At a local presentation, a tech-savvy audience began tweeting at both the presenter and the organization only to find the Twitter handle for the presenter was a young poker player in the west coast who looked nothing like the presenter. Although the audience quickly adjusted by tweeting at the company instead of the individual, I’m sure the poker player was bewildered by the mentions accompanied with technical jargon about a presentation he clearly did not present.

While it’s not the end of the world if your company’s CEO doesn’t tweet, a Burson-Marstellar study in 2011 found that 77 percent of Fortune Global 100 companies are using Twitter. Although many brands post regularly on Twitter, how many times have you seen the CEO or CMO tweet? Outside of the SMB world, I’m guessing not very often. While they are few and far between, a study by social media branding firm BRANDfog found that consumers and employees regard company leaders who engage on social media platforms positively therefore affecting the view of not just the brand, but also of the executive leadership team. Here are a few statistics pulled from the survey:

• According to the respondents, 78 percent said CEO participation in social media leads to better communication, 71 percent said it leads to improved brand image, and 64 percent said it provides more transparency.
• In fact, 86 percent of respondents rated CEO social media engagement as somewhat important, very important or mission-critical. At 94 percent, respondents said C-suite social media participation actually enhances brand image.
• Looking internally, 82 percent of employee respondents trust a company more when the CEO and leadership team communicate via social media.

Although these numbers clearly indicate the importance of C-suite transparency in social media, C-suite buy-in along with speed of adoption of new online technologies continue to be two major challenges for many organizations. To view graphs and additional information, read the following article.

We’ve recently started working with one of our clients for their upcoming email newsletter. Some skeptics may ask, “Are email newsletters the right channel for BtoB marketers to reach their customers?” I started digging and finally stumbled across Econsultancy’s recent survey and was greeted with a resounding YES.

Who to market to?

As a BtoB marketer, personalized, targeted marketing is key. (Check out Sami’s blog on how to get persona(l) with your buyers for more on targeted marketing! ) There are several ways to segment emails including lead source (i.e., search, phone inquiry, or event), demographic data (i.e., age, location, gender) and behavior (i.e., time on site, links clicked, and pages viewed). In fact, according to the February survey findings, 55 percent of organizations currently segment by lead source.

With that in mind, you might want to re-examine WHO you are currently marketing to, HOW you’re marketing to them, and WHAT you’re marketing.

Why this matters?

E-newsletters can have several business objectives. From increasing awareness to building thought leadership or increasing sales, the e-newsletters are more than another platform to tout recent accomplishments and the latest corporate and industry news. For example, email conversion rate benchmarks are significantly higher for BtoB than BtoC companies for newsletter conversion rates in the lead generation and direct sales categories.

Right message?

Now you know how to segment the target market and the purpose of the e-newsletter, marketers must ensure they have the right message. The content of the e-newsletter must be personalized to your target audience and tailored to meet your recipient’s needs…not yours. Once the e-newsletter makes its way past the spam filters to the recipient’s inbox, there’s still competition against other emails and factors competing for recipients’ time and attention. The study found that “social media competing for readers’ time” is the most significant challenge marketers face today.

You have a new product? Great, but will this product solve a problem or meet some type of need? You’re celebrating the company’s 10 year anniversary? Congrats, but what contributions have you made to the industry and how will your recipients benefit from this? In case you’re still unsure about the importance of personalized marketing and content, the survey also found that 71 percent of BtoB respondents agreed that specific business/industry information is the most widespread personalization factor.

Before your organization puts out its next e-newsletter, take a quick look to see how your lists have been segmented to ensure you’re sending it to the right people through the right channel with the right message.

Although fire drills may seem more distracting and counterproductive than helpful,  organizations may need to apply the concept of fire drills to their social media and online plans. You may not ever need to implement the fire drill procedure, but it’s better to have an online crisis communication plan in place.

Through social media, a single comment, video, or even tweet can spread like wildfire. Without timely and relevant responses, distrust and negative sentiment for your brand can quickly develop. Still not convinced? Check out these two examples on United Breaks Guitars and Motrin Moms to see how fast negative comments can escalate out of a brand’s control.

Based on a PRSA Technology Special Interest Group presentation by Sarah Evans, there are three main steps to creating an online crisis communication plan.

1.       Goal-setting 
Talk with your executives to develop a reasonable and measurable goal of the program. Is it to change online sentiment, show transparency, or minimize negative repercussions? Writing out this the goal of the online crisis communication plan also helps to ensure you and your executives are on the same page. Be sure to keep the fundamentals of crisis preparation in mind and don’t assume you won’t use an online platform. Just because your brand isn’t on an online platform doesn’t mean people won’t be talking about your brand online. So be sure to secure your brand’s username, Twitter handle or YouTube channel before someone else does.

2.       Identify the crisis type
Understanding the type and level of crisis can help you respond accordingly. There are two basic crisis types: forseeable or abrupt.

