Research Report Jan 2016

STATE
OF B2B
MARKETING
2016

www.regalix.com
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Introduction
With the rise of digital, marketers today are
battling with a dynamic medium in which they
must constantly embrace newer practices each
day even as they continue to master the old.

Digital versus traditional marketing is no longer

the debate; the way forward is to see both
perfectly integrated into a unified whole.

We spoke to senior B2B marketing professionals

from companies across a range of product
categories - we hope to understand how they were
coping with the shifting marketing landscape;
what challenges they were facing; and how they
see the future unfolding.

While some of the trends that we saw last year

(State of B2B Marketing 2015) continued to
evolve this year, there were some newer insights
that we gleaned from the study which may play
out in the future.

01
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Sales related measures

top list of priorities for
marketers in 2016, while
customer engagement
measures continue to lag.
Increase in revenue (69%) and increase in leads generated
(68%) topped the list of marketing objectives accomplished
in 2015, as chosen by marketers in our study. They
Sales related measures top list of priorities
continue to be top priorities for them even in 2016.

for
The marketers
dominance in 2016,
of sales related measures in driving while customer
engagement measures continue to lag.
marketing programs is understandable. However, while
digital media offers numerous possibilities to support
customer engagement and foster brand loyalty at levels
that were never
Increase before(69%)
in revenue possible, these appear
and increase to be
in leads far
generated (68%) topped the list of marketing objectives
from fully realized.
accomplished in 2015, as chosen by marketers in our study. They continue to be top priorities for them
even in 2016.

The dominance of sales related measures in driving marketing programs is understandable. However,
while digital media offers numerous possibilities to support customer engagement and foster brand
loyalty at levels that were never before possible, these appear to be far from fully realized.

02
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Which of the following marketing objectives did you accomplish in 2015?

Increase in revenue 69%

Increase in leads generated 68%
Increase in sales 65%
Increase in customers acquired 62%
Increase in brand awareness 61%
Improved engagement/customer relationship 46%
Thought leadership 46%
Better customer experience 35%
Increase in brand loyalty and advocacy 27%
Reduction in cost of operations 12%

Which of the following marketing objectives would be top priority for

your brand in 2016?

Increase in revenue 67%

Increase in sales 61%
Increase in leads generated 61%
Increase in customers acquired 56%
Improved engagement/customer relationship 54%
Increase in brand awareness 48%
Thought leadership 48%
Increase in brand loyalty and advocacy 43%
Better customer experience 41%
Reduction in cost of operations 21%

03
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Please map how you will prioritize

your efforts across the following
programs in 2016

Digital is the High Medium Low

new marketing.
Digital/Online marketing 77% 20% 3%
Offline marketing 23% 54% 23%

Digital marketing is quickly gaining traction as the

emerging face of mainstream marketing in the B2B
space. Our study bears this out:

Which of the following marketing

77 percent of respondents identified digital programs proved to be effective in
marketing as high priority for them in 2016 as meeting your marketing goals in 2015?
opposed to 23% who chose offline marketing.

37 percent of respondents picked digital marketing

over offline marketing (11%) when asked which 37%
program proved to be more effective in meeting their
marketing goals in 2015.
Digital/
Online marketing 52%
Both
11%
Offline marketing

04
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Offline and Online

Marketing are Merging.
82 percent of marketers said their digital and
traditional marketing activities were either
fully-integrated or partly-integrated and were in
the process of being integrated further.

62 percent of respondents rated their

organizations current digital capabilities in
defining a digital strategy as average to above
average; another 30% said they were in the
process of building this capability.

05
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

How well integrated are your digital and traditional marketing activities?

Fully-integrated 17%
Partly-integrated, but we hope to integrate further 65%
Limited integration, and thats the best we can do 12%
Not integrated at all 6%

How would you rate your organizations current capability in defining a focused
digital strategy?
New to digital 4%
In the process of developing our capabilities 30%
Average 22%
Above average 40%
Best in category 4%

06
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Traditional channels continue to

dominate the digital space; video
advertising and mobile improve,
paid advertising slips.

86 percent marketers pick

website as their most effective
online channel in 2015

07
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Continuing the pattern we saw last year

(State of B2B Marketing 2015), website (86%)
and email (72%) led the pack of online channels
that marketers found effective in meeting their
goals in 2015. They were followed by SEO (54%)
and social (52%).

In line with this finding, investments planned by

marketers for 2016 followed a similar trend.

80 percent of marketers said they plan to

increase spend on website; this was followed by
email (61%), social (66%) and SEO (54%).

08
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Which of the following digital/online distribution channels proved

to be effective in meeting your marketing goals in 2015?

Website 86%
Email 72%
SEO (organic search) 54%
Social (Facebook, LinkedIn etc.) 52%
Blogs 39%
Online events (workshops, seminars etc) 37%
Paid search 30%
Social communities 24%
Online display ads 21%
Mobile web 14%
Video advertising 14%
Mobile app 13%
Affiliate marketing 10%
Mobile messaging (text messaging) 5%

09
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Which of the following digital/online distribution channels do

you plan to increase/decrease spends in 2016?

Increase Decrease

Website 80% 4%
Email 61% 13%
SEO (organic search) 54% 9%
Paid search 42% 20%
Social (Facebook, LinkedIn etc.) 66% 6%
Social communities 35% 13%
Blogs 55% 6%
Online display ads 24% 25%
Affiliate marketing 18% 24%
Mobile web 32% 13%
Mobile app 28% 16%
Video advertising 39% 14%
Mobile messaging (text messaging) 9% 30%
Online events (workshops, seminars etc) 55% 6%

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 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Some underlying trends in the effective performance

of channels also emerged.
Which of the following digital/
Social improved upon its performance significantly
online distribution channels proved
from 2014 (41%) to 2015 (52%) to be effective in meeting your
marketing goals?
Mobile continued to disappoint in terms of absolute
numbers, although mobile web in 2015 (14%) scored
2014 2015
better than it did the previous year (10%).

