I wrote this post more than two years ago and thought of re-posting it while watching a new HBO documentary on Joe Namath, called “Namath: From Beaver Falls to Broadway.”

The manufacturing industry has been somewhat slow to accept social media as a marketing tool. This is largely because it can be difficult to see how social media plays into the larger business-to-business (B2B) marketing strategy. That, however, appears to be changing. Acccording to a Forrester report released in March 2011, 30 percent of global manufacturers intended to increase social media investments in 2012.

QR codes are still somewhat on the fringe, but with smartphone numbers constantly on the rise, there are still some great opportunities to add them to your B2B marketing mix.

Behavioral research has found that “foot-in-the-door” techniques can prove effective when attempting to motivate your target audience to make a large behavioral change. For example, if you are marketing a B2B product or service that requires your prospects to make a huge change (such as switching from a provider  they’ve used for decades), it may be useful to have them agree to a smaller change first to get your foot in the door.

A recent post on Mobile Commerce Daily said QR scanning in North America increased 1,200 percent in the last six months. I don’t doubt it. Considering it’s still new technology to most consumers, the big increase makes sense. There are many instances in which QR codes can work well in B2C, and smartphone purchases and usage are on the rise as well.

WEEK OF JANUARY 16-20, 2011

This week in B2B marketing the B2B blogosphere is buzzing about mirroring leadership, mastering new innovation, and building relationships via new means. Stay aware.

Behavioral research has found that persuading someone to act may be more effective when using detailed recommendations versus general recommendations. Though this may seem obvious, I often encounter B2B marketing promotions that simply don’t give enough specifics — which is unfortunate, because detailed recommendations can be crucial to the efficacy of a B2B promotion.  

As a B2B marketing agency, we encourage our clients to work on their website content before diving in too aggressively in social media. In most cases it makes sense for our clients to be blogging, providing white papers, case studies, video and other content that will be helpful to their customers and prospects.

There are more ways than ever to match your marketing messages to the needs of your customers with more personalized, relevant and actionable information. The more you can customize your content to relate to your best buyers, the more buyers you will attract, and the more conversions you will drive.

WhichTestWon.com recently conducted a great case study testing two concepts that can influence someone’s buying behavior: self-efficacy and testimonials. The test consisted of two pages with the same heading of “30-Day Free Trial on All Accounts,” but with different subheads. One subhead gave instructions for signing up, while the other related positive testimonials from customers.