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| Marketers to Hire Again; Remain Focused on Social Media |
Top marketing officers at U.S. companies plan significant hiring increases over the next two years as they remain optimistic about prospects for their firms and the U.S. economy, a new survey has found.
The February 2010 CMO Survey is a nationwide poll of chief marketing officers conducted twice each year by Duke University's Fuqua School of Business in conjunction with the American Marketing Association. The survey collected responses from 612 marketing executives during the last two weeks of January.
Nearly half of companies say they expect to hire new marketers during the next six months, while 60 percent will do so in the next year and almost 90 percent over the next two years. Firms plan to increase hiring levels by 8 percent in the next six months, 13 percent during the next year, and 24 percent over the next two years.
Experienced marketers with skills related to Internet marketing, innovation and growth, and customer relationship and brand management will be the most sought after by survey respondents.
The biggest increase in marketing hiring is expected among business-to-business (B2B) product companies, while B2B services companies predict the smallest hiring growth. Consistent with this, B2B services marketers report the highest expected increase in outsourced marketing activities.
Overall optimism among marketers continues to grow, with 62 percent reporting their optimism about the U.S. economy has increased since last quarter, and nearly 64 percent feeling more optimistic about their own companies than they did last quarter. By contrast, in the August 2009 survey, marketers felt upbeat about the economy (59 percent) but less so about their own companies (48.2 percent).
This optimism is also reflected in respondents' expectations for customer behavior, with 66 percent of firms anticipating increased volume in customer purchases, and 26 percent expecting higher prices. Nearly half of firms (47 percent) also expect an increase in the number of new customers in their markets, and 45 percent believe they have improved their abilities to retain current customers.
Overall, marketing budgets are expected to rise by 6 percent, the largest expected increase in a year. Internet marketing expenditures will account for the largest share of this increase, while traditional advertising will continue to drop off.
Social media continues to emerge as a central component of Internet marketing strategies. Firms currently allocate 6 percent of their marketing budgets to social media, an allotment they expect to increase to 10 percent during the next year and 18 percent over the next five years.
B2B services companies report the largest planned increases in social media spending, from 7 to 11 percent of overall marketing budgets, over the next year. This trails similar increases already made by business-to-consumer services companies, which increased social media spending from 3 to 7 percent between August 2009 and February 2010.
Other findings of the survey include:
Marketing channels show a similar economic rebound, with partners expected to increase level and range of products and services as well as prices paid.
Companies plan to increase market research and intelligence activities by 7 percent, indicating firms are investing in activities to identify new growth opportunities especially those involving diversified growth.
72 percent of firms currently outsource some aspect of their marketing programs, and 41 percent expect to increase outsourcing over the next year.
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Mar-07-2010 |
| Sales Reps are in for a Tough 2009, but CRM Sales Software may Help, Survey says |
Just about everyone agrees that 2009 is going to be a tough year for business, but it could be particularly difficult for those in sales, judging from the results of an annual sales performance survey.
Despite the difficult times, a majority of companies (86%) said they were raising quotas for their sales force in 2009, according to the 2009 Sales Performance Optimization Survey from CSO Insights, a sales consultancy based in both Boulder, Colo., and San Francisco. Making that quota should prove a challenge, considering that only 58% of organizations made their overall sales quota in 2008, down from 61% in 2007.
CRM implementations continue to rise, with 71% of respondents reporting that they have formally implemented CRM sales software. Of those who have yet to implement CRM, 40% say they plan to do so in 2010. Yet the top benefits that respondents cite from CRM are efficiency focused -- improved communications, improved forecast accuracy, and a reduced burden on sales. The benefit of "increased margins" was cited by only 6% of respondents.
Satisfaction with CRM vendors is on the increase as well, with 48% of respondents saying they were satisfied with their vendor and another 20% saying they were very satisfied. Those numbers tend to rise with the length of time a CRM system is in place. For example, of those who had CRM for less than a year, 13% said they were very satisfied, compared with 19% who had a system one to three years, and 27% for more than three years.
