B2B Marketing Online: Foraging for feedback
The CRP technology that is available today offers an insight into the customers that every business needs to survive. In the B2B sector CRP technology can provide a valuable additional layer of marketing insight that if exploited fully can give your business an edge over its competitors. The B2C sector has show how customer referencing can work and there is no reason that these basic principles can't be applied to the B2B sector as well – albeit with some modifications.
Horwitz concludes, “I believe customer references are a valuable tool for B2B marketers in pretty much any area, however the adoption of technology needs to be driven by specific needs and objectives – and ultimately supported by a process to ensure success. Quite a lot can be done with basic lists and simple tracking, but it's quite hard to maintain control and demonstrate impact. I'd say the technology is best for organisations that already have an eye to using CRP for competitive advantage and need the tools to take the effort up a level.”
The future looks very bright for CRP systems that will find their way into the marketing arsenal of every business, as without them they will be at a distinct commercial disadvantage. What is clear is that CRP sourced data must be taken more seriously across all B2B enterprises. This data has immense value but continues to be largely overlooked with limited resources allocated to develop and exploit the captive audience that CRP platforms can deliver to a business's marketing teams. Today, CRP has matured into a strategic value resource that few businesses can afford to ignore
Read the full article on B2B Marketing Online (subscription required)