We are looking for someone with tremendous pride but little ego who wants to play an integral part in growing the agency. A Sr. Copywriter at SK has to be a hungry mind that is turned on by learning, loves the challenge of understanding complex information and translating it into compelling content. You must be able to plan, architect and create content - not just be a headline writer. You have big campaign ideas but can still write content plans, collateral, email, video scripts, direct mail, websites, and ads.

You\\'ll also help defining creative strategy and delivering creative work and will be involved in the concept of new biz pitches and campaigns, which will include traditional, digital, social and mobile channels.

For more info, click here >>

Each submission is entered in for a drawing for two passes to hear Geehan's presentation.  Submit as often as you like! The more detail the better but financials and names can be hidden to protect the "innocent."

• Fred Wiersema, author of The Discipline of Market Leaders and Customer Intimacy
• Beth Comstock, CMO of General Electric
• Robert Pollack, Vice President of Advertising, Brand adn Market Positioning at Boeing Commercial Airplanes
• Keith Pigues, author of Winning with Customers: Do Your Customers Make More Money Doing Business With You?
• Eduardo Conrado, Senior Vice President and CMO, Motorola
• Philip Clement, Global Chief Marketing and Communications Officer at AON Corporation
• Ed O'Boyle, Global Practice Leader, Brand and Customer Engagement at Gallup Consulting
• Pat LaPointe, Managing Partner at MarketingNPV
• Chris Brogan, author of Trust Agents
• Walter Pomfroy, Vice President, Marketing and Communications at Tinium Corporation
• Jeffrey Hayzlett, author of The Mirror Test: Is Your Business Really Breathing?
• David Meeerman Scott, author, The New Rules of Marketing and PR, World Wide Rave and the forthcoming Real-Time Marketing & PR

uide to anticipating and leading change.

Following the program was a small group workshop for BMA members. This was a great format to be able to discuss in detail how one begins to take the tools provided and put them to good use. Where does one begin to try and change how we receive and process information to ensure we do not miss opportunities and reach our potential? We need to find ways to “create purpose daily” and allow ourselves time to think freely and without restriction. Analyze less and “DO” more!

- Camila Drahn

BMA-Minnesota has been approached with a great offer for our members to attend the Integrated Marketing Summit (IMS) at a 20 percent discount. We hope you will join BMA-Minnesota and over 200 area marketers and advertising professionals May 25 at the downtown Minneapolis Hilton to find out how to be more successful with your marketing and advertising efforts across all channels.

IMS will feature 15 sessions and panels, 2 keynotes - the most current expertise and information in a one-day, interactive format. IMS is bringing to the Twin Cities over 25 marketing and advertising experts for this unbelievable one day format.

Speakers include:

• Michael Pranikoff, EVP of Emerging Media at PR Newswire Presents "Forget what you know about PR, It\'s a brand New World" (Washington, DC)
•  Tim Arnold, Adweek Columnist and 30 year veteran of advertising responsible for "This Bud is for You" campaign and the record breaking 2005 GoDaddy super bowl ad. (NY, NY)
• Alan Kuritsky, Principal Acxiom, Presents "Multichannel Best Practices" (NY, NY)
• Chris Kovac, Director of Social Media Influence at Nicholson Kovac (Kansas City, MO)
• Chad Mitchell, Principal Analyst Marketing Leadership at Forrester Research (Atlanta, GA)

1. Where do you want to be in 5 years and
2. How is an organization like BMA-MN going to help you get there? 

1. Beware the Seduction of Meaningless Names

“Where do you want to be in 5 years and how is an organization like BMA-MN going to help you get there?”

