributing the rise in revenue to conditions caused by the pandemic — two of several statistics of interest to digital marketers contained in new survey data. MediaPost ON THE LIGHTER SIDE: A lighthearted look at “targeted holiday advertising” by Marketoonist Tom Fishburne — Marketoonist The 30 most Onion-worthy headlines of 2020 — AdAge TOPRANK MARKETING & CLIENTS IN THE NEWS:

• Lane R. Ellis — Starting a Business in 2021? Read These Expert Tips First — Small Business Trends
• Dell Technologies — How CIOs and CMOs will ‘co-create’ in 2021 — CMO by Adobe

Have you found your own top B2B marketing story from the past week of industry news? Please let us know in the comments below. Thanks for joining us for this special holiday edition of our B2B marketing news, and we hope that you will return again next Friday for more of the most relevant B2B and digital marketing industry news. In the meantime, you can follow us at @toprank on Twitter for even more timely daily news.

The post B2B Marketing News: Top B2B Investments For 2021, LinkedIn’s New Company Product Pages, Adobe’s CX Report, & Google’s 3D Search Content appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Article Source: http://bathseoexpert.blogspot.com/2020/12/b2b-marketing-news-top-b2b-investments.html

Best Of B2B Search Marketing: Optimize Your 2021 With Our Top 10 SEO Posts

Search marketing has matured in many ways throughout this pandemic year of 2020. At each shift and change along the journey, we've done our best to not only cover each twist and turn thoroughly, but to also offer insight and research-based strategy to help savvy B2B marketers meet the challenges this year has placed in front of us. We're lucky to have a wealth of talented B2B marketing professionals contributing to the TopRank Marketing blog — which will celebrate its 18th year in 2021 — including our CEO Lee Odden, Joshua Nite, Elizabeth Williams, Anne Leuman, Nick Nelson, Debbie Friez, Birdie Zepeda, the author of this post, and Alexis Hall, among others. To help our blog community grow its search marketing knowledge, we’re thrilled to offer this list of our most popular search marketing and search engine optimization (SEO) posts of 2020.

Our Most Popular Search Marketing Posts in 2020:

1. 5 Unheralded SEO Tools for Content Marketers — Lane R. Ellis

In our most popular search marketing post of 2020, I shared popular and little-known SEO tools to help B2B marketers refine and augment their search engine optimization efforts. From Google Lighthouse to WebPagetest and more, there SEO tools offer insight that will be just as relevant to marketers in 2021. Sorting through lists of the seemingly endless number of available SEO tools can be frustrating as well as a hit and miss proposition, however this collection lets skip the search and get right into SEO tools you can use today to help you create amazing content marketing stories. You can check out all of my posts here, and follow me on Twitter and LinkedIn. [bctt tweet="“How can you be the best answer for your audience if you don’t understand what questions they’re asking or what problems they’re trying to solve?” — Lane R. Ellis @lanerellis" username="toprank"]

2. SEO is Not Enough: Why B2B Marketers Need to Optimize for Trust with Influence — Lee Odden

What good is being found if your content isn't credible? In the second most popular search marketing post of the year, our CEO Lee Odden shows why SEO is not enough, and why optimizing for trust and credibility serve as a force multiplier for B2B marketers. "At a minimum, content marketers should leverage the keyword and topic research done for SEO as inspiration for the queries used to find relevant influencers on those topics," Lee observed, suggesting several ways marketers can think about influencers from an SEO perspective:

• Identify influencers that already create content on the topics of interest that already have great visibility on Google
• Pick influencers identified by Google as entities
• Evaluate influencer’s likelihood of attracting links when they publish or contribute content
• Provide influencers with SEO audits of their blogs so they can improve their search visibility

Check out all of Lee’s 2,600+ posts here, and follow him on Twitter and LinkedIn. [bctt tweet="“By integrating SEO and Influencer Marketing marketers can attract and engage buyers more effectively.” — Lee Odden @LeeOdden" username="toprank"]

