This report explores the top trends and strategies for building a powerful sales pipeline, with insights from industry leaders like Kyle Poyar, CROs, and CMOs from Carta, G2, Jellyfish, Miro, and many others. These actionable ideas are designed to drive pipeline growth and help your business thrive in the coming year.

1. Doubling Down on Events: From Virtual to Intimate Gatherings

Despite the rapid rise of digital marketing and AI-driven strategies, events remain a cornerstone of pipeline generation for many B2B companies. As Kyle Poyar, Operating Partner at OpenView, explains, “Events are the top area where revenue leaders say they’re doubling down for H2. Whether virtual or in-person, they consistently deliver strong results.”

The pandemic may have temporarily shifted the focus to virtual events, but their staying power is undeniable. Kyle Lacy, CMO at Jellyfish, shared an impressive stat: “Our virtual conference produced a 28x return on investment to pipeline generation, far outpacing any other channel in our marketing mix.”

But it’s not just about large-scale events. Small, intimate gatherings are making waves too. Dan Fahy, VP of Sales at Memo, highlighted the success of their dinner events: “We host 10-15 prospective buyers at each dinner, and about 80% of attendees end up taking a sales meeting with us. From those, 25-40% convert into qualified leads or closed deals. That’s a huge win.”

Carta’s CRO, Jeff Perry, also praised the effectiveness of blending events with targeted outreach. “Over the past six months, we’ve hosted 17 events, including everything from dinners to happy hours and sporting events. By involving our executive team and leveraging personal invites, we’ve influenced over $2.5M in pipeline.”

This push for experiential, in-person events is also seen at Miro. Adam Carr, Head of Global Sales, shared their approach: “We’re hosting 15-20 events per quarter—everything from large trade shows to smaller Miro experience days and happy hours. These events give us a chance to connect with target personas and strategically map those back to the pipeline.”

2. Orchestrating Cross-Functional Account-Based Plays

The days of isolated marketing or sales teams are over. In 2024, cross-functional orchestration is key to pipeline success. As Eric Gilpin, CRO at G2, emphasized, “Our tiered account strategy is rooted in a propensity score based on 30+ attributes. By unifying product, marketing, and sales, we’ve developed a strategy that accelerates new business, reduces churn, and drives expansion revenue.”

What sets this approach apart is how it mobilizes every relevant team member to ensure engagement with key accounts. Sasha Anderson, VP of Customer Success at Procore Technologies, detailed their playbook: “We’ve created five or six distinct plays, each with associated offers, and our entire account team is trained to pitch them. Whether it’s an AE, a BDR, or a CS rep, the person with the closest relationship leads the conversation. This white-glove experience is crucial for conversion consistency.”

For some companies, account-based marketing (ABM) also means focusing on expansion opportunities within existing accounts. James Kaikis, Head of Go-To-Market at TestBox, said, “We’ve been laser-focused on specific categories like revenue intelligence. It’s incredible how nearly every company in that space is either a customer or in an active sales process with us. By highlighting their wins and creating custom landing pages, we’re creating a strong FOMO effect within competitive categories.”

3. Getting Creative with Outbound Tactics

Cold calling and email aren’t dead, but they need an overhaul to break through the increasing noise in the B2B space. Brandon Redlinger, VP of Marketing at Chili Piper, shared an innovative approach: “We started using SDR personal pages, which significantly reduced friction for prospects. This personalized touch led to 80 qualified meetings, generating $340,000 in pipeline. Prospects are less likely to ghost someone they feel they know.”

Outbound creativity isn’t limited to SDR pages. Ralph Barsi, VP of Sales at Kahua, emphasized the importance of company-wide prospecting days: “We’ve held 10 company-wide prospecting days, adding nearly 80 new opportunities to our pipeline. Everyone participates, and we hold ourselves accountable for generating new pipeline.”

Data mining and relationship mapping are also becoming key components of outbound strategies. Samantha McKenna, founder of #samsales Consulting, explained how relationship-based prospecting can be a game-changer: “We run plays based on deep mining of LinkedIn Sales Navigator data. For example, we ask, ‘Who worked for our company that now works in my territory?’ or ‘Who do my execs know that works in my territory?’ These simple tactics can open doors that cold calls might not.”

4. Revisiting Pricing and Packaging for Land-and-Expand

Pricing strategies have always been a lever for growth, but 2024 is seeing a shift toward flexible, modular pricing that supports both customer acquisition and expansion. Alex Poulos, CMO at Crossbeam, put it bluntly: “Pricing and packaging is the most underestimated lever by GTM teams. We introduced usage-based pricing and removed legacy pricing floors, resulting in a 3x increase in self-serve conversions and a 65% boost in quarterly expansion revenue.”

For companies like Superhuman, even the pilot phase is being rethought. Andrew Johnston, Head of Sales, shared: “We’ve committed to a ‘no free pilots’ rule. Even if it’s just a nominal fee, it ensures ownership from both sides and helps set up future expansion. This strategy significantly reduces churn and creates a stronger relationship from the start.”

5. Harnessing the Power of Founder-Led Content and LinkedIn

A growing number of sales leaders are recognizing the value of founder-led content in driving pipeline. Andrew McGuire, Founder and Pipeline Strategy Advisor, was surprised more companies haven’t adopted this tactic: “Founder-qualified leads through producing LinkedIn content is becoming one of the best channels for highly qualified pipeline. Founders have a unique voice that can cut through the noise, and when they create authentic content, it drives engagement in ways traditional marketing doesn’t.”

This approach works especially well for companies still in the early stages, where the founder’s voice can carry significant weight. As Samantha McKenna added, “Prospects today want to feel connected to the people behind the brand. A founder’s personal touch through content can build that relationship before any sales conversation even begins.”

6. Leveraging Data and Automation to Refine Lead Targeting

In 2024, data-driven decision-making is more important than ever, particularly when it comes to refining lead targeting. Kyle Poyar emphasizes that companies should “be relentless in testing and refining what works.” Data analytics tools allow for more precise targeting of leads, helping companies focus on the prospects most likely to convert.

Eric Gilpin of G2 shared how they use data to prioritize outreach efforts: “Our tiered account strategy, built on a propensity score from over 30 attributes, helps us know which accounts to target and when. This level of granularity ensures we’re reaching out to the right people at the right time.”

Automating repetitive tasks is another way to ensure your sales team is focused on what matters most. “We’ve automated follow-ups based on key triggers,” said Brandon Redlinger. “This frees up time for SDRs to focus on higher-value activities and ensures that no lead falls through the cracks.”

7. Aligning Sales and Marketing for Seamless Handoffs

Finally, one of the most critical factors in building a successful pipeline is ensuring alignment between sales and marketing teams. “Without seamless communication, you end up with wasted leads and lost opportunities,” said Sasha Anderson at Procore. “We’ve created a unified revenue play experience where both sales and marketing are trained on the offers and can seamlessly hand off leads depending on where they are in the funnel.”

