How to Strategically Use Digital Marketing to Build Your B2B Website

Building your B2B website is the easy part, but how can you leverage digital marketing across the respective channels in a more strategic way? On this week’s episode, we have an in-depth discussion with James Hipkin (CEO/Founder, Inn8ly; CEO/Managing Director, Red8Interactive) about the key components of a successful digital marketing strategy, what a good B2B website should include, and why it’s crucial to have an “outside in” approach.

James also elaborates on the “Hub and Spoke Strategy”, and how this approach helps B2B marketers to generate more revenue and better results for their online initiatives.

https://youtu.be/Y8uOp5Ypb0Q

Topics discussed in this episode:

• James talks about how B2B marketers can use digital marketing to build their website [1:34] | [4:00]
  
• James explains the “Hub and Spoke” strategy [14:46]
  
• What B2B marketers should prioritize and focus on to take their digital strategy to the next level with limited resources [20:47]
  
• James shares his view on email marketing and why he thinks it is a missed opportunity [29:24]
  
• Jame’s advice: Start journey mapping and stop focusing on the features and attributes [33:14]
  

Companies & links mentioned in this episode:

• James Hipkin on LinkedIn 
  
• Inn8ly 
  
• Red8Interactive
  

SPEAKERS

Christian Klepp, James Hipkin

Christian Klepp  00:00

Welcome to B2B Marketers on a Mission, a podcast for B2B marketers that helps you to question the conventional, think differently, disrupt your industry, and take your marketing to new heights. Each week, we talk to B2B marketing experts who share inspirational stories, discussed our thoughts and trending topics, and provide useful marketing tips and recommendations. And now, here’s your host and co-founder of EINBLICK Consulting, Christian Klepp. Welcome, everyone to this episode of the B2B Marketers on a Mission podcast where you get your weekly dose of B2B marketing insights. This is your host, Christian Klepp. And today, I am joined by someone who is on a mission. And that’s to help B2B marketers and entrepreneurs navigate the ins and outs of digital marketing in an easy to understand and jargon-free way. So coming to us from Nevada City, California, Mr. James Hipkin. Welcome to the show.

James Hipkin  00:51

Hey, there, I’m so happy to be here. I’m really looking forward to our conversation.

Christian Klepp  00:55

Same here. And you know, we really had a great conversation like a week ago, and I’m really looking forward to diving in here. So let’s get started.

James Hipkin  01:04

Fantastic. Let’s do it.

Christian Klepp  01:06

So James, you’re quite the expert. And that’s probably the understatement of the year. But like, you know, when it comes to websites and digital marketing for B2B. So, in our previous conversation, you talked about the importance of, well, let’s, let’s just put it this way, building websites is the easy part. The true challenge lies in the digital marketing aspect of it. So talk to us about how you think B2B marketers can use digital marketing to build their websites?

James Hipkin  01:34

Well, it starts, oddly enough, with a non-technical thing. It starts with understanding what the objective of the website is. A lot of times people think about the website is, well, it’s something I have to do. And oh, don’t worry about it. It’s just brochure where. And when you think about it that way, that’s exactly what you’re going to get. But if you do think about the website, in terms of what’s the business objective of the website, then you’ve got a plan, and you’ve got something you can map strategy against, you can make decisions around tactics. And generally speaking, business to business websites fall into two large buckets. They’re either confirmation or conversion, the conversion objective is pretty common. And everybody understands that. The less understood objective is confirmation, which is very applicable, particularly in professional services, business to business, advertising, and marketing. Executive A tells executive B about this great lawyer they found and executive B goes to the lawyer’s website. And it looks like it was built in the 1990s. Well, do I really want to talk to this person? Perhaps not. And I hear this frequently from business folks, well, you know, I don’t need to update my website, I don’t get any leads from my website. And the thing is, they can’t see the no set, they can’t see the people who went there based on word of mouth, and just didn’t bother to call. So understanding the objective of the website is possibly the most important step that you need to make, and it’s the one that’s often skipped.