3. 12 Top B2B SEO Trends & Predictions for 2021 — Lane R. Ellis

In the number three spot on our top search marketing posts of 2020 list, I asked 12 subject matter experts how SEO will change next, and what search marketing will look like in 2021. Learn from industry leaders as they share their top predictions for 2021, including Barry Schwartz, Lily Ray, Dixon Jones, Melissa Fach, Tim Mayer, Aleyda Solis, Jordan Koene, Roger Montii, Melanie Mitchell, Neil Marshall,  and our own Birdie Zepeda and Seth Epstein. "We need to incorporate intent into the keyword mapping exercise by matching keywords with the right intent to the right document," Tim Mayer noted in this, our third most popular SEO post of 2020. [bctt tweet="“2021 will see B2B marketers taking SEO and search marketing into not only a new year but perhaps a new boundary-pushing era, especially among B2B brands.” — Lane R. Ellis @lanerellis" username="toprank"]

4. Marketing During a Pandemic: Stop Pushing and Start Pulling with SEO — Lee Odden

How do you do marketing during a pandemic? One way is to stop pushing and start pulling, and in the fourth most popular search marketing post on our blog in 2020, Lee shows how SEO helps customers find information on their terms, without the alienation of tone deaf marketing. In infographic format, this post explores 10 top SEO tips from industry pros Barry Schwartz, Jono Alderson, Aleyda Solís, Jesse McDonald, Britney Muller, Ayat Shukairy, Dixon Jones, Hamlet Batista, Tiffani Allen and others. [bctt tweet="“Instead of being tone deaf or completely opportunistic about marketing, companies can double down on their SEO efforts to become the best answer for customers at the very moment they need a solution.” — Lee Odden @LeeOdden" username="toprank"]

5. Best SEO Tips for Marketing During the Pandemic Plus 9 Top SEO Platforms — Lane R. Ellis

SEO platforms can be a vital part of successful marketing efforts, and in the fifth most popular search marketing post of 2020 I asked nine top platforms for their best tips to help weather the pandemic. It's been a prime year for exploring the power of search optimization, and in this post we also share top SEO tips, from top industry firms including:

• WooRank
• Moz
• SpyFu
• Majestic
• Serpstat
• SEMrush
• Ahrefs
• inLinks
• Searchmetrics

With 51 percent of primarily B2B global marketing professionals seeing data insights and analysis as the single most important element when implementing a marketing technology stack, SEO platforms are poised to deliver the martech information businesses are eager to get, and we dig in and show how here. [bctt tweet="“Marketers have incredible power to spread some calm in a chaotic world right now. Use it wisely.” — BritneyMuller @BritneyMuller" username="toprank"]

6. SEO Strategy: 5 Reasons Why It’s More Important Than Ever For B2B Marketers — Lane R. Ellis

Why has SEO been more important than ever for B2B marketers during the global health crisis? In our sixth most popular search marketing post of 2020 I examined how SEO has showed its strength, stability and resiliency, including five of the top reasons to double down on B2B SEO:

• SEO is Performing Better During the Health Crisis
• SEO Helps as Pandemic Consumers Are Shopping Primarily Online
• SEO Platforms Help Maximize Remote Worker Efficiencies
• Doing SEO Now Will Strengthen Future Brand Efforts
• SEO’s Stability Is Important For B2B Brands

[bctt tweet="“With more people visiting B2B websites, it’s never been more important to have online content that’s properly indexed, easily findable, and that swiftly answers customer questions.” — Lane R. Ellis @lanerellis" username="toprank"]

