How customer voice
drives business

There is no denying that open source software has emerged as a powerful force in the development of modern enterprise technologies. Some of the hottest developments in software technology have emerged with strong links to the open source movement. A good example of this is the Internet of Things (IoT), one of the most talked about technology developments in recent years. Open source software plays a key role in its emergence: It is Linux-based, and open source networking standards make it possible for smart devices from different manufacturers to talk to each other. But although open source software is in the vanguard of many emerging technologies, it will not necessarily eclipse more traditional proprietary software. Get a group of techerati in the same room to discuss the relative merits of open source versus proprietary software, and you’re bound to elicit some strong opinions. However, regardless of where you stand in the open source vs. proprietary debate, you probably use tools every day that were developed with open source programs. Many in the tech industry argue that the collective action of open source development results in better programs and code—an argument which does carry some statistical weight. On the other hand, […]

Lead-based marketing strategies have ruled the digital age, but in the past couple of years an alternative B2B marketing strategy called account-based marketing (ABM) has picked up steam, challenging marketers to think more strategically about the companies they sell to — the contexts in which their leads work. If lead-based marketing is like throwing semi-adhesive objects at a wall to see what sticks, account-based marketing is precisely selecting objects, applying a careful dob of glue, and arranging them as desired. The strategy that leaves the most objects on the wall entirely depends on the organization, its target market, and its approach. For marketing or sales teams that view account-based marketing with a combination of intrigue and skepticism, Demand Gen Report’s ABM Early Benchmark Survey Report may help you understand whether it might be a good fit for your organization. It shows the choices companies make to achieve success with ABM, including how they build a list of accounts to go after, and which content, technology, and measurements they use in ABM campaigns. But before we analyze the report, let’s discuss the concept of ABM in a little more detail. What Is Account-Based Marketing? ABM deployments require the sales, marketing, and […]

Business process management (BPM) is a mature technology that has continued to evolve to meet the changing needs of enterprises. From its origins in middleware integration used primarily by IT staff, through more user-centric systems, the focus has always been on an approach to making an organization’s workflow more effective and more adaptive to changing business conditions. The latest iteration of these tools called “low code systems” reduces the complexity of traditional BPM systems by providing a set of tools that can be used by business users without traditional coding skills. Ultimately, these users can assemble simple applications by using visual tools designed for the technically-savvy “citizen developer”. However, the basic idea of process optimization remains the same throughout these various iterations.   If you’re not sure where to start, TrustRadius is here to help you discover what qualities and capabilities you should look for when selecting BPM software. Overall, full-service BPM suites that allow the organization to achieve maximum operational efficiency, usually contain the following components: 1. Modeling: Visual Design Tools Business process modeling means visually conceptualizing current business processes using diagrams and graphical representations. In essence, these representations form the basis for conversations between the IT department and […]

You know the old adage: time is money. And that’s why in a world that’s increasingly loaded with distractions everywhere (hello Facebook-Instagram-Twitter-Snapchat) it’s important to know where your time is going. This is doubly true of your employees, especially in a growing workforce of freelancers and remote workers (whom you may not even have met in person). Here are 5 popular free time tracking tools, listed from highest overall score to lowest, that you might want to look into if you’re looking to better track your or your team’s time. 1. TSheets TSheets offers time tracking and scheduling capabilities, replacing traditional time cards, and allowing companies to streamline payroll. TSheets tracks time and GPS points (even without cell or internet service) then automatically syncs when back in service. There’s also a feature called “Who’s Working” which lets a business see what employees are working on and where at any given time. The company offers a free plan for one user, as well as more robust paid options. TSheets also offers customizable reminders and alerts, integrations with accounting tools Quickbooks and Xero, and free unlimited phone, email, and chat support. One user says, “TSheets tracks and monitors our employees, and their respective […]

