10 New year’s resolutions for a wildly successful year in B2B marketing
As B2B marketers, we are always seeking out opportunities to grow professionally and sharpen our craft. We devote time and attention to global conferences, enroll in courses to upgrade our skills, and seek out the most influential thought leaders in order to drive the cutting edge of B2B marketing. And once we’ve mastered the art and science of B2B marketing, a new disruptor changes the landscape and suddenly there’s room for us to expand again.
There’s no manual for professional growth...but what if there were? It’s not that we’re not enjoying the scenic route on our journey to becoming our best professional selves but, in the interest of expediency, we went straight to the best sources—influential VPs and CMOs from enterprise organizations across North America—and asked for advice.
During season five of The Marketer’s Journey podcast, Uberflip CMO, Randy Frisch asked his guests a simple question: “What do you wish marketers would do more of?” We compiled the responses into a master wish list. Put these ten resolutions into action in the new year, and have yourself a wildly successful 2022!
Resolution #1: Focus on customer centricity
"Without a doubt it's more customer facetime. It's rarely a waste of time to speak with your customers. Make it a point to connect with your customers on a daily basis if you can."
—Jake Athey, Vice President of Marketing at Widen
"I wish that we would think about the customer and what they want rather than ourselves and what we want. Think about what the customer wants and how we can solve their problem in a way that is differentiated. We do too much inside-out vs. outside-in."
—Bill Kramer, Vice President of Marketing at Karat
"I think customer centricity has become so important and being able to actually understand the customer, where they are and what kind of information they need to go ahead. So increasing customer interactions, whether this is through your customer-facing teams partnering closely with them, or through your community initiatives or your own events, but being able to create many more touchpoints with the customer is incredibly important for marketers."
—Archana Agrawal, Chief Marketing Officer at Airtable
"Talk to your audience. Understand your audience better. Get out there. The best way would be to go where they are…talk to them, don't be selling, just try to understand."
—Tarah Neujahr Bryan, Chief Marketing Officer at Health Catalyst
"I think marketers absolutely have to engage directly with customers in a very, very personal way…when you do that, that's how you win. When you help them be successful, that's how you win."
—Dan Lowden, Chief Marketing Officer at HUMAN
Learn more about customer marketing:
Resolution #2: Measure your performance and apply your learning
"Analytics. Full stop. We've probably talked it to death in the last five years as marketers, but understanding and digging in and wanting to be curious about how what you're doing is responding with the market at a relatively quick pace. This is really important and a lot of marketers think that only one aspect of their role is the most important and maybe that breadth in analytics is where they're missing, so definitely more analytics.”
—Kirsten Newbold-Knipp, Chief Marketing Officer at FullStory
"Stop, reflect, analyze. Look at the data and optimize while your campaign is still in flight. Don't wait until something is over to go, womp-womp, that wasn't great. You can always course-correct if you're monitoring what you're doing along the way."
—Leslie Alore, Global Vice President of Growth Marketing at Ivanti
"Something I get greedy about that's near and dear to my heart is around analytics. I push people to dig into the details, use data as a competitive advantage, and bring it into every meeting."
—Scott Holden, Chief Marketing Officer at ThoughtSpot
"Measurement. I tell my team we have to eat data for breakfast. We can’t just be the people who run up and down the stairs faster, we have to be building the high-speed elevators to get to the 100th floor. And that means clear measurement milestones.”
—Carol Carpenter, Chief Marketing Officer of VMware
Learn more about marketing analytics:
Resolution #3: Create alignment with your sales team
"Talk to sales. Sit in on customer calls. I think too often folks in marketing are disjointed from sales and they think they know what's actually happening in the minds of their buyers, but there's no better way than to actually sit in the room or on a Zoom call and listen to how the message is being received. Listen to the kinds of questions they're asking."
—Noreen Allen, Chief Marketing Officer at Bandwidth
Learn more about sales engagement:
Resolution #4: Refine the art of storytelling
"They could always do better in learning the art of storytelling. It's a striving-for-excellence point for all of us."
—Chandar Pattabhiram, Chief Marketing Officer at Coupa
Learn more about storytelling through content:
Resolution #5: Believe in yourself
"Confidence! I think we struggle with that as marketers, I'm not sure why; but really believing in yourself and being confident in your abilities, making the right decisions and being confident in those, is something I think everyone can work on."
—Cristy Garcia, Vice President of Marketing at Impact
"Market themselves. I feel like marketers are terrible at sharing their accomplishments internally. That needs to change."
—Leela Srinivasan, Chief Marketing Officer of Checkout.com
Learn more about building your personal brand:
Resolution #6: Focus on the destination, not the route
"I wish marketers would take the spirit of advice from marketing thought leaders, not the letter. I think we could do a better job of listening to the problem that somebody is trying to solve and how they're approaching the solution versus rushing right to 'Wait, what was that tool you used?' Listen to the spirit of what thought leaders share."
—Joe Chernov, Chief Marketing Officer at Pendo
Get more tips from influential thought leaders:
Resolution #7: Understand how marketing contributes to overall business outcomes
"I think it's understanding the role that marketing plays in driving the business. And that your job doesn't end with your marketing qualified leads. Our job is to drive pipeline and growth.
—Melissa Sargeant, Chief Marketing Officer at Litmus
Learn more about understanding the value of marketing:
Resolution #8: Be more creative
"Bring in more creative ideas. Sometimes we are just so trapped for time. My team is just phenomenal when they have the breathing room to bring creative ideas. I love that and I think we need to do more of it...If you're in B2B, look at B2C. If you're in tech, look at healthcare. and see what what they're doing and see what you can learn."
—Genefa Murphy, Chief Marketing Officer at Five9
Learn more about sales engagement:
Resolution #9: Say no
"Saying no. And testing. There's so much that we can do, but what should we do? And really honing in on that."
—Jamie Gilpin, Chief Marketing Officer at Sprout Social
Learn more about taking the right risks:
Resolution #10: Ask for help when you need it
"Asking for help is not a sign of weakness, it's a sign of strength; that you're vulnerable enough to admit that you don't know what you don't know. And it makes me feel good when I can actually help my team with something."
—Chris Koehler, Chief Marketing Officer at Box
Learn more about teamwork:
Start the new year off on the right foot
As you take your career to new heights, we want to equip you with the tools you need to improve your business outcomes. Get all of the B2B marketing trends, benchmarks and insights you need to set yourself up for success in 2022. Get out there and make 2022 your best year yet!