Christian Klepp  03:26

Yeah, those are really great points. And would you also say that, you know, not understanding the business objective of the website is also, in many ways a missed opportunity. I mean…

James Hipkin  03:37

Oh, for sure.

Christian Klepp  03:38

Yeah. And also people tend to, like, you know, we’ve seen this happen a lot, especially in the B2B space, missed opportunities. And also to your, to your other point about it being some kind of like online brochure per se. More often than not, people get so tempted to just cram so much information to that website, they are just drowning in overwhelm.

James Hipkin  04:00

And that gets to the next really big opportunity relative to this, and that’s, again has nothing to do with technology. It’s understanding the customer journey. Understanding how the website and the rest of your digital marketing can facilitate the customer journey. I use an acronym TTV. And it stands for Traffic, Trust and Value. Job one is get the right kind of traffic into your marketing funnel. Job two, is to build a relationship to build a trust levels with this these customers and that’s comes from understanding their journey. The journey is not black and white, it’s not this bloke need that bye. There are steps… building that that mid funnel area. I’ve written about this quite a bit on my blog, the mid funnel area where you’re building trust is another missed opportunity I frequently see, they throw everything and sundry onto the homepage of the website, and nobody knows what to look at. And they leave. You know, so understanding the customer journey is a key factor to the success of any marketing program. The website becomes the hub within that marketing program. And as a result, that’s your opportunity to maximize the value proposition that you’re creating.

Christian Klepp  05:35

Yeah, no, that’s absolutely right. That’s absolutely right. You know, you’ve been on this field for some time, and you’ve probably seen it all. So just talk to us about some of the common misconceptions and mistakes you’ve seen B2B marketers make when it comes to digital marketing, and what they should do to address these?

James Hipkin  05:56

Really common mistake is what I call inside out marketing. Not B2B, necessarily. But this latest little debacle out of Facebook is a great example of inside out marketing. They’re talking about themselves. They’re talking about them what they want to do.

Christian Klepp  06:15

Oh, yeah, me, me, me.

James Hipkin  06:16

Oh, yeah. And it’s a big, big mistake, because your prospective customers, your existing customers, are looking for solutions to their problem. If you can convert that inside out language in your digital marketing, into outside in marketing, outside in language, then you’re going to have much more effective… marketing is going to work much harder for you. What’s the problem that they’re trying to solve? Agitate the problem, give put some urgency against it, tell them about the risks if they don’t solve this problem, then present, we have a solution. And then make it crystal clear what they should do next. And then further down the page. You can get into, you know, overcoming obstacles, you can talk about social proof, you know, the other companies we work with the testimonials we’ve received, etc, etc. But it all starts with what’s the problem that the consumer wants solved, that the business owner wants solved when they reach out to you? And that’s a very common thing. Common mistake I see frequently.

Christian Klepp  07:36

That’s absolutely right. That’s absolutely right. And I believe the approach that you were referring to, I think it’s called PAS, right. So Problem, Agitate, Solution, right?

James Hipkin  07:50

Yeah. Problem agitate solution. Pas.

Christian Klepp  07:53

PAS.

James Hipkin  07:53

Yep.

Christian Klepp  07:54

There you go. Yeah, absolutely.

James Hipkin  07:56

It’s actually, I like the I always emphasize the CTA is also very important. I can’t, I can’t tell you that… Well, okay. So what am I supposed to do?

Christian Klepp  08:07

Right, right. After I’ve seen all of these, what do you want me to do?

James Hipkin  08:10

It’s like, oh, that’s a good idea. But you know, I see this, I see this.

Christian Klepp  08:18

Yeah, I’m sure I’m sure. Right. Um, talk to us about a challenge that you and the team have faced these past couple of months and how you managed to solve it?

James Hipkin  08:29

I don’t know that we’ve solved it. But I can certainly talk about it.

Christian Klepp  08:35

Sure.

