BtoB Media Business - October 2011 - (Page 17)

Sales & Marketing Bridging the gap Penton Media, MeritDirect team to offer program that combines lead-gen, email BY MATTHEW SCHWARTZ SALES & MARKETING AD VANTAGES I n most lead-gen programs, business publishers provide their clients with contact information and other demographics from their lists, which clients can then use to develop a sales and marketing strategy specifically targeting those individuals and which may or may not succeed. By contrast, the results of a typical email campaign will tell marketers openand click-through rates, but not much else. Now, Penton Media and database marketing company MeritDirect want to wed the best of both worlds. In July, the companies rolled out their Email & Lead Advantage Program, which bundles email campaigns and actionable leads gleaned from Penton email lists. “It’s the first time we’ve made this type of program available,” said Chris Blohm, senior VP-data and media solutions at MeritDirect, who added that the program could be duplicated for other b-to-b media companies. “What’s unique about it is that we take the tried-and-true principles of email marketing and combine them with delivering actionable leads at the end of the campaign.” Joann Kropp, VP-customer data solutions at Penton Media, stressed that segmentation of audience data has become an increasingly critical factor in the publisher’s ability to capture marketers’ budgets, particularly in the small and midsize business arena. “More and more of our customers are asking for tools to help them validate ROI and assist them in the sales nurturing process so they can speed up the sales cycle,” she said. She added: “We can no longer say we have a large database of names and hope that because we have it, they will come. … We understand the challenges with budgets and the challenges of how we partner with our advertisers that are renting our names for segmentation, targeting and nurturing.” Penton Media’s database includes information on 17 vertical markets—such as electronics, manufacturing and natural products—reaching almost 4 million subscribers through permission-based email addresses. Here’s how the program works: Marketers provide the creative for the email campaign and a blast is sent to 15,000 names in a targeted segment from Penton’s database. Detailed results are analyzed with the marketer after the campaign. Penton examines opens and clicks on the links as well as areas within the creative. It also provides the demographics of those who opened and/or clicked, such as job title, job function, company size, sales volume, SIC codes, NAICS codes and purchasing power. A second campaign of 15,000 names is sent, using new segmentation based on the results of the initial blast. As a general rule, Penton will supplement the second blast with new names to make up for the names dropped off the first blast. The test and retest phase—garnering intelligence into what segments perform for a campaign and the ability to mail or call those who have demonstrated interest in a product or service—is key. “We could say, ‘You thought it was employee size under 50 that would respond [to the email campaign]; it’s actually larger-sized companies. So on the second blast, let’s go out to larger-sized companies,’ ” Blohm said. Contact information, excluding email addresses, of opens and clicks from both of the email efforts is then passed along to the marketer to allow them further follow-up to either nurture the leads or use them in a multichannel campaign. “We’ve built a way to monetize and increase the performance of our audience data for email campaigns, which is how the ROI will improve for the advertisers renting our data,” Kropp said. She added that, so far, the program is working. “It validates that we did target the right person and the right person is opening [the email]; and sometimes it also shows us, gee, we need to tweak the selection criteria.” ediabrands, Interpublic Group’s media buying and digital services unit, in September named Lauren Snyder as the company’s chief communications officer. Synder will be responsible for the marketing and communications for the soon-to-debut New Yorkbased IPG Media Lab, which will match clients with technology, and Virtual Lab, an internal, BIO Web-based client LAUREN resource. Before joining SNYDER Mediabrands, Snyder was Chief Comexec VP-chief communimunications Officer, cations officer for resorts Mediabrands company Kerzner International Holdings. Media Business: What is your initial marketing strategy to increase the visibility of Mediabrands? Lauren Snyder: The first objective is to simplify the positioning of our abilities and our purpose. We say we are dedicated to reinventing the business of modern day media and marketing. We’ll roll out a new set of brand logos, a new website, a group of well-oiled leadership speaking in the press [and] to the industry and within the context of ‘culture’ as the start. MB: What role will IPG Media Lab and Virtual Lab play in growing the company? Snyder: The IPG Media Lab and Mediabrands’ Virtual Lab are examples of us putting investment into the future of media. Identifying the ‘change-makers’ in the digital space, adding relevance to our products to make them more useful for our clients and then educating all of our talent on how these technologies can change the way our clients interact with consumers will change our business. MB: What are some of the elements involved in becoming a performance-based agency network? Snyder: How we look at the world; how we are compensated tied to client business growth; how we invest in our talent, measurement tools and access to emerging technology—all contribute to our behavior as a perfor—M.S. mance-based agency network. Identify digital ‘change-makers’ M mediabusinessonline.com | October 2011 | Media Business | 17 http://www.mediabusinessonline.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of BtoB Media Business - October 2011

BtoB Media Business - October 2011
Contents
McGraw-Hill Split Raises a Number of Questions
Who's Who in Business Publishing
Virtual Events are Moving Beyond the Booth
Sales & Marketing
M&A
Audience Development
Production
Benchmarks
How to Keep Up as B-to-B Media Transforms

BtoB Media Business - October 2011