I can’t remember the last news bulletin I watched that didn’t include Donald Trump in some way. My knowledge of him basically stems from the first few seasons of The Apprentice (which I am not embarrassed to say I loved).
Apart from the whole “You’re fired” routine, there wasn’t much more I knew. So, like all good content writers, I turned to Wikipedia to get the ‘facts’. Here is a short summary:
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American businessman, politician, television personality, author, and candidate for the Republican nomination for President of the United States in the 2016 election. Trump is the Chairman and President of the Trump Organization, and the founder of the gaming and hotel enterprise, Trump Entertainment Resorts, now owned by Carl Icahn.
On June 16, 2015, Trump announced his candidacy for President of the United States at Trump Tower in New York City. Trump drew attention to domestic issues such as illegal immigration, offshoring of American jobs, the U.S. national debt, and Islamic terrorism, in a campaign strongly emphasized by the slogan “Make America Great Again.”
Trump runs as a self-described far-right conservative, particularly as it relates to fiscal and religious matters. He campaigns on a platform that puts great emphasis on American patriotism, with a significant disdain for political correctness. Trump’s candidacy has largely succeeded, partly because of widespread media coverage, his ability to self-finance his campaign and not be reliant on super PACs, frequent endorsements, and the idea that he and his supporters call “telling it like it is.”
So in this piece, I am going to “tell it like it is” and give you the Donald Trump guide to B2B marketing success!
“You have to think anyway, so why not think big?”
1. It’s a number’s game
Does your team truly understand what they need to do to hit B2B marketing team goals?
Has the B2B strategy been clearly outlined and shared amongst the group? High performing teams are well aware of the numbers they need to hit and how much activity they need to generate in order to obtain it.
“The point is; you can never be too greedy.”
Make sure your team has access to the right conversion calculators and funnel tools that allows them to clearly identify what they need to do in order to generate the desired outcomes. Allowing a team to predict conversions through the customer lifecycle will breed a culture of success – winning becomes innate.
“My whole life is about winning. I don’t lose often. I almost never lose.”
2. It’s all about the people
With so much B2B marketing activity happening, it’s easy to lose track of who you are actually targeting with your campaigns. An important factor here is to ensure you have all the tools in your arsenal necessary to make sure your team operate at full efficiency.
“My Twitter has become so powerful that I can actually make my enemies tell the truth.”
Not just social media, but like B2B marketing automation, online portals, a CRM, and analytics platforms are necessities of the modern day marketer. Being more productive with less has become the new mantra.
“Part of being a winner is knowing when enough is enough. Sometimes you have to give up the fight and walk away, and move on to something that’s more productive.”
Customers are spending more time conversing with online channels than ever before. It is now common knowledge that a salesperson is being engaged much later in the sales process. Therefore, it has become imperative that the right content is being targeted to the right person at the right time. The number one priority is knowing who your audience is.
“I have never seen a thin person drinking Diet Coke.”
Building out buyer personas and having content for different stages readily available for when they are ready to consume is now paramount.
The buyer expects to take their own journey and only engage you when they are ready. But the more important factor here is that if you are not presenting your content to the buyer via this medium, they won’t even consider you in the buying process.
Talk to us about creating content that convinces & converts.
3. No really, it’s all about the people
Have you ever asked what your customers want? Do you have a feedback policy in place?
“Sometimes you need conflict in order to come up with a solution. Through weakness, oftentimes, you can’t make the right sort of settlement, so I’m aggressive, but I also get things done, and in the end, everybody likes me.”
Are your teams talking, sharing and learning from each other? Sales and Marketing must be aligned and have an open dialogue to make sure campaigns evolve, optimise and ultimately win.
Feedback (good and bad) is vital, and mixed with the quantitative date helps shape the direction you need to take. Be it product improvements, service offerings or the way you go to market – continuous improvement (backed by data) is fundamental.
Know what your customers want, where they operate, what drives them – in a nutshell ‘what keeps them up at night?’
4. Go above & beyond
“I will build a great wall – and nobody builds walls better than me, believe me – and I’ll build them very inexpensively. I will build a great, great wall on our southern border, and I will make Mexico pay for that wall. Mark my words.”
What are you willing to do to win? What makes you stand out from the pack? What can you do that is different from your competitors?
“I think the only difference between me and the other candidates is that I’m more honest and my women are more beautiful.”
Is it about the relationship you have, the strategic direction you offer or the quality of your outcomes?
Whatever it is, exploit that and make sure your customers and potential customers are well aware of it. There is a large number of competing outfits putting forward their case so make sure yours is better.
Build a wall around the customer (not Mexico) – and make them feel like the only priority. If that is through personalised contact, targeted content offers for one or tailored solutions – be all you can be to them.
“It is better to live one day as a lion than 100 years as a sheep.”
5. Be adaptable
“I don’t think I’ve made mistakes. Every time somebody said I made a mistake, they do the polls and my numbers go up, so I guess I haven’t made any mistakes.”
Today’s marketer has more information at their fingertips than ever before. The key to this data is knowing what to do with it. Unless, like Donald, you never make mistakes, chances are you are constantly measuring, analysing and adapting the way you do business.
Performance is key and the new marketer must be able to report on their success and be able to project this into the future. This may be a new direction for some marketers but the ability to become more strategic about the future planning and decision making of the business will develop into that winning feeling.
“If you’re interested in ‘balancing’ work and pleasure, stop trying to balance them. Instead, make your work more pleasurable.”
In Closing
Turn your attention from yourself to your customer – put yourself in their shoes and be the one who makes a positive difference in their life.
“We will have so much winning… that you may get bored with winning. Believe me.”
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