Some survey respondents (13%) are also more willing to replace their CRM system. While that might seem an expensive prospect during a recession, Software as a Service (SaaS) applications are making switching easier, according to the report.
Most importantly, sales needs to focus on effectiveness in 2009. If budgets can't be increased, then reallocate wisely. For example, money spent on hiring additional people or to replace people who have left could be used elsewhere. The ramp-up time to get to full productivity is 10 months or longer for 46% of organizations.
Other interesting benchmarking data from the Sales Performance Optimization 2009 Survey
Less than 37% of firms are leveraging mobile device access to CRM data, although those that do are more satisfied with their CRM vendor.
SaaS CRM customers are more loyal. 72% of SaaS application users say they are loyal advocates for the CRM provider, compared with just 38% of sales organizations that have on-premise CRM.
15% of respondents said they are currently using sales analytics, and another 13% plan to use it in 2009, which apparently has a significant impact on win rates. Those using sales analytics report win rates of 51%, compared with 47% for those who are not. Similarly, loss rates are 27% for those who use analytics and 31% for those who do not.
61% of reps with CRM tools installed make their quota, versus 58% that do not.
source: SearchCRM
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[Full Article]
Mar-07-2010 |
| Gartner Reveals Key Customer Relationship Management Predictions for 2010 and Beyond |
Facebook will be the No. 1 social network in all but 25 countries, according to Gartner, Inc. In countries such as Brazil, Russia, India, China and Japan it will not be No. 1. The prediction is one in a series Gartner analysts have made on customer relationship management (CRM) in areas including CRM marketing and social CRM.
CRM remains high on the business agenda for CIOs in 2010. According to the Gartner Executive Programs (EXP) 2010 CIO Agenda survey, attracting and retaining new customers will be the No. 5 business priority for CIOs in 2010.
Gartner's predictions for CRM in 2010 and beyond include:
By the end of 2010, Facebook will be the No. 1 social network in all but 25 countries, but it will not be No. 1 in Brazil, Russia, India, China or Japan.
Marketers and customer service management will need to switch focus from the large number of social networks to the three or four that will dominate specific languages.
Through 2010, marketing budgets will remain flat in more than 90 percent of companies, despite a return to growth.
CFOs are demanding increased accountability from marketing departments, often exerting unprecedented pressure to link programmes to sales results and return on investment (ROI).
By the end of 2010, more than 80 percent of market growth in social applications will center around a business use case for improving external customer relationships, rather than improving internal collaboration.
Although the hype around any and all social media activities will continue through 2010, companies are struggling to find a business case, including hard metrics and specific business outcomes, using general social activities and generic social applications.
Nevertheless, social projects evaluated by Gartner show that those with a clear and direct mutual purpose (benefits for both company and customer) were the ones likely to show measurable results. Gartner said that the social application vendors that make the transition from general purpose to support for specific business, with use cases and key performance indicators, will see double- or triple-digit growth in 2010.
By the end of 2011, more than 90 percent of Fortune 1000 marketing campaigns will include online marketing, up from 50 per cent in 2009.
Marketers are responding to the expansion of the internet by investing in addressable branding and advertising, and contextual, community and transactional marketing.
Gartner predicts that marketers will see a 10 to 20 percent savings in marketing communications as a result of precise attribution metrics for campaigns. Online marketing will enable faster testing and campaign refinement, and help avoid the continued waste of funding a failed campaign, while engaging in more-thorough campaign testing prior to launch. It will improve the overall success of all marketing objectives. Both speed of analysis and response will be critical to success.