1. If you are unemployed when your annual membership renewal is due, contact BMA and advise them of your status. You will then be put in the Membership Bridge Program, which will extend your membership without dues payment for three (3) months.
2. BMA will at that time confirm your current contact information (mailing address, phone, email, etc.).  You can also maintain your own member profile through the website at www.marketing.org.
3. If you are still unemployed after the initial three (3) month extension, BMA is able to extend the membership an additional three (3) months, for a total of six (6) months of extended membership.  Contact BMA again to set up this additional extension.
4. When you become re-employed, either by a company or as an independent consultant, notify BMA again. BMA will adjust your profile back to its regular membership classification and you will be able to pay your dues going forward.
5. For more details, or to be placed in the Membership Bridge Program, call BMA Member Services Manager Kelly Staley at (630) 544-5054 ext. 100 or e-mail kstaley@marketing.org.
6. Or visit www.marketing.org/bridge for more information.

• President Chris Schermer, Schermer Kuehl,
• Executive Vice President Andrea Eidsness, Kroll
• Secretary Victor Hallberg, Brand Consultant,
• Treasurer Steve Bunnell, ThermoFisher Scientific,
• Professional Development Vice President Heidi Wight, Padilla Speer Beardsley
• Communications Vice President Eva Keiser, Risdall McKinney Public Relations
• Membership Vice President Tim Lebens, OpenWater Inc.
•  Partnerships Director Amy Hubler, Delta Airlines
•  Membership Director Anne McGuire, 3M

•  Directors: Michelle Siebert, Compellent; John McPhee, Toro;Megan Effertz, Archway Marketing Services;Jane Payfer, Ergotron;Jennifer Roth, JKR Consulting; andNick Wassenberg, EG Insights.
  

Michael Happe, V.P. and General Manager of Toro’s Commercial Division, shared how Toro leverages the breadth and depth of the company’s industry relationships that drive innovation and customer loyalty. As a follow-up to his presentation, Happe graciously agreed to bring the discussion to the B2B Backroom blog.

Every company understands that “people” are one of the key ingredients to their ability to succeed in their marketplace. Most companies refer to their people as their most valuable resources, but employees are only one of the relationship dimensions (i.e. groups of people) that impact the decisions that get made in the marketplace. 

At Toro, we might argue that the collective strength of your relationships with Employees, Channel Partners, Customers, Vendors, Industry Experts, Media, and other groups vis-a-vie your competition is strongly correlated to your ability to innovate, to command a price premium and to maintain high levels of customer loyalty.  We believe that it is these strong relationships that have allowed The Toro Company to build and hold high market share positions in most of our served markets.  Moreover, strong relationships have a less tangible, yet equally important impact in terms of word-of-mouth advocacy for future sales.

Multi-dimensional relationships are critical to every businesses success, but few companies take a strategic or methodical approach to how their investments in both time and money are deployed in support of ongoing relationship development.

By analyzing who the primary decision makers are for your business and by mapping out who they listen to when making their purchase decisions, you can quickly see where relevant relationships need to be funded, nurtured, and measured.  As the strength and breadth of these relationships grow over time, so – too – will your business successes (assuming that you’re selling a good, high quality product or service).  You will have deeper customer insight, learn about trends and key issues faster, and be better positioned for every sale!

For many businesses, it is very difficult to justify spending valuable marketing resources on the many buyer groups that have a direct influence on your sale.  It is even more challenging to fund initiatives with groups of people who may never purchase your product, yet, it is often these indirect relationships that have the most impact on, and credibility with, the buyers.

Strong relationships do not happen over night.  The multi-dimensional relationship business model must always be active to build a strong “social network” of advocates that touch your customers.  With that said, this investment is, perhaps, the most difficult thing for any competitor to replicate.  In short, healthy multi-dimensional relationships can be the biggest barrier to entry that you or your customers face!  Easy to say, hard to do!

Based on our experience, we would certainly encourage other companies (other than our competitors) to take investment in these multi-dimensional relationships seriously.  Start with your own organization and build an environment of mutual respect.  Invest first in the relationships that are most closely coupled to your customers and continue to extend your relationship reach (social network) to other key influencers.  Invest both time and money in these relationships.  Any competitor can write a check to sponsor some advocacy group but only the market leader will invest both money and their time (and passion) into long term relationships that will continue to pay dividends for years to come.

