A B2B Marketing Idea I Proudly Salute: The B2BTOTY Awards
I know a great idea when I see or hear one, and The B2B Twitterer of the Year Awards is a wonderful example.
Odds are you came across this article by way of a link through Twitter, LinkedIn or some other social medium (SM). If so, you are probably very aware of the ever-growing role that SM in general, and specifically Twitter, is now playing in many B2B marketing plans.
If you’re not big on Twitter (yet), and are reading this because you happened to be visiting the MLT Creative website, I encourage you to bear with me as I explain why I think the B2BTOTY Awards are brilliant, and why the winner will be someone I’ll gladly follow.
First of all, the award is not about Twitter; it’s about how Twitter is being utilized by a B2B professional as a two-way channel for sharing B-to-B Marketing and Communications ideas, research, case studies, forecasts, product and service insights, strategies, questions and answers, invitations, reminders, referrals and more. And all in messages that are145 characters or less in length.
The B2BTOTY Awards Program is the brainchild of Joe Zuccaro, who says, “It’s not just about how many followers someone has, or how many times a person tweets in a given time. It’s about creating a community and the value a B2B entity brings to it.”
The marketing professionals who will be judging these awards have a big challenge ahead of them. I’m nominating several candidates I follow for different reasons, and just choosing one favorite would be tough enough. And choosing from the hundreds of other B2B marketing “braniacs & maniacs” I follow wasn’t easy, either.
Yes, I follow lots of different leaders, but I’m not sheepish about it. The great thing about Twitter is that most of them follow back, and everyone gets smarter as a result.
Twitter is an open exchange of information that flows non-stop with, or without, you and me. So I dive in several times a day just as I used to leaf through trade journals (and still do).
So what makes one B2B Twitterer best? Great question. Just to give you an idea, here are some of the B2B Twitterers I follow (there are many more).
@jeremyvictor Jeremy is a B2B Marketing genius and creator of www.B2Bbloggers.com@Michelelinn Michele is one of the SavvyB2Bmarketing.com sisterhood and a Freelance Writer @rebelbrown @B2B_MarketingPR @ckburgess @diannahuff @basebot @ardath421 @dgtlpapercuts @MichaelGass | @Dougkessler London-based Doug Kessler is part of Velocity Partners and off-the-chart-smart@elizabethsosnow I really like Elizabeth’s last name. Sosnow. And I really like her B2B Marketing ideas. Always has great things to contribute. @b2bspecialist @B2B_Sales_Leads @GalenDY @markwschaefer @StephanieTilton @CopywriterTO @copywriter4u @JasonFalls |
The nomination form for the actual award is very extensive, so I won’t be nominating all of these. But I do suggest you take time to follow them if you are interested in learning all you can and sharing your knowledge about B2B marketing. And if all the other nominees are as deserving as mine, you can bet the winner B2BTOTY Award will surely be worth following. If you have someone you’d like to nominate, don’t wait too late, the deadline is December 18th, 2009.
I’d like to hear your thoughts about this award idea and if you also follow any of the same thought leaders I do, share your ideas on them as well. And to all of the other 1,000 plus B2B braniacs & maniacs I follow that I didn’t mention this time, I apologize. Thanks!