The BL[OZ]

As ChatGPT gains momentum, concerns are growing regarding its impact on everything from coding to SEO.  It depends on who you ask, but the current consensus is that AI is not likely to kill Search Engine Optimization. In fact, it may actually prove quite useful in enhancing and optimizing SEO efforts. AI-powered technologies can provide insights, automate tasks, and improve the efficiency of SEO strategies.

If it’s repetitive and time-consuming, AI has got you covered

Why spend time on keyword research, competitor analysis, and content optimization, when you can be focusing on strategic planning and higher-level tasks? Here are three key ways AI can help:

1. Data Analysis 

AI can process and analyze large amounts of data quickly and accurately, which can help identify patterns, trends, and opportunities for SEO optimization. This can include analyzing search data, website analytics, and user behavior data to inform SEO strategies and tactics.

1. Content Optimization

AI-powered content generation tools can assist in creating high-volume and optimized content. These tools can provide insights on keyword usage, content structure, readability, and relevance to improve the overall quality of content for SEO purposes.

1. Personalization

   AI can analyze user data and behavior to deliver personalized search results and content recommendations. This can help improve user engagement and satisfaction, which can indirectly impact SEO rankings.

AI is your assistant, not your replacement

AI can’t replace human expertise in SEO. SEO professionals will still play a crucial role in interpreting and implementing the insights provided by AI, as well as adapting SEO strategies to changing algorithms, user behaviors, and business goals. AI tools can be powerful to support and enhance SEO efforts, but human creativity and strategic thinking will remain crucial in the SEO landscape.

How can you utilize ChatGPT for SEO purposes?

Here are its suggestions:

1. Content Generation: Use ChatGPT to generate ideas for quick content for your website, blog, or social media posts. You can input keywords, topic ideas, or specific questions related to your SEO strategy, and ChatGPT can generate content that aligns with your SEO goals.
2. Keyword Research: Utilize ChatGPT to brainstorm and generate keyword ideas for your SEO campaigns. You can input seed keywords or topic ideas, and ChatGPT can generate a list of related keywords that can help you identify opportunities for content creation and optimization.
3. Meta Tags Optimization: Use ChatGPT to generate optimized meta tags, including title tags and meta descriptions, that are relevant to your target keywords and audience. ChatGPT can provide suggestions and variations for meta tags that can improve your website's click-through rates (CTRs) and search engine visibility.
4. SEO Content Optimization: Input your existing content into ChatGPT to get suggestions on how to optimize it for SEO. ChatGPT can provide recommendations on improving content structure, keyword placement, and readability to make your content more search-engine-friendly.
5. On-Page SEO: Use ChatGPT to get suggestions on optimizing various on-page SEO elements, such as headings, image alt tags, and URL structure. ChatGPT can provide insights on how to improve these elements for better search engine visibility and user experience.
6. SEO Strategy assistance: Utilize ChatGPT to brainstorm and generate ideas for your overall SEO strategy, including content topics, and social media integration. ChatGPT can provide wide suggestions and insights that can inform your SEO planning and execution.
7. SEO Troubleshooting: Input specific SEO challenges or issues into ChatGPT to get insights and suggestions on how to resolve them. ChatGPT can provide troubleshooting tips and recommendations to overcome common SEO obstacles.

While ChatGPT can provide valuable insights and suggestions for SEO purposes, it's still essential to use human judgment and expertise in evaluating and implementing the recommendations. SEO best practices may vary depending on your specific industry, audience, and search engine algorithms, so it's crucial to conduct thorough research and consult with SEO professionals to build a comprehensive SEO strategy.

Watch Google's update on Search Generative Experience:

When I just started my career, an intelligent woman told me that only when I understand that the customers of the company pay my salary and not the company owners, will I be able to call myself a marketer. So when you think about the future of marketing, you need to first consider what kind of customers we will meet. Let’s talk about how you “consumerize” the customer journey; how you look at the B2B (Business to Business) customer a bit like a consumer.

The new B2B customer is a digital native

Our childhood determines our future behaviors as adults, the people we become, and the decision-makers we grow up to be. It is also true of the technological environment in which we were raised. The millennials, also known as Generation Y, were born after 1980. They are now in their 30’s. Generation Z, as you can see in the table, is still young, but we will soon see them influencing our businesses. Since technology is changing very quickly, a sub-generation was born between the Millennials and Generation Z. Zillennials were born between ‘93-‘98 and were influenced by more advanced technology than the Millennials. For their entire lives, digital natives have been surrounded by technology, social media, mobile devices, computers, and the internet. They speak this digital language as their mother tongue. They did not learn this language in their 20’s, 30’s, or later. They do not have an accent, so to speak. This impressive figure tells the whole story: More and more millennials and gen zers are entering the B2B decision journey, some as technological or professional influencers and others as decision-makers. It is important to note that among the people involved in decision-making, you usually meet several generations. A few months ago, we at Oz Global B2B did a project for the American agricultural market. The intergenerational integration in the decision-making process that arose there was very prominent.

• • A family business where the younger generation initiates a decision, and the founding generation approves it. Sometimes the founder initiates the decision but immediately passes it on to the younger generation to check online what the options are.
  • A senior manager at a big business closes a deal, but the people in the field - professionals or salespeople - do not “speak” the same language. This will greatly affect the next purchase.

