Dive Brief:
- A survey from Demandbase in conjunction with Wakefield Research on B2B digital marketing found that 89% of respondents said their digital marketing mix wasn’t optimized.
- In terms of digital advertising, 70% reported their strategy didn’t meet expectations and an overwhelming 96% said their digital advertising inevitably reaches people outside their intended target.
- The biggest challenge reported was the difficultly in measuring ROI at 46%, closely followed by too long of sales cycle at 44%, and not enough quality leads at 42%.
Dive Insight:
“Enterprises have realized the potential of digital marketing and are now allocating more and more marketing dollars toward it,” Peter Isaacson, Demandbase CMO, told Marketing Dive. “However, almost three quarters of B2B marketers surveyed find that their digital advertising frequently fails to meet their expectations. We found this disconnect fascinating; marketers are continuing to put money into programs while struggling to prove the impact.”
The survey uncovered respondents marketing mix by channel. Website marketing and SEO headed the list at 25% following by direct response which lumped together SEM, webinars, email, social media and content at 21%. The list was rounded out with mobile (18%), display and native ads (17%), and video (16%). Website/SEO was the channel most respondents said would increase investment in 2016 at 63%, followed by mobile at 57%.
Isaacson said the research also found that B2B marketers have issues with KPIs, stating, “We were surprised to see how many B2B marketers are using B2C metrics to measure the success of their campaigns. More than 50% measure success by conversion rates and cost per impression. It’s clear that we need to better educate and arm B2B marketers with the right metrics to demonstrate success.”