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Top 10+ Takeaways from Marketing Profs B2B Marketing Forum Conference

by Andrew Lutts

Marketing Profs B2B Forum

 

Last week on Oct 5 and 6 the 16th annual Marketing Profs team assembled in Boston for their B2B Forum conference. https://mpb2b.marketingprofs.com/

Over 500 attendees enjoyed presentations from a dynamic group of speakers on all things marketing.

There was lots of talk about AI, future trends, and best practices.

If you missed the event not to worry. We attended, and here are our top 10+ takeaways.

Top 10+ Takeaways from the Boston B2B Forum by Marketing Profs

Artificial Intelligence Takeaways

  1. When in doubt, ChatGPT it! If you need help creating something, revising something, improving something, or getting another view on what you have written, run it though ChatGPT.
  2. Currently, many of us are using ChatGPT like a powerful search tool. It’s much more than that. Try using it, along with other AI tools, to do many more things.
  3. AI can be thought of like a “Digital Doppelganger.” It makes you better.
  4. Just like when people started bringing smartphones into the office in 2007, and business leaders worried about the appropriate use for the technology, AI will be used by the masses and adopted quickly (with the exception of some industries which need great caution such as healthcare privacy, etc.).
  5. You will give up a certain amount of privacy and data to get the most out of AI.

Marketing Tactics and Methods Takeaways

  1. In an email message, the From line is more important than the Subject line. Said another way, your subscribers want to get email from a person (you), not a nameless faceless anonymous organization. The opens and clicks statistics prove it.
  2. Weird isn’t nice, it’s needed! To stand out, it’s okay to be a bit weird, or unconventional. Weird gets noticed. Weird is personal. Weird works.
  3. To write with authority like a thought leader, use a journalistic approach to storytelling (gathering, recording, verifying, and reporting on information.).
  4. Use only one Call to Action (CTA) in an email newsletter for improved response.
  5. Landing pages should match the look and feel of the newsletter that sent you to it.
  6. Dark mode is lots more popular than most people think. Make sure your email and web site are legible in dark mode (especially if addressing consumers or younger readers).
  7. To complement your email efforts, choose one social media platform and excel with that one. It may not be worth the effort to be good on every platform. The ROI may just not be there. Focus on just one social media platform.
  8. Focus on Pillar Content (a high level comprehensive introduction to a topic that you want to demonstrate that you are the expert at), and then develop deeper-dive sub content to reinforce the content: infographics, blog posts, landing pages, video.
  9. In emails and landing pages use social proof (testimonials and 5 star reviews), urgency (limited time period), and FOMO (fear of missing out) exclusivity to get subscribers to take action.

Predictions and Strategy

  1. The voice and original thinking of an authentic human will increase in value, as a result of the proliferation of AI content.
  2. Be careful of adopting a Blue Ocean strategy (creating new market spaces with little or no competition) by creating value innovation. Sometimes the new markets just don’t materialize. And then you're left out in the middle of an ocean with nobody around.
  3. Prediction: We will see a return of quarterly, printed, glossy print (magazines, catalogs, more). Why? Since the volume of postal mail is way down, everything in the mail gets noticed.

Thought leaders from the event included speakers Anne Handley, Andrew Davis, and Joe Pulizzi.

Marketing Profs founder and chief marketer (Allen Weiss) has a new book forthcoming. Written with his wife Debbie MacInnis, the new book covers positioning and branding. I’ve ordered my copy. See it at https://www.brandbenefitsplaybook.com

Overall the conference was a big hit. Excellent keynotes, informative sessions, great vendors, friendly attendees, helpful roundtables, and an excellent venue. We’ll be there next year too. If you attend, let us know you are coming as we’d love to see you.

And if you’ve been to a good conference lately on anything marketing, email marketing, or business related, let us know. We’d love to hear more about it.

Resources

Marketing Profs: https://www.marketingprofs.com/

Marketing Profs Annual B2B Marketing Forum: https://mpb2b.marketingprofs.com/

Thought Leader Anne Handley: https://annhandley.com/

Thought Leader Andrew Davis: https://www.akadrewdavis.com/

Thought Leader Joe Pulizzi: https://www.joepulizzi.com/

Marketing Profs Founder & CEO Allen Weiss: https://www.marketingprofs.com/about/management/

Email Marketing Articles and Ideas https://www.netatlantic.com/resources/email-marketing-articles