Even if you think your business is less exposed, check again! It does not matter if the decision-makers are digital natives or digital immigrants. Within the process, there will always be a mix of generations.

The Millennials and Gen Zers highly influence who will enter the decision funnel

About 50% of all product searches on the web are conducted by digital natives. The customer journey is long, complex, and involves many stakeholders. By the time the customer recognizes that he has a problem, we are, in most cases, not there. Identification is an internal stage from which someone is appointed to start researching information to find options for a solution. 50% of those who conduct the research and seek alternatives regarding a product or service, may not take an "official" part in decision-making but are the ones who put the relevant suppliers in the decision-making funnel. They are the ones who build the long list. They are the ones who decide whether or not you will be included in the “consideration group,” which is of critical importance.

Two tips to gain the trust of digital natives:

1. Be authentic!

The generation that grew up on social networks, fake news, and unfounded marketing does not believe in marketing messages and does not believe in unproven statements. They have developed a hypersensitivity to online messages - they suffer from a blatant lack of trust in what is being said online. They continue to consume information online, but with a very large firewall. The bright side of it is that digital natives recognize authenticity when they see it..

So what does authentic marketing look like?

• 1. Get your executives to use social media Customers want to know the people behind the executives or the company representatives that they are in contact with.Make sure your site reveals who you are beyond your formal title. What topics do you choose to share? Who are your friends, what groups do you belong to, and to whom do you respond to?LinkedIn is not everything. Feel free to diversify to other social networks - Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and even Tik Tok.

• Share user-generated content from real people Show real things, with real customers behind them. If you trust your product, let it tell your story.
• Go live on social media platforms Talk without filters. To digital natives this sounds obvious, to digital immigrants, it is less trivial. At first, the digital immigrants posted posts after editing them numerous times. Then they agreed to post an edited video. The transition to live video is scarier, but this is exactly the meaning of authenticity.
• Promote employee advocacy Empower your employees to share smart, quality content with their own social networks. On average, employee networks have 10x more connections than a company has followers. Plus, according to the Edelman Trust Barometer, people are 3x more likely to trust company information shared by an employee than that shared by a CEO.

2. Consumerize!

This word does not exist in the dictionary yet but already stars in the literature that follows trends in the B2B world. As Mona Akmal, Falkon CEO and Cofounder, once said, “As work and life flexibly intertwine, so must our approach to reaching our target users.” Gone are the days when the customer was a business person between 9-17 and a consumer on evenings and weekends. Studies show that the business customer is very much influenced by his consumer experience and expects to have a similar experience in business purchases. The customer experience touches on all stages of the journey - collecting information, placing an order, contacting the company up to paying.

• More than 80% of B2B customers stated that they will look for a new supplier if their expectations in terms of customer service and user experience are not fulfilled.
• According to McKinsey & Co, B2B brands score below 50% on customer experience index ratings on average, compared to 65 to 85% for typical B2C brands.
• Gartner illustrates that 77% of B2B buyers report that their last purchase was very difficult or complex.

The conclusion is that as customer experience improves in the consumer world, B2B buyer expectations will rise as well. In short, do not compare yourself only to competitors in your immediate area. The customer or client expects from you the same experience as on Amazon, Netflix, or Uber.

To sum up…

1. The digital natives are digital animals. They were born into it, and it is their playground. It requires us to be present and comfortable in the digital space. Allow them to find us easily and learn about us in a convenient way that interests them. Allow them to easily consult, purchase and pay online.
2. Life in the digital arena has taught them to be suspicious, not to believe everything they are told. They have developed the skills and expertise to recognize fake news when they see it. This requires us to be authentic in interactions with them, without filters and edits.
3. Remember, before they are decision-makers, customers, or partners, they are first and foremost human beings. Their personal lives have seeped into their business life and it is very difficult for them to separate the two. So, we have no choice but to "consumerize" the way we treat them.

The different characteristics between the B2C and B2B worlds are getting blurry. Whether we are marketing to a B2B customer or a B2C consumer, we are actually humans who sell to other human beings. So let’s all agree that it is really H2H marketing. Want to talk to Nirit? You can reach her at nirit@ozglobalb2b.com

Key takeaways from HUG Haifa #2, “All About Video”

When’s the last time you watched a video? Today? Yesterday? That puts you in good company. Humans love video. 1/3 of all time online is spent watching videos. In fact, 500 million people watch a video on Facebook every day. And here’s another mindboggling stat for you: Adding a video to your website can improve the chance of a front-page Google result by 53%. That’s right. It doubles your chances of getting onto the first page of Google. Yes, video is big. Yes, it needs to be an important part of your B2B marketing strategy. And no, it’s not nearly as hard as you think to get started with video. From tactic to strategy Video has changed a lot in the past six years, points out Maria Trubicina, Senior Customer Success Manager at HubSpot. In 2013, videos were mostly passively watched on desktop or YouTube, hard to create and made by a few; in 2019, videos are actively watched on mobile or social, easy to create, and made by many. This calls for a change – moving from video as a tactic (made by a creative team, highly produced, expensive, one to many, an awareness play, unmeasurable), to a strategy (made by all teams, low production, cheap, actionable, BOFU and measurable.)   Listen up! To create relevant, actionable and engaging videos you need to get all your teams involved. That means talking to sales, quality control, production, legal, and even accounts. Every department will have a unique perspective about your product or service that you may not have even thought of. One video does not fit all. Each video needs to be tailored to the specific target market and goal. Make it simple. And keep it real.   What kind of videos should you be creating? You’ll need to develop targeted videos for every stage of the flywheel and for every purpose – attract, engage and delight – and modify them to meet the needs of the specific channel (YouTube, social media, website).

