How to Make B2B Marketing Successful on Social Media

How to Make B2B Marketing Successful on Social Media Capturing the interest of consumers online is packed with challenges, and  B2B marketing is a whole different ballgame. Agency recruiters are tasked with a unique combination of both agendas both attracting candidates and winning clients. Operating in such a saturated and competitive industry, recruitment agencies must have a strong B2B marketing strategy in order to cut through the noise of the  competition. Sometimes, the best way to develop the agenda is by  absorbing lessons from those who are leading from the front. Katie Canton  is the social media and content marketing function at  Informa Business Intelligence. Its part of the Wider Informa group, which has a range of news products, analyst products and database products surveying several key market sectors including pharmaceuticals, technology, maritime and financial. For them the emphasis is not so much about community size, but about community engagement. They do this by focussing on fleshing out interesting niche topics that will resonate with their target market and actually engage their audience. You can listen to her full guide to B2B marketing below, or just read on for a summary of her top takeaways! The challenges of B2B marketing One major challenge is that people are wearing their business hat while  they wear their sort of non-business hat. So its harder I think to get people to engage in a business-to-business environment on social, which is kind of a challenge. But the nice thing about where I am now is that business intelligence is a content business essentially, so we have loads and loads of really good quality content. And the easiest way to get someone to engage on social media is to give them something of value that they actually want to engage with. Whats your step-by-step guide to social and content success? Were very much in a process to get to where we want to be, but we started about a year ago and did a lot of research, so did a lot of auditing about our current social media state, competitor landscape obviously. Did a lot of customer surveys and customer research and a lot of customer visits to find out what people want from us. And then we had the joy of distilling all that information down. Well, first thing is deciding what we actually then wanted to get out of our social media activity because, like most businesses, we dont have loads and loads of people on our social media marketing team, so we cant just do everything for the sake of doing everything and being on every platform for the sake of being on every platform. Everything we do needs to be quite strategic and quite planned and make sure weve got a good effort to return ratio. So we took all that research, we had a lot of thought internalizing the marketing teams and the marketing teams and our product teams and the senior management team to come up with our overall objectives, which is that community focus. And then we had to come up with a plan of how we were going to do that and who was going to be involved. And a lot of that planning was done within the marketing team and the product teams. And then it was about implementing, for getting the right tools and to help us implement was a big part of that and training was a big part of that. So training the whole marketing team so that everybody knows about the importance of social media and content marketing, not just the social media and content marketers. And then another big part is training anyone in the wider business who wants to get involved in social. So thats something that were cur rently starting to roll out is making sure that our analysts and journalists and sales and client services are as upscale as they want to be on social media. And then, obviously, once we study implementation and then its report and review and tweak, and thats kind of what were in the process of doing now. So its an ongoing process. What  pitfalls should B2B marketers avoid? Pitfalls, lets see. I think in the beginning we were focusing on the wrong things. So in the beginning, the overall feeling was to just grow big communities and get the numbers up. And so thats what we were measuring against and thats what youre tracking against and thats what youre tracking against and thats whats where the goal was, and it just really wasnt working in a sense that we were growing but we werent getting any more visits from that, we werent getting any more leads from that, we werent getting much more than that other than that Twitter ticker going up. So I think a pitfall, I guess, to avoid is making sure that youre doing it for the right reasons and those reasons are in line with your overall marketing objectives and your overall business objectives, because theres no point in going off and trying to accomplish one thing on social media that actually doesnt move the business forward. How do you go about measuring ROI on social and content marketing? Essentially we can distil our social media metrics into three buckets. And one is community growth, one is engagements, and that includes lots of different things, and then the other one is moving those people from engagement through the funnels, so whether its visits to the site or whether its context or whatever that next step is. So all of our metrics fit into those three buckets. And then any time anyone within the business comes up with a suggestion of a piece of content we should be creating or different social network we should be joining, we need everything to come back to, A, the objective and if we can measure it. We need to have return for that effort, so everything needs to come back to those three buckets or the overall objective. Whats next? With all the different networks turning towards the more algorithm-based news feed and making it really hard for people and companies to continue to grow organically on any of these channels, I think if anyone can find a way to get around that or best that or utilize it better, I think lots of companies would pay lots of money for that. Follow Katie on Twitter  @katiecanton  and subscribe to the Employer Branding Podcast.