Eric Gilpin echoed this sentiment: “At G2, we’ve worked hard to ensure marketing and sales are completely aligned, from messaging to metrics. This coordination has been essential in keeping our pipeline healthy and conversion rates consistent.”

Building a Strong Pipeline in 2024

As companies push to hit aggressive revenue targets in 2024, the importance of building a robust, sustainable sales pipeline cannot be overstated. From leveraging events and account-based plays to revisiting pricing models and using creative outbound strategies, the playbook for pipeline success is evolving. As Kyle Poyar reminds us, “The key is to be relentless in testing and refining what works. Every touchpoint should drive pipeline growth, and every strategy should be tied to clear, measurable outcomes.”

By embracing cross-functional collaboration, personalized outbound approaches, and data-driven tactics, companies can ensure their pipelines remain full and conversions high, setting the stage for a strong year ahead.

The Importance of Follow-Ups

Initial contact on LinkedIn is merely the first step. To truly convert prospects into clients, follow-ups are essential. According to Cady (our name for her), the host of Snov.io’s video, “Your lead didn’t convert after your first message? Not a surprise. Everyone knows that follow-ups are key to turning prospects into happy customers.” Consistent and strategic follow-ups significantly increase the chances of conversion, making them a crucial component of any sales strategy.

Personalization is Key

One of the golden rules of effective follow-up messages is personalization. Generic, one-size-fits-all messages are unlikely to make an impact. Instead, tailoring each message to your interaction’s specific individual and context is crucial. “Personalization shows that you are genuinely interested in the recipient,” Cady explains. “It helps build a stronger connection and demonstrates your commitment to understanding their unique needs.”

With Snov.io, personalization has never been easier. The platform offers features like SpinTXS and dynamic content, allowing users to craft messages that resonate with each recipient. For instance, referencing specific details from previous conversations, mentioning shared interests, or highlighting mutual connections can make a follow-up message stand out. “Always tailor each message to the specific individual and context of your interaction,” Cady advises. “This approach significantly enhances the effectiveness of your follow-ups.”

Timing and Frequency

Timing is another critical element of successful follow-ups. It’s advisable to send follow-up messages within a few days of the initial contact to keep the memory of the interaction fresh. However, it’s also important to consider the recipient’s schedule and time zone. “Sending messages during business hours and on weekdays tends to be more effective than late at night or on weekends,” Cady suggests. “It ensures that your message is seen when your recipient is most likely to engage with it.”

Providing Value

A follow-up message should not be about your needs or objectives; it’s an opportunity to provide value to your prospects. Sharing relevant articles, resources, or insights that align with the recipient’s interests or industry can create a win-win situation. “Your message should touch on their professional goals and interests,” Cady explains. “Offering your assistance or expertise can significantly increase engagement and show that you are committed to helping them succeed.”

For example, if your prospect is interested in digital marketing trends, share a recent article or report. If they are facing a particular challenge, offer a solution or a helpful resource. “Providing value in every interaction is key,” says Cady. “It shows that you are not just interested in making a sale, but genuinely invested in their success.”

Clarity and Conciseness

When writing follow-up messages, clarity and conciseness are paramount. Avoid lengthy paragraphs or overly detailed explanations. Instead, highlight the key purpose of your message early on. Each message should have a clear and actionable next step, such as scheduling a follow-up call or meeting. “A well-defined call to action guides the recipient and increases the likelihood of a response,” notes Cady. “Make your intentions clear right away to avoid any confusion.”

Leveraging LinkedIn Features

Beyond messaging, utilizing LinkedIn’s various features can enhance your follow-up strategy. Endorsing your connections’ skills, commenting insightfully on their posts, and participating in relevant groups can keep your professional presence front and center. “It’s about actively participating in the LinkedIn community and building stronger connections,” Cady says. “Engagement through LinkedIn’s features can help reinforce your presence and make you more memorable.”

For example, if your connection posts an article or update, leave a thoughtful comment that adds value to the conversation. If they achieve a milestone or receive recognition, endorse their skills or congratulate them. “These small gestures can go a long way in building a stronger relationship,” Cady emphasizes. “It’s not just about what you say in your messages, but also about how you engage with your connections on the platform.”

Automation Tools

While personalization is key, LinkedIn automation tools can save time and ensure consistency. Tools like Snov.io LinkedIn Automation can automate sending connection requests, follow-up messages, and profile visits, mimicking human behavior to avoid detection by LinkedIn’s algorithms. “Automation should complement, not replace, human interaction,” Cady advises. “Automated follow-ups can be a game-changer, optimizing your LinkedIn networking efforts and ensuring you never miss a chance to nurture valuable connections.”

Combining Outreach Channels

To maximize your reach, consider combining LinkedIn outreach with other channels such as email. Snov.io simplifies this process, allowing users to integrate email and LinkedIn outreach seamlessly. “Reaching out through multiple channels increases your chances of conversion and ensures your prospects don’t miss your offer,” Cady points out. “This multi-channel approach keeps your message in front of your leads, making it harder for them to ignore.”

For instance, you might send an email follow-up a few days after your LinkedIn message, reiterating your key points and providing additional value. This reinforces your message and increases the likelihood of a response. “Combining channels allows you to engage with your prospects in multiple ways, increasing your chances of success,” says Cady.

Testing and Adapting

An iterative approach is vital for optimizing follow-up strategies. Testing different message formats, call-to-action phrases, and timing can help identify what works best. “Keep an eye on your response rates and adapt your approach based on the data,” Cady advises. “This iterative process allows you to refine your messages for maximum impact and continuously improve your strategy.”

For example, if particular messages or call-to-action phrases generate higher response rates, incorporate those elements into future follow-ups. “Data-driven insights can help you fine-tune your approach and achieve better results,” Cady emphasizes.

Mastering LinkedIn follow-ups requires a strategic approach that balances personalization, timing, value, and clarity. “The follow-up process on LinkedIn may seem more complex than email, but it’s an opportunity to establish meaningful connections with prospective clients,” Cady concludes. “Stay tuned for our next video, where we’ll help you build a follow-up strategy for any purpose.”

In the ever-evolving digital marketing and sales world, mastering the art of follow-ups on LinkedIn can be the difference between a missed opportunity and a successful conversion. By following these guidelines, marketers and sales professionals can navigate the ocean of sales opportunities more effectively and build lasting relationships with their prospects.

Additional Tips from Snov.io

“One of the biggest mistakes people make with LinkedIn follow-ups is being too generic. Your prospects can tell when they receive a canned message. Taking the time to personalize your follow-ups shows that you value their individual needs and are willing to invest the effort to build a genuine connection.”

“Effective follow-ups are about providing value. Whether sharing a useful resource, offering a solution to a problem, or simply showing appreciation for their time, each interaction should demonstrate your commitment to helping your prospect succeed.”

