Thank You for Being a Trend — A 2023 Marketing Trend, That Is!
It’s fairly common at the new year to take time to reflect on the previous 12 months and think about how you’ve progressed (hopefully with a glass of bubbles and a slice of your favorite holiday pie!).
What goals have you accomplished? What new experiences have you had? What new friends and colleagues have you met along the way? And although looking back and reflecting upon your year seems worthwhile (which it is, especially in sales/marketing), B2B marketers are also constantly looking forward to seeing what new trends have arisen on the playing field.
Let’s take a look at a few of the marketing trends our UDG team members noted as we entered 2023.
Doing More With Less
“As budgets and teams cut back, companies need to find more ways to become scrappier and leaner while meeting even higher revenue goals.”
— Ellie Cary, Martech Director
As budgets decrease and expectations rise, Ellie certainly hits the nail on the head in terms of how teams are coping with the squeeze. Communication and alignment between sales and marketing teams has never been more crucial, and this valuable alignment can help you be more nimble when driving toward your 2023 revenue goals.
Expansion From Within
“The strategic shift toward focusing on marketing to your existing customer base rather than trying to find new customers has grown a lot. We’ve seen a lot of clients focusing on customer satisfaction and relationship building to increase sales/increase adoption of their products while using fewer marketing resources (by talking to existing customers!).”
— Katelyn Nollette, Account Strategist
Similar to doing more with less, it’s also important to play to your greatest strength: your existing customer base! With tightened budgets potentially restricting new business opportunities, expanding your current efforts on your customer and partner ecosystem is a great way to drive revenue and ensure internal growth for your business.
Partner-Led Growth
“We’ve seen a push in marketing teams relying on their channel partners to help with co-selling. Aligning this with a direct sales strategy has really helped influence pipeline growth and expansion of ICP. Teams with partner ecosystems should be fully utilizing these key players to expand and take their strategies to the next level.”
— Ricky Spiese, Head of Marketing and Revenue
So this one’s totally me, and I can’t stress it enough. Utilizing your partner channel is a great way to gain access into new segments, accounts, and even new ways of marketing to your buyer. A company’s partners are oftentimes an untapped resource that can make or break a deal’s conversion and also add value to your existing customers. This is my shameless plug to reach out to me to learn more about how we can help you in your channel marketing efforts and take advantage of UDG’s extensive experience in helping companies launch their channel marketing strategy.
Interactive Content
“Personalized, animated polls, quizzes, calculators, games and chatbots are big, even in the B2B space. While the staff resources needed to launch this type of content is heavier than for static content, the reward is high.”
— Tonya Vinas, VP Content
Rounding out the list of this year’s trends: keeping your buyers engaged. It’s crucial to cut through the content noise and present your value proposition to prospects and customers, and many of our clients are doing it with interactive experiences like Ceros. Not only do interactive experiences drive engagement, they make an impact on buyers to drive awareness. Who doesn’t want to drive that?
There are countless trends coming over the horizon as we drive forward with 2023, but one thing is certain: Marketers need to stay up to date on what we’re hearing on the front lines of B2B.
If you’d like to explore more ways to get scrappy, expand your existing resources, or perhaps even look toward cutting-edge new experiences, please be sure to connect with our sales team. Cheers to 2023!