• Forseeable: By identifying possible crisis scenarios, internal stakeholders are able to own the original messaging and prepare how they want to respond to the circumstances depending on the level of urgency. This helps relieve some of the pressure your team may face when a crisis occurs and provides direction on the expectations of your stakeholders. For example, your team may be expected respond immediately or prepare an official company statement through a press release, media alerts, or other announcement.

• Abrupt: When an unexpected crisis occurs, the messaging originates from an external source. Examples include but are not limited to an inflammatory blog post or tweet, slanderous campaigns by word-of-mouth or online, the spreading of misinformation or anything else that attacks the brand or key stakeholders.

3.       Mobilization
Once you’ve identified the crisis type, outline immediate and ongoing tactics in a logical timeline. Be sure to assign activities to positions/individuals and include time increments. Then, activate your crisis communication plan. Even more critical, your online response within the first 24 hours can make, or break, the success of your plan.

Next, keep in mind that proactive outreach prior to a crisis can help you build loyal brand ambassadors. For example, third-party sources who are “defending” your brand and redirecting to the proper source on your website can be just as effective, if not more, than a corporate response.

Now that you’ve got the basics on how to create an online crisis plan, your next step is to get that crisis plan in front of your boss. For more online crisis communication essentials, be sure to check out Arketi’s next blog post on what you’ll need in your social media toolbox.

Recently, the folks at the Content Marketing Institute published a survey entitled “B2B Content Marketing: 2012 Benchmarks, Budgets and Trends”—a survey which further validates Arketi’s own findings at our fourth Annual High Tech CMO Roundtable event .

According to the survey, content marketing, which is viewed as one of the hottest trends in publishing in 2011, is poised to continue its market dominance in the upcoming year. In fact, 60 percent of surveyed business-to-business marketing personnel plan to increase content market spending in 2012. On average, the surveyed marketing personnel allocate 26 percent of their total budget to content marketing initiatives.

According to CMI’s findings, BtoB marketers use an average of 8 content marketing tactics to achieve their goals. Article posting ranks the highest with 79 percent usage; social media (other than blogs) is used by 74 percent of survey respondents. Blogs, enewsletters and case studies rounded out the top 5 with 65 percent, 63 percent and 58 percent of the vote.  See below for full ranking.

In the social media sector, Twitter reigns supreme. Twitter use increased by 35 percent to 74 percent in 2011, with Facebook use up 30 percent from 2010 numbers to 70 percent. Joe Pulizzi, founder of the CMI, noted that, “Twitter, from a listing standpoint and niche content standpoint, is easier to use in a niche business rather than a large consumer. You’re focused on hashtags and different searches that are focused on content sets. Twitter is our most effective broadcasting tool: less social media, more broadcasting.”

“Twitter is closer to what they [marketers] are doing now, as opposed to Facebook, where you really have to interact,” he stated.

YouTube and LinkedIn shared double digit jumps with increased usage of 47% and 39% respectively, while blog and video use leaped 27 percent in 2011 from 2010.

In 2011, we posted a B2B Marketing Minute that summarized our own content marketing tend findings from our Annual CMO Roundtable. We learned that 90% of BtoB organizations are now engaged in content marketing. In addition, more than a quarter of BtoB organizations’ marketing budgets would be used on content marketing alone in 2011.

Stay tuned to find out the latest findings and predictions for 2012, as we’ll reveal our 5th Annual Roundtable findings for both the Atlanta office and our new North Carolina branch.

Several Arketians snuck out of the office for the May PRSA Georgia luncheon and returned with great insights on the “State of Public Relations Industry” from Rosanna Fiske, chair & CEO, Public Relations Society of America. Fiske covered a number of topics from PR trends to ethics to diversity and how our industry has changed.

In surveying PR pros in December 2010, the top PR trends for 2011 centered around 3 main ideas that, as we too have seen in the first quarter, here they are:

1. Reputation management- Aside from the reactive approach of crisis communication, PR departments are proactively managing the reputation of both their brand and their clients.
2. Data deluge- Through the increasing consumption of the Web and social media, our clients and their customers are being inundated with information while continuously demanding fresh content daily.
3. Rise of mobile PR- As technology advances, mobile devices are decreasing in size and increasing in capabilities.  PR must keep up, if not stay ahead, of the industry understanding the wealth of opportunities in this space.

In examining ethics and trust in the industry, Fiske shared some interesting statistics.

PR is estimated to be a $4 billion industry with predictions of an $8 billion industry in 2012. This is expected to lead to more than 2,000 additional jobs in the near future.

If you’re still in the 80’s mind set that PR pros are just a bunch of “flacks,” check this out: The average consumer is exposed to the equivalence of 174 newspapers of data a day.  According to Fiske, PR professionals produce about six newspapers worth of work a week.

Aside from the “who owns social media – PR or Marketing?” question, PR tech is an emerging player as there has been an increase of 14 percent in annual budgets for digital PR activities. Not surprising, more than 50 percent of clients are looking to PR for social media projects over ad agencies.

Whether you’re an entry-level professional or seasoned veteran, we hope you’ve found these interesting statistics encouraging. And from the words of Spiderman’s Uncle Ben, “With great power comes great responsibility.”