Best of LinkedIn: Field Marketing CW 22/ 23

00:00:00: And uh...

00:00:21: We are so excited to get into this one.

00:00:23: Yeah,

00:00:23: absolutely!

00:00:24: So to set the stage for you our mission for This Deep Dive is really cut through The Fluff.

00:00:31: we're looking at top field marketing trends that popped up across LinkedIn during calendar weeks twenty-two and twenty three

00:00:37: Right of twenty twenty six

00:00:38: Exactly And were strictly focusing on actionable strategic insights.

00:00:45: B-to-B marketing professionals who actually want to drive real pipeline, because honestly the whole build it and they will come.

00:00:51: era of event marketing.

00:00:52: It's completely dead.

00:00:53: Oh

00:00:53: totally that I mean.

00:00:54: we've treated field marketing.

00:00:55: is this like sanctioned vacation from their office or just this vague brand awareness exercise for decades?

00:01:02: Right let's hand out some branded pens and see what happens.

00:01:05: Yeah exactly.

00:01:06: but Manpreet Waddon summarize the macro shift here perfectly in his post, he basically argues that leading teams they no longer view events as these isolated marketing activities.

00:01:18: They aren't just one-off things anymore?

00:01:19: No

00:01:20: not at all!

00:01:20: The engineer them is full end to end revenue programs.

00:01:23: you have to build a pipeline before the event accelerated during the event and then actually convert it after

00:01:28: which is such a massive shift in how the work has waited like if your strategy is entirely centered on what happens when Nine AM on Tuesday.

00:01:38: Yeah, you're just paying for a very very expensive real estate.

00:01:41: You're

00:01:41: just renting space.

00:01:43: the actual revenue is secured in that pre-event phase.

00:01:46: teams are Partnering with sales development reps weeks in advance to prebook meeting rooms using intent data and setting The agenda before a single badge has even printed.

00:01:55: And speaking of treating it like a real Revenue engine.

00:01:58: I have to bring up snail Nurgant cars post about adopt AI because this

00:02:02: blew my mind.

00:02:03: how the budget shift.

00:02:04: yes Because digital channels are getting so saturated and so expensive, Neil moved a massive eighty percent of his go-to market budget into field marketing.

00:02:13: Eighty percent?

00:02:15: I mean just let that sink in for a second.

00:02:17: It sounds wild right like In the modern marketing environment where i can track every single millisecond of a digital ad click.

00:02:23: dumping That much your budget into in person handshakes Sounds well almost

00:02:28: reckless.

00:02:29: it does looks completely reckless until you until you actually examine the customer acquisition costs across those digital channels right now.

00:02:39: Digital is just prohibitively expensive, buyers are totally exhausted by the noise.

00:02:44: so the physical channel even with a higher upfront cost it has a dramatically higher win rate.

00:02:49: but you know Sunil uses this really strict crawl-walk run framework to make sure he's getting predictable ROI

00:02:55: Which makes sense!

00:02:55: You can't drop millions on a mega booth day one...you have size the bet your company stage

00:03:01: Exactly, and Alexandra Panichina actually posted a brilliant breakdown that connects right to this.

00:03:06: She talked about shifting from what does she call it random acts of events?

00:03:10: To a true go-to market engine.

00:03:13: her core argument is that success just has to be based on closed one Revenue outcomes.

00:03:18: write.

00:03:18: no more vanity metrics

00:03:20: Yeah No more accounting.

00:03:21: how many people spun a prize wheel?

00:03:22: It has to tie back to close one deals.

00:03:25: Okay But let me let me push back on this Just a little bit or play devil's advocate here before.

00:03:29: are we Maybe treating live events too much like a digital ad click now.

00:03:33: Like if we squeeze every single handshake for a mathematically measurable ROI do We risk suffocating that organic serendipitous networking?

00:03:43: That makes life events magical in the first place.

00:03:45: you mean The random hallway bumping.

00:03:47: yeah,

00:03:47: the random conversation at the hotel bar that turns into a million dollar partnership.

00:03:51: Do we lose that?

00:03:53: it's a fair question.

00:03:54: but tracking revenue doesn't kill serendippity.

00:03:58: It really just ensures you are being serendipitous in the right room.

00:04:01: Ah, I see what you mean!