Looking for a Customer Service Role

Looking for a Customer Service Role Looking for a Customer Service Role? If you have an important customer service job interview coming up, dont worry â€" you have got this covered with our helpful advice.It is not an easy job to second-guess what interview questions you will be asked, but putting in a little preparation can really help, especially when it comes to customer service jobs. These types of role are heavily dependent on your personality traits, so you should place precedence on your personality when your interview questions come up. Going by past experience and information gathered by industry sector experts, the chances are you will be asked the following interview questions. To help you out, we have also listed great ways to answer them.Q: Can you give me an example of when you worked well in a team?This is quite a common interview question for customer support roles. The thing to remember here is that there’s no ‘I’ in customer support. Try to avoid saying I said this or I did that, instead focus on saying we or our team. The inte rviewer will want to know that you can work well in a team and they will want you to be able to prove it.Refer to an actual event that happened in your previous role where you worked together as a team. Tell your story and pay particular attention towards giving credit to your team-mates and work colleagues while explaining how your role fitted into the story.Q: Tell me about a time where you were faced with a difficult customer. How did you diffuse the tension and solve their problem?What the interviewer wants to know here is whether you have the ability to talk calmly and patiently to disgruntled customers, or if you simply crack under pressure. In this case it isnt important to go into great detail about why the customer was complaining. Simply focus on how you used your skills to understand their issue and kept the customer calm while finding a resolution to their problem. Your answer could go something like this: A customer called about a faulty product. Firstly, I listened to their whole explanation and could understand why they had an issue. I apologized on behalf of the company and empathized with their issue. I went on to offer the customer a refund or replacement, as was the company policy. The customer opted for a full refund, so I made sure I processed this for them immediately while they were still on the phone. I asked if they needed assistance with anything else, then left the customer my name and direct number should they wish to contact me with any further issues.Q: Can you describe a time when you provided excellent customer service?What you need to describe here is how you are willing to go out of your way to ensure you deliver a high quality service. Many customer service roles have general scripts and guidelines to follow when dealing directly with customers. However, an employer really wants to find those candidates who do more than just sit and read out pre-prepared scripts.Again you can demonstrate your willingness to provide excepti onal customer services by referencing a time when you went to extra lengths to make a customer happy. It may have been when you personally chased up a late order on behalf of a customer and took the time to call them back with your results and confirmed delivery dates rather than simply lodging a query for the sales department to deal with. Examples like this can show customers that they are really valued, and this helps to build better trust in the company as a whole.Q: If you cannot answer a question from a customer, how do you handle this?This can be quite a loaded question to answer from the interviewer. What they are really asking is if you can handle difficult situations well, and to see if you are willing to admit to a potential weakness and then make the effort to actively seek out a solution to solve it. It is in your best interest to answer this question in a positive way. You can explain that in a situation where you dont know the answer, you will do your best to ensur e that the customer gets the appropriate help and advice from another team member or manager. You would explain that you would use this situation as a learning experience should you encounter the same question again in future. previous article CV Design for the Female Applicant For the Ladies! next article Dotted in Red â€" A Free Resume Template with a Touch of Red you might also likeThe Best Way to Explain Your Sabbatical To a New Employer

Sales Lessons Learned - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career