• Attract videos expand reach and build trust and credibility with your audience.
• Engage videos convert your visitors into leads and ultimately close them as customers.
• Delight videos encourage customers to embrace your brand and become brand evangelists.

You’ll want to create at least TWO videos for each of these stages. Watch videos across the buyer’s journey and take a look at these content ideas for each stage in the funnel. One critical question before you dive into video creation Before you whip out your camera and start filming, make sure you’ve asked this critical question: What’s the intent of this video? Get really clear about what you want to get out of this video:

• Increase brand awareness and attract customers to your site
• Help your prospects consider your solution to solve their problem
• Help your leads decide to do business with you

To keep yourself on track, it’s a good idea to set SMART goals. Once you’ve done that, you can move ahead to brainstorming ideas for your video content, writing a script, and producing that first video. Where do you get the content from? Chances are, you already have it. Take a look at your existing content. Which web pages were visited the most? What calls to action did users click on? What blogs were the most successful? Repurpose them into compelling stories. But make sure your video answers the key question your potential customers at the Attract and Engage stage are going to ask before deciding to watch or ignore your video: What’s in it for me? How are you solving MY problems?   Hold it! Don’t make these three mistakes. Video content specialist Sivan Felder, from Two Heads Consulting, points out that many B2B companies make these mistakes:

1. You’re not the hero of the story. This isn’t about you. It’s about your customer (the hero) who has a crisis. He meets a guide (your company). And thanks to your product or service, he survives or thrives.
2. The laws of human psychology apply to your target customer as well. Behind every rational purchasing decision is an emotion. Identify it and speak to it. Help your prospective customers out of confusion and into clarity. And remember to tell them what they need to hear (as opposed to what you want to say.)
3. A one-size-fits-all video. We’ve already said it, but we’ll say it again. Your customers want to hear different things from you at different stages. What are the touchpoints? Where are customers going to come into contact with your video and how are you planning to get your video out there?

  Set your KPIs Key KPIs that you’ll want to look at are:

• Play rate — the percentage of people who played your video divided by the number of impressions)
• Clickthrough rate — the number of times your call to action is clicked divided by the number of times its viewed
• Conversion rate — the number of times your visitors completed your desired action divided by the number of clicks on your call to action

  Elevate your video marketing To take your video marketing efforts further, consider using Vidyard or TwentyThree, which give you a host of valuable features. Also, consider these tips from Maria Trubicina:

• Make your videos an interactive experience. Use smart CTAs and embedded forms.
• Increase SEO effectiveness. Finetune your meta info to make it easy for search engines to find you.
• Monitor performance. Keep track of your video views, clickthroughs and conversions, so you can optimize them accordingly.
• Build relationships. Record one-to-one videos directly from the CRM and send directly from email.
• Provide better customer service. Use videos to improve the service experience and provide helpful tips or troubleshooting advice.

Video goes way beyond creating awareness and nurturing leads. It can also help you build relationships and excel in customer service.   Ready? Hit record! If you have HubSpot and want to get started with video marketing, contact us! Don’t miss out! Join a HUG These great tips are just a taste of what we talked about during our HubSpot User Group meeting, All About Videos. HubSpot makes it easy to make video an integral part of your marketing mix. Take advantage of all these great resources. Get some practical advice on how to get started with video marketing. Or take one of HubSpot’s great free video courses.

There are lots of reasons why you may want to rebrand.  For example: Have you recently undergone a merger or acquisition? Was there a major shuffle in management or business strategy? Are you planning to launch a new product or version? Does your brand identity no longer reflect your current corporate culture, values and focus?  If you answered “yes” to any of the above questions, it may be time to consider rebranding.

Refresh or rebrand?

When rebranding, you can either refresh and improve your current branding or start over and create an entirely new one. No matter what you decide, the rebranding process involves a lot more than designing a new logo or changing your corporate color palette. Here’s what you’ll need to do:

1. Defining a clear rebranding strategy.
2. Reanalyzing your company’s vision, mission and values.
3. Conduct market research and competitor research including new players who may have popped up more recently.
4. Research existing customers, potential customers and target audiences.
5. Redefine your message.
6. Create a new visual identity.
7. Create new marketing materials.
8. Relaunch your brand (internally and externally).

Spreading the news

The rebranding journey can sometimes be confusing for your employees and customers who have become accustomed to your existing brand identity. Use this as an opportunity to reconnect with them and clearly communicate during the process and after its completion. If you want the transition process to be a success, you should be as transparent as possible and clearly communicate these changes both internally and externally.

Rebranding with OZ

At OZ, we understand the complexity of rebranding and our team has extensive experience helping our customers successfully navigate the rebranding process. We can use this experience to successfully guide you through it from planning through to implementation and beyond.

The New Year is officially here and we decided to put together a countdown of marketing trends that will affect B2B brands in 2018! Here goes…..