“Consistency is key. Follow-ups should be timely and relevant, but also part of a broader strategy that includes regular engagement on LinkedIn. This helps keep you top of mind and reinforces your professional presence.”

“Automation tools can be incredibly helpful, but they should be used wisely. The goal is to enhance your follow-up strategy, not to replace the human touch. By combining automation with personalized interactions, you can achieve the best of both worlds.”

By incorporating these insights and strategies into your LinkedIn follow-up process, you can improve your chances of converting leads into satisfied customers and build stronger, more meaningful connections with your prospects.

Recognizing these challenges, Nowsite emerges as a game-changing platform. It leverages advanced artificial intelligence (AI) technology to revolutionize the way network marketers engage with prospects and drive sales. At its core, Nowsite is designed to empower users with the tools and insights needed to effortlessly navigate tough conversations, ensuring that no opportunity goes untapped.

One of the key features that sets Nowsite apart is its AI-driven assistance, which top network marketing experts train. This expertise is infused into the platform, enabling users to access tailored responses and guidance in real time as they interact with prospects. Whether overcoming objections, providing product information, or addressing skepticism about network marketing, Nowsite equips users with the knowledge and confidence to navigate any scenario efficiently.

Consider the scenario of engaging with a prospect interested in a wellness business. As the conversation unfolds, the prospect raises concerns about cost and skepticism about network marketing. These objections are common in the industry and can often derail the sales process if not addressed effectively. However, with Nowsite, they become opportunities for meaningful engagement and education.

Using Nowsite’s intuitive interface, users can seamlessly integrate AI assistance into their conversations. By simply pasting the dialogue into the platform, Nowsite’s AI sales expert analyzes the context and provides tailored responses that address the prospect’s concerns while steering the conversation toward a positive outcome. From highlighting products’ value propositions to showcasing the potential for personal and financial growth through network marketing, Nowsite ensures that users have the right words to drive results.

What sets Nowsite apart is its commitment to enhancing human interactions rather than replacing them. While AI is crucial in providing guidance and support, the platform ultimately empowers users to build authentic connections with prospects and deliver value in every interaction. By leveraging AI as a strategic ally, network marketers can focus their energy on building relationships and driving sales, confident that Nowsite has their back.

In a world where sales success is contingent on connecting with prospects on a personal level and effectively addressing their needs, Nowsite emerges as a transformative tool for network marketing professionals. By harnessing the power of AI to augment human capabilities, Nowsite paves the way for a new era of sales excellence. With Nowsite as their ally, network marketers can confidently navigate the complexities of the sales process, knowing that they have the expertise of top professionals at their disposal.

1. Tailor Your Value Proposition

At the core of successful sales lies a tailored value proposition. Instead of casting a wide net with a generic pitch, focus on crafting a proposition that resonates deeply with the specific needs of your target audience. Drawing a vivid analogy, the expert emphasizes the importance of specificity by likening it to the urgent need to dispose of a body. Just as a specialized service for rapid disposal would grab attention in such a scenario, a tailored value proposition grabs the attention of potential buyers, setting the stage for meaningful engagement.

2. Shift Focus from Features to Desires

In a paradigm shift, the expert advises sales professionals to avoid highlighting product features and benefits. Instead, the focus should be on tapping into the buyer’s desires. By addressing the core desires driving purchasing decisions, sellers can forge deeper connections with prospects and drive conversions more effectively.

3. Refine Your Ideal Customer Persona (ICP)

Success in sales hinges on identifying and targeting the right prospects. Continuously refining your Ideal Customer Persona (ICP) allows you to hone in on individuals who align closely with your offerings. You can fine-tune your approach and maximize your sales efforts by analyzing common traits among prospects who convert into customers.

4. Implement a Systematic Sales Cadence

Consistency is key in sales, and implementing a systematic sales cadence ensures a steady flow of prospects through your pipeline. By following a step-by-step process, sales professionals can mitigate the rollercoaster effect often associated with sales cycles. With a reliable cadence, stress decreases, and predictability increases, leading to more sustainable and successful outcomes.

5. Embrace Micro-Closing

In a departure from traditional closing techniques, the expert advocates for micro-closing throughout the sales process. By periodically confirming alignment and commitment at various stages of interaction, sellers can maintain focus, gather valuable feedback, and keep the sales process on track. Micro-closing not only keeps prospects engaged but also provides insights into the effectiveness of your sales approach.

Incorporating these strategies into your sales arsenal can yield transformative results, propelling your sales performance to new heights. Whether you’re a seasoned sales professional or just starting in the field, mastering these techniques is essential for success in today’s competitive marketplace. As you embark on your sales journey, remember the power of innovation, adaptability, and continuous improvement in driving sales excellence.

Dave Gerhardt, VP of Marketing at Drift, was recently interviewed on the B2B Growth podcast by John Rougeux who is VP of Marketing at Skyfii. Gerhardt discusses conversational marketing as a new B2B product category and how it is changing marketing from reaching out to you later to a conversation that is happening now:

Conversational Marketing is About Connecting You Now

Conversational marketing is a whole new way of thinking about marketing and sales. The traditional way of doing marketing and sales is all about later. Come to my website and fill out this form and somebody is going to reach out to you later, when it’s convenient for them. The big shift that is happening in marketing and business over the last five to ten years is customers have all the power today. You can’t make people wait. Information is free now.

I can find anything I want to know about a company without ever having to go to your website. It’s crazy to think that you are going to force people to go to your website, fill out a form, wait three days to hear back from your sales team, and then get a demo. Conversational is all about connecting you now with the people who are ready to buy now while they are live on your website.

B2P – Marketing to People

It’s not about buyers. It’s not about sellers. It’s not about sales. It’s not about marketing. It’s about people. That’s how people all communicate online today. I pressed one button in my car and I got a list. I ordered something from Amazon while I was here this morning to send back to my house and it’s going to be there tomorrow when I get home. There are countless examples of that. That is how we all behave online in our real lives today.

But then something happens weird happens. We go to our jobs in B2B and none of the tools that we use match how we actually buy as real people. That’s the most exciting thing to me about conversational marketing. It’s really closing the gap between B2C and B2B. We just call it B2P, marketing to people.

What Ties Our Products Together is Conversation

We have an email product and we have a landing page product. Black and white versions of those people would say everybody has email, everybody has landing pages. The thing that ties those together is conversation. That forces us to think about what is conversational email? What is conversational landing pages? What is conversational whatever? That one word forces our product team to think about how can we change this? If our fundamental stance as a company is that the internet should be one conversation, then how does that weave into everything that we build?