James Hipkin  08:35

And we’re doing it right now. The challenge that we face is, and we build large websites for corporations, we know what we’re doing. I mean, six figure budgets are not uncommon. We also have a product, where we’re providing websites for businesses who are at six figures and trying to get to seven figures. And that’s a very different market from the multi seven figure business that we do the customer for. But that’s such a noisy market. And I think a lot of B2B marketers face the same problem. It’s how do you get your message through a noisy market? If you’re in a business group on Facebook, and you innocently posts that you think you want to build a new website? Within 10 minutes, 200 people have commented on it saying I can do it for you for $500. Yeah. And given the crap that I see out there. No, they can’t. But how do you break through all that noise? You’ve got Wix out there buying Superbowl ads and telling them Oh, my God, this is so the fashion model telling them all this is so easy. I hear from my customers. The fashion model lied to me. It’s not that easy. And I don’t want to be a webmaster. Right? I need this. But I don’t want to have to figure out how to do this. And but I don’t have $80,000 to spend on a website. So how do you break through that noise and I’m using being an expert guest on podcasts as a way to break through that noise. It’s kind of I was in a… one of our customers is the angel investment group, Sacramento Angels. And we built their new website, and they invited me to speak at 1 Million Cups event yesterday. And I was talking about this and one of the other investors in this group was saying, you know, you most of your business is through word of mouth, how are you… How are you going to extend word of mouth? And I’m thinking that podcasting can be an extension of word of mouth. It’s the first one I’ve run across that seems to be a viable way and for professional services, companies who are doing business to business marketing, and again, trying to fight with all this noise. My thinking is that podcasting, and being an expert guest on podcast, or actually having your own podcast might be a very effective way to break through this noise.

Christian Klepp  11:17

This comment is gonna sound really biased coming from me the podcaster. But yes, I agree with you. (laugh) But here’s the reason why I agree with you, James. I absolutely agree that being a guest on targeted podcasts, so podcasts that your, your ideal customer or your target audience listens to is a good way of like helping to increase visibility for your brand, in a way that is… and this is really important. To your point about the group’s in a way that’s not obtrusive, it’s not intrusive, it’s not salesy. It’s not in your face, like sign up now, it’s you sharing your expertise in in a digestible format and getting people to like, know who you are, trust you and see that you have this credibility, you have this expertise to back it all up, right?

James Hipkin  12:17

And particularly in B2B marketing, because at the end of the day, people buy people.

Christian Klepp  12:22

Yes.

James Hipkin  12:24

And, you know, there’s these relationships and that, okay, this, this is a real dude. And he seems to know what he’s talking about. And, you know, the last guy, I mean, I’ve literally had a customer call me up, and I said, Hi, Joe. And there was silence, and I could hear shuffling around. And then he came back on. I said, Joe, what happened? Where do you go? And he said, I had to sit down. You’re the first web developer I’ve ever called who answered their phone.

Christian Klepp  12:56

Wow, really? (laugh) Oh, because everybody else, you just fill out a form and then click submit and then…

James Hipkin  13:04

You signed up at Wix or Squarespace or wherever it is, and they they hand you the keys to a Ferrari, and wish you luck on the freeway. You know, God help you if you break something. Yeah. And guess what, they break stuff all the time. And it’s, it’s not nearly as easy as the fashion model in the TV ads said it is. But it is more and more important every day, that your online presence, be professional, be real, and be easy for your customers to work with. And get value from.

Christian Klepp  13:40

And top of mind tool, right? Like I mean, you know, give them something to remember you by that, you know, when they do think about okay, B2B website expertise, that your name comes to mind.

James Hipkin  13:52

Sure. And if you’re a B2B owner, if you’re a business owner, it’s make sure that your customers look forward to going to the website because every time they go, they get more value. Because you’re looking to build that relationship, you’re looking to create value that goes beyond the transactional benefits. That’s what creates competitive insulation. That’s what keeps people coming back to you.

Christian Klepp  14:18

That’s absolutely right. That’s absolutely right. James, there was something in our previous conversation that you said that really jumped out at me and I really want to jam on this further if that’s okay with you. So you spoke about, um, you spoke about this approach and that, I think you aptly called it the Hub and Spoke strategy. Right? So tell us about why you think that’s so effective and how that will help B2B companies to increase their revenue?