7. How Influence and SEO Can Drive Customer Experience — Lee Odden

How can influence and SEO drive customer experience for B2B marketers? In our seventh most-read search marketing article of the year, Lee shares how genuine, authentic, and impactful influencer content collaborations combine to build CX success and best-answer search experiences. "For optimal SEO performance, best answer content experiences should be delivered with relevant, fast loading pages that are mobile friendly and deemed credible by other websites that link to them," Lee noted. "Even better is when that content is optimized for trust with relevant third-party experts," Lee added. [bctt tweet="“For brands, delivering a great user experience in search means understanding searcher intent and providing content that meets those expectations at the very moment of need.” — Lee Odden @LeeOdden" username="toprank"]

8. 8 Virtual SEO Conferences for B2B Marketers — Tiffani Allen

Attending virtual conferences is a great way to not only stay connected to the B2B marketing and SEO communities, but also to learn how SEO helps customers find your brand on their own terms. In our eighth most popular search marketing post of 2020, Tiffani Allen shared a collection of eight virtual SEO conferences to put on your agenda. Attending conferences – even in a virtual setting – is a great way to stay connected to the marketing and SEO community, and many of these digital events will also be held in virtual formats during the coming year. Check out all of Tiffani’s posts here, and follow her on Twitter and LinkedIn. [bctt tweet="“While many of our favorite search conferences are being postponed to later dates, there are still plenty of excellent virtual conferences to attend in the meantime.” @Tiffani_Allen" username="toprank"]

9. Why SEO & Influence are Critical to Pandemic Era Content Marketing — Lee Odden

How can your brand be the best answer? This year SEO and influencer marketing have played increasingly important roles as B2B brands look to become and stay the best answer for their customers, and in our ninth most popular search marketing article of 2020 Lee shares why and offers an array of helpful insight. "Understanding that B2B buyers already prefer to pull themselves through most of the sales experience with their own research and content, B2B marketers are increasingly emphasizing SEO for the current time when field marketing, events and experiential marketing are no longer an option," Lee noted in this insightful post. [bctt tweet="“Marketing is about optimizing for improved performance and the role that organic search plays in pulling customers to your brands solutions at the very moment of need is clear.” — Lee Odden @LeeOdden" username="toprank"]

10. 10 SEO Books for B2B Marketers in 2020 — Birdie Zepeda

B2B marketers understand SEO's importance, but do they understand its inner workings? Rounding out our top ten list of search marketing posts for the year is our SEO strategist Birdie Zepeda's insightful look at 10 SEO books that help demystify some of the practice's inner workings, and also provide plenty of practical advice. The SEO books on this list help B2B marketers to better understand the technical optimization intricacies of your company’s website and to further develop an SEO strategy that will best serve your audience and their needs. Check out all of Birdie's posts here, and follow her on Twitter and LinkedIn. [bctt tweet="“Some SEO questions are worth buying, borrowing, or downloading a book for a deep-dive into the subject.” — Birdie Zepeda @birdie_zepeda" username="toprank"]

Thanks TopRank Marketing Writers & Readers

Thanks to all of our top search marketing authors for contributing these top 10 SEO posts of 2020 — congratulations on making the list! Additionally, we publish several marketing influencer lists every year, and we wanted to share them here as a helpful way to find and follow some of the leading digital marketing influencers:

• 25 Top B2B Marketing Influencers To Follow In 2021 #MPB2B
• 50 Top B2B Content Marketing Influencers To Follow in 2021 #CMWorld
• 20 B2B Influencer Marketing Pros to Follow from Top Brands
• 32 Top Social Media Marketing Influencers To Follow

Another helpful resource for B2B marketers to learn about crafting a successful B2B influencer marketing program is our recently-launched Inside Influence series, featuring interviews with top industry experts such as the latest episode with Paul Dobson of Citrix. We published dozens of posts this year specifically about search marketing, and plan to bring you even more in 2021, so stay tuned for a new year of the latest helpful search industry research and insight. Please let us know which search marketing topics and ideas you'd like to see us focus on for 2021 — we'd love to hear your suggestions. Feel free to leave those thoughts in the comments section below. Many thanks to each of you who read our blog regularly, and to all of you who comment on and share our posts on the TopRank Marketing social media channels at Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.