Ultimately what we care about is that email becomes a conversation. Meaning, the way that marketers have had to use email the last decade is a one-way channel. Email is meant to be a two-way channel. Marketers have been using it as, “John come to my webinar.” What happens if you actually respond to that email? Most of the time you can’t because it’s donotreply@ or it just goes to some inbox where nobody is answering it. That is a terrible experience. Our belief is that if you reply, “Hey actually I can’t make it. Can you reregister my colleague?” That should get handled. We are thinking of that from an evolution standpoint.

The same thing with landing pages. Most landing pages today are static. You go to the landing page, put a bunch of info in and you are gone. What if that was a real-time conversation on the page? That one topic has to weave itself into everything we do from a product perspective.

>> Listen to the complete interview with Drift Marketing VP Dave Gerhardt on the B2B Growth podcast.

Avishai Sharon, Co-founder & CEO of TrenDemon, discussed their software on ILTV:

How Do You Connect Content Marketing to Sales?

My personal background was heading a marketing agency for many years and one of my biggest struggles was how do I prove our value and our effort to our customers and how do you connect the impact of what we call content marketing to business goals and to sales? When we couldn’t find an easy way to show that correlation three and a half years ago we went ahead and founded TrenDemon to help companies do just that.

We connect their marketing efforts, which today rely mostly on content, you want your audience to consume valuable content, as opposed to just advertising. The big challenge is how do you attribute those efforts to sales? There’s actually a prior problem, how do you actually map the customer journey? How do you track those different touch points into one picture?

Reverse Engineering Successful Customer Journeys

The first thing we do is look at all the different touchpoints that a customer has had over his lifecycle. We ask the question, not just where do they come from, but how deep was their engagement? Did they actually watch the video? Did they actually read the article? Then you can start reverse engineering those successful journeys and say what’s common about all of these successful journeys.

What we found, and this is the interesting thing, we’re working with over 90 companies today worldwide and the vast majority of content the companies produce, over 90 percent, is ineffective at driving business goals. As you guys know it’s very expensive to create quality content and it takes a lot of effort.

If People Read the Right Content They Will Covert to a Sale

The second interesting thing is that if you do manage to find those 10 percent and you find a way to get it in front of the right people you’re actually able to improve dramatically your results. So there’s not just a correlation between what buyers did beforehand, there’s also a causation, a causal relationship, that if people read the right content at the right time they’re more likely to follow a path. We’re not probably as sophisticated as we believe that we are.

We’re a SaaS company, a cloud-based solution. We’re working a lot in the US and one of our biggest markets and growing markets is Japan. They’re investing a lot of content and a lot on technology. Essentially, because we look at the customer journey and not necessarily specific languages we can operate in any environment which allows us to grow pretty much anywhere. As long as they have content, which means that they’re producing something other than just advertising, they want people and audiences to actually engage with what they’re producing and they do have some business outcomes that they’re looking to measure.

About TrenDemon:

Founded in 2013, TrenDemon is the world’s leading content marketing attribution and optimization solution, helping marketers prove and improve their content’s impact.

TrenDemon insights can help you uncover your content marketing ROI, impact on business goals, and engagement to help guide the content strategy. Our optimization units will help you increase conversions and shorten time to convert on your owned assets.

TrenDemon proudly serves a wide range of customers, from Fortune 500s and brands to SaaS, B2B, and financial companies and is backed by leading VCs.

Fortunately, digitization has made it possible for small businesses to reach out to prospects online in the global marketplace. Businesses shouldn’t overlook the importance of digital marketing, regardless of their size. Besides learning various effective digital marketing methods, small businesses should keep tabs on digital marketing trends to remain competitive. Below are a few reasons small businesses shouldn’t overlook digital marketing strategies.

1.  Target Online Customers

Unlike before, modern shoppers begin their search for brands, products, and services online. In the current digital age, prospects expect businesses to have a strong social media presence and a website. There’s a lot that potential customers look for before reaching out to brands for business. For instance, parents might want to know how to transfer a car title from parent to child before buying car insurance.

Small businesses should leverage this opportunity to reach such customers. Your website should be mobile responsive, reflect your brand image, and have solid reviews. Most online customers start by reading reviews to learn what other customers say about your business. For instance, 87% of online customers check online reviews before reaching out to local businesses.

2.  Learn What Your Competitors are Doing

Small businesses should pay attention to their competitors for business success. Digital marketing methods can help businesses monitor and learn from their competitors. For instance, regardless of your niche, if your competitors have a better-performing web presence, you can begin by evaluating their content strategy. Do they use blogs or visual content?

Conducting thorough competitor research is the best way to learn about your competitors. Identify their preferred platforms, focus keywords, influencers, and other important pointers. Excellent tools for competitor research include:

• Ahrefs – Best for discovering competitor’s linked content
• SEMrush – Best for finding ranking keywords
• BuzzSumo – Used to track performing content types
• Moz – Keyword ranking platform
• Google Alerts – Used to track competitor mentions

You should also explore other consumer insights tools to boost your content marketing strategy.

3.  Improve Accessibility to Customers

You should strive to position your small business in front of potential customers, which is majorly the online space. As mentioned, modern customers start searching for products online. Businesses without an online presence miss many opportunities and cannot compete equally, especially if competitors have a strong online presence.

Small businesses should leverage digital marketing to position their brands in front of prospects. Besides creating a strong website, digital marketers should learn search engine optimization to outrank competitors on Google searches. Keywords (both long and short tail) are important, and you should understand how to use them to rank your website.

An online presence creates an environment where customers can reach out day and night. Prospects and customers can send emails, schedule appointments, and purchase products or services anytime. You can also visit WebmastersHall to learn more about improving your digital marketing efforts for enhanced accessibility to customers.

Endnote

Digital marketing is beneficial to small businesses in many ways. Unlike other marketing strategies, digital marketing is affordable, making it suitable for small businesses with limited marketing budgets. Businesses that haven’t ventured into the digital space miss a lot of customers and business opportunities.

Nirosha Methananda, Vice President of Marketing at Bombora, discusses the challenges of marketing without annoying your potential customers by bombarding them with marketing messages in an interview with Logan Lyles on the B2B Growth Podcast:

Marketing Is Really About the Customer Experience

As a B2B marketer, I get marketed to a lot. It’s something that I have increasingly noticed and I’m probably not the only one. That’s just becoming part of the experience in terms of being inundated with different messaging and different calls and this, that, and the other. Use this, do this, buy this, whatever it is. It’s really not a great experience. It doesn’t necessarily provide value. Marketers are so busy as it is, and I know that is applicable across the board with everyone we are marketing to. Being able to cut through the noise and having an understanding of all these different things is very challenging. 

Having on top of it being inundated with this constant flow of messaging like meet me, meet me, meet me, is not very helpful. That’s one of the things that I’m passionate about. It’s really about customer experience. I think that is something fundamental to marketing. I feel like we have gone down this path of almost over automating and having to constantly pounce on people without necessarily being conscious and mindful of what their experience is on the other end. From my experience, it’s leading to me switching off and ignoring messages. I’m sure I’m not the only one. 