Sales Lessons Learned - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career Selling anything to anyone is a very hard thing to do. Once you get out of your comfort zone and get used to sales, you learn a lot of life lessons. Below you can find 5 of them. It is the stories that sell: Products don’t sell by themselves. You need to back them up with stories. You need to touch other people’s feelings so that they can put themselves into the same shoes. If you look at the marketing videos carefully, all of them try to tell a story putting the product into the center of the story. Therefore, it is important to have a few stories about the product because facts don’t sell but stories do! Befriend the right people: People prefer to work with people that they like and get along well. Therefore, if you work in corporate sales, try to become friends with the people that you work with. Become friends with not only the ones that will buy from you but also with others such as the employee sitting in the front door of the company that you visit or the marketing people, etc. You will soon realize that this makes your life much easier plus you can learn inside information, for instance whether there are different offers other than yours, if you befriend the employees. Be honest: Always be an honest salesperson. Don’t over exaggerate your product and if you are giving a service, be realistic about timelines. Admit to your clients when your product is not a good fit for their business so that you can earn their respect. When you gain the respect and trust of your clients, you can build a forever business. Otherwise, if you deceive them, you can only get a one-time shot. Think this as a marathon and not a sprint. Deal with rejection: If you want to be a good salesman, you need to learn how to deal with rejection. When you get rejected, ask for feedback. Try to learn the reason behind rejection. If you can learn the real reason, next time you can take steps to avoid the same situation. Also, when you get rejected, don’t take it personally. You are not getting rejected as a person, your product or service is getting rejected. Therefore, go back to your team and brainstorm what you can do to prevent rejection again. Not everybody is your customer: Learn your target segment very well. For example; if your product is intended for AB income classes, then don’t waste your time with the DE group because you won’t succeed. Remember that not every client fits into your sales strategy. Also, stay away from clients that expects you to work only for them 24/7 because this is not realistic. You are their salesperson and not slave.

Twentysomething Problems with working at a big company

Twentysomething Problems with working at a big company By Ryan Healy If there is an overarching impact my generation is already having on the corporate world, it is entrepreneurship. Roughly 80% of my friends and acquaintances plan to start their own business at some point. Both males and females, college grads and current students, everyone wants to run their own business, and many of us will. However, it is not practical to assume that everyone will. In fact, I would bet that less than half of the aforementioned people will take the plunge into entrepreneurship. The economy needs both entrepreneurs and employees to run successfully and lets face it, not everyone is cut out for the risky, constantly changing life of an entrepreneur. That said, I dont think my friends will land at large companies, either. Theyll go to smaller ones. Here are three reasons why large companies will have an increasingly difficult time trying to recruit and retain their young talent. 1. Following the crowd is boring. To me, there is something very unsatisfying about being one of many. This does not mean that I want to rebel or move to a remote village and drop out of society. This means that I know I am an individual and I know I can achieve what I set my mind to. Because of this, following the crowd and working in a large organization with hundreds or thousands of people doing the same tasks is very disheartening. Ben Casnocha, the best example of a young entrepreneur I can think of, sums it up best in his book, My Start Up Life. He says, I dont want to be normal, I want to be something else. Simple, straight forward and to the point, this quote sums up how young, ambitious people think. These days, its all about going above and beyond the crowd. And where do you follow the crowd more than in a massive organization? 2. Bureaucracy is a waste of time. During one of my far-too-common discussions with a friend about paychecks, raises and the corporate BS involved with them, my friend said, Im going to start looking for another job that pays more money. I cant ask for a raise I dont even know who to ask! If you have a boss who reports to a boss, who reports to another boss etc. it is going to take weeks or months to get your request to the right people. And who exactly are these right people anyway? Many people I know have multiple supervisors. Which one do you ask? I guess my friend could go to the HR department with the request, but the chances of the HR folks knowing his job responsibilities or knowing which manager to contact about the request are slim. When HR finally figures all of this out, my friend would have missed out on three or four paychecks that could have been paid at the higher rate. So its not hard to understand why he is about to begin interviewing with other, smaller companies. 3. I can be a CEO and an intern at the same time. Because of the hierarchical structures that nearly all organizations adhere to, big decisions and big-picture work happen at the top of the food chain. Smaller organizations can be much less rigid and more lenient then large organizations because of the high visibility across the organization. Even if a young person isnt able to make the huge decision, at least they know the person who did. And they can decide if they trust the decision-maker to lead the company in the right direction. Its ironic that I am barely a step above an intern at my corporate job, but one could argue that I am the CEO of Employee Evolution. During the day I often perform low-level intern-type tasks, but at night I have meetings with entrepreneurs and authors, record podcasts for the Wall Street Journal and discuss my vision for the future of Employee Evolution with my web designer. Its not hard to see why 9 to 5 at a big company probably isnt the quickest way to the top. Ryan Healys blog is Employee Evolution.

