BtoB articles from October 2004

BtoB archives from October 2004

Senior execs see improvement ahead; Study shows decision-makers optimistic about their companies, global economy.(News)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: KATE MADDOX Senior corporate decision-makers are considerably more optimistic about their company and industry performance this year than they were last year, according to new research from Doremus and its client Financial Times....

Case Study: Sun 'blitzes' Web with ads for live Webcast.(NetMarketing)
October 11, 2004... Byline: Karen J. Bannan Getting click-through on a banner is challenging enough. Imagine how difficult it is to get someone to click through, sign up and attend a live, hour-long, online event. At Sun Microsystems' latest Web event,...

Rise in ad spending seen in Q4.(News)
October 11, 2004... Byline: KATE MADDOX Fourth-quarter ad spending is expected to be up this year over last, as many b-to-b advertisers launch ad campaigns for new products and reposition their brands. GE, Intel and Kodak are just a few advertisers...

Quote Unquote.(Opinion)(Businessblogconsulting.com)(Brief Article)
October 11, 2004... "On the one hand, [blogs] allow you to be as thorough as you can about your product and, on the other, you can form a level of trust with your individual voice.'' Rick E. Bruner, creator of Businessblogconsulting.com, on the marketing...

OgilvyOne captures ABM's Grand CEBA; Awards ceremony held in conjunction with huge Advertising Week festivities