10 – Visual content

The trend for visualization through video, images and infographics will get stronger. In fact, predictions indicate that by 2019, video will account for 80% of consumer internet traffic. And, according to Facebook, live is even better and live video gets 3x more views and is expected to dramatically increase in 2017. B2B brands can use live videos in lots of different ways, including at events to give followers a behind-the-scenes look, host interviews with key influencers, and launch promotions.

9 – Big (big) data

Big data’s been a big trend for many years now, but it’s become more accessible because of machine learning and AI. As more and more platforms and marketing methods start incorporating big data, the use of big data is becoming an essential part of marketing and understanding what the consumer wants and when is worth its weight in gold.

8 – Authenticity

Transparency and trust have become a major component of the customer’s decision-making process as customers’ become less and less tolerant towards fake news and reviews, or in other words, exaggerated marketing. Brands should invest in community management to keep the online community engaged, informed and happy; and can use technology advances such as virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) to connect with users on a deeper, more emotional level.

7 – Content and influencer networks

There is no arguing with the fact that content is still king. However, there is a need to deal with the challenge of oversaturation. Now that most brands have some sort of content strategy and social media networks are full of content, the focus needs to shift slightly. Rather than fighting for more visibility, marketers will need to think out of the box and stand out in space that is already taken. This is where influencers come into the picture. By leveraging the networks of influencers who already have a “captive” audience, marketers can increase their online influence and start to reduce the volume of content produced, or in other words, go for quality and not quantity.

6 – Shift of focus from millennials to Generation Z

Born between 1995 and 2010, this consumer group marks a substantial shift that will affect all brands. These digital natives are different from millennials and they will have increased buying power in the near future. Keep an eye out on key platforms such as Snapchat and Instagram when targeting this young and highly dynamic demographic.

5 – Mobile, mobile, mobile

We cannot emphasize this one enough. Consumers are spending most of their time on their mobile phones. In fact, in 2018, mobile video consumption is expected to grow by 25% and ad spending on mobile video will reach 18 billion dollars next year, surpassing desktop. Even Google has even given priority to pages that are AMP optimized (Accelerated Mobile Pages). So the bottom line is that if you haven’t yet done so, you need to start optimizing your marketing strategies, websites and ads for mobile.

4 – Shift in KPIs

While it’s still important to know how many people visited your site and from where, at the end of the day it’s all about sales. For this reason, it’s important to track conversions and revenue, in other words, who buys and at what stage of the buyer’s journey. In this way, it becomes easier to track your return of investment on digital marketing.

3 – Data protection

The digital age brings with it the need to take multiple aspects including data privacy into account. In May 2018, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will take affect with the aim of improving protection for EU citizens and adapting privacy and data laws to the digital age. This will require marketers to think and act very differently as it will affecter multiple factors in a marketer’s focus, some of which require organizations to start preparing immediately.

2 – Native ads and smart content

Native advertising is expected to drive more than 74 percent of all add revenue by 2021. Because of their more natural placement and format, these ads usually get more exposure and engagement than traditional banner ads. However, these ads need to be written according to the preferences of those seeing the ads, and they should also be linked to “smart content” that is adapted to audiences based on NI, cookies and an in-depth understanding of target audiences.

1 – Take advantage of the FOMO effect

Even though we already mentioned this one in a previous point, we think it deserves to be repeated for emphasis. As more and more people experience the FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) effect, marketers need to create unique and original content that makes potential customers feel like they’re the first to know. For example, content that involves a “behind-the-scenes look”, an exclusive with an influencer, or a sneak preview of upcoming projects and product launches can be used to really create a buzz and get potential consumers to engage “before” anyone else does.

Israel and China are a perfect match – China is an incredible opportunity for Israeli cybersecurity, medical devices and artificial intelligence industries. While at the same time Israel is a source of talent and know-how with its startup culture – something that China is lacking. Bilateral ties between Israel and China have increased significantly in recent years, sparking the launch of the Israel-China Innovation Committee and the Israel-China Economic Task Force. The US is the typical route for Israeli companies expanding abroad. Language and culture make China seem daunting at first, and certainly for consumer-oriented companies trying to figure out the Chinese customer has led to many failed enterprises. B2B opportunities, on the other hand, are a perfect setup for Israel companies. Possible access to capital for expansion and growth another major reason to look at China.

How to break into the Chinese market:

Understand the target customer and other stakeholders Find the right strategic partners to help you. Consumers in China are entirely different than what you are used to. They are on different channels, they have different expectations, and there are important cultural norms you’ll want to be aware of. A local team on the ground with the experience and tools to understand and effectively target customers is crucial to preventing big blunders. Regulatory concerns It is critical to spend time researching and understanding the regulatory environment prior to making any decision to enter the market. China has extremely strict laws protecting consumers, including quality, standards and other regulations covering most industries. Sensitive industries such as medical devices and pharmaceutical are especially strict. Trademark everything, immediately As soon as your product comes on the scene in China you can bet there will be copycats. We’ve seen it with big brands and small, if you don’t take trademarking seriously, you run the risk of expensive, messy and prolonged legal battles. Before talking to anyone, start the trademark process and make sure you own the corresponding Chinese domain names (.cn and .com.cn). Don’t assume what works in the West will work in China Look no further than eBay and Uber, two remarkably successful international companies that failed in China. Chinese consumers have different tastes, different expectations, different cultural norms and customs that are deep-rooted in society. On top of all of this is an unrelenting drive for innovation, which makes brands with a weak positioning strategy extremely vulnerable. If you take your brand to the China market and your messaging is unclear, or your branding is weak, there is a good chance your product or service will be copied and eaten up by a domestic brand. Find a decent Chinese name It doesn’t have to be a direct translation, or even exactly the same as the Western version. The Mandarin language is comprised of thousands of characters that all have a great deal of significance. Meaning there are lots of options for translations that can turn out great, or translations that can turn out… not so great. AirBnB fell prey to a naming mishap when they entered the Chinese market as 爱彼迎  (Àibǐyíng), which they explained means “let love meet each other” but to native Chinese this name conjures up images of a “love hotel”, and many complained that it is awkward to pronounce. Even if you think you’ve settled on a great name, test it, test it and test it again. Start with distribution and expand from there You don’t need to set up shop right away. After you’ve trademarked everything, going through a distributer to test the waters is a good way to enter the China market. Many SME’s in the medical industry routinely work with distributors to get their products into hospitals in China. Set up your website Number one piece of advice; put your Chinese website on a server in China or Hong Kong. Shrinking attention spans haunt every content marketer, so don’t lose your audience even before your beautifully, well-crafted home page loads. If you are hosting on a local Chinese server you are required to apply for the ICP license and this also means you need to have a local entity already organized. You’ll typically need to apply for an ICP license from the Chinese Government; this will lead to better search results on Baidu and allows you to run PPC campaigns. Don’t forget to make your website mobile optimized! In China more than 95% of Internet users are using their mobile phones to access it. Choose the right trade shows This goes hand-in-hand with understanding your target customer and stakeholders. There are hundreds of trade shows in China every year, with thousands of exhibitors. It can be tempting to try and get your foot in the door to as many as possible, but this will leave you out of budget and exhausted quickly. Can you team up with similar brands? Make connections with attendees beforehand? Enter social media with your big toe in the water With all the hype around WeChat in China, many brands are ready to dive headfirst and go all out for this mega-app, but take a step back. WeChat is completely different than Facebook, Instagram or any other typical social media platform you are familiar with using. It is important to set the right expectations, and the right strategy. Become well versed with the app, it’s functionality and it’s limitations before setting your KPIs. While it is important for brands to have a WeChat account, there may be other channels to investigate.

Afimilk case study: partner portal

In the world of B2B, it’s really important to nurture partner relationships and find ways to make it easier for our partners and distributors to satisfy the needs of their (and our) end customers. In this manner, you can create a win-win situation where both your customers (distributors) are happy and their customers (end users) are happy with your brand. Recently, as part of our ongoing services for Afimilk – a global leader in advanced dairy management technology solutions – we created a unique and creative solution for its partners. With the goal of encouraging Afimilk’s dealers to make more purchases online and give them easy access to marketing materials, we designed an integrated and intuitive online partner portal. This portal provides end-to-end marketing and sales support, and an easy-to-use online ordering system. It includes three valuable tools that are also integrated with Afimilk’s ERP system:

1. Knowledge center – with marketing resources including brochures, presentations, and supporting materials to help dealers promote Afimilk solutions.
2. Configurator wizard – builds price quotations tailored to customer requirements while promoting Afimilk’s preferred solutions.
3. Market gate – intuitive online ordering system tailored for Afimilk partners to encourage online ordering.

By designing a responsive and interactive user experience that adds value for its partners, offers instant marketing support, and integrates with Afimilk’s ERP system, we helped Afimilk take their partner engagement to the next level!

We're entering a new age of healthcare, the "Social Health" era, where the focus has shifted to informed patient-consumers. With ever-increasing access to information, our patient-consumers are now empowered more than ever to make choices for themselves by researching and even shopping online for everything from health plans and doctors to medical equipment and insurance policies. As the digital revolution disrupts the way we've traditionally done business in the medical and healthcare space, there is a need to communicate with both intermediary customers (payers) and patient-consumers. This means transitioning from a more traditional Business-to-Business (B2B) model into a newer Business-to-Business-to User (B2B2U©) model. Because at the end of the day, even if you aren't selling directly to your patient-consumers, you still need to engage with them to understand their challenges, meet their needs and ultimately create bottom-up demand for your brand. This move to a B2B2U model starts with identifying your patient-consumers and gathering information about their challenges. Once you’ve identified them, you can then open up direct channels of communication with them, offer them valuable information and also show them how your services or products offer real value and help solve their challenges. One of the challenges in this approach is making sure that you don’t compromise your relationship with your paying customers when you start communicating directly with your patient-consumers. This can be solved by involving them in the process and maintaining full transparency about your goal, that is, to raise brand awareness and drive demand (and not to sell directly to patient-consumers). Interested in learning more about how you can create a win-win situation for both you and your intermediary customers? 

Trendlines Group case study: rebranding and visual identity As our clients grow and expand their global reach, we are committed to helping them tell the story that sets them apart while staying true to their authentic corporate values. In the case of Trendlines Group – an innovation commercialization company that invents, invest in, and incubates innovation-based technology – global expansion and going public on the Singapore stock exchange were the main catalysts for looking to OZ for rebranding. As we've been partnering with Trendlines for the last 20 years, it was natural that the company turned to us for support at this significant point of growth. Against the backdrop of our long-term relationship, we worked together to develop a new visual identity that stands out in today's global market and is also centered around Trendlines’ two foundational principles:

It’s about the people AND building relationships

Because Trendlines Group’s hands-on investment approach and commitment to improve the human condition through innovation are inseparable parts of the company's character, the refreshed visual identity rests strongly on these principles. The result – a new compelling brand and visual identity – was launched at Trendlines’ 7^th Annual Trendlines Company Showcase attended by hundreds of biomedicine industry professionals from around the world, and sponsored by companies worldwide.

