7 Scary Practices Still Haunting B2B Marketers

7 Scary Practices Still Haunting B2B Marketers

Darkness falls across the landThe midnight hour is close at handMarketing practices up to no good

Will frightenize y’all’s neighborhood

—Vincent Price, “Thriller” (sort of)

H alloween is almost here, and everyone from your neighbor to your local dentist

is celebrating the macabre. Ghoulies, ghosties, long-legged beasties—you name it, someone has an inflatable version of it perched on their front lawn.

In keeping with the spooky spirit of the holiday, you can do a little monster-hunting of your own. But don’t book a flight to Transylvania just yet. There may be plenty of truly heinous fiends lurking in your own marketing practices.

T he following sinister seven monsters can suck the life out of a full funnel

marketing program. So sharpen your (metaphorical) stakes, and get ready to do battle with the undead.

GHOSTS IN YOUREMAIL DATABASE

B rush the dust off your database, pry open the lid (imagine a sufficiently spooky creeeeaak),

and look inside. Do you see skeletons? Cobwebs? More broken and inactive accounts than healthy ones? Can you send out an email without being beset by mailer daemons saying your message was undeliverable?

If your database has more dead links than a sausage factory, it’s time to clean house. Purge those inactive accounts and start replacing them with new leads. LinkedIn SlideShare has a lead capture function that can turn your best decks into lead-gen powerhouses.

ZOMBIE SEO STRATEGY

S EO is a rapidly-evolving, ever-changing field. If you are using outdated tactics, you may have

a shambling, groaning imitation of SEO still struggling along, but it can’t have much life left in it.

Getting the most out of your SEO efforts takes brrrraaaaaaains. Start with these SEO resources to get up-to-date. Make sure you’re optimized for mobile and that your keywords are on point, and you can avoid being a snack for a zombie horde.

VAMPIRE PROJECTS

M ost marketing departments have a few Nosferatu-style projects lurking in the

dark corners. Only instead of sucking blood, these vampires suck money out of your budget without delivering ROI.

Take a long, hard look at your analytics. When you identify a vampire project, don’t keep it around—the stakes are too high. For the future, keep in mind that it’s easier to identify and avoid vampires in your marketing efforts if you have a solid strategy, measurable goals, and the data to evaluate progress.

FRANKENSTEIN’S MARKETING SOFTWARE STACK

W hat does your marketing automation process look like? Is it a clean, organized

flow from platform to platform? Or is it built from layers of old subroutines, software bolted together until it blinks and sits upright on the slab?

Most marketers have at least a little Frankenstein in their DNA. But real software integration can make you more efficient, make your campaigns more effective, and make the whole process easier to track.

THE DATA MONSTERIN THE CLOSET

W hen we were kids, we would pull a blanket over our heads to stay safe from monsters.

Now we know that a flimsy blanket is no match for monster claws, and the monster doesn’t disappear just because you can’t see it. Yet when it comes to data-driven marketing, many marketers are still cowering under the covers.

Like it or not, data-driven marketing is changing the industry, and those who embrace it will see better results than those who ignore it. Throw back the blankets and stare your data monster in the face, then start reorganizing your team to make data and creative work together.

MUMMIFIED MOBILEEXPERIENCE

Y ou know what movie monster has never been scary? Mummies. They’re like zombies, only

less effective. They’re slow; they’re monosyllabic; they’re relics of a bygone time. Slow, simple, antiquated…Do any of these adjectives describe your site’s mobile experience?

Are you still forcing mobile visitors to pinch and zoom to see text, or use megabytes of data just to see one image? More than half of web browsing time is on mobile devices. Don’t leave half of your customer base grappling with a mummy: optimize for mobile.

THE HEADLESSSOCIAL ACCOUNT

I n Washington Irving’s story “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” a headless

horseman rises every Halloween. Has your social media strategy lost its head and have you, busy as you are with your marketing efforts, neglected some of your social media accounts? Make sure to update your accounts regularly and make them work for your organization. Your LinkedIn Company Page is a good place to start.

O nce you have beaten these seven marketing monsters, your full funnel

marketing efforts can finally survive and thrive. But remember to keep improving and stay on the lookout for effectiveness-draining practices. Because if there’s one thing a monster loves, it’s coming back for a sequel.

Learn how to avoid other horrors that ensnare marketers with our Sophisticated Marketer’s Crash Course

in Full Funnel Marketing.