Marketo’s Greatest Hits of 2012 – A B2B Marketing Retrospective

Marketo’s Greatest Hits of 2012 – A B2B Marketing Retrospective: by Jason Miller


2012 has been a fantastic year for marketers. Social, content, and marketing automation have all intersected and are now working together to help B2B marketers execute targeted campaigns, better measure their results, and ultimately drive more revenue. As the year comes to a close and the threat of the Mayan Apocalypse safely behind us, I thought it would be interesting to collect Marketo’s most popular blog posts from the past year and revisit them as a Greatest Hits collection.
What you won’t see are song titles scrolling across your screen as with the classic TV commercials enticing you to order. Instead I present to you the most popular Marketo blog posts from 2011 based on views and shares. Let’s put on side one.
1.  Mega-List of Features in Marketing Automation (Not in CRM) - A comprehensive look into the capabilities of marketing automation systems, including a functionality comparison with CRM.
2. The ROI of Paid Social Media Ads - Everything you ever wanted to know about the return on investment of paid social media ads on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and more.
3. Optimizing Twitter for Lead Generation - Twitter is one of the most effective prospecting channels. How do you optimize it for lead generation for B2B marketing? Find out in this post, complete with strategy and hard metrics.
4. What’s the Difference Between Email Marketing and Marketing Automation - We often hear, “How is Marketing Automation different from email marketing?” Compare features and find out if marketing automation is right for you.
5. How B2B Buyers Really Use Social Media: Insights from the 2012 Buyersphere Report - Given the relatively low usage of social in today’s actual B2B buying, but the rapid growth ahead as millennials become more involved in key purchases, there is a significant opportunity for companies to unlock the real value of social media in their B2B marketing.
6. Does Facebook Work for B2B Lead Gen? Hell Yes! - Tips, best practices, and real world numbers on using Facebook to generate leads. This one was a bit controversial because some B2B marketers claimed it to be much too specific. I completely disagree. There are not a lot of case studies regarding Facebook for B2B, this provides a roadmap for success.
7.  The Art of Social Sharing: 5 Campaign Ideas to Get Your Audience Engaged - An excellent way to get your audience engaged is to provide them with a reason to share your message on their social networks. Here are five examples to get you inspired.
8. How do you Explain Marketing to a Six Year Old? – Marketo co-founder Jon Miller’s six year old asks him the question “What is Marketing?” Jon answers the question then crowd-sources using Linkedin to get more opinions and refine the definition.
9. The 411 Rule for Lead Nurturing - The 4-1-1 rule developed for Twitter can also apply to your lead nurturing using email. Plan a diverse cadence of emails you’ll send to prospects.
10. Moneyball – Another Name for Marketing Automation – A clever look at how B2B marketers can have a much bigger impact with smaller budgets. We can start looking at our marketing campaigns in the same way that legendary Oakland A’s manager Billy Beane looked at his players.

5 bonus cuts from the world of Infographics: Marketo’s Top Infographics for 2012

If you think the Infographic is dead, you would be mistaken. A well thought out infographic with a great design can be a major player in the growing world of visual content marketing. Here’s our top five for the year.
1. True Colors: What Your Brand Colors Say About Your Business – We put the rainbow under a microscope to find out how each color can help you connect with your customers. Also see why Marketo choose purple as its primary branding color.
2. Killing Time: How to Destroy Your Productivity – This infographic was based upon one of my favorite blog posts of the year. Did you know that checking your email while performing another creative task decreases your IQ in the moment by 10 points? Check out the post for additional tidbits of productivity destroyers.
3. How B2B Marketers are Scoring Big with Social Media – We teamed up with the fine folks over at Social Media Examiner for this one. Fascinating stats  from the 2012 Social Media Marketing Industry Report.
4. Must Attend Marketing Events in 2013 – An Interactive Infographic – One of our most popular infographics from 2011 gets an update and an upgrade! It’s your one-stop shop for the biggest and best marketing events in 2013 and now it’s interactive!
We have some really great things in store for 2013, so here’s to a year of fresh ideas for the modern B2B marketer. We invite you to subscribe to the blog and hope it will become a daily part of your marketing inspiration for the new year. Cheers!
What’s your favorite post from 2012? What would you like to see more of in 2013? Join the conversation in the comment section below.

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Marketo’s Greatest Hits of 2012 – A B2B Marketing Retrospective was posted at Modern B2B Marketing - Marketo Best Practices Blog. | http://blog.marketo.com