On 21 June 2017, we held a successful Inbound for Medical & Healthcare Companies event for over 50 attendees. At the event, industry experts shared the following insights on marketing for medical & healthcare companies:

• Matt Brown, HubSpot Specialist from Boston – US Trends in Healthcare Marketing
• Dina Gidron, VP Strategy at OZ – Opening New Channels of Communication
• Mickey Nave, Corporate Marketing Director at Lumenis – Medical marketing: generating leads that your sales team will love
• Bat-chen Grinberg, Founder of MC Forum – Digital tools that reduce your work overload

Here are some important takeaways from the event:

1. The age of “Social Health”. The combination of healthcare reforms, the age of consumerism and mobile technology is creating the perfect climate for change in healthcare.
2. We see YOU, we know YOU, we understand YOU, we want to help YOU. The digital revolution is transforming the way we do business as we shift from a Business-to-Business (B2B) to a Business-to-Business-to-User (B2B2U^©).
3. Patient-consumers are the center of the universe. As patient-consumers become the single most important factor in this new era, we need to open up direct channels of communication with them to understand their challenges, increase brand awareness and create bottom-up demand.
4. Trends in medical and healthcare. Patient-consumers are avid researchers; marketers are targeting patient-consumers AND payers; digital channels are overtaking traditional marketing channels; and digital content is key to the decision process.
5. Brands must recognize social health and deliver value across the full spectrum to drive leads, convert prospects to customers and keep them loyal.
6. Inbound marketing and content marketing are well-suited to the medical and healthcare industry as it promotes targeted communication, trust-based decision-making, long-term relationships, and thought leadership and industry expertise.

 

Preparing for the age of “Social Health”

As healthcare reforms, the era of consumerism and mobile technology create the ideal climate for positive change in the medical and healthcare arena, we’re ushering in a new age – the “Social Health” era. As we transition into this new era, patient-consumers are becoming the single most important factor in the medical and healthcare eco-system; and as they research and shop online for medical services, products and insurance plans, the medical & healthcare industry increasingly resembles a retail industry. The impact of this shift on medical and healthcare providers is huge as it means they need to open up direct channels of communication with patient-consumers to understand their challenges and offer services and products with real value. Or in other words, there is a need to move from a Business-to-Business (B2B) to a Business-to-Business-to-User (B2B2U©) approach. As we enter this age of “Social Health”, brands need to recognize the need to deliver value across the full spectrum to drive leads, convert prospects to customers and keep them loyal.

It's time to attract your prospects instead of bombarding them.

Inbound marketing is a customer-centric approach that focuses on attracting customers to your business through content and interactions that are valuable, helpful, and trust-building.

It’s all about using remarkable content to develop and nurture long-term relationships with your prospects so they ultimately build trust in your brand.

In comparison, traditional marketing, which is marketer-centric, uses more interruptive methods to vie for the attention of prospects.  

	Inbound	VS.	Outbound
Definition	Inbound marketing uses customer-centric tactics to attract prospects, address their challenges and goals, and build trust in your business		Traditional marketing uses more interruptive methods to push products and services and get the attention of prospects
Communication	Based on interactive communication that engages prospects and attracts them to you		Based on one-way, outward communication
Tools/techniques	Educational content such as blogs, videos, eBooks, white papers, SEO, and case studies		Print and TV ads, banner ads, direct mail, cold calling, and mass email campaigns
Goals	Offer prospects value through educational content and earn their trust		Drive sales through product-centric marketing

 

In one of our last blogs, we spoke about how content is the fuel behind inbound marketing. The question now is where do you start and what do you focus on? Let’s start with a quick recap of the recommended process for creating content for inbound:

1. Consider the content’s purpose, format and topics.
2. Create content that builds trust amongst your prospects.
3. Get your content in front of the right people at the right time.
4. Analyze & repeat. Determine what worked and what didn’t, and repeat your successes.

In this blog we’ll focus on the first stage: Plan. But stay tuned for future posts on the whole process. In the planning stage, you’ll need to decide on the content's purpose, format, and TOPICS. And that’s where you’ll need to get your creative juices going. Because you’ll need to come up with ideas that attract potential customers and keep them coming back for more. But how do you get out of your own head and into your potential customers’ heads to find inspiration? The most obvious place to start would be by ASKING THEM. Yes, we know it sounds trivial but when was the last time you actually spoke to your end users and customers about their actual challenges? Another great source of information is your field sales team who frequently interact with your end users and customers.