Michael Happe
V.P. and General Manager - Commercial Division
Toro Company

As noted in a previous post, the Minnesota chapter of the BMA enters its second year of existence with a solid base of 120 members.  This group, along with the hundreds of non-members that have attended past events, makes up a vibrant and engaged community of Minnesota’s business-to-business marketers.

But what does this tribe look like? Well, here’s a snapshot of your BMA-MN community:

Member Gender

• Male: 50%
• Female: 50%

(It’s true: as of today membership is a 50/50 split!)

Member's Office Location

• Minneapolis: 23
• St. Paul: 15
• Plymouth: 8
• Eden Prairie: 7
• Chanhassen: 5
• Eagan: 5
• Edina: 4
• St. Louis Park: 4
• Bloomington:  3
• Maple Grove: 3

(Note: Only cities with 3 or more members are shown here, many more locations around the metro are represented by at least one member!)

Most Preferred Future Event Topics

• Emerging Trends in BtoB Marketing      
• Lead Generation and Nurturing  
• Multi-media Strategy
• Marketing Research; Customer Analytics
• Sales/Marketing Alignment

(These are the most common requests for future events; we’re always open to hearing other topic or speaker ideas!)

A community isn’t about demographics or profiles. It’s about people coming together with shared interests. It’s about making connections and learning from each other.  But hopefully the information above gives you a feel for the kind of people that are involved.

If you attend an upcoming event, I think you’ll find that we’re a diverse group. But we share a common passion:  the pursuit of success in B-to-B marketing.  If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to post a comment or contact us.

Nick Wassenberg

Director of Chapter Insights, BMA-MN

Research Analyst, E.G. Insight

For over twenty years, in every job I’ve ever had, getting the contact list right from the get-go and then management of that “golden” list has been a fundamental challenge. And it is not a very fun one.

The bottom line is there seems to be no easy way to merge/purge/slice/dice/update and validate contact lists. It always takes thoughtful, but mind-numbing grunt work from somebody, somewhere in the organization.

And usually, I found, that person was me.

Why? Because there’s something to be gained, when you dive head first into list management.

You’re giving yourself the insider’s edge. Lists are not just data in a file. These lists are real people at real companies who need real interaction.

People matter. Knowing who they are and what they’re capable of doing, matters.

The interconnectedness of them, and their companies, matters.

List management has never been more interesting (or more challenging) than it is now, with the ever -expanding options of social media contact info available through LinkedIn, Facebook IDs, Twitter tags and the like.

What doesn’t matter is what you call it - whether customer relationship management, database management or contact management.

What doesn’t matter is the sophistication of the tool you use to manage it: it can be an Excel file, a high falutin’ ERP system or a web based 2.0 application.

What matters most is intimacy with your community. Our community.

Having said that – it’s past time for me to go back and review our list management processes.

I would certainly appreciate any of you sharing your personal or organizational approach to contact list best practices. We will all benefit from the refresher.

And, most importantly, I’m hoping to get to know each of you, beyond the list, soon.

Jane Rodmyre Payfer
Chief Marketing Officer
Ergotron, Inc.
twitter.com/pay4this
http://applepiemom.wordpress.com

In the case of David Letterman, the accused extortionist was asked Letterman to pay him to be quiet. In my opinion that isn’t much different than someone asking for payment for saying something positive about you without disclosing they are being paid.

Case in point bloggers. 

There have been some bloggers who have accepted gifts with the understanding that in exchange they would write favorable posts about a company or individual. In my opinion, this lack of transparency goes against the very foundation of user-generated content. 

However, this week’s announcement by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in their updated “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising,” the government has attempted to restore a layer of transparency to the situation.

While advisory in nature, the new guidelines will reset standards of behavior that public relations, marketing and advertising professionals should adopt to avoid violating underlying laws against unfair competition and false advertising.