James Hipkin  14:46

Well, I think it’s effective because it really takes advantage of the real world. You know, the growth in online presence, the growth in online traffic, and particularly as a result of the pandemic has been, you know, huge, you know, retail numbers are down 20% year over year last summer. And yet, when you looked inside those numbers, online sales were up over 20%. So retail sales would have been a lot worse if it hadn’t been for that. And that genie is not going back in the bottle. So your online presence is vital. And the Hub and Spoke strategy acknowledges that it creates a hub using the website around which your digital marketing activity rotates. So the website is the hub, the digital marketing channels that you’re using are the spokes and your content and messaging strategy, that outside in thing we were talking about before, that becomes the rim. And the power doesn’t come from the individual tactics, the power comes from the connection, and drawing people into an environment where you can acknowledge and support and reinforce the journey they’re on and build that relationship. Digital Marketing done in isolation can’t do that. But when you glue the pieces together, like I’m describing, and you use the Hub and Spoke strategy, as your basis, you know, suddenly all of the pieces work harder. Because the connection is maximizing the value that’s created, the value that’s created for your customers and the value that’s created for the business.

Christian Klepp  16:45

Well, those are some really interesting points. And, you know, as you were explaining that I came up with another question about. So you’ve laid out a hub and spoke strategy and its respective parts and, you know, on average, based on your experience, how long would it generally take a B2B company to develop an implement that?

James Hipkin  17:07

Not that long, because they’re probably doing most of the bits and pieces now. It’s looking at it holistically. That’s the insight. It’s having the various piece parts work in concert with each other, you know, as simple idea as having lead forms connected directly to an email service provider, and then having an automation automatically join in. So that’s one lead… leads coming in on one spoke, it’s hitting the website, it’s going back out and other spoke. That spoke is talking to customers, you’ve got a consistent messaging strategy going on, you know, that they’ve already engaged with you. So the messaging in the email, acknowledges where they’re at in their journey. It’s that connection, that brings the power. Most B2B marketers are probably doing the piece parts now. They’re probably doing too many pieces now. And not doing any… as a result not doing any of them nearly as well as they could be. Because they don’t have a holistic strategy. And they’re probably doing too many things.

Christian Klepp  18:19

Put in layman’s terms, they’re probably like focusing a little bit more on the trees than they are in the entire forest.

James Hipkin  18:25

Right. Right. That’s right. Right. And, and shiny things syndrome gets involved.

Christian Klepp  18:31

Yeah, yes.

James Hipkin  18:32

You know, I can’t I kept people have come to me, and they’re like, Well, we’re, we’re doing all this stuff on Instagram. I’m like, really? Why? Your audiences all over 40. They’re not on Instagram. Why aren’t you doing… Why aren’t you in LinkedIn? Why aren’t you doing? I mean, this is, this is where we’re at with a lot of folks. And how do you get from six figures to seven figures? It’s by stepping up to some of this stuff.

Christian Klepp  19:02

Right.

James Hipkin  19:03

It’s by, you know, being smarter than your competitors by being a bit more strategic, and maximizing the impact of all of the bits and pieces in your digital marketing strategy. And it starts and ends in the website, in my humble opinion, and that’s not… it’s a bit like your podcaster comment earlier. Appreciating that, of course, it’s what I do. But that’s also based on 40 years of experience working with high end brands, and, you know, major programs and major budgets. It’s the website, the spokes and the rim. It’s a way to think about it. But it’s really about get the right message to the right person at the right time. And now in the digital age, in the right way. And that’s where this is coming from.

Christian Klepp  19:55

Yeah, yeah. Those are really good points. Those are really good points.

Hey, it’s Christian Klepp here. We’ll get back to the episode in a second. But first, is your brand struggling to cut through the noise? Are you trying to find more effective ways to reach your target audience and boost sales? Are you trying to pivot your business? If so, book a call with EINBLICK Consulting, our experienced consultants will work with you to help your B2B business to succeed and scale. Go to www.einblick.co for more information.

You’ve spoken about it a little bit in the past couple of minutes. But what do you think B2B marketers should prioritize or focus on when it comes to like taking that digital strategy to the next level? And here’s the other thing I’m going to throw into that question, especially if budget or resources are concerned?