Create a Marketing Strategy That’s Not Annoying

It also leads to this annoyance and irritation which leads to distrust of brands and that’s not great for this industry. From a customer perspective those bad experiences, unfortunately, more than good experiences, they stay with you for longer and you remember that. Another thing that we don’t necessarily think of is that it’s wasteful. It’s wasteful of time and it’s wasteful of money especially for marketing and sales where money is a precious resource. It’s not something to be wasted. That’s basically why I’m passionate about creating a marketing strategy that’s not annoying.

As an example, our Intent Event was our first flagship event that we did last year. It was a closed event so we did have limited numbers and we were limited as to what we could do with promotion. What we did was try to have mindfulness around what we were sending out and ensuring that it was helpful. Making sure that the recipients, the people that we invited, were given all the relevant information, but there was brevity in the communication as well as encouraging them to participate without forcing them to be there. 

There was certainly some urgency around some of our communication but it wasn’t you need to attend this and this is why you must attend this. It was more about being a bit more subtle in presenting them the idea and the concept of what it was, why it would help them, and exactly the information that they needed. What that meant was not sending out multiple emails, being very controlled around it, really thinking about what the experience was before the event, to during the event, to after the event. We were really focused on the customer and making sure that all of the content and communication was educational and helpful.

Nirosha Methananda, Vice President of Marketing at Bombora, discusses the challenges of marketing without annoying your potential customers by bombarding them with marketing messages in an interview with Logan Lyles on the B2B Growth Podcast:

Marketing Is Really About the Customer Experience

As a B2B marketer, I get marketed to a lot. It’s something that I have increasingly noticed and I’m probably not the only one. That’s just becoming part of the experience in terms of being inundated with different messaging and different calls and this, that, and the other. Use this, do this, buy this, whatever it is. It’s really not a great experience. It doesn’t necessarily provide value. Marketers are so busy as it is, and I know that is applicable across the board with everyone we are marketing to. Being able to cut through the noise and having an understanding of all these different things is very challenging. 

Having on top of it being inundated with this constant flow of messaging like meet me, meet me, meet me, is not very helpful. That’s one of the things that I’m passionate about. It’s really about customer experience. I think that is something fundamental to marketing. I feel like we have gone down this path of almost over automating and having to constantly pounce on people without necessarily being conscious and mindful of what their experience is on the other end. From my experience, it’s leading to me switching off and ignoring messages. I’m sure I’m not the only one. 

Create a Marketing Strategy That’s Not Annoying

It also leads to this annoyance and irritation which leads to distrust of brands and that’s not great for this industry. From a customer perspective those bad experiences, unfortunately, more than good experiences, they stay with you for longer and you remember that. Another thing that we don’t necessarily think of is that it’s wasteful. It’s wasteful of time and it’s wasteful of money especially for marketing and sales where money is a precious resource. It’s not something to be wasted. That’s basically why I’m passionate about creating a marketing strategy that’s not annoying.

As an example, our Intent Event was our first flagship event that we did last year. It was a closed event so we did have limited numbers and we were limited as to what we could do with promotion. What we did was try to have mindfulness around what we were sending out and ensuring that it was helpful. Making sure that the recipients, the people that we invited, were given all the relevant information, but there was brevity in the communication as well as encouraging them to participate without forcing them to be there. 

There was certainly some urgency around some of our communication but it wasn’t you need to attend this and this is why you must attend this. It was more about being a bit more subtle in presenting them the idea and the concept of what it was, why it would help them, and exactly the information that they needed. What that meant was not sending out multiple emails, being very controlled around it, really thinking about what the experience was before the event, to during the event, to after the event. We were really focused on the customer and making sure that all of the content and communication was educational and helpful.

Dave Gerhardt, VP of Marketing at Drift, was recently interviewed on the B2B Growth podcast by John Rougeux who is VP of Marketing at Skyfii. Gerhardt discusses conversational marketing as a new B2B product category and how it is changing marketing from reaching out to you later to a conversation that is happening now:

Conversational Marketing is About Connecting You Now

Conversational marketing is a whole new way of thinking about marketing and sales. The traditional way of doing marketing and sales is all about later. Come to my website and fill out this form and somebody is going to reach out to you later, when it’s convenient for them. The big shift that is happening in marketing and business over the last five to ten years is customers have all the power today. You can’t make people wait. Information is free now.

I can find anything I want to know about a company without ever having to go to your website. It’s crazy to think that you are going to force people to go to your website, fill out a form, wait three days to hear back from your sales team, and then get a demo. Conversational is all about connecting you now with the people who are ready to buy now while they are live on your website.

B2P – Marketing to People

It’s not about buyers. It’s not about sellers. It’s not about sales. It’s not about marketing. It’s about people. That’s how people all communicate online today. I pressed one button in my car and I got a list. I ordered something from Amazon while I was here this morning to send back to my house and it’s going to be there tomorrow when I get home. There are countless examples of that. That is how we all behave online in our real lives today.

But then something happens weird happens. We go to our jobs in B2B and none of the tools that we use match how we actually buy as real people. That’s the most exciting thing to me about conversational marketing. It’s really closing the gap between B2C and B2B. We just call it B2P, marketing to people.

What Ties Our Products Together is Conversation

We have an email product and we have a landing page product. Black and white versions of those people would say everybody has email, everybody has landing pages. The thing that ties those together is conversation. That forces us to think about what is conversational email? What is conversational landing pages? What is conversational whatever? That one word forces our product team to think about how can we change this? If our fundamental stance as a company is that the internet should be one conversation, then how does that weave into everything that we build?

Ultimately what we care about is that email becomes a conversation. Meaning, the way that marketers have had to use email the last decade is a one-way channel. Email is meant to be a two-way channel. Marketers have been using it as, “John come to my webinar.” What happens if you actually respond to that email? Most of the time you can’t because it’s donotreply@ or it just goes to some inbox where nobody is answering it. That is a terrible experience. Our belief is that if you reply, “Hey actually I can’t make it. Can you reregister my colleague?” That should get handled. We are thinking of that from an evolution standpoint.

The same thing with landing pages. Most landing pages today are static. You go to the landing page, put a bunch of info in and you are gone. What if that was a real-time conversation on the page? That one topic has to weave itself into everything we do from a product perspective.

>> Listen to the complete interview with Drift Marketing VP Dave Gerhardt on the B2B Growth podcast.

Avishai Sharon, Co-founder & CEO of TrenDemon, discussed their software on ILTV:

How Do You Connect Content Marketing to Sales?

My personal background was heading a marketing agency for many years and one of my biggest struggles was how do I prove our value and our effort to our customers and how do you connect the impact of what we call content marketing to business goals and to sales? When we couldn’t find an easy way to show that correlation three and a half years ago we went ahead and founded TrenDemon to help companies do just that.