MarTech 2017–the annual conference for senior-level marketing, IT, and digital executives and experts at the intersection of marketing, technology, and customer experience–is fast approaching. At the conference, Scott Brinker will unveil his updated MarTech landscape, ushering marketers into the latest wave of marketing technology innovations. Last year’s landscape showed 3,874 marketing technology solutions, almost twice as many as the previous year. You can check out his pre-release of the 2017 Marketing Automation category here; this piece of the landscape alone is up 36% from the 2016 version. In preparation for this year’s conference, which takes place in San Francisco May 9-11, TrustRadius talked with two of the conference organizers and martech thought leaders, Barry Levine (right) and Marc Sirkin (left), about the biggest trends influencing the marketing technology landscape right now, and how collaboration, integration, and strategic investment in technology can drive better marketing practices. Barry Levine covers marketing technology for Third Door Media. Marc Sirkin is VP eCommerce & Marketing, Third Door Media. Data Accessibility & The Evolution of the MarTech Stack What makes a marketing tech stack effective in 2017? What are the biggest differences you see in the technology landscape, as “Martec’s Law” continues to unfold? BL: The “effectiveness” of a […]

Traditionally, industry analysts like Gartner and Forrester have played a central role in informing IT purchasing decisions. However, they tend to focus on larger, better known vendors and have very limited coverage of emerging or open source solutions. Moreover, the primary data sources for researchers are conversations with vendors, augmented by customer surveys and calls (the audience is often directed by vendors) and occasionally lab tests. Few analysts have hands-on experience with every product, nor do they work with the products on an ongoing basis to experience customer support, upgrades, test integrations, etc., so coverage can lack usage details highly relevant to buyers. For this reason, IT executives find that conversations with peers are often vital to securing unfiltered, direct knowledge of a product’s capabilities, and any hidden issues like difficulty of implementation, integration with other products, or customer support experience. This kind of information can be invaluable to help formulate areas of concern to drill into during vendor calls, or as part of an RFP process. The challenge with peer conversations is scalability. Most IT executives have limited personal networks so it is challenging to talk to enough people who have used/evaluated the same set of products recently, and […]

As account-based marketing has continued to catch the attention of practitioners, marketing technology vendors, and the Marketing media, both the supply of and the demand for ABM technology has skyrocketed. New tools designed around account-based marketing challenges and best practices have entered the market; established marketing technologies have released new features to better address account-based marketing use cases (Marketo is a notable recent example, though the release is forthcoming); and some products have merely re-branded, latching on to the ABM trend. TrustRadius Research recently attended the #FlipMyFunnel Festival in Austin, a roadshow entirely dedicated to ABM. We interviewed speakers and attended sessions to find out more about: How account-based marketing impacts the use of foundational marketing and sales technologies like CRM and Marketing Automation. When it’s necessary to invest in new technologies to support new ABM initiatives. What kinds of software support an ABM strategy, and how vendors, experts and practitioners are categorizing them. ABM & Your MarTech Stack Right Now The Role of CRM and Marketing Automation in ABM Marketing automation and CRM systems are frequently called out for making it difficult to set up account-based marketing programs, since MA is built around leads, associating leads with accounts and opportunities is […]

TrustRadius has just published the 2016 Buyer’s Guide to Business Intelligence Software, based on 2,250+ end-user ratings and reviews across 22 BI software products. This is an update to the original guide published in 2014, and is a significant revision containing brand new TrustMapsTM that compare products in the category based on end-user satisfaction ratings and research frequency by prospective buyers on TrustRadius. The guide also contains individual profiles for each of the main vendors and products in the category, advice on how to buy a BI solution, and a discussion of recent trends in the BI market, identifying several trends that have either occurred, or gained in strength, since the first version was published. The grand theme is a change in focus to the needs of business users, and away from IT . Major trends identified are: The shift away from centrally governed, IT-led tools to agile, self-service BI. Most of the full-stack tools like SAP, IBM, SAS and Microsoft have now released data discovery and visualization tools designed for business users/analysts that are not dependent on IT. Data discovery and Visualization vendors building more enterprise-level features. The data discovery and visualization vendors are being pressed to provide more enterprise […]