The post Best Of B2B Search Marketing: Optimize Your 2021 With Our Top 10 SEO Posts appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Article Source: http://bathseoexpert.blogspot.com/2020/12/best-of-b2b-search-marketing-optimize.html

Top B2B Marketers Share their Content Marketing Predictions for 2021

Even in the steadiest of times, content marketing can be a difficult field to project forward. The craft is fluid and fast-changing by nature. When customer preferences and behaviors are evolving, which is always, so too must the ways we reach and engage them. Needless to say, predicting what lies ahead for content marketing is especially tough right now, as we wrap up a chaotic year of 2020 and stare into the uncertainty of 2021. That doesn’t mean we won’t try! As organizations lay out plans and strategies for the coming year, it’s vital to get a bead on trends and threadlines that will shape the terrain. Where should content marketers and strategists be setting their sights? Which challenges and opportunities stand out? What will be the keys to success?

Content Marketing in 2021: What Top B2B Marketing Influencers Foresee

To help you gain some well-rounded insight, we reached out to several leading B2B content marketing experts and influencers with a firm grasp on the discipline and its ongoing evolution. Here are their predictions for 2021:

1 — Ardath Albee: “Interactive Content will Become a Mainstay”

@ardath421 I wrote recently here that digital experiences will be a top priority for content marketers in 2021. Veteran marketer Ardath Albee, who currently serves as interim VP of Marketing at Modus, also sees this as a pivotal frontier for content marketers:

B2B has gone digital and it’s not going back. Buyers are relying on self-education more than ever. Engagement and experiences are critical for company growth. Interactive content will become a mainstay in Demand Gen and Sales Enablement programs in 2021 and beyond. From virtual product tours to 3D virtual experiences, to value assessments and Digital Sales Rooms – marketers who want to facilitate the end-to-end buying experience with outcomes that prove contribution to revenue will increase focus on interactive content. They’ll up their game, moving beyond quizzes and surveys to content that resonates by getting buyers to actively pursue conversations with the companies that get them involved in what it takes to buy with confidence.

[bctt tweet="“Marketers who want to facilitate the end-to-end buying experience with outcomes that prove contribution to revenue will increase focus on interactive content.” — Ardath Albee @ardath421" username="toprank"]

2 — Ty Heath: Accelerating the ‘Right-Brain’ Movement

@tyrona Business decisions are made on the basis of both rational and emotional factors. Too often, B2B marketers have over-indexed on the former. Ty Heath, Director of Market Engagement for LinkedIn*’s B2B Institute, anticipates a collective push toward creativity and humanization:

For a long time, marketing's view of the world has been very left brain rational. The pandemic will accelerate the shift to a ‘right-brain’ movement. We will see more humor, more storytelling and emotion in B2B marketing in the coming year. We expect to see more brand mascots like Salesforce's feral raccoon-child mascot, Astro. We can look forward to more memorable B2B marketing messages that connect brand to demand. If you are a creative B2B marketer, that's something you can get excited about!

[bctt tweet="“We can look forward to more memorable B2B marketing messages that connect brand to demand. If you are a creative B2B marketer, that's something you can get excited about.” — Ty Heath @tyrona" username="toprank"]

3 — Robert Rose: Content-as-a-Strategy on the Rise

@Robert_Rose Robert Rose has always been a vocal content evangelist, so it comes as no surprise that the founder of CMI’s Content Advisory foresees a continued push to make content marketing a strategic centerpiece for businesses:

The trend of in-housing content-as-a-strategy continues and expands greatly in 2021. We’ll see big growth of content studios within brands to handle all manner of content marketing and content strategy functions. Agencies and Media companies will still be relied on, but to fill more niche-oriented “skill positions” and initial “strategy”. As such, companies will start to demand more cross-functional skills from their content marketing teams.

[bctt tweet="“Companies will start to demand more cross-functional skills from their content marketing teams.” — Robert Rose @Robert_Rose" username="toprank"]

4 — Christopher Penn: “The Top Challenge? Screen Fatigue.”