We connect their marketing efforts, which today rely mostly on content, you want your audience to consume valuable content, as opposed to just advertising. The big challenge is how do you attribute those efforts to sales? There’s actually a prior problem, how do you actually map the customer journey? How do you track those different touch points into one picture?

Reverse Engineering Successful Customer Journeys

The first thing we do is look at all the different touchpoints that a customer has had over his lifecycle. We ask the question, not just where do they come from, but how deep was their engagement? Did they actually watch the video? Did they actually read the article? Then you can start reverse engineering those successful journeys and say what’s common about all of these successful journeys.

What we found, and this is the interesting thing, we’re working with over 90 companies today worldwide and the vast majority of content the companies produce, over 90 percent, is ineffective at driving business goals. As you guys know it’s very expensive to create quality content and it takes a lot of effort.

If People Read the Right Content They Will Covert to a Sale

The second interesting thing is that if you do manage to find those 10 percent and you find a way to get it in front of the right people you’re actually able to improve dramatically your results. So there’s not just a correlation between what buyers did beforehand, there’s also a causation, a causal relationship, that if people read the right content at the right time they’re more likely to follow a path. We’re not probably as sophisticated as we believe that we are.

We’re a SaaS company, a cloud-based solution. We’re working a lot in the US and one of our biggest markets and growing markets is Japan. They’re investing a lot of content and a lot on technology. Essentially, because we look at the customer journey and not necessarily specific languages we can operate in any environment which allows us to grow pretty much anywhere. As long as they have content, which means that they’re producing something other than just advertising, they want people and audiences to actually engage with what they’re producing and they do have some business outcomes that they’re looking to measure.

About TrenDemon:

Founded in 2013, TrenDemon is the world’s leading content marketing attribution and optimization solution, helping marketers prove and improve their content’s impact.

TrenDemon insights can help you uncover your content marketing ROI, impact on business goals, and engagement to help guide the content strategy. Our optimization units will help you increase conversions and shorten time to convert on your owned assets.

TrenDemon proudly serves a wide range of customers, from Fortune 500s and brands to SaaS, B2B, and financial companies and is backed by leading VCs.

Shantanu Narayen, Chairman and CEO of Adobe, discusses how the pandemic has created another “inflection point” in the move toward digital transformation:

Digital Transformation Is A $120 Billion Opportunity

It was a good quarter all around. All of our businesses performed exceedingly well. On the Creative Cloud and the Document Cloud, not only did we have a great acquisition. in other words, new customers adopting the platform, but we really focused on engagement and demonstrating the value of our products to our customers. Even our retention levels came back to pre-COVID levels which we believe is a really good sign.

What’s happening in the world is the businesses that we’re in, namely creativity and enabling people to tell their story, what’s happening with documents and accelerating document productivity, and what’s happening associated with every single enterprise needing to engage with their customers digitally, when you add all of this up we think it’s over a $120 billion of an addressable market opportunity for Adobe.

Pandemic Was Inflection Point For Everything Being Digital

What the pandemic and the current health situation has done is that it has created yet another inflection point for everything being digital. What we will have to continue to monitor is what happens in the spending environment. But as it relates to the overall need for the kinds of solutions that Adobe provides as well as the importance of digital in the marketplace I think that’s going to be sustainable for decades. You’re not going to put the genie back in the bottle as it relates to engaging digitally and creating content digitally.

We believe that we’re in this third phase of what is happening in the enterprise. Traditionally, businesses first focused on automating the back office, and then they focused on automating the front office for knowledge workers. It’s absolutely clear that the biggest imperative that exists in the enterprise today is how do you engage with customers? This is a category that we call Customer Experience Management.

Customer Insight Is Key To Your Digital Transformation

If you’re an enterprise today and you’re thinking about digital transformation, what’s top of that stack in terms of where you have to invest is to make sure that you have insight into what your customers are doing. How are they engaging with you? What’s the profile? How do you deliver the personalized experience?

We really believe that what you’re seeing in the enterprise spend environment is that the companies that are focused on this next generation of delivering customer engagement, the customer experiences, and the insight associated with how to take the most advantage of that data, they’re going to be the secular winners moving forward.

ChatGPT is one of OpenAI’s most well-known innovations and has gained widespread recognition. According to CNBC, Google employees expressed concerns about ChatGPT, especially given Microsoft’s backing of OpenAI. Given Google’s background in AI, employees were concerned the company could be falling behind.

“Is this a missed opportunity for Google, considering we’ve had Lamda for a while?” read one top-rated question at a company all-hands meeting.

In response to, CEO Sundar Pichai and Google AI head Jeff Dean emphasized that Google already has similar capabilities as OpenAI and ChatGPT, but that the company needed to be extra careful since so many people rely on Google for quality answers.

“This really strikes a need that people seem to have but it’s also important to realize these models have certain type of issues,” Dean said

Interestingly, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman seemed to endorse Google’s caution, admitting ChatGPT was not production-ready.

Microsoft Teams is the leading corporate messaging platform. Until now, working with PDFs was a weak point, one that has been solved by close collaboration between Microsoft and Adobe. Collaboration between the two companies allows Adobe Acrobat to be the default PDF handler for Team, providing full viewing and editing support.

“The Acrobat app in Teams allows for viewing, editing, exporting, organizing, combining, converting, compressing, protecting, accessing PDFs from Teams chats, channels, OneDrive or SharePoint,” writes Tulika Gupta, Adobe Senior Product Marketing Manager, Strategic Partnerships & Integrations. “You can use Acrobat for Microsoft Teams as a Personal Tab, Bot, Tab, Message Action, or Message Extension. We had also added Single Sign-On (SSO) and introduced the personal tab — a home page for curating all your recent documents, tools, and collaboration into one view.”

The improved integration should go a long way toward streamlining workflows.

“Given Teams is where you’re already having the conversation with your colleagues, there is no longer the additional burden of providing context (say goodbye to those emails),” Gupta adds. “You can also get notified when comments are added to PDFs directly in Teams. All comments get recorded on a single version of the PDF stored in SharePoint or OneDrive (by default) as the ‘single source of the truth.'”

The integration of Acrobat and Teams demonstrates what is possible when companies work together to make their products and services interoperable.

Incorporate User-Generated Content

All companies have to face it: customers are no longer simply consumers. They are active participants and content creators and are impossible to ignore in your marketing strategy. UGC content serves as social proof for your brand reputation and product quality. New customers are more likely to purchase your product or service when they discover positive reviews.

You can capitalize on formal or informal UGC. You might (with the creator’s permission) repost pictures or videos demonstrating customers using or raving about your products, or you can solicit active participation through company-sponsored contests and giveaways. You also have the option to access UGC regularly through partnerships with influencers.

Brand partners and influencers allow you to set the terms for the content that will best serve your brand, and they allow you to reach a large audience through influencers’ trusted advice. Whatever direction you take, incorporating UGC into your marketing strategy is essential.

