Intermission: 1 week till Season 8
Just a reminder I exist
Hello Mehketeers!
Next week is the proper Season 8 Issue 1 grand opening, and really I’m just sending this email to gently remind people I exist so my open rate picks back up.
But, since you were so nice as to open this email, I do have two updates/topics for you!
1. An update to a previous Mehdeeka
This issue from Season 6 about the history of artists and commercial advertising is not only one of the most popular Mehdeeka issues, it’s also a personal favourite because I do really like art and I got to really geek out recently because I went to the Alphonse Mucha: Spirit of Art Nouveau exhibition at the Art Gallery of NSW.
Note for my local Sydneysiders, this only recently opened so go see it! It runs until September 22, 2024 and was genuinely such a good exhibition.
Mucha (pronounced moo-ka) became really well known for his super identifiable (even today) style, and he did a lot of poster work for Bernhardt, a theatre company which did a lot of Shakespeare plays. This lead to…
The success of the Bernhardt posters brought Mucha commissions for advertising posters. He designed posters for JOB cigarette papers, Ruinart Champagne, Lefèvre-Utile biscuits, Nestlé baby food, Idéal Chocolate, the Beers of the Meuse, Moët-Chandon champagne, Trappestine brandy, and Waverly and Perfect bicycles. (wikipedia)
Not only does the exhibition have the theatre posters, it also has the JOB cigarette poster, the Moët-Chandon posters, original packaging for chocolates, biscuits, and a bunch of other random stuff, and most interestingly from the art side, a lot of his drafts alongside finished pieces.
Highly recommend for art nerds and marketing nerds alike!
Here’s what the exhibition plaque had to say about another poster, this one for La Trappestine liqueur:
Mucha applied the style he developed for Sarah Bernhardt’s theatre posters to this image, an advertisement for a liqueur. Here the graceful figure feels vaguely virginal — entirely suited to advertising a drink made by Benedictine monks. She dominates the composition against a nimbus decorated with circular motifs that would become characteristic of Mucha’s style.
In this and the other posters here, Mucha used a centrally placed and idealised woman to communicate — and sell. Capturing attention first through her looks, only then does she send an alluring and indirect message about the product being advertised. Unliked the ‘macaroni hair’ of his JOB posters, the hair here is exaggerated by contained; a single sharp strand acting to lead the eye all the way down via outstretched hand to the bottle.
2. Forrester released some marketing reports
Summaries of the parts that were interesting to me, because these reports are really in line with “that meeting could have been an email. If you only want to read one, the third is the best one (skip to the diagrams below.)
From this one, a reminder that there’s four types of value:
Economic value. B2B buyers want to be sure that a solution they’re considering justifies the time and effort that they’re investing in the purchasing process. Providers create economic value by enabling buyers to find the information they’re looking for quickly. Marketers contribute by equipping sales with insights and relevant resources.
Kayla note: By “relevant resources” I’m assuming they mean market research, ROI statistics, case studies, and testimonials.Functional value. Buyers want to ensure that the solution they choose will in fact solve for their needs. B2B providers create functional value by understanding buyer needs and infusing this understanding in their solutions and interactions with buyers. Post-purchase, you must ensure that customers continue realizing value from doing business with you.
Kayla note: Remember there’s a time and place for both functional descriptions (it does abc) and value propositions (and that delivers xyz) — they’re probably referring to both here.Experiential value. When buyers feel supported and respected in every interaction of their journey, providers have created experiential value. Providing clear, simple steps toward a purchase also contributes to experiential value.
Kayla note: Hello this is customer journey maps, how may I help you?Symbolic value. Buyers derive symbolic value when they feel that their association with a company confers status on them or their work. Learning opportunities that offer progressively higher levels of mastery, for instance, offer symbolic value. Customer communities also offer symbolic value through a sense of belonging.
Kayla note: Brand, brand, brand. If you’re early stage, associate yourself with leading-edge, at the forefront, technology driven brands who see this risk as advancing their own reputation.
My takeaway: Have you let one of these take up too much of your attention, and neglected the others? A good balance is key here (which looks like content marketing, product marketing, sales enablement, and brand marketing all working together.)
From this one here’s the best tips on sales-marketing alignment:
Shift from focusing on leads to focusing on opportunities, reducing duplicate leads and becoming more driven by lower-funnel metrics which are more meaningful
Use the same tech so that the insights one team has are accessible to the other team (and use this advice from Forrester to justify being on the same CRM as sales if you’re currently struggling with that!)
Don’t silo marketing in terms of funnels — treat all activity as campaigns spanning multiple touchpoints
Reminder: “Existing customers account for more than three-quarters of annual revenue for B2B organizations” — don’t forget about customer marketing
Final report, this one goes deeper on the concept of moving from leads to opportunities via three iterations of the sales funnel:
In many cases, organizations already receive multiple leads from the same account, each of which is demonstrating interest in the same solution. However, marketing automation platforms don’t make the connection between those individuals. This means marketing can’t see, for example, that one potential opportunity is represented by multiple buying group members while another potential opportunity is represented by only one.
This lack of insight severely limits the performance of the entire demand management process, including marketing, revenue development, sales, and the customer organization. Once an organization shifts its focus from leads to opportunities with buying groups, it often sees a substantial improvement in performance.
How to identify and view “opportunities”:
The rest of the paper goes into detail about how to set up your CRM to actually identify and trigger alerts when you’ve got what you need to activate a buying group, it’s pretty interesting and actionable (depending on how messy your CRM is…)
See you next week, and don’t forget
Everyone who refers a friend to Mehdeeka between now and Issue 2 goes into the draw to win a copy of Badvertising: Polluting Our Minds and Fuelling Climate Chaos and I’ll purchase it from a local bookstore of your choice, so it’s open to anyone anywhere.
Next week is the REAL start of Season 8, see you then!
Kayla