Rocco Baldassarre says, “Marketing budgets are usually tight. To maximize profitability, every dollar must be allocated effectively. Here are five strategies that can be implemented instantly to get the most out of marketing budgets. 1. Focus on what works best. Set up goals in Google Analytics to effectively measure the source and quantity of leads or sales. By comparing sources such as paid campaigns, organic traffic and social media channels, you can apply the Pareto Principle, also known as the 80/20 rule. You are going to find out what sources generate the majority of sales to later... [...]

Christopher Ratcliff says, “7% of companies plan to increase their digital marketing budgets, the highest rate since our Marketing Budgets survey began, and up from 71% last year. This stat is taken from our Marketing Budgets 2015 Report, published in association with Oracle Marketing Cloud. The survey, featuring responses from almost 600 companies, acts as a guide for the general health of the marketing industry, looking at the extent to which companies are increasing their budgets across a range of channels and technologies, comparing online and offline budgets while also looking at the balance... [...]

Rick Whittington says, “Think fast! 2014 is winding down, and you may have extra money left in your marketing budget. Don’t let it go to waste! Here are 30 ideas for spending leftover funds in your marketing budget. 1) Test new versions for low performing calls to action. Estimated cost: $50 per call to action Sort calls to action by click rate and conversion rate, then redesign ones with the lowest performance. Change the design to see if you can attract more visitor attention, and tweak the wording to see if you can strengthen the “connection” between the messaging on your... [...]

Joe Chernov says, “Who knew a single agreement could make such a difference for marketers? Not me. Well, at least not until we analyzed 175,000 answers submitted to HubSpot’s 2014 State of Inboundsurvey and saw something that surprised us: the purse-loosening properties of a Service Level Agreement, or SLA. For those unfamiliar with sales/marketing SLAs, they generally work like this: The marketing leader commits to generating a certain number of leads that meet a particular quality score,while the sales leader agrees to follow up with those leads in a pre-determined amount of time.... [...]

The latest ‘Econsultancy’ blog post is titled “60% of businesses plan to increase marketing budgets in 2014”. Graham Charlton says, “Marketers are more likely to be increasing their overall marketing budgets for the year ahead than at any time since the launch of our first Marketing Budgets Report during the height of the economic crisis.  The Marketing Budgets Report 2014, published by Econsultancy and sponsored by Responsys, is based on a survey of more than 600 company and agency marketers, carried out in December 2013 and January 2014. This infographic presents... [...]

The latest ‘Econsultancy’ blog post is titled “71% of businesses plan to increase digital marketing budgets this year: report”. David Moth says, “Three out of five businesses plan to increase their overall marketing budgets this year, which is more than at any other time since the height of the economic crisis. This increase is largely driven by digital channels, with 71% of companies planning to increase the amount they invest in digital marketing. In comparison only a fifth of companies (20%) are planning to increase traditional budgets over the next year. The findings... [...]

The latest article on HubSpot blog is titled “11 Simple Steps to Implement Inbound as a One Person Marketing Department”. Virginia Bussey says, “Whenever I talk to someone that is a one-person marketing department, I kind of get excited. I suddenly have this urge to fist bump them or do some sort of secret handshake as if we were in the same fraternity (or sorority). You see, being a one person marketing department has a unique set of challenges that only people that have been there and done it can appreciate. As a one person department, you have unique opportunities to take... [...]

The latest article on HubSpot blog is titled “What Should I Tweet? 8 Places to Find Fantastic Content”. Shannon Johnson says, “Unless you’re famous, it’s really difficult to amass a huge following on Twitter without some hard work. For the average person or business, growing your following takes time and attention on a daily basis. The good news: There are a few big levers you can pull to quickly collect at least 1,000 quality followers for your personal or professional Twitter account. You just need to know how to invest your time and effort“. What Should I Tweet?... [...]

The latest article on HubSpot blog is titled “20 Top Experts Share 24 Trends Transforming Sales in 2014”. Anum Hussain says, “I often hear people question, “Why is New Year such a big deal anyways? I mean, it’s just another day.” Well, while it may be just another day for some … for those in the sales world, it’s a night to celebrate hitting year-end quotas and breathing a sigh of relief before having to jump right into January goals. As we transition from 2013 to 2014, we wanted to share the top predictions for what sales trends will emerge this... [...]

The latest article on HubSpot blog is titled “Enough Already! 7 Marketing Predictions We’re Tired of Hearing”. Ginny Soskey says, “About this time every year, something happens. No, I’m not talking about people celebrating holiday festivities, nor am I talking about your boss’ crazy leftover budget spending. I’m talking about those marketing predictions posts. You know — the ones that try to guess what the next year will bring for all of us marketers … even though there is no way that anyone really knows what will happen. (And yes, we’ve... [...]