@cspenn People consumed more digital content out of necessity in 2020, with little else to do amid pandemic-driven shutdowns. While this created new opportunities for brand visibility and engagement, it also contributed to a sense of burnout from living life through our computers and devices. Christopher Penn, Co-founder and Chief Data Strategist for Trust Insights, believes that overcoming screen fatigue will be an imperative for content marketers in 2021:

I have no idea what to predict for 2021 — and neither does anyone else, if we're honest. But I can tell you what's happening now and what we're doing about it. We did a survey to our audience a couple of weeks ago and asked what the top challenges they're facing heading into 2021 are. The top challenge? Screen fatigue. No one wants more podcasts, more videos, more livestreams, more time on their devices. Literally no one. So all the marketers who pivoted in 2020 to making podcasts, videos, livestreams, etc. are facing substantially diminished audience interest. What do people want? Content they can consume faster. Want to know what the top converting channel was for us in 2020? Our email newsletters — and not by a small margin. Email was responsible for 56% of all our conversions in 2020 — and we're not alone. The perennial meme is "this meeting could have been an email." Apply that thinking to your livestreams, podcasts, vlogs, videos, interactive events, etc. Are you doing anything that REQUIRES that medium, or just doing it because it's what all the cool kids seem to be doing?

[bctt tweet="“The perennial meme is 'this meeting could have been an email.' Apply that thinking to your livestreams, podcasts, vlogs, videos, interactive events, etc.” — Christopher Penn @cspenn" username="toprank"]

5 — Michael Brenner: “Committed Brands Are Going to Win Big”

@BrennerMichael There’s no need to reinvent the wheel, according to Marketing Insider Group CEO Michael Brenner. He suggests that content marketers who simply lock down the fundamentals and invest in success will be poised to take the lead:

Go big or go home! In 2021, committed brands are going to win big in content marketing. There's so much noise out there. And yet, there are amazing B2B content marketing examples who have grown massive audiences and delivered marketing ROI. What do they do differently? Just the basics: 1.) They publish keyword-focused blog posts consistently. 2.) They mix in long form and short form content. 3.) They co-create stories with customers, executives, influencers, and partners. 4.) They focus on building subscribers. 5.) They measure ROI

[bctt tweet="“In 2021, committed brands are going to win big in content marketing. There's so much noise out there. And yet, there are amazing B2B content marketing examples who have grown massive audiences and delivered marketing ROI.” @BrennerMichael" username="toprank"]

6 — Melanie Deziel: “Doubling Down on Video and Live Video”

@mdeziel Many content marketers who were holding off on video marketing tactics, including live-streaming, took the plunge in 2020 out of necessity. Melanie Deziel, Chief Content Officer for StoryFuel, is heartened by this development and expects to see it carry over into next year:

If I had to find a silver lining of 2020 for marketers, it would be the fact that we increased our agility and adopted new ways of communicating with our audiences. I’ve been particularly impressed by how many brands have fully embraced video and live video. I hope marketers retain this mentality in 2021, doubling down on video and live video, and exploring still more formats for communicating with our audiences: quizzes, maps, timelines and more.

[bctt tweet="“I hope marketers retain this mentality in 2021, doubling down on video and live video, and exploring still more formats for communicating with our audiences: quizzes, maps, timelines and more.” — Melanie Deziel @mdeziel" username="toprank"]

7 — Carla Johnson: Innovation Through Smart Risks

@CarlaJohnson Experimentation and a willingness to learn through failure are instrumental to breaking new ground. Marketing & Innovation Strategist Carla Johnson feels that the disruption and demands of 2020 forced many content marketers to back away from taking risks, understandably, but hopes to see a big rebound next year:

Every content marketer has greater pressure to evaluate, measure and report on how, how much, when, where and why customers connected with their brands in 2020. The year was about being nimble, responsive and methodical with execution. There was no room for trial and error. For 2021, B2B content marketing will be about taking smart risks that lead to more innovative work. They’ll take inspiration from brands that have pushed the envelope with candor, openness, empathy and even humor. With so much that didn’t work, they’ll be able to get rid of projects that don’t deliver and free up at least portions of budgets to begin to experiment. These tiny experiments will lead to more creative ways that solve problems for customers that shake the stereotype that B2B means ‘boring to boring.’