Writing a Winning Resume - Making Sure That You Are Prepared For The Next Step

Writing a Winning Resume - Making Sure That You Are Prepared For The Next StepDuring your time at Berkeley, writing a winning resume is something that you should be able to handle as you prepare to leave the university. It is an important step in the process of securing employment after graduation, so taking the time to prepare for it is a good idea. Here are a few pointers to help you do just that.The first thing that you will need to do is research on the subject of your final project. You will be required to present a written example of your ability to do this in your application. If you are not familiar with the computer program that the University uses, make sure that you check this out before writing your resume. You will want to find out about the specific requirements and policies of the program that you wish to apply for so that you know what type of paper to create.The next area that you should spend some time on is research on the course that you are applying for. You can find this information on the web or from some references that you know. If you have experience working in the field that you would like to showcase, you can talk to your references about what kind of career path they have had. This will give you a better idea of the type of work that they are looking for.If you are applying for an internship, make sure that you take time to research on the job that you want to work on and how much you will be paid for the internship. During your interview, make sure that you look professional and clean-cut, even if you are not on campus. Many employers will be checking out the interviewee to see if they appear well-dressed and polished.If you are applying for a job as a food service supervisor, there is a special job that needs to be filled. The Human Resources Office will be checking your education and previous experience to ensure that you are the right candidate for the position. If you have any other community college experience, this will also be taken into consideration.As a student who has already received a degree, you may need to turn in your transcripts. If you have a list of credits on hand, that will help your school to help you get your transcripts, which are needed for many financial and educational goals. Make sure that you keep your school records up to date so that you can always have an idea of what you need to do to complete your degree.Last but not least, make sure that you are bringing the right kinds of materials when you are submitting your application. Try to bring as much information as possible on the kind of job that you are applying for. Have a list of questions and answers prepared. Also be sure that you take the time to interview for a job by sending an email, fax or phone call.If you have not taken the time to prepare for writing a winning resume, you may want to consider doing so before you leave Berkeley. There are many resources available to help you get ready for the next step in your life.

