Since it’s a slow period between Christmas and the New Year, now is a good time to take a look back at the first year of posts on The Distributed Marketing Blog. Our mission is to publish industry news, best practices, tips and techniques for marketing professionals who work in distributed multi-channel marketing organizations. Our […]
Best Practices.
Influence Marketing Tips from Hobbiton & Hogwarts
Most marketers would agree that finding and persuading the individuals who shape markets is critical. Word of mouse — the online buzz that comes when key influencers are tweeting, chatting, and posting about a product — is often the difference between an industry leading brand and a laggard. If you’re looking for a bit of magic […]
Content Marketing Increases Despite Skeptics
Digital lead generation through content marketing was once viewed as an expensive and unproven technique. As recently as 2010, surveys showed that up to a third of executives were unsure that the strategies were worth their time according to a recent article by Nicholas Kinports. That’s not far from the results that we got when […]
The Distributed Marketing Circle of Life
Recently, I heard a very smart marketer say that his job wouldn’t be tenable without his “circle of life” – a web of vendors and services he relies on to manage, integrate and optimize campaigns. He’s not alone. Forrester, Gartner, and IDC all predict that marketing automation will continue to be a top investment priority […]
Four Landing Page Mistakes to Avoid
A simple landing page with no navigation links, a clear call to action, and just enough “sell” copy to encourage conversion, can improve campaign results dramatically. The clients I work with are in different industries, and they approach online marketing from very different perspectives. The one thing they have in common is that effective landing […]
How to Create Contagious Content
Earlier today, Distributed Marketing Blog Editor Deb McAlister-Holland joined MyPRGenie for a session on the tips and techniques that marketers can use to help content “go viral” – even without a video. It was a huge success, attended by a wide range of PR people, marketers and bloggers who want to be heard and draw traffic […]
Harnessing the Power of Word-of-Mouse
We often promote this blog through press releases and advance copy sent to other bloggers and journalists. Last week, Forbes.com columnist David Coursey surprised us by a draft blog post that quoted him and submitting it to Forbes.com as a guest post. “I had planned to write something about the topic myself, and link back […]
Four Avoidable Marketing Metrics Mistakes
A lot of marketers wanted to emulate TV’s Mad Men: creative geniuses who build brands and marketing empires. Instead, became math men spending their days with statistics and spreadsheets filled with complex formulas for measuring every message and justifying spending. In fact, half of CMO’s say that justifying spending through metrics takes more than 30% […]
Why Testing Email Subject Lines Isn’t Optional
By Deb McAlister-Holland Marketers understand that email marketing is changing. Still, in July 2011, 95% of the marketing executives surveyed by The Distributed Marketing blog rated email “somewhat” or “very” effective in delivering results – far more than any other marketing communications channel. At the same time, everyone involved in email marketing acknowledges that the […]
Print Collateral Drives Sales
If you relied solely on the trade press and Twitter, it would be easy to think that marketing and sales organizations have moved beyond print to a world where everything is digital. But actual data shows that print remains near the top of the list for many marketers. Why? Because it works, and there are […]
CRM + Marketing Automation
Few organizations today could thrive if they relied solely on Rolodexes, paper lead sheets, or Outlook address books. Whether they use a SaaS solution like Zoho or Salesforce.com, or a robust customized CRM solution, most organizations are convinced that they’re getting an excellent result from their CRM investment. The question is, could they be getting […]
Four Marketing Lessons from The Grateful Dead
By Deb McAlister-Holland On April 15, 2010, IDC analysts Frank Gens and Amy Konary presented an executive briefing called The Maturing Cloud: What the Grateful Dead Can Teach Us About Cloud Economics. In addition to IDC’s usual carefully researched data, the webinar included a wealth of thought-provoking information that used analogies from the band’s storied history and […]