As more vendors, thought leaders, and practitioners have embraced (and amplified) the account-based marketing trend, specific questions about what is needed for ABM and what type of companies should be doing ABM are becoming more widespread. Best practices for organizational structure, budget share, and technology are growing in complexity. More Marketing and Sales leaders have learned from their early ABM efforts and technology investments, and are willing to share their key learnings with peers. Accordingly, the #FlipMyFunnel Festival has grown from 1 track of presenters in San Francisco in February to 3 tracks in Austin this June. TrustRadius, a media sponsor for the show, attended sessions and interviewed presenters to understand how ABM impacts the overall company strategy and structure, and what is required for this to be effective. One of the biggest takeaways was that interdepartmental alignment underlies all aspects of effective ABM, in terms of collaboration on target account lists, the topics and language of marketing messaging, ABM measurement, and integrated tech stacks. There are two sides to this coin: some interviewees said ABM requires alignment (push), while others said ABM creates alignment (pull). Either way, the consensus is that organizations taking an account-based approach will need to have Sales, Marketing, and […]

B2B marketing leaders and content marketing experts weigh in on challenges & changes in content marketing at the Marketo Marketing Nation Summit. They said content marketers should take action to improve their efforts and maximize content ROI, and shared tips for making Marketing messages more strategic, more relevant, more profitable, and more accessible. The State of Content Marketing in 2016 Content Marketing Programs Have Been Adopted But Are Still Immature Content marketing has grown in popularity as an inbound tactic for B2B marketers. The strategy involves using content to attract, engage, retain, and grow a brand audience by providing helpful information about topics that interest the brand’s universe of ideal customers. At the recent Marketing Nation Summit, Marketo’s user conference, there were several presentations by marketing leaders championing particular approaches to content marketing, as well as by software vendors like ScribbleLive, Uberflip, and Kapost, and consultants who assist with content creation and program design. During the Summit, TrustRadius Research interviewed experts and practitioners to get a pulse on the state of content marketing in 2016. These conversations revealed that although marketers are starting to use content more, effective content marketing remains a challenge. Defining the relationship of Marketing to Sales, determining the strategic value of content, and creating impactful […]

The FlipMyFunnel festival makes its way to TrustRadius home base Austin, Texas next month for a day of ABM-themed sessions, including high-level thought leadership and practical case studies to help attendees “challenge the status quo of B2B marketing and sales.” What is #FlipMyFunnel? #FlipMyFunnel is a movement started by Sangram Vajre, the co-founder and CMO of Terminus, which is an ABM tool that serves ads via mobile, social, display, video and direct mail and provides account-level revenue attribution. The movement, which has gained support from vendors and practitioners across multiple software categories, proposes to reverse the traditional marketing funnel that passes a large volume of leads through various stages of education before a narrow slice of them purchases the product. The flipped funnel concept says you should instead identify the right set of target customers, find more like them, engage them with personalized content, and turn them into loyal fans that stick around, spend more, and advocate for you to a broader base of prospects. The implication is a greater focus on finding the right customers and making them happy. What’s new in ABM? As TrustRadius has observed before, Account-based Marketing is not necessarily a new concept. We talked to a couple of speakers […]

  Regarding the state of Sales in 2016, Scott Albro offers this provocative piece of advice: “Companies that figure out how to adopt sales technology and mitigate risk grow a hell of a lot faster than those that don’t.” Albro’s claim—part observation, part promotion—is based on research done by TOPO, a sales process and technology consulting firm where Albro is the CEO. To some extent, this advice is self-serving, since TOPO’s business model involves advising companies about growth strategies that involve technology. However, based on TrustRadius’s independent study of sales tech buyers and users, as well as surveys done by other sales tech experts like Nancy Nardin, many companies are planning to adopt new sales technology this year, whether for the first time or to replace/fill in older ecosystems. If you’re heading into product evaluations this year, there are a few things you can learn from early adopters. While I was at TOPO’s recent Sales Summit, I talked to practitioners at leading tech companies to find out: Which pieces of the Sales tech stack they’re focused on How sales tech relates to organizational growth initiatives Lessons learned around managing user adoption Goals for future use of sales technology Organizing for Growth: Sales […]