Lead nurturing is the process of engaging with contacts via automated workflows to build a relationship with them. The end goal is to close more educated and qualified customers faster and to delight customers to become promoters of your brand. Because the reality is that not all leads are ready to talk to the sales team at the beginning of their interaction with your company. In fact, most aren't, and according to HubSpot, research shows that only 5-25% of visitors that come to your site are ready to close the deal. This means that in order for inbound marketing to be effective, you need to engage with your leads along every stage of the buyer's journey until they are ready to do business with you. Which is where lead nurturing comes in. As a key component of your B2B marketing strategy, lead nurturing utilizes automated email campaigns that are timely, offer valuable content, and address your prospects' specific interests to nurture them until they're sales ready. And, because the emails are automated, it saves you a lot of work by qualifying leads and pushing them through the sales funnel quicker, meaning a higher return on investment. In fact, DemandGen Report found that nurtured leads increase sales opportunities by an average of 20% versus non-nurtured leads. As you begin to develop your lead nurturing workflows, always remember these foundational principles:

• Grow and nurture relationships
• Offer educational content
• Use hyper personalization

This means you should constantly consider whether you're offering your customer value, and ensure your content isn't promotional but rather informational and educational. Also, don't forget to target and personalize your communication based on your buyer persona's questions and interests and where they are in the buyer's journey. This keeps your communication efforts relevant and consistent – which is ultimately what produces results.

Inbound marketing is a customer-centric approach that focuses on attracting customers to your business by offering valuable and informative content that speaks to theirs needs and builds trust in your business. As opposed to more traditional, marketer-centric marketing, which uses interruptive methods such as emails, cold calling, and printed ads to get the attention of prospects, inbound marketing creates positive interactions that empower prospects with the information they need to make decisions for themselves.

Why inbound marketing?

We live in an age where people are bombarded with advertising wherever they turn, and for this reason, have become increasingly skeptical of standard interruptive marketing methods. In fact, Harvard Business Review reports that 90% of B2B buyers never respond to cold-marketing. For this reason, instead of competing for consumer attention, inbound uses the fact that prospects seek out the information they need on their own terms. By developing valuable and relevant content with the expectation to be found, potential customers will come to you, become new clients, and ultimately be delighted by their experience.

How does inbound marketing work?

Inbound marketing is based on four phases: attract, convert, close, delight

ATTRACT

First, attract visitors to your website using tools such as blogging, website optimization, and, social media. Tools: blog, social media, keywords, pages

CONVERT

Once you have new visitors, you can convert some into leads by gathering their contact information, the currency of inbound marketing. To do this, it's important to offer them something valuable, usually in the form of additional information or useful content. Tools: calls-to-action, landing pages, forms, contacts

CLOSE

Once you’ve converted some visitors into leads, you need to nurture their interest by providing them with relevant information. In this stage, tools like email and CRM are helpful in selling to the right leads at the right time. Tools: email, workflows, lead scoring, CRM integrations

DELIGHT

Once you close a sale with a customer, your relationship is just beginning. At this stage, you need to continue to delight and engage them so they become happy promoters of your brand. Tools: social media, smart calls-to-action, email, workflows Analysis is critical to making inbound marketing work. Every strategy and technique you use, and content you create, should be analyzed regularly to see if it's working, and adjusted as needed to make it better.

Attracting customers with inbound marketing

Inbound marketing is a customer-centric approach that focuses on attracting customers to your business. Unlike traditional interruptive marketing that vies for attention through cold calls, purchased ads, and email blasts, inbound marketing responds to prospects’ needs and interests by offering them valuable content in the right place and at the right time. “By publishing the right content in the right place at the right time, your marketing becomes relevant and helpful to your customers, not interruptive.” - Hubspot Read more about inbound marketing here.

So how does inbound marketing work for B2B?

It’s often assumed that inbound marketing is better suited for businesses that sell directly to consumers (B2C); and, in the recent “push” to “pull” marketing shift, it appears that B2C organizations have more easily adopted this new marketing model. In contrast, B2B or B2C organizations appear to be more skeptical and adopt the new approach with more caution. The main reason for this is that a lot of B2B and B2B2C organizations are still trying to figure out how inbound marketing can work for them; and they often question whether this new approach is even applicable to business customers.

The answer is — of course — YES!

Because the truth is that it doesn’t matter what you’re selling or to whom, the majority of your prospects are usually partially through the buying cycle before they even consider talking to a salesperson. And that’s where the emphasis needs to be — ON YOUR PROSPECTS. In order for inbound marketing to work, you need to have an in-depth understanding of your value chain and your sales model. Once you have that, you can then create valuable content that attracts visitors to your business, converts them into prospects, engages them until they decide to purchase your product or service, and then delights them so they become promoters of your brand. In this manner, you can use inbound marketing to create a win-win situation where you get closer to both your distributors and your end users, and in the process, increase brand awareness to enhance end-user demand for your brand (even if you they are not buying directly from you). But here’s the thing – you need to be in it for the long haul. Inbound marketing takes time, effort, and patience. But it’s definitely worth the wait!

Inbound marketing is not just about attracting people to your business; it's about attracting the right people to your business – those who will become leads, and then customers, and ultimately happy promoters of your brand. There are tools for every stage of the inbound marketing process, and the first phase — attract — is all about getting suitable prospects in the door. This is usually done by offering valuable content and using a variety of marketing techniques to ensure that B2B buyers find your business, including blogging, SEO, and social media — but for the moment, let’s leave that for another post. Because before you start anything, in order to attract the right customers, you obviously need to know who your ideal customers actually are — right? Understanding who your customers are and what they want For the inbound customer-centric approach to work, you need to know who you're actually trying to reach. The best way to learn about your ideal customers, their interests, and their buying habits is to develop buyer personas, which are simply representations of your ideal customers. Buyer personas are based on three essential practices – research, identifying trends, and creating persona profile stories. This research and analysis allows you to uncover the mindset, goals, challenges, and motivations of your potential buyers. Once you've determined who your ideal customers are, the next step is understanding the buyer’s journey — which is the active research process your potential prospects go through before making a purchase. This journey, which is usually divided into three stages – awareness, consideration, and decision--, helps you tailor your inbound marketing and content to create meaningful interactions with your ideal customers (buyer personas) at every stage of their process (buyer's journey).