James Hipkin  20:47

Yeah. And that’s a great question. It begins and ends with customers. Your best source of new business is your existing customers. I mean, customers, and particularly best customers, and I’ll talk a little bit more about best customers in a minute, contribute value five ways. So you got five different ways that you can generate value out of your existing customers, first and foremost, the longer they stay with you, the more return you have on the investment that was required to acquire them in the first place. The longer they stay with you, the better they understand your products and services. So their cost of service is lower, which increases the revenue that’s available to you. The longer they stay with you, the more likely they are to recommend your product or service to other customers just like them. Maximizing revenue again. They understand your value proposition. You don’t have to bribe them to buy again. And notice I use the word bribe and I mean you still… one of the relationship marketing principles is good customers expect to be rewarded. Different between being rewarded and being bribed. Being rewarded is value add, being bribed is oh we can do it for that price. You know, and good customers don’t need that. They recognize your value proposition. And then finally, loyal customers are much more likely to advocate for you. They’re going to recommend to people just like them, that you ought to do business with these people, which gets back to the website, objective thing we talked about before is when that happens, make sure your value proposition and how you solve problems is clear on the website. Because guess what, in this digital age, that’s where people are going to go.

Christian Klepp  22:53

Yeah, no, that’s absolutely right. And those are some really great points. And you know, going back to what you said, if that’s not clear, in this digital day and age, and they’re on your website, and they don’t get what you do, guess what? They’re gonna move on to the next one.

James Hipkin  23:08

The average website visitor has an attention span… Goldfish has a larger, longer attention span than the average website visitor.

Christian Klepp  23:16

Isn’t that scary?

James Hipkin  23:18

You have… you need to do… you’ve got a maximum six seconds to get folks. And some of those seconds are used up by page load.

Christian Klepp  23:28

Yes.

James Hipkin  23:30

So if your website is on a funky server, and it wasn’t very well built, and you’re using up three of those seconds, just to load the page? I mean, why? Yeah, why start so far behind?

Christian Klepp  23:43

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Speaking of which, that was a beautiful segue into the next question, because what do you believe, is currently the biggest challenge that B2B digital marketing is facing right now?

James Hipkin  23:59

I think it’s the same answer as we were talking about before, it’s the noise. It’s people with the with the proliferation of social media, the proliferation of digital channels, and all the different choices and, and all of the things that are distracting people, the attention span thing that we’re talking about. That’s a huge challenge for a marketer today. And it’s a challenge that really didn’t exist to the same degree, you know, 10 years ago. How do you break through the noise and get your message, you know, get the right message to the right person at the right time. Nobody’s gonna argue with that. That’s a hackneyed old axiom that everybody will nod their head over. You’re nodding your head right now. (laugh)

Christian Klepp  24:51

I am indeed, I am.

James Hipkin  24:52

You know, but the reality is, it’s a really noisy space out there. And how do you break through that noise? That’s the key challenge that digital business to business marketers are facing right now. Particularly with more expensive products, with more complex products, where you need to do you know, work with somebody as they’re going through their decision making process. And it’s having that plan to nurture the relationship, understanding that you’re not gonna, you know, you need to build some trust before the actual sale. And thus my comments to your earlier question about where’s your best source? It’s your current customers, because at least some of that works already done. So use digital marketing to draw them back in, to remind them, you know, even if all they do is see the subject line in preview text on your emails, it’s still keeping your name and your solution top of mind.

Christian Klepp  25:59

Absolutely.

James Hipkin  26:00

It’s, it’s people miss out on that. Well, nobody opens the emails. It’s a missed opportunity.

Christian Klepp  26:08

It certainly is. And, you know, it reminds me of, you know, something that we’ve all read somewhere online, whether it’s a report put together by McKinsey or Gartner or what have you. Not every B2B industry, but many of them will have multiple stakeholders who are responsible for the decision making in the buying process. They will all conduct independent research, more often than not, even before they contact the vendor.

James Hipkin  26:37

Yeah.