41% 52% Social (Facebook, LinkedIn etc.)

Video advertising showed signs of resurgence, 5% 14% Video advertising
moving from a mere 5% (2014) to 14% (2015). 10% 14% Mobile web
10% 13% Mobile app
Paid advertising seems to not have delivered. Paid 35% 30% Paid search
search in 2015 (30%) fell short of what it was in 2014 26% 21% Online display ads
(35%); while display ad was lower in 2015 (21%) than
it was in 2014 (26%).

11
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Except for events,

offline channels fail
to curry favor for
further investment.
74 percent of respondents said they would
increase spend on events in the coming year.

Direct mail (32%) and print media (25%) were

the distant second and third choices.

12
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Which of the following offline distribution

channels do you plan to increase spends in 2016?

Events (exhibitions, conferences, trade shows, etc.) 74%

Direct mail 32%
Print media 25%
Telemarketing 17%
Television 9%
Radio 9%
Outdoor ads 6%

13
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Understanding
and managing the
customer journey is
vital for success,
say marketers.
Understanding the customer journey (78%) and
mapping the right content asset to each stage of
that journey (77%) were the outright winners in the
list of capabilities that marketers felt were very
important to the success of their initiatives over the
next 3 years.

Given the less-than-enthusiastic response that

mobile has received from marketers in the B2B
space, it comes as no surprise that understanding
the mobile users customer journey was ranked low
in the listing.

14
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Very Somewhat Not

Important Important Important
According to you,
how important
will the following
Understanding customer
buying journey
78% 15% 3%
be for your
Educating and influencing
digital marketing
77% 17% 2%
purchase by mapping right
content assets and distribution
initiatives over channels to key stages in the
the next 3 years? customer buying journey

Understanding the mobile users

customer journey
37% 31% 26%
Customers dependency on
connected devices for making 27% 37% 28%
purchase decisions

Integrating offline and

online data points to provide
consistent and enhanced
46% 39% 9%
customer experience

Attributing and measuring

performance of multiple
channels used by customers in
53% 37% 3%
their buying journey

Social medias contribution to

the bottom line
41% 43% 11%
Measuring effectiveness
of digital vs offline 51% 31% 11%
marketing activities

15
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Marketers expect content

marketing and marketing
automation to have the most
impact on business in 2016,
while also placing their bets
on newer technologies.
As in the previous year, content marketing (64%) and marketing
automation (50%) were chosen by our respondents as the
technologies that will have the most impact on business in 2016.

Some interesting insights emerge.

Marketers seemed to place their faith in the following technologies

growing in importance in the coming year:

Social media marketing, which moved from 30% (2015) to 45%

(2016) in terms of perceived impact; video marketing, from 14%
(2015) to 38% (2016); mobile marketing, from 8% (2015) to 25%
(2016); big data, from 10% (2015) to 24% (2016).

It remains to be seen how these various technologies actually play

out to define the digital marketing landscape in the coming year.

16
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Of the following, which marketing

initiative would you say had, and
which do you think will have, the
most impact on your business in
2015 and 2016?

2015 2016

41% 50% Marketing automation

55% 63% Content marketing

14% 38% Video marketing

10% 24% Big data

8% 25% Mobile marketing

30% 45% Social media marketing

35% 42% SEO (organic search)

27% 30% Paid search

13% 19% Community forums

10% 15% Affiliate marketing

7% 8% Wearables

17
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

Final thoughts
Trends that we saw in 2014 in the B2B marketing space continued to play out
in 2015, and will probably do so in 2016 as well.

Sales revenue remains top-of-mind for marketers, while customer

engagement metrics lag. As a result, pre-sale activities dominate. Given the
growing importance of digital in marketing, we hope to see more companies
leverage the potential of the medium to promote loyalty and advocacy among
their customers.

Mobile needs more evangelists. Marketers felt mobile will have a greater
impact on their business in 2016 than it did in 2015. This could well be the
first signs of its emergence from the shadows of the Web, especially as the
medium for fostering customer engagement.

Newer channels, newer forms of digital assets and newer technologies will
emerge as digital stakes a more prominent role in the marketing arena.
However, for the moment, traditional strongholds like website, email and
social will continue to play a significant part in the marketing plan.

Whatever the changes we see, the basics will remain true. Understanding
the customer journey, producing good quality content and engaging with the
customer on a regular basis will still continue to hold the keys to the success
for any marketing program. Marketers would do well to remember this.

18
 STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016

What is the planned allocation of your

marketing budget toward digital/online
marketing initiatives in 2016?

51% and above 29%

26-50% 27%
10-25% 42%
0% 2%

19

About the Analysts
Nimish Vohra
SVP, Principal Analyst
Nimish, Senior Vice President, works with
CMOs and senior marketing professionals.
His research focuses on customer
experience management, predictive analytics,
mobile enablement and other emerging
trends that help customers leverage
technology as an enabler of marketing and
business outcomes.
STATE OF B2B MARKETING 2016
Arunh Krishnan
Sr. Analyst
Arunh started his career with consumer
product marketing, moved to brand
management, and been involved in new
product launches. In his various roles, he
has had deep involvement with consumer
and product research. Arunh is currently
involved in studying emerging trends and
understanding consumer behavior in the
digital space.
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About Regalix Research
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