What Skills do you need to make it in B2B Marketing?
B2B Marketing and the Marketing Automation Skills Gap
What skills does the average B2B Marketer in the UK possess? Often they have some sort of recognised Marketing qualification from the CIM. I teach some CIM Diploma modules so know full well what the course covers. The part of the syllabus that covers ‘Metrics’ is called Managing Marketing. There is a bit about Finance in it (but not much). It covers things like budgeting, forecasting and cost-benefit analysis. There are even some words on Activity Based Costing and a few other things that are really about accounting. The problem with teaching accounting is that accountants understand it better than marketers. What really needs to be taught is how to make a compelling business case..and this requires the thing accountants and CEO love…metrics.
There is almost no connection between what is taught on the CIM syllabus and the kind of metrics and analytics used by B2B Marketers in the UK. It doesn’t help that so many Marketers get a ‘nervous’ around numbers. Isn’t the whole reason they went into marketing the first place something to do with the fact that they are not very good at maths?
New technology is making the results of marketing more manageable. However, most taught marketing, remains pretty light when it comes to metrics and analytics. Marketing Departments need “IT Types” with analytical and system administration skills and an ability coordinate complex projects with a lot of technical moving parts. If you don’t have these skills you need to acquire them. If you don’t want them you need to find those quite corners of the marketing world that are slow to adapt? The ‘winds of change’ are blowing through B2B and ‘storm clouds are gathering over the marketing department’.
Think about your next interview. There are two candidates to choose from to run the department.
Candidate A
- CIM Diploma (a few years ago)
- Good at managing suppliers/others
- Tells a good story around awareness, brand-building, and all that ‘other old school’ stuff
- Knows where all the best restaurants in town are (because the suppliers take them there)
The Right Candidate?
Candidate B
- Started out in IT got involved in Marketing through web-site support
- Project Managments Skills
- Awareness of current technology trends and emerging tools for marketing
- Can build a case for a project around ROI and business benefits
Which one is most like you?
Biz-Builders exists for companies who need a little more oomph! from their B2B marketing and sales teams and must find new customers quickly. We do this because we must. There is no comparable b2b marketing training in the UK. No Plan No Fun. We build a b2b sales and marketing plan and help you implement it. We offer marketing automation technology consulting and support too – if that’s what you need. You may not!
John Sweeney, Director Biz-Builders, is a B2B Marketing expert. He has helped many hundreds of B2B Marketers with b2b marketing consultancy projects and b2b marketing training. At times he has been able to call New York, London and Devon home. Right now it’s Berrylands and he is slowly adjusting.
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