Along with account-based marketing and selling, specialization is one of the biggest trends in SaaS sales right now. Many sales leaders at high-growth B2B tech companies are following the advice offered in the bestselling book Predictable Revenue by Aaron Ross & Marylou Tyler, also supported by research findings (touted by vendors like InsideSales.com): specialist models “achieve a 7-point improvement in close ratios over a generalist model.” Specialization means to break out responsibilities and disperse expertise, so that people focus on a particular piece of a larger operation. Much of the TOPO Sales Summit conference, which happened last week in San Francisco, was focused on how to specialize Sales organizations effectively—in terms of people, processes, and technology. Sales development is not the only area that can be specialized, but it seems to be the focus of conversation in the space right now. There were presentations from TOPO analysts and consultants on the topic, as well as from high-growth sales leaders who have been successful with specialized SDR teams. At the conference, I interviewed sales development leaders about their experiences building and honing SDR teams. Across companies, these are some of the key steps to implementing an SDR team: Map SDRs onto the sales process/greater sales […]

TrustRadius Research aims to help buyers navigate the sales technology landscape with a new report, featuring expert and user advice on how to build your sales stack in 2016. The report is timely, because of changes underway in the market right now. Vendors are rapidly releasing new and overlapping product functionality, renaming software categories, and attaching themselves to trends and buzzwords in the Sales/Marketing space. At the same time, many businesses are looking to scale their Sales operations by creating specialized high-velocity teams, while automating and optimizing key pieces of the sales process. These initiatives can be supported by technology, so many Sales leaders are looking to invest in new software for their sales teams this year. Scott Brinker, Editor of Chiefmartec.com, commented, “Sales technology has lagged a bit behind MarTech in terms of development and adoption but it is quickly catching up, and 2016 may very well be the Year of the Sales Stack.” The visual below combines different ways to look at sales tech products-by user role, function/stage of the sales process, and vendor offerings–which are not usually presented together. This comprehensive view, excerpted from the TrustRadius Research study, allows buyers to get a better sense of which products do what for who, and which vendors offer solutions […]

Account-based marketing is a huge trend in the B2B software world right now, but sales leaders and experts on sales methodology are starting to ask—how does it fit into the overall scalable revenue machine? The account strategies underpinning ABM are drawn from fairly traditional Sales tactics (which are being adopted by Marketers), and, after all, ABM cannot produce its celebrated benefits without the help of Sales. So what is the role of Sales in ABM, and how can companies organize around a unified account-based strategy? At their recent Sales Summit conference, TOPO proposed a framework to establish how the relationship between Sales, Marketing, and customers should work with an account-based strategy. TOPO calls their framework Account-based Everything—in summary: target high-value accounts; be data and intelligence-driven; organize around account strategy; make interactions valuable for the buyer; and use the appropriate number of touches. To find out what these account-based strategies look like in practice, I interviewed practitioners Ted Purcell (Marketo), Doug Landis (Box), Lars Nilsson (Cloudera), Jeff Imm (When I Work), and Chris Albro (Zendesk). Here are the big takeaways: The right approach depends on your product and the business model. An account-based strategy looks different for companies that are targeting a […]

Note: this article was first published 4/1/16 on ChiefMartech.com. TrustRadius Research attended MarTech last month to interview a number of vendors exhibiting there about their perspective on “hot” categories within the marketing tech landscape. Account-based marketing (ABM) was one of the biggest topics at the MarTech conference. Nearly every exhibitor featured a reference to ABM, and many of the presenters touched on the trend as well. Across software categories like predictive analytics, sales & marketing intelligence, and ad serving & retargeting, ABM is impacting vendor positioning, marketing campaigns, and even product roadmaps. The TrustRadius research team checked in with some of the leading vendors to get a pulse on how ABM is shaping their product and business. Here are the major ABM trends that emerged: Vendors that provide contact and account data (sometimes called prospecting tools, data vendors, or sales intelligence solutions) are positioning themselves as the foundation for alignment between marketing & sales teams. Predictive analytics vendors, which use machine learning to determine a company’s “ideal customer profile,” are surfacing best-fit accounts in addition to contacts. Some are also offering their own prospecting and data verification features. In addition to creating personalized content that is relevant to specific target accounts, companies practicing […]