00:04:02: Right because a random hallway conversation is only valuable if the person you bump into Is actually your ideal customer profile If You're In A Hallway Full Of Junior Practitioners Who Can't Sign A Contract?

00:04:14: All The Serendipity In The World Isn'T Going To Generate Pipeline

00:04:18: Which Flows Perfectly Into Next Big Theme We Saw In These Weeks Pre-event intelligence, like how do you know exactly who is in that room before even book your flight?

00:04:28: Yes.

00:04:29: The audience intelligence piece is huge right now!

00:04:32: And Jess Hopps shared the statistic.

00:04:33: that is just, it's terrifying honestly.

00:04:36: She noted that seventy percent of teams are choosing events without actually knowing who will be there.

00:04:40: Seventy

00:04:41: percent?

00:04:41: That is throwing money into the wind!

00:04:43: It really

00:04:44: is like renting out a massive restaurant for dinner party.

00:04:47: right and you don't even know if your guests live in this same city let alone they're hungry.

00:04:51: THAT IS THE PERFECT ANALOGY!

00:04:53: And Warwick D expanded on his exact problem.

00:04:56: he pointed out that sophisticated exhibitors they don't even care about audience volume anymore.

00:05:02: They don't

00:05:02: care if there are fifty thousand people there!

00:05:05: Exactly, they care about buyer concentration.

00:05:08: You aren't buying generic exposure any more.

00:05:11: you're buying access to the top fifty buyers in your specific market.

00:05:16: Right because If have a niche show with one-thousand people but eight hundred of them hold their budget for software that's way better than massive convention where we have to hunt for our buyers

00:05:26: But The hunting part That's still a painful reality for a lot of teams.

00:05:30: Rachel Ann had this great, super relatable post about their reality check-of event prep.

00:05:36: Oh the spreadsheet posts?

00:05:37: Yes!

00:05:38: She said that somewhere right now there was a VP of sales toggling between an exhibitor list and LinkedIn like a day trader

00:05:47: Just manually cross referencing names spending hours trying to guess who might be in show.

00:05:51: We have all been that person or managed that person.

00:05:53: we absolutely have.

00:05:55: but um Modern event teams are finally fixing this.

00:05:57: Alex Reynolds posted about how you have to lean into the technical side of an event go-to market

00:06:02: because You can't just do it with human relationship building anymore, right?

00:06:07: Ten thousand attendees in minutes before a single badge is even printed.

00:06:12: You pipe that raw registration list through an API, cross-reference it with your CRM and intent data...and boom!

00:06:18: You instantly know who you're top fifty targets are?

00:06:20: Okay so once you've done all of the intelligence work And you know mathematically That your buyers or walking around building A pressure totally shifts

00:06:28: Now you have to actually engage them Exactly.

00:06:31: how do get them stop at your booth instead of just Walking right past?

00:06:37: Which brings us to theme three.

00:06:40: Booths

00:06:41: need to drive conversations, not just visibility.

00:06:44: People are so blind to standard booths now.

00:06:47: They don't stop for products.

00:06:48: they stopped for experiences

00:07:07: right on the show floor.

00:07:08: Which is just so bold!

00:07:09: It was a massive tribute to their specific audience, it had working podcast studio live music custom hat bar.

00:07:17: they totally broke category norms and it drove four thousand B-to-B leads and tripled there onsite sales.

00:07:24: Tripled?

00:07:25: Just by creating destination instead of display.

00:07:28: you have contrast that with what Ed Billet observed.

00:07:31: he pointed out.

00:07:32: company can spend million dollars in booth but fails entirely completely fails if the sales reps just stand in a circle talking to each other.

00:07:41: Which

00:07:41: happens all of time!

00:07:42: You walk past these gorgeous expensive booths and their reps are staring at your phones... Right,

00:07:47: because they have to deliver a story worth stopping for.

00:07:50: Meghan Martin brought up great perspective on this too.

00:07:53: She highlighted brand that took tiny ten by ten booth And turned it into live content studio.

00:07:58: Oh thats smart.

00:07:59: so instead of scanning badges They're creating content.

00:08:01: Exactly

00:08:02: The questions people ask on the floor, those become your next campaign.

00:08:06: The booth becomes this engine for first-party data.