Christian Klepp  26:38

Right.

James Hipkin  26:38

Oh, yeah.

Christian Klepp  26:39

So what are they gonna find if they look, look you up?

James Hipkin  26:42

Yep.

Christian Klepp  26:43

Right?

James Hipkin  26:44

How are you going to differentiate yourself? And every business is different. I mean, we have one customer who’s… they’re a boutique consultancy. But they work in artificial intelligence and applying artificial intelligence to business process. And they work with companies like Chevron, right? And how do you set price at pump using artificial intelligence rather than, you know, the sort of gut feeling that people have. The CEO of this company, and this is a guy I’ve worked with for probably 15 years? I think we’ve rebuilt his website four or five times. It’s, you know, his perspective is… he says, this is like the book Moneyball. We’re using data to make decisions that were historically subjective. And the return… I’ve seen the numbers, I can’t get into the numbers, but I’ve seen the numbers, the ROI that they’re generating out of this investment is in multi seven figures. And, you know, and but, but how do you get past the gatekeepers? That’s another common solution for business to business websites, and you just brought it up? How do you get past and his whole website strategy is around “I have to get past gatekeepers”. That’s the job of the website. And he was very clear on what his objective was. And as a result, he has a very effective website.

Christian Klepp  28:19

Exactly. Because, and again, this goes back to what you were saying earlier on the conversation. They understand who it is they need to reach out to and why and how?

James Hipkin  28:29

Where they are in their journey.

Christian Klepp  28:30

Correct.

James Hipkin  28:31

Yep.

Christian Klepp  28:32

Correct. As opposed to shooting in the fog, right.

James Hipkin  28:36

He says if he can sit down one on one with the CEO of a major corporation, and the Chief Technology Officer and the Chief, you know the Chief Marketing Officer, once he gets in the room with those people, eight times out of 10, they’ll buy their services. The purpose of the website is to get him in that room.

Christian Klepp  28:58

Kind of sounds like it’s, it’s achieved that objective, right?

James Hipkin  29:03

Yeah.

Christian Klepp  29:03

Fantastic. Fantastic. These next two questions are an opportunity for you to get up on your soapbox. What’s a status quo or a commonly held belief in your area of expertise that you passionately disagree with? And why?

James Hipkin  29:24

One of we touched on it already. There’s a commonly held belief I hear it frequently of:  Email marketing, it’s old, it’s no longer… I don’t need to be thinking about that anymore. I think that’s a huge mistake. It’s a big big mistake. It’s one of the least expensive digital media channels you’ve got. It gives you the opportunity to build value with existing customers more effectively than anything else. We talked about the five ways that existing customers can build value, but it’s doesn’t happen by accident. And email marketing is a very cost effective way to achieve that. I wish people would be paying more attention to it and in doing it more effectively. And one of the ways that they miss when they’re doing email marketing, is they think it’s a sales channel. It’s not a sales channel. It’s a chance to build relationship and to build trust. And you do that by creating incremental value. Value that goes beyond the functional and transactional benefits of your product and service. And email marketing is a great way to do that. It’s a missed opportunity, in my opinion.

Christian Klepp  30:43

Yeah, no, I totally agree with that. And, you know, it’s… just as you said, it’s about building relationship and trust, it’s not an opportunity to like, you know, pitch customers, like, Hey, this is our new product, right.

James Hipkin  30:58

Now, there are still opportunities, I mean, to build, I mean, and good smart email marketing. If you do an article in your email, and you know, the opening paragraph, and then there’s a “Read More” link, and the article is about a particular problem that you know is becoming a more important problem in your business sector. And somebody clicks on that link. They’re sending you a big giant message. They’re sending you okay, I’m no longer on the periphery here. I’m in prime doing some consideration and some prospecting here. Okay. What are you doing about that? Do you have an automation in place in your email market…, even email platform that sends them a message, and that message could be a bit more sales oriented. Because they’ve told you about what they’re doing, by virtue of clicking on that link. They’ve told you what they’re interested in, answer that question.

Christian Klepp  32:03

And they’ve indicated that they’re ready to move on to the next step. Right?