Create Quality Content

The content you release should reflect your specific audience’s needs and preferences, but one thing remains true for every brand. Your content must be of high quality.

Your long-form content, such as blog posts and research articles, should be grammatically correct, engaging, and contain optimized keywords to boost their SEO performance. Using tools like Ahrefs and Semrush, you can edit your work to increase your readership and add value to your customers.

Video content should also hold an esteemed position within your marketing plan. Videos quickly capture viewer attention and increase accessibility by utilizing audio, visuals, alternate text, and subtitles. While every company battles for customer attention, you can set yourselves apart through quality videos that present them with information quickly.

When you make or solicit videos, you should ensure they have high-quality visuals and audio, show multiple angles, and keep the product, creator, or customer within the frame. You must engage viewers through authentic and relatable stories.

Conduct Market Research

You might have the most impressive, trusted marketing practices in your toolkit, but they are only effective if you know your target audience. While many consumers share similar needs and preferences, you find business success in identifying their unique qualities and niche groups.

You must center your marketing strategy around your niche audience. Whether you’re launching your business or updating your previous marketing strategy, you must identify and narrow down your target audience to provide more personalized content and outreach. Build consumer personas and perform SWOT analysis tests to determine what calls to action, color schemes, and information your customers respond to.

When you conduct market research, stay on the lookout for trends that work for your industry and specific audience. Though trends come and go, incorporating some of them into your marketing techniques will help you stay relevant and generate excitement. Additionally, you’ll want to study your competition’s marketing strategies to take stock of their strengths and weaknesses. You can adapt what they do well to meet your business needs and avoid their pitfalls. Comparative market analysis will help you stay on budget and stand out from the crowd.

Outline Your Objectives

Developing a marketing strategy requires goal-setting. You need to know what specific results you’re working towards and implement measurable KPIs to reach them. When creating or updating your marketing approach, select a few long-term goals and outline short-term objectives.

Setting goals will help get your team on the same page and allow you to track your progress and adapt to unforeseen challenges. Actionable market plans increase brand awareness, generate leads, and boost revenue.

Take SEO Strategies into Account

You can’t overlook search engine optimization when creating and sharing content with your target audience. Including optimized keywords and generating backlinks to your website in other off-site articles boost your search engine rankings and allows you to share your credentials and expertise with a larger audience.

SEO also helps you improve the customer experience. By adapting your content to reflect what your customers are looking for, you make it easier for them to find solutions to their problems.

Conclusion

You can improve the results generated from your company’s marketing strategy by incorporating user-generated content, conducting market research, and outlining your objectives. While it might seem like the marketing world is an ever-changing landscape, if you base your marketing techniques on your target audience’s needs and preferences, you’ll find success.

What Is Salesforce?

The purpose and potency of Salesforce may not be immediately apparent to laymen, but software developers link the technology’s effectiveness to meticulous data collection and management. Essentially, Salesforce is the stand mixer with which to bake the cake of data analysis.

At its core, Salesforce is a cloud-based technology that utilizes software and services in order to learn more about what customers want from businesses. To keep track of customers is to keep track of so many things. There are so many different items such that one person cannot possibly keep track of the needs of every customer. Businesses can outsource this type of menial labor to software like Salesforce. Creating relevant customer experiences, Salesforce offers advertisements that are curated for any possible lead.

Salesforce’s internal architecture allows for explosive financial growth, providing benefits like API integration, digital support, versatile scalability, configuration options, and low prices. Because of this, Salesforce is easily one of the best digital service providers, able to meet your business needs quickly and efficiently. It even provides an artificial intelligence platform with which to optimize machine learning for purposes of greater revenue.

Because Salesforce is so widely used, small businesses depend on it as much as large businesses do. The key facet of Salesforce that allows for better interdepartmental communication is the way in which the technology breaks down a business’s operations into each of that business’s parts. This ensures that departments always have access to the information they need, no matter how distant any two departments might seem to be from each other. Now that we have outlined the importance and relevance of Salesforce, it is time to address the benefits of Snowflake, another potent technology.

What Is Snowflake?

A curious phenomenon, Snowflake is a technological marvel with which to solve problems on four primary fronts: collaboration, monetization, building, and accessibility. Snowflake offers great accessibility by bringing data out of silos and into contact with other data, making clear the relationships among data instead of focusing on hard numbers. With Snowflake, first-party and third-party data can be governed effectively in a way that brings about unimaginable insights among executive departments.

The next major front is building, or leveraging Snowflake’s unmatched speed and versatility to establish excellent data models, streamline digital pipelines, and run data applications. Snowflake can allow your business to collaborate: Enjoy work across multiple clouds without any lapses in communication toward other departments, no matter the data, applications, or internal communities at play. Finally, monetization is the process of creating new avenues by which to obtain revenue. Snowflake helps you win new customers and maintain relationships with old customers. It accomplishes this by offering data sets and data services, both of which aim at the heart of what customers need. All of this begs the question, under what circumstances should Snowflake and Salesforce be combined?

Effective Account Pursuit

Data analysis should enable your executive teams to chase after the warmest leads. Combining these two eminent technologies allows for lead info to travel from your data warehouse to a CRM, which enables marketing professionals to sell products to the most receptive accounts.

More Direct Action

Pushing product data enables account managers to ascertain the activity and general behavior of potential clients. With Snowflake and Salesforce, you can know what your potential customers are up to at all times, and this allows for more convincing advertisements across the web. Whether potential customers are offline or online, you can keep track of their needs.

A Reduction in Cost

Churn and health score are both major factors that any good business is going to want to limit. Both CRMs, specifically the Salesforce CRM, present an unparalleled account management platform with which to track the changing needs of customers. Reducing costs means advancing advertising capabilities, and greater advertisement capabilities means more revenue. Each of these cases requires a combination of Salesforce and Snowflake. While combining the two is no easy feat, the rewards are potentially limitless.

The price of automotive purchases in the US has been exploding as a result of supply chain issues and rising inflation. The result has been record prices, often made worse by dealerships adding on “junk fees.” The FTC is preparing to crack down on these practices, proposing new rules to address the problem.

“As auto prices surge, the Commission is taking comprehensive action to prohibit junk fees, bait-and-switch advertising, and other practices that hit consumers’ pocketbooks,” said Samuel Levine, Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection. “Our proposed rule would save consumers time and money and help ensure a level playing field for honest dealers.”

The FTC is proposing rules that would address four specific types of dishonest, exploitative behavior:

• Ban bait-and-switch, wherein customers are lured in with deceptive promises, only to be saddled with more expensive options, worse financing terms, and more.
• Ban fraudulent junk fees, such as services and options that offer no value or benefit.
• Ban surprise junk fees and prohibit dealers from charging additional, undisclosed fees without the customer’s written consent. The rule would also require the dealer to inform the customer what the vehicle would cost without the add-on fees, giving the customer the ability to make an informed decision.
• Require full disclosure of costs and conditions upfront. This would require the “offering price” to be the full and total price, with only government taxes and fees excluded.