Note: this article was first published 4/8/16 on CustomerThink. Last week (March 21-22), Totango hosted their annual Customer Success Summit, which brought together leaders who manage Customer Success teams and tech vendors whose software products are used to facilitate customer success strategies. Totango provides customer success management software, which includes user monitoring, alerts about customer health, analytics, nurture campaigns, and BPM tools. Their product is part of a growing practice where B2B companies are focused on making sure their customers are deriving continuous value from their product, to ensure retention, growth and advocacy. Several other vendors, like Gainsight, Bluenose Analytics, Amity, Preact, Natero, and Churnspotter, also provide software designed to enable Customer Success teams. TrustRadius interviewed leaders in Customer Success about the trends and changes they’ve observed in the space, their goals for their own Customer Success teams, and learnings about best practices from their own experience and from conversations at the Summit. Mark Roberge of HubSpot, David Apple of Typeform, Matt Oxley of Opal Labs, Dan Adika of WalkMe, and Loretta Jones and Megan Roth of Insightly all had different, valuable lessons to share about customer success. Across these conversations, several topics emerged as important considerations as you build and evaluate your own Customer Success strategy: Customer Success impacts revenue, […]

Content plays a role throughout the buyer’s journey. Content marketing, which is the strategy of creating and distributing useful and relevant content to attract the right audience, is often seen as classic top-of-the-funnel, awareness stage content. Mid-funnel content might be focused on nurturing and demand generation, whereas content for sales enablement, which is the practice of equipping salespeople with the information, assets, technology and best practices needed to sell more effectively, is often seen as bottom-of-the-funnel, conversion stage content. TrustRadius talked to several vendors exhibiting at MarTech who focus on one or more stages of content use. In general, these vendors discussed the importance of thinking about your content strategy across all stages, whether you’re using one tool or a set of tools to support and track your activities. Meet the Vendors The vendors we interviewed span a few different categories: Kapost, a content marketing platform. Content marketing platforms support content creation, publication, distribution, measurement and optimization. Vidyard, an online video platform. OVPs allow users to host and measure the impact of video content. Acrolinx, a tool that helps companies with large writing staffs produce writing with consistent quality and tone, and Persado, a tool that uses machine learning to write targeted, effective content for […]

  This year’s MarTech Conference was abuzz with talk about how to enable agile marketing. The short answer? With data. Marketing thought leaders and exhibiting vendors debated what it means to be a data-driven marketer–what type of data helps your marketing strategy, what too much data looks like, and how marketers can use technology to more effectively manage and operationalize data insights. The Marketer’s Data Dilemma One group of vendors, in particular, evangelized the importance of real-time data, comprehensive cross-channel dashboards, ROI attribution, and actionable insights made accessible to Marketing without intervention from the data scientists. BrightFunnel, Bizible, Beckon, Datorama, Allocadia, Origami Logic, Impact Radius, and Full Circle Insights fit into a subset of Marketing Analytics software that’s specifically concerned with putting BI-style data insights into the hands of marketers, so that the Marketing department can more quickly and intelligently (re)allocate resources to achieve their own goals as well as the bottom-line goals of the business at large. Note that some of these products focus on B2C, while others focus on B2B; some are designed to handle enterprise loads, while others stress usability and fast time-to-value for SMBs. There is not yet consensus around what this subset of Marketing Analytics should be called. Tools have been described as […]

The role of video in marketing was a theme among vendors at this year’s MarTech Conference. We talked to three video platform vendors (Brightcove, Vidyard and HapYak) about the evolution of video marketing—from a brand awareness effort with questionable ROI, to a highly sophisticated, targeted content method that can drive measurable results. Meet the Vendors Brightcove is an online video platform with two main lines of business: media companies looking to monetize video through advertising and other methods, and organizations looking to leverage and measure video content as part of their digital marketing strategies. The company was founded in 2004 and has 5,500 customers. Vidyard is a video marketing and analytics platform for businesses, allowing for hosting, distribution, management and measurement/analytics of video content. The company was founded in 2011, has 700 customers, and recently raised $35 million in a series C funding round. HapYak is an interactive video platform that allows users to add interactivity – such as chapters, clickable buttons, text annotations, quizzing, branching, etc. – to existing videos. The product works with any online video platform. The company was founded in 2012 and has several hundred customers. Video Marketing Trends 1. Video is now being used across the funnel Unsurprisingly, all […]