Content is what sets you apart

It’s the fuel behind inbound marketing – it carries the message your company wants to deliver to your customers at the right time and in the right place. It’s what powers a successful inbound strategy by pulling people from one stage of the inbound methodology to another and addressing their challenges and questions. It’s what attracts the right visitors to your site, converts them into leads, nurtures them, helps close them into customers, and then delights them into promoters.

We speak a lot about branding — adding value to B2B brands, building global brands, marketing in a digital world, employee branding, etc. Yes, they are all absolutely vital to business growth and success. But we often tend to speak less about or even ignore a less “sexy” component— lead generation. Most people just hear the term and get overwhelmed, which is a major problem as despite the challenges involved, lead acquisition and tracking is a crucial part of any business. And in a world where the heat is always on to win (or maintain) market share and stay ahead of the competition, traditional methods are no longer enough. More of the same just doesn’t cut it anymore and creativity is key! In the case of Amiad Water Systems, a world leader in water treatment and filtration solutions, the marketing team decided to try something different to support and improve the sales process. This came after the company successfully underwent rebranding; and with a solid foundation in place, it was time to get the word out and translate all the efforts into revenue. After getting the go ahead from the sales team and researching potential buyer personas, the team created Amiad FilterIT — a digital tool (app) to help end users understand which of the company’s solutions best suited their needs. The idea was simple. The user would sign up and download the app, add the criteria, and receive information on the products that met these criteria. In addition to helping the end user and collecting highly-qualified leads, the Amiad FilterIT app could also be used to promote new and innovative products, push notifications to customers, track data and optimize products and services based on user behavior and needs. Once the app was implemented in one specific market, Amiad used a digital campaign to promote it and as a result, the sales team received hundreds of qualified leads that could then be nurtured through direct communication. Based on this success, Amiad is currently in the process of implementing the app in additional markets globally.

There is no greater satisfaction than watching our customers successfully launch groundbreaking and transformative products that take the market by storm — especially when we played a role in branding them! Which is why we’re so psyched by the extensive media coverage and enthusiasm surrounding the recent release of Mazor X —a transformative guidance platform for spine surgeries developed by Mazor Robotics. According to Ori Hadomi, Chief Executive Officer of Mazor Robotics in a quote for Yahoo Finance: "The Mazor X system is the culmination of a multi-year development effort by our team of robotic, algorithm and imaging experts, incorporating market feedback gathered from thousands of clinical cases performed with the Mazor core technology. It exemplifies our vision of healing through innovation and our ongoing dedication to patients by expanding guidance capabilities in the spine operating room. We believe it can change the way spine surgeries are performed.” During the development of Mazor X, Oz Branding and Adlai & Partners worked with Mazor Robotics to identify key values for multiple customer segments, created a compelling brand promise for the new product — Align With Experience.

With the evolving nature of the marketplace, the role of the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) is quickly transforming and becoming one of the most strategic functions in most organizations. As a result, the skill set required of the CMO and the marketing team is also changing rapidly. Once responsible mainly for market research, corporate brand management and advertising, the CMO now has additional complex responsibilities that extend far beyond traditional marketing — including technology (digital marketing), analytics, customer experience expertise, and content. According to Bill Lee, founder of the Center for Customer Engagement in an interview with CMO.com: “CMOs today have a real opportunity to get a competitive jump by organizing more forcefully around today’s buyer—who is changing rapidly. It’s arguably the most important trend in marketing.”

The customer leads the way

With digital disruption and an ongoing increase in Internet and social media usage, consumers now have almost all the information they need at their fingertips. In fact, research shows that the majority of customers engage in online research and brand comparison before they commit to a specific product or service — even (and often especially) in the world of business to business (B2B) — and continue to use online platforms at multiple points across their buyer journey. This has far reaching effects on the marketplace, and businesses are being forced to adapt their marketing strategy accordingly. Instead of interruptive marketing fighting for a customer's attention and money, twenty-first century businesses need to focus on both offline and online marketing to attract potential customers, increase sales and maintain an ongoing relationship with their customers.

Expanding the CMO’s Role

These changes to customer behavior, as well as the ability of companies to reach a more diverse and global customer base, have led to an expansion or even a complete redefinition of the CMO’s role, in both B2C and B2B marketing. As advocators for customers — or the “voice of the customer” —CMOs will need to lead changes across companies. This involves playing a more active role in areas such as global branding strategy and public profile, product development, leading the move from a product-centric to a customer-centric model, content planning and generation, digital media, and more.

Afimilk case study: all you need is lab

When Afimilk — a pioneer and global leader of management technology for dairy farming — was preparing to launch its In-line Milk Lab internationally, the company turned to Oz for assistance in creating a combined online and offline campaign for the launch.