James Hipkin  32:06

Exactly. Exactly. And that’s… I mean, you can do all of that very easily and very cost effectively, using an email service provider, you know, that it can be as simple as MailChimp, or Active Campaign or one of the standalones. Or it can be more sophisticated, like HubSpot, or Marketo, or Pardot. Or I mean, there’s any number of solutions out there. But they’re all much more effective if they’re executing against a strategy.

Christian Klepp  32:40

That’s right. That’s right.

James Hipkin  32:41

And the, you know, you touched on it before the conflict between sales and marketing. I’m sure that never happens in any B2B company.

Christian Klepp  32:50

No, of course not. (laugh) All hearsay, yeah. Well, that’s, that’s fantastic. And, you know, just to wrap up the conversation, James, like, if you were to give those B2B digital marketers advice out there, what’s one thing you think they should start, and one thing you think they should stop doing?

James Hipkin  33:14

They should start journey mapping, they should start putting a bunch of energy. And this is where sales and marketing can really cooperate with each other. Map that journey, understand that journey, let the customers’ journey drive the marketing and sales decisions. Not the opinion of the sales manager or not the opinion of the Chief Marketing Officer, let the customer journey drive those decisions. That’s something that they should absolutely start doing, if they’re not already doing it. And if they are already doing it, go back and do it better. And the thing they should stop doing is they should stop selling features. Stop talking about themselves, you know, use their features and attributes as reasons to believe. Not as the primary message, the primary message is, we can solve your problem. We can solve your problem. And that’s a practical and logical message. And that can also be an emotional message. I mean, the famous positioning statement from Federal Express, that revolutionized the overnight shipping category, “when it absolutely positively has to be there overnight”.

Christian Klepp  34:43

That’s exactly it.

James Hipkin  34:45

They were competing with behemoths in the shipping world. And they came out of nowhere and just left them all in their dust. By speaking to the… how do I solve this problem? They didn’t talk about their hub and spoke system. They didn’t talk about the number of airplanes they had. They didn’t talk about how big their warehouses were. They didn’t… they said when it absolutely positively has to be there overnight. So the thing they should stop… B2B marketers have to really be good about stopping is to stop talking about your features.

Christian Klepp  34:23

Yeah. And If I may throw in one more thing, they should stop talking about their proprietary technology. (laugh)

James Hipkin  35:33

Yeah. Talk about that with your investors, but don’ts… That’s not a marketing strategy.

Christian Klepp  35:41

That’s right. That’s right. No, James, thank you so much. I mean, this, this conversation has been super informative, insightful, very thought provoking, and you gave us also very actionable tips. So please do us the honor of introducing yourself to the audience and let folks out there know how they can get in touch with you.

James Hipkin  35:59

Okay, so I’m James Hipkin I am the founder and CEO of a company called Red8interactive. Our B2B website service is called inn8ly. You can find out about that at inn8ly.com. But what I really want, what I would really like to see is, you know, I want B2B marketers to embrace the Hub and Spoke marketing strategy and see for themselves the power of connection. So go to HubandSpoke.marketing, where you can download our ebook Journey to Success: Digital Marketing for Small Business Owners. Let me repeat that web address, HubandSpoke.marketing to download the free ebook. Read it to see how John a small business owner to learn to connect the rim, his content, the tactics, his spokes, and the website, the hub, and how he maximize the impact of his digital marketing. That would be awesome. I can get that message out there.

Christian Klepp  36:59

Fantastic. Fantastic. James. Thanks again for your time. Take care, be safe, and I’ll talk to you soon.

James Hipkin  37:06

Absolutely Christian, it’s been an absolute pleasure and I truly look forward to talking again, about any of these subject areas.

Christian Klepp  37:14

Alright, take care. Bye for now.

James Hipkin  37:15

Bye bye.

Christian Klepp  37:17

Thank you for joining us on this episode of the B2B Marketers on a Mission podcast. To learn more about what we do here at EINBLICK, please visit our website at www.einblick.co and be sure to subscribe to the show on iTunes or your favorite podcast player.