3 Strategies for Making it Past the Initial 5-Second Resume Scan - CareerAlley

3 Strategies for Making it Past the Initial 5-Second Resume Scan - CareerAlley We may receive compensation when you click on links to products from our partners. However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results. Winston Churchill Author Byline: Jessica has a true passion for the job seeker, evidenced by her desire to share everything she can with everyone she can about resume writing and interviewing Author Website: http://www.greatresumesfast.com Ive heard it said various ways that you get a 5-, 7-, or 30-second initial scan from the hiring manager. I can tell you personally that when I was an HR manager and had 100 resumes to go through, my initial scan was about 5 seconds long, and I was looking for something to catch my eye. Here are the three areas I looked at when considering whether to invest more time: PROFESSIONAL FORMATTING When youre reviewing 100 resumes a day, the ones that really stick out are the ones in which you can tell the person invested time into creating. The professional and executive resume formats that were well-organized, easy to read, and perfectly laid out really made reviewing the resume easierand definitely caught my attention. When youre comparing a professionally organized and strategically laid out resume to a messy, unprofessional, and disorganized one, the choice of which one to invest time into reading becomes a no-brainer. After all, why waste time searching through a document trying to find the info you need when someone else has clearly laid it out for you? EASY-TO-FIND REQUIREMENTS When I posted a job ad online and was deluged with responses, I was appalled at how many people just shot me a resume that said absolutely nothing about the requirements that I had spent so much time writing to include in the ad. Normally, when I posted a job ad I would include: REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS and PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS. At the very least, to even be considered, the person had to possess the required qualifications; and the resumes that caught my attention were the ones that made it easy for me to see that they did indeed meet the requirementseither by listing them in the top or calling attention to them in a bold, underlined, or italicized font and placed throughout their resume. Want to put the nail in the coffin? (I know, Halloween humor groan ) Call attention to the fact that you also meet their preferred qualifications. Meeting the required and preferred qualificationsand calling attention to this fact in your resumemakes you a perfect candidate for the job. COMPELLING, EASY-TO-READ CONTENT Long paragraphs on resumes serve one purpose and thats to lose the hiring managers attention. If youre using paragraphs with 5+ sentences then you not only lost my attention, but now the info I need isnt readily accessible; its buried beneath an enormous amount of text density that I dont have the time to wade through. Keep it concise, cut out the mundane, and highlight your accomplishments. Dont go super crazy with the bold, underline, or italics, but use them when it fits, and use them to call attention to the most important information. Just to reviewheres how to make it past the initial 5-second scan: Professional, polished, and well-organized format (colors and white space, goodmessy and distracting, bad.) Make it easy for the hiring manager to find exactly what he or she needsand to find it quickly. Keep the content concise, and highlight the critical information the hiring manager needs in order to make the decision to call for the interview. Other strategies come into play when creating a compelling resume that will secure interviews, so if youre not sure your resume has the right stuffand if you havent heard of personal branding or incorporated it into your resumeit may be time to call a certified resume writer and get a resume checkup. If it means the difference between 3 interviews next week or 3 more months of job searching, you may want to consider speaking with a professional. More Resumes Article courtesy of the Recruiting Blogswap, a content exchange service sponsored by CollegeRecruiter.com, a leading site for college students looking for internships and recent graduates searching for entry level jobs and other career opportunities. This is a Guest post. If you would like to submit a guest post to CareerAlley, please follow these guest post guidelines. Good luck in your search. Joey Trebif

Savvy Social Networking-How Using Facebook Can Help You Land a Job Interview - CareerEnlightenment.com

Another Side of YourselfIt is also worth considering that there are things you can say about yourself on Facebook that you really ought not to say on your resume, and that you really cannot say on a site like LinkedIn. On your resume, you need to keep things focused on your career experience and professional interests. On Facebook, though, you can show another side of yourself, and ultimately come across as a more dynamic candidate.This might include your hobbies and family interests. We do not need to reiterate the importance of keeping slovenly drunk photos and other dubious exploits off of your profile, but pictures of family hiking trips or vacations with your spouse can be helpful. If you are an avid reader, you can connect your Facebook account to your Goodreads page. If you love to bake, you can show off photos of favorite dishes. In short, you can show how well-rounded and versatile you are in ways that simply are not appropriate for traditional resumes.And you should absolut ely include links to charitable organizations and non-profits that you support. This can go a long way toward establishing your character, and it is especially helpful when an employer is particularly socially-aware. Just make sure not to like the pages of hot-button political groups; you may feel a certain way about marriage equality or marijuana legalization, for instance, but there is no way to know whether those views will help or hurt you with a particular employer so it is best to omit them from public view altogether.Social Media and Candidate AppealThe moral of the story: Employers are coming more and more to use Facebook and other social networks as resources for weeding out red flag job applicants. You might simply minimize the threat of being lumped in with the red flags, and stay off of Facebook altogether. Even more prudent, however, is using Facebook to cast yourself as a truly desirable job candidate.Mike Zammuto became President and COO of www.reputationchanger.com in the fall of 2012. The company offers services for online reputation repair as well as a variety of additional reputation management services.