The Guide changes, as set out in the FTC's notice, make three key departures from previous guidance that could impact public relations practice:

The FTC advises that "endorsers" as well as advertisers can be held liable for false or unsubstantiated claims or for failing to disclose material connections between the parties.

The Guides no longer offer the "safe harbor" whereby testimonials can be qualified by a "results may vary" disclaimer.

Regarding endorsements, the Guides specify that celebrities should disclose relationships with advertisers.

While the FTC will approach each potential violation on a case-by-case basis, the new guidelines will impact how professionals should approach some common practice scenarios. Here are some applications of the guidelines:

Bloggers who receive cash or in-kind payment (including free products or services for review) are deemed endorsers and so must disclose material connections they share with the seller of the product or service.

Any firm that engages bloggers by paying them outright to create or influence editorial content or by supplying goods or services to them at no cost may be liable if the blogger does not disclose the relationship.

Advertisements or promotions that feature a consumer who conveys his or her experience with a product or service as "typical" should clearly disclose what results consumers can generally expect or specify how the results were unique to the individual circumstances.

If research is cited in an advertisement or promotion, any sponsorship of the research by the client or the marketer should be clearly disclosed.

Celebrities who make endorsements outside the context of traditional ads, such as on talk shows or in social media, should disclose any relationship with the advertiser or marketer.

As with anything, consumers need to access the credibility of the information source and seek other information before making a decision – whether it is a b2c or b2b buying decision.

While other associations are losing members at a disturbing rate, the newly-formed Minnesota chapter of the Business Marketing Association (BMA) is celebrating the completion of its inaugural year this month with over one hundred and ten new members.

In the coming year, BMA-Minnesota will continue to expand its programming and resources for business-to-business marketers including:

The introduction of a small group networking concept called “Troikas.” In Troikas, BMA helps connect and facilitate three members to meet monthly and discuss professional challenges, share best practices, and brainstorm solutions.
And the launch of this blog!

So go ahead, make a wish and we'll bring it to life!

I also want to thank our inaugural members, who joined our fledgling chapter because they believed that we would succeed in bringing together a new community of B2B marketers. They were right – we are now over 110 active members strong!

Speaking of members, I have to admit that I’m blown away by the caliber of members we’ve attracted – from leading B2B companies like Toro, 3M, Wolters Kluwer Financial Services, Tennant, Jostens, Compellent, Ergotron, Minnesota Life, The Wall Street Journal, Delta Airlines, and Thomson Reuters, to name a few.

And yes, I’m also impressed by the quality of thought-leaders we’ve presented to our local B2B marketing community, including experts from Google, Ceridian, Carlson Marketing, Eloqua, and next month, Toro’s VP of Commercial Marketing.

But what really amazes me is the passion and purpose that our members have. How they want to actively help bring this new organization to life; to make connections, to create its culture and help shape its future.

We all have our own motivations for why we want to be part of a group like BMA Minnesota. Yet we all have one thing in common. We aren’t just marketers – We’re B2B marketers. Together, we can help our companies and ourselves by helping each other build a B2B marketing community.

Please join me. Please join us.

Chris Schermer
President – BMA Minnesota
President – Schermer Kuehl

BMA is a different marketing association; in addition to being  focused on B2B marketing opportunities, it is focused on the senior leaders of  the best marketing organizations in Minnesota.  We have a membership that draws CMO, EVP, VP and Director level personnel.  

BMA has a wonderfully unique platform in that it focuses on education, knowledge exchange and networking with your senior level marketing peers.  It is my belief that over the last year we have built a membership of  many strong leaders whom are advancing the position of  B2B marketing and creating an association where we all are welcome to  bring our thoughts, perspectives and ideas to exchange, learn and increase our independent value proposition through networking and meeting others.

I look forward to continued career advancement and an ability to dialog, network and learn from my peers whom are advancing the market position of their  respective brands and organizations.

Come join in, it is a refreshingly smart collection of people who humbly enjoy the ability to share, learn, grow and have fun in the process.

 Tim Lebens / EVP Partners & Hunt Consulting Services