Harvard Business Review

NOVEMBER 20, 2018

” By the end of a quarter, she had wrung every ounce of energy out of marketing, and we started the next quarter from a standstill with no momentum and no leverage. It is highly efficient at capturing, storing, and releasing energy. If you’re B2B, the train is parked in the station, but it’s leaving soon.

B2C 14

B2C Energy Marketing Efficiency 14

Harvard Business Review

FEBRUARY 22, 2012

Or total energy use during the product's lifetime? The best thing to share will depend heavily on the product - the labels on energy hogs like light bulbs, air conditioners, and cars should tell us the total energy use and cost to operate over a year or the product's lifetime.

Supply Chain 14

Supply Chain Retail Apparel B2B 14

Harvard Business Review

FEBRUARY 10, 2011

In addition to using less energy to run machines, slashing paper use also saves large amounts of energy and water upstream in the paper production process. Meanwhile, the other stream of waste will create a potentially significant source of clean energy (adding to the sustainability win).

Productivity 15

Productivity Products Christensen Document 15

Harvard Business Review

MAY 22, 2018

Shifting to a TAP view of the world, they realized that there may be business opportunities in the B2B space, by partnering with those on-demand apps and mom-and-pop shops. But our experience is that after an initial period of discomfort and unfamiliarity, it unleashes an enormous amount of energy, enthusiasm, and creativity.

Organization 10

Organization Company Venture Capitalist B2B 10

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 10, 2014

Loyalty and reward programs provide this type of context for B2C companies, while strategic account and relationship management programs do the same for B2B companies. Owned media can be used in B2B as well. There is no doubt that these owned media strategies are complex and require a real commitment of time, energy, and resources.

Media 8

Media B2B Disintermediation Content 8

Harvard Business Review

MARCH 7, 2011

Given the diversity of countries and industries (everything from energy to telecom, government to nonprofit) and company sizes (multinationals to startups) there are some striking commonalities that emerge. This means bundled solutions where you provide an end-to-end package, especially for B2B companies.

Innovation 15

Innovation B2B Price Trends 15

Harvard Business Review

JULY 17, 2012

Once the company is up and running, most founders obsess over perfecting the product or service, and perhaps devote energy to secondary tasks such as building a website. Too often, there's a task that's far down this list of priorities that deserves to be much higher: Making the company's first sale.

Entrepreneur 15

Entrepreneur Discount B2B Long-term 15

Harvard Business Review

JULY 17, 2012

Once the company is up and running, most founders obsess over perfecting the product or service, and perhaps devote energy to secondary tasks such as building a website. Too often, there's a task that's far down this list of priorities that deserves to be much higher: Making the company's first sale.

Entrepreneur 15

Entrepreneur Discount B2B Long-term 15

Harvard Business Review

MARCH 1, 2016

research on B2B purchases indicates that 25% of the buying decision depends on the interaction with the sales professional. But remember, every hour spent developing an opportunity that’s outside your sweet spot is a non-strategic use of time, energy, and resources. McKinsey & Co. It’s a balancing act.

Strategy 8

Strategy Execution How To CRM 8

Harvard Business Review

NOVEMBER 5, 2015

This use metric has a positive and significant effect on both outcomes even after controlling for marketing analytics spending, product vs. service, and B2C vs. B2B. We have found that companies that invest time and energy focusing on activating insights rather than just generating them have the greatest success.

Marketing 8

Marketing ROI Metrics B2C 8

Harvard Business Review

AUGUST 5, 2015

The AIDA model and its variants are the basis for sales funnels at many B2B firms. In fact, B2B buyers report that, compared to other sources of information, these interactions are the most influential in their decision making process: The source considered the least influential is social media. Don’t believe the hype.

B2B 8

B2B AIDA AIDAS Disintermediation 8

Harvard Business Review

JUNE 23, 2015

Those systems can now transmit real-time data about the performance of industrial machines as well as the components of energy and transportation systems. These three big shifts are now playing out in nearly every industrial market, regardless of whether it is B2C or B2B, high- or low-asset intensity.

Industry 8

Industry System Business Model B2C 8

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 17, 2013

This is the kind of mismatch I look out for when I try to reconcile stated strategy with a comp plan: In this case, selling research was our company’s core strategy, yet the sales staff was incented to divert energy to sell something completely different. Or consider a B2B software company I know.

Planning 9

Planning Incentives Document Price 9

Harvard Business Review

DECEMBER 17, 2018

Microsoft, where we work, is no exception, and B2B sales is one of the areas where we are seeing the most value. Deeper analysis showed that investing more time and energy into partnering with some of these lower growth accounts could improve them. Or do we spend more time with them because they are higher growth?

Analysis 8

Analysis B2B Engineering Learning-by-Doing 8

Harvard Business Review

JUNE 7, 2016

Alex Mohler admits that when he first started as director of client services at Crubiq, a B2B sales company based in Raleigh, North Carolina, he felt like a fish out of water. I notice that it has a big impact on the dynamic and energy in the room.” If it’s too much, say so.

How To 8

How To Case Study Tactics Goal 8

Harvard Business Review

MAY 24, 2017

In contrast, today’s scarcest resource is your human capital, as measured by the time, talent and energy of your workforce. Energy, too, is difficult to come by. Consider the case of one B2B supplier that wanted to figure out what made some salespeople top performers. Energy can be created and destroyed.

Human Capital 15

Human Capital Management Company ROCE 15

Miles Anthony Smith

NOVEMBER 7, 2019

TopRank Marketing TopRank Marketing has been doing innovative and impactful work with interactive content and B2B influencers for huge brands like SAP, Dell, LinkedIn, 3M, and Oracle for over 18 years. A deep understanding of ABM in B2B is its super-power. If you want your B2B content to be great, invite your community to participate.

Marketing 105

Marketing Content Audience Brand 105

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 20, 2016

In the B2B world, it’s all about lead generation: getting people to hand over their email addresses and phone numbers so that you can spam and telemarket them into submission, where “submission” means actually buying your product. Which is exactly why I think Lyons is right to pillory these kinds of practices.

Cost 8

Cost Marketing Content Media 8

Harvard Business Review

JULY 8, 2015

We came to these conclusions after studying the sales force of a large B2B software company using six quarters of quota attainment data for several thousand employees. Energy: This new angle, which is very much related to the previous two, includes a collection of metrics that measure overall time and effort exerted by salespeople.

Metrics 8

Metrics B2B Competitive Advantage Analysis 8

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 27, 2014

Inside many companies, particularly in B2B settings, the notion of “liberation” remains challenging. It was exactly the sort of entrepreneurial energy that he hoped a platform organization would unleash. “We Yet it also matters to these businesses to keep launching innovative new offerings. — his response was: “Of course not!”

Innovation 8

Innovation Strategy Drucker Project 8