00:08:09: it's an active interaction not a passive

00:08:11: one.".

00:08:11: Okay but again let me ask if everyone starts doing this right?

00:08:14: If everyone builds Airstream trailer parks and live podcast studios.

00:08:18: does the show floor just become completely chaotic?

00:08:21: noisy circus like at what point is simple clear message actually went out over massive spectacle.

00:08:28: Angela Gallic brought this up, and I think it's a great point.

00:08:31: She said sometimes just three clear words.

00:08:34: her example was acquire invest operate.

00:08:38: that wins seconds of attention way better than some complex noisy activation.

00:08:43: she's totally right.

00:08:44: i mean whether you build A literal trailer park or You Just have a minimalist wall with Three Words.

00:08:49: None Of That experiential magic Actually Matters if the operational gears behind The scenes are grinding to a halt.

00:08:54: Exactly.

00:08:55: Which brings us To our final theme The invisible operations and the post-event orchestration.

00:09:00: The stuff the attendees never ever see, right?

00:09:03: Ian Morrison shared this powerful anecdote about how good event management is entirely invisible.

00:09:08: He talked about this festival back in twenty thirteen where two massive trucks of gear went missing on a flooded highway.

00:09:14: Oh yeah And the riot squad was literally on standby.

00:09:17: yes It was a total nightmare behind the scenes But the team solved it.

00:09:22: the bands walked out on stage just three minutes late and eighty-two thousand fans had absolutely no idea.

00:09:29: anything went wrong.

00:09:30: That is the gold standard for B to D events too.

00:09:33: The prospect should never feel operational friction.

00:09:36: but you know, Harsha R pointed out that most event ROI isn't actually lost on the trade show floor when the Wi-Fi goes down

00:09:43: or whatever.

00:09:43: Really?

00:09:43: Where's it lost?

00:09:44: It's lost in the seventy two hours after the event.

00:09:47: Oh!

00:09:47: The follow up.

00:09:48: Yeah

00:09:48: The moment completely dies when all those hard-earned badge scans just sit in a spreadsheet waiting for cleanup while the very first follow up email goes out like five days late.

00:09:58: Right, and by then the prospect has totally forgotten who you are.

00:10:02: Jerry Abiyog had a fantastic strategy for this.

00:10:04: he said we have to stop measuring badge scans and start measuring remembered conversations.

00:10:09: I love that phrasing remembered conversations right?

00:10:11: A contact only becomes a relationship when you remember specific nuances Like oh!

00:10:16: This prospects favorite bourbon is Maker's Mark or they love this specific football team.

00:10:21: Because if you just scan a badge, it's just the name?

00:10:23: Exactly!

00:10:24: It is like going on an incredible highly engaging first date and then sending generic to whom-it may concern text message five days later.

00:10:33: Oh that's brutal but its so true.

00:10:35: The magic is entirely in personalized details.

00:10:38: You have capture immediately before memory fades And

00:10:41: use tech voice to text into CRM.

00:10:44: second prospect walks away.

00:10:46: completely automate the busy work so you can focus on the human connection.

00:10:50: Which actually leads to a final, slightly provocative thought I want leave all with.

00:10:54: inspired by Amanda Crawford's post

00:10:56: This was great take away It

00:10:58: really is!

00:10:59: So everyone right now talking about what AI will replace but Amanda suggests we should look at it makes more valuable and what make infinitely more valueable is Human Interaction

00:11:09: Because as AI handles all those repetitive workflows, the lead scoring.

00:11:12: The CRM cleanup it makes human trust so much more critical.

00:11:17: Exactly what if that ultimate event strategy for the future isn't about outtouching?

00:11:22: The competition on the floor?

00:11:24: What if it's about using tech just enough in the background So you can be relentlessly authentically Human when you are face-to-face with your buyer?

00:11:32: I mean that is the whole game right there.

00:11:34: really

00:11:36: Well, if you enjoyed this episode and new episodes drop every two weeks also check out our other editions on account-based marketing.

00:11:42: go to market channel marketing MarTech social selling And AI in B to be marketing.

00:11:47: Thanks for tuning in everyone.

00:11:49: Yes

00:11:49: Thank You so much for joining us on this deep dive.

00:11:51: make sure to subscribe and we will catch you next time.