The FTC’s rules should help address some of the more egregious issues plaguing car buyers, especially since the beginning of the supply chain issues impacting the industry.

With inventory in short supply, some dealerships have taken to gouging customers. Others have even reserved the right to price-adjust up to six months after purchase, charging the customer more depending on current pricing.

The FTC’s new rules should be a boon for consumers and reign in the dishonest, predatory behavior some dealerships are engaging in.

However, you need to have the right email marketing infrastructure in place to adequately reach new customers and loyal subscribers and build better relationships that generate more leads and consequently increase sales. These platforms even come with email analytics and optimization features that enable you to improve your email marketing campaigns and increase your conversion rates. Luckily, there are multiple email marketing platforms to choose from. To help you navigate the market, we outline some of the top email marketing platforms for businesses:

1.    Constant Contact

Constant Contact is undoubtedly the top email marketing platform for startups and small businesses. It’s also the fastest-growing email marketing provider worldwide, while it remains beginner-friendly and easy to use. Using Constant Contact, you can conveniently manage your contacts, email lists, email templates, marketing calendar, and more. Your account comes with unlimited email access for easy tracking and subsequent reporting. It also has built-in capability for social media sharing, list segmentation, a free image library, integration for Facebook ads, and a powerful Shopify eCommerce integration.

Constant Contact’s Plus Package comes with additional features such as powerful email automation, online donations, drip campaigns, subject line A/B testing, coupons and surveys, and polls, which will help you broadcast targeted emails to maximize your open rate.

2.      HubSpot

HubSpot is also a popular marketing platform with all the necessary tools to accelerate your business growth. Email marketing, however, is just one feature of their CRM plan, which also comes with other tools such as the meeting scheduler, live chat and bots, form builder, and landing page builder. For instance, you could set up your landing page with a simple signup form that will enable you to capture new users’ email addresses in your CRM. However, the real utility of HubSpot email marketing is the CRM’s ability to log your contacts automatically and record all your business interactions to help you create and send deeply personalized emails.

3.      Moosend

Moosend is one of the most affordable email marketing platforms for startups and small businesses. Its offering comes with powerful email marketing automation features, email-building tools, landing pages, and more. Using Moosend, you can easily and quickly customize your email newsletter that matches your brand in a few minutes by utilizing their numerous pre-built email templates.

The good thing about Moosend is that email marketing automation features are available across all plans. They also allow you access to their automation workflow designer, who will help you personalize your newsletter for new subscribers. More importantly, Moosend uses detailed analytics of important email metrics, including email opens, bounces, clicks, custom event tracking, product views, purchases, and even demographics data.

Endnote

Despite the common belief that email marketing is dead, it remains a crucial tool for businesses of all types and sizes. This is mainly because it’s a cost-effective means to quickly reach a mass audience and generate leads more efficiently while also sharing crucial market information and trends. Additionally, email marketing software is typically easy to use, enabling you to create customers for life through personalized connections to your client base.

Salesforce and AWS are the leaders in their respective industries, making collaboration between the two companies a natural step. As part of Dreamforce, the two companies have announced deepening integration between their two platforms. Customers will be able “to use Amazon SageMaker, AWS’s machine learning (ML) modeling service, alongside Einstein, Salesforce’s artificial intelligence (AI) technology.”

The key to these new integrations is Salesforce Genie, “a hyperscale real-time data platform that powers the entire Salesforce Customer 360 platform.” The new tool is designed to help companies make the most of the data they have, adapting to changes in real-time.

“Einstein makes it easy for our customers across every industry to get started with AI. With over 175 billion predictions per day across the Salesforce Customer 360, Einstein operates at a massive scale and helps our customers across every industry sell smarter, deepen customer relationships, scale customer support, and personalize experiences,” said Rahul Auradkar, EVP and GM, Unified Data Services and Einstein at Salesforce. “By opening our platform, we’re enabling data scientists and developers to bring their own AI models with SageMaker, and quickly deploy custom AI into the Salesforce Platform. And, with Salesforce Genie, tap into real-time data that makes it easier than ever to hyper-personalize every moment and every application, in real time.”

“The biggest challenge customers face today isn’t that they don’t have data — it’s that the data isn’t connected, and it’s difficult to glean business insights or easily put that data into action. With Amazon SageMaker and Salesforce, we aim to solve this challenge by enabling data scientists and developers to successfully build, deploy, and run high-quality machine learning models at scale,” said Ankur Mehrotra, Director, Amazon SageMaker at AWS. “Amazon SageMaker offers the deepest and broadest set of machine learning services and we’re excited to help our joint customers accelerate innovation and time-to-value by bringing our collective product suites, ecosystems, and resources together.”

TikTok has revolutionized the social media industry with its short-form videos. Countless influencers’ careers have started on TikTok, with short-form videos that have gone viral. Hotels are now using short-form videos to show off their properties, attract guests, and tap into people’s desire for something unique.

“TikTok is no longer considered a dance-trend app for teenagers,” Richard Hyde, managing director of Small Luxury Hotels, told Skift. “The platform is rapidly aging up. We’ve seen engagement from users of all ages on our Small Luxury Hotels of the World account.”

“Authenticity is quickly becoming the new cultural currency,” he said, speaking of the popular “behind the scenes” approach. “Our hotels are experiential, entertaining, spontaneous, enriching, and fun – like Tik Tok. The platform doesn’t require polished content. Users will sniff out professionally made videos and they won’t perform as well. Our TikTok strategy is based on showing our beautiful hotels from a guest’s perspective.”

As Skift points out, TikTok is an especially valuable resource for hotels and companies with limited marketing budgets. Savvy marketers can tap into existing trends and then tie in their products or services, thereby benefiting from the wealth of user-generated content.

For example, the report highlights The Retreat Elcot Park in the English countryside, which tapped into the popularity of Netflix’s Bridgerton.

“With the Bridgerton tag trending on TikTok, we entered that cultural conversation in an authentic way,” Hyde said. “Using a soundbite from the new series, we framed the hotel as a place that Bridgerton fans must visit.”

“The TikTok reached an audience of 50,000 — 86 percent of whom discovered the video via the ‘For You Page’, meaning they were not following us yet,” Hyde added. “The comments were filled with friends tagging each other saying that they must visit the property.”

“As well as discoverability, ‘saves’ are an important metric for us,” Hyde explained. “Users are now saving the destinations they would like to visit in the future.”

TikTok has clearly evolved far beyond its roots and is now playing a major role in many companies marketing campaigns. With a little effort and even less budget, your company could benefit from this phenomenon and reap the rewards of engaging with user-created content.