Creating Demand in B2B With Influencer Marketing

Bill Duggan How do you define influencer marketingUrsula Ringham Influencer marketing is a tactic to reach new and diverse audiences As an influencer marketing organization we discover and build relationships with a community of trusted voices and collaborate with these influencers to tell our story through their lens to build awareness and to create demandDuggan Tell us about the SAP influencer marketing teamRingham We have a small yet mighty team that heads up our global influencer marketing program We are responsible for designing the program as well as running influencer discovery and negotiations content creation project management vendor management networking and much more And we crosscollaborate with many different internal teams to bring our program assets and campaigns to fruitionAt SAP we also have several business units that act independently and have their own influencer marketing people My goal in 2019 was to bring all these teams together as quotOneTeamquot to utilize the same IRM amp8212 influencer relationship management amp8212 platform share best practices and crosscollaborate on numerous activities and assets And we succeeded There is now more structure and organization in everything we do since we now have a unified influencer marketing approachWe also use several agencies to help bring to life our influencer content such as video production graphic design content marketing and social media supportDuggan What types of influencers do you work with and how do you find themRingham To truly understand influencer marketing you have to be in social media and understand it For this reason I live in social media I started seven years ago when I managed SAP39s small and midsize business social media channels I was in the trenches creating the social copy posting the messages joining the Tweet chats researching the latest trends and engaging with everyone including influencers As a result I built my own social presence and am on all channels every day watching listening and reading what influencers create and postAs an organization we use an IRM tool When we have a certain project we input the exact criteria amp8212demographics topics etcetera amp8212 and then IRM spits out a list We then analyze each candidate and zero in on the ones who look interesting We put them on a watch list and let their social posts inform us If we find their content interesting and it aligns with our brand we slowly engage Get to know them And then when we are ready we reach out and set up a call or meet in person We work with traditional B2B influencers so we look for thought leaders who might have been a practitioner in a certain line of business a former analyst with a tierone firm or someone who has a lot of knowledge on how technology is changing the future of business All have some sort of social presence but we look at the quality and engagement of their content over quantity of followersDuggan A recent Wall Street Journal article questions the value of influencer marketing How would you defend SAP39s use of influencersRingham That article had a lot to do with the B2C market And yes I must agree It39s kind of like the Wild Wild West with influencers being paid exorbitant amounts of money for product placement photosFor B2B it is a whole different ballgame with influencer marketing and it39s really in its infancy I work with influencers and never ask them to promote our products I want them to investigate how technology is changing businesses and helping companies make better informed decisions The content we create with influencers is a teaser to cut through the noise and lead people to check out what SAP can do for their businessDuggan How do you measure the effectiveness of your influencer marketingRingham It all depends on the campaign Mainly awareness We measure the effectiveness of campaigns through impressions reach engagement and clickthroughs But we also have some demandgen campaignsDuggan What39s different about influencer marketing for a B2B brand versus a B2C brandRingham The biggest difference is that B2B brands do not have sexy products I always say the quotSquot in SAP does not stand for sexy We have to work twice as hard to cut through the noise to reach our audienceWe make innovative software that helps the world run better and improve people39s lives but you can39t touch it You can39t see it You can39t feel it So we have to be innovative and creative with our storytelling We focus on the business challenges and the technology that solves these issues And I39ve found collaborating with influencers is an essential way to tell this storyClick the social buttons to share this story with your friends and colleaguesThe opinions and points of view expressed in this content are exclusively the views of the author andor subjects and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet Inc management or associated writers

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Creating Demand in B2B With Influencer Marketing

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Bill Duggan

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