Marketing Automation Weekly Wrap-up - 2009/09/11

In this week's marketing automation weekly wrap-up, there seems to be a theme of "lists" as lists are published, and list nominations are called for. At the same time, some recent listings of great B2B and Marketing Automation related blogs have surfaced some great writers I did not have on my own reading list previously.

Galen De Young (@GalenDY) from Proteus B2B Marketing published the 2009 list of B2B marketing blogs, many of which are classics, and many were new to me. It’s a tremendous (and comprehensive) list, and I was able to add a few new ones to my own list of blogs to read:

http://www.proteusb2b.com/b2b-marketing-blog/index.php/big-list-b2b-marketing-blogs/



The B2B Marketing Zone is also worth introducing, on our theme of "lists", for those who haven't come across it yet. Managed by Tom Pick and Tony Karrer, it aggregates many of the best B2B marketing blogs, and provides their content in an easily accessible way:

http://www.b2bmarketingzone.com/


Kate Brodock (@just_kate) from B2B Voices makes a push for video as a key part of the B2B marketer’s tool kit, if nothing else, because of its SEO effects. I like the fact that Kate avoids the idea that B2B videos must “go viral” to be successful:

http://www.b2bvoices.com/2009/09/using-video-as-a-b2b-marketing-tool/


Susan Fantle on B2B Marketing Smarts looks at resurrecting the dead with a discussion of the merits of direct mail in a B2B environment. It’s definitely a media type that has been under-utilized recently and has some compelling benefits:

http://b2bmarketingsmarts.com/?p=393


Stuart Wheldon on B2B Magazine with a post about SaaS, Social Media, and the economics of educating buyers. Makes for an interesting read in looking at the economic reasons behind why we are more apt to invest in buyer education than ever before:

http://www.b2bm.biz/blog/2009/09/saas-social-media-and-the-econ.html


Simon Salt (@incslinger) from Inc Slingers provides an Essential Social Media bookshelf of must-reads for social media, and it’s not the list you might expect as he goes beyond pure social media titles. (note: I’m biased here, as Digital Body Language was included – thanks Simon!):

http://www.theincslingers.com/2009/09/the-essential-social-media-bookshelf/


James Obermayer from the Sales Lead Management Association continues the theme of “lists” this week as he has opened nominations for the 50 most influential lead management professionals list:

http://blog.salesleadmgmtassn.com/2009/09/01/slma-seeks-nominations-for-first-annual-50-most-influential-sales-lead-management-professionals-list.aspx


Craig Rosenburg (@funnelholic) from The Funnelholic looks at webinars and what makes them work, with his recent post on the ABC’s of highly converting webinars:

http://www.funnelholic.com/2009/09/03/the-abcs-of-highly-converting-webinars/


Tim Wilson (@tgwilson) from Gilligan On Data covers data, business, math, and the irrational quirks of human psychology in this post on data cleansing processes – worth a read for anyone wondering why data always seems to be a mess:

http://www.gilliganondata.com/index.php/2009/09/04/the-inertia-of-the-status-quo/


Kipp Bodnar (@kbodnar32) from Social Media B2B looks at 3 examples of B2B companies using Facebook as part of their marketing efforts. Lots of experimentation in this area, but it’s hard to see the ideal path. Kipp’s examples are interesting success stories:

http://socialmediab2b.com/2009/09/b2b-company-facebook-lead-generation/


I hope you enjoyed this week's writings on marketing automation and B2B marketing as much as I did. It's great to have a new set of writers to keep track of.