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[Full Article]
Mar-07-2010 |
| Social Media Adoption by U.S. Small Businesses Doubles Since 2009 |
American small businesses are pushing the limits on new ways to improve efficiency in the prolonged downturn, including a steady increase in social media adoption. The third wave of results from the Small Business Success Index(TM) (SBSI) sponsored by Network Solutions and the Center for Excellence in Service at the University of Maryland's Smith School of Business reports social media adoption by small businesses has doubled from 12 percent to 24 percent in the last year.
The SBSI found that nearly one out of five small business owners are actively using social media in their business. Small businesses are increasingly investing in social media applications, including blogs, Facebook and LinkedIn profiles. The biggest expectation small business owners have from social media is expanding external marketing and engagement, including identifying and attracting new customers, building brand awareness and staying engaged with customers. Sixty-one percent of the respondents indicated that they use social media to identify and attract new customers.
Key findings include:
Small business owners use social media to attract new customers:
75% surveyed have a company page on a social networking site
61% use social media for identifying and attracting new customers
57% have built a network through a site like LinkedIn
45% expect social media to be profitable in the next twelve months
Small business owners still have concerns with social media:
50% of small business social media users say it takes more time than expected
17% express that social media gives people a chance to criticize their business on the Internet
Only 6% feel that social media use has hurt the image of the business more than helped it
Small businesses experience positive effects from the economic downturn:
72% have found ways to operate more efficiently (up significantly from 66% in June)
47% have been led to find new products and services that benefit customers
43% have become better teams as hard times force people to work together
Building online presence continues to be key focus for small businesses:
Company Web sites are a top technology investment in the next two years, with small businesses either adding new features/functionality to their existing Web sites or building one from scratch.
The ability to showcase their products and services online to attract new customers is second in the hierarchy of technology investments small business owners plan to make in the next two years.
Social media investments rank third in small business investments to be made in the next two years.
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[Full Article]
Feb-21-2010 |
| Cloud-Based Services and Collaboration Fuel Growth in the North American Hosted Enterprise Email Markets |
After years of uncertainty, the North American hosted enterprise email markets have finally taken off. As businesses perceive email as mission-critical, they were skeptical about email applications residing outside the enterprise in a third-party data center in the past. However, the entry of large cloud-based providers and on-premise email vendors has lent credibility to the software as a service (SaaS) delivery model. In addition, technology maturity and cost advantages have helped spur the growth of hosted email services among enterprise users.
New analysis from Frost & Sullivan finds that the market earned revenues of over $319.1 million in 2008 and estimates this to reach $604.4 million in 2015. On-premise email platforms are complicated, expensive, and require a certain level of expertise and investment capabilities. Increasing email sizes and larger storage requirements have also contributed to escalating costs. Email archiving (online backup and recovery), compliance, and security (filtering, spam control) add layers of complexity to the email environment.
Compliance issues dictate that organizations archive their email over a period of time, thereby forcing businesses to invest in expensive storage area network (SAN) architectures. In addition, businesses need to monitor closely the rapidly evolving virus and spam threats, which are major causes of distraction from their core business focus.
Typically, a cloud model would accommodate a wide variety of applications and is not subject to the lowest common denominator principle that is applied in a physical environment. The basic tenet of the cloud services model is that customers have a greater choice in terms of the number and range of applications.
The market will be in a certain state of flux as large cloud-based email providers align their collaboration strategies. While the growing number of collaboration applications built around email will drive adoption in terms of sheer number of email boxes/seats, bundling will drive down the price per box when email is offered as part of a more comprehensive package.
The hosted enterprise email market is evolving continuously, with new competitors entering the market and business models undergoing transformation. While established hosted email providers are offering integration capabilities and tools to differentiate themselves in the market, email software vendors have launched cloud-compliant email and collaboration solutions. Pure cloud-based email providers are leveraging their low-cost delivery model to encourage migration from on-premise platforms.
Enterprises are already experimenting with hybrid email models to reduce email costs. As service providers and application vendors collaborate to integrate more applications, this hybrid model would work well even for large organizations.
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[Full Article]
Feb-21-2010 |
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