[bctt tweet="“For 2021, B2B content marketing will be about taking smart risks that lead to more innovative work.” — Carla Johnson @CarlaJohnson" username="toprank"]

8 — Amy Higgins: Co-Creating More Content with Customers

@amywhiggins Amy Higgins, Director of Content Strategy at Salesforce (and TopRank Marketing alumni) sees more co-creation of content with customers as key to building brand loyalty:

Many things have changed this year — including how marketers have embraced digital channels and tapped into the emotions of our audience. Our job as B2B content marketers has always been to help fill the pipe by bringing in new audiences, keeping them engaged, and moving them toward the next step of their buyer’s journey. However, in 2021, I predict that will change. We will focus not only on educating new audiences. But, we will expand our focus to further help our existing ones. Customer acquisition will still have a place at the table, but the guest of our honor will be our customer. This year we will co-create more content with our customers and for our customers to help strengthen loyalty and build evangelism.

[bctt tweet="“We will co-create more content with our customers and for our customers to help strengthen loyalty and build evangelism.” — Amy Higgins @amywhiggins" username="toprank"]

9 — Lee Odden: Optimize for Findability, Credibility and Experience

@leeodden Our CEO and co-founder Lee Odden sees an opportunity in 2021 for B2B marketers to raise the bar on their content marketing by optimizing customer experiences with more findable, credible and experiential content:

History will remember 2020 as a year many want to forget with many B2B marketers struggling to manage uncertainty and brand distrust, overloaded communication channels and a buyers' accelerated expectations of digital experiences. And yet, some B2B marketers have not only survived 2020, but thrived - including our own agency TopRank Marketing. I predict that many of the lessons we've learned from creating trusted content that reaches and engages B2B customers for some of the top B2B brands in the world will become the new normal in 2021. Findable - SEO is more important than ever for B2B content marketers as buyers increasingly rely on digital channels like search to find the information they need across the entire sales journey. Fresh topic research to reflect new buyer preferences plus content and link optimization will raise the bar on being the best answer for customers at the very moment of need. Credible - Buyers' increasing distrust of brand marketing and messaging plus the shift towards digital channels has accelerated the impact that subject matter experts are having with content credibility, quality and distribution. B2B brands will raise the bar on content credibility by partnering with external influencers while building the internal influence of their executives through content collaborations. Experiential - Video has become the price of entry for B2B customer attention but there's more to creating great marketing experiences and in 2021 successful B2B brands will raise the bar on customer experience with better virtual events, personalization, episodic brand content, more interactive content and increasingly collaborative content.

[bctt tweet="“The lessons we've learned from creating trusted content that reaches and engages B2B customers for some of the top B2B brands in the world will become the new normal in 2021.” — Lee Odden @LeeOdden" username="toprank"]

Cheers to a New Year in 2021

This is an exciting time to be in content marketing. We have an opportunity to shape the “new normal” and further solidify the function as a business strategy cornerstone. Carve your own path in 2021, but heed the words and advice of these bright business minds who’ve seen many twists and turns in the journey of content marketing, and will help guide us through those to come. For more 2021 B2B marketing predictions, be sure to check out 12 Top B2B SEO Trends & Predictions for 2021 and 14 Expert B2B Influencer Marketing Predictions for 2021. *LinkedIn is a TopRank Marketing client.

The post Top B2B Marketers Share their Content Marketing Predictions for 2021 appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Article Source: http://bathseoexpert.blogspot.com/2020/12/top-b2b-marketers-share-their-content.html