Authentic Blog - Marketing Insights for Growing Businesses

From “What” to “So What”: Building a Messaging Foundation for Modern Marketing

By the time I'm meeting with a business leader, it's because he or she is ready to invest in strategic, proactive marketing. Most often, the business has grown steadily through a sales focus and a bit of marketing "here and there" (with no clarity on what works or drives ROI). But now the business is at a point where sustained growth will require new approaches to pipeline development. It's time to invest in building a modern marketing team and program, focused on demand generation and expanded engagement. (more…)

Everything Marketing Automation: A Virtual Panel of Expert Perspectives

What do you get when you pick the brains of five digital marketing experts, representing partnerships with some of the most popular martech platforms on the market? You get everything marketing automation: the good, the bad, the ugly, and a whole lot of wisdom gleaned from the trenches. Welcome to Authentic's first "virtual panel": a Q&A exchange with five leaders in the Twin Cities digital community. (more…)

There’s no such thing as balance. How life and EOS® showed me a better path.

Balance. I once thought it was possible. Until I hit the proverbial wall. My career wasn't moving in the direction I had planned. I had just had my second child. I was spending too much time commuting, not enough time sleeping, and was nowhere near living up to the expectations I'd set for myself as a wife, mother, friend, community member, and business leader. In short, I felt like I was half-assing every category in my life. (more…)

Beyond Buzzphrases: How emerging tech could actually change everything for marketers

For the past several years, there's been plenty of buzzphrase mania around topics such as IoT (internet of things), connected devices, big data / deep data, artificial intelligence, cognitive computing, machine learning, and virtual / augmented reality. And while many of these concepts may still feel abstract and fuzzy, these emerging technologies are taking tangible shape right now in many businesses. In fact, new research just released by Forbes today, based on Salesforce's Fourth Annual State-of-Marketing Report, shows that: (more…)

Let’s be friends: How sales and marketing can help each other

What can salespeople do to help marketers? And conversely, what can marketers do to support sales? I love this question because I've been on both sides. I cut my professional teeth in B2B sales before shifting my focus to marketing, and then marketing team leadership. I've experienced the tension between these departments, and the reality is that it doesn't have to be that way. So, here's a little bit of advice for both sides, from someone who gets it. (more…)

How Do We Get More Customers?

“How do I get more customers or clients?” It sounds like a smart question, right? Because it's not asking "How do we get more leads?" but rather "How do we get more sales?", which should be the core metric of a growing business. But be careful here. We're living in an era of MORE. (more…)

Shocking But True: The Marketing Automation Disconnect

I'll never forget the day I realized just how huge the gap could be between expectation and reality, relative to marketing automation. I had recently taken a new job, after 13 years in sales and marketing for a fast-growth technology consulting start-up; a firm that specialized in CRM and marketing automation. My new organization was a contrast to my start-up experience in every way (more…)

The hard truth about marketing automation

It's one of the greatest misnomers of modern marketing: marketing automation. It's not a new term or technology. In fact, the pioneers in this space entered the market as early as 1999. And yet, despite its strong adoption and incredible growth, businesses large and small still struggle with what marketing automation actually means, and the level of commitment and resources required to manage an effective program. (more…)

Brace Yourself: It’s Marketing Conference Season

It seems that every 18 months or so, the conversations around B2B marketing shift. The most obvious way to observe this evolution is through the themes and titles of marketing conference keynotes and breakout sessions. A few years ago, all the conferences were focused on social and mobile. More recently, inbound and content marketing have dominated the topic lists. Today, everyone's talking ABM, predictive analytics, and lifecycle marketing. And rumblings are picking up around artificial intelligence, machine learning, and virtual / augmented reality. (more…)

The Problem with Modern Marketing

If you're in B2B marketing, you probably feel it. Something's not quite right. I felt it, too. In previous roles as a corporate B2B marketing leader, I spent nearly two decades building marketing programs and teams, sensing along the way that - though we were constantly innovating, producing great content, and growing our engagement numbers - we were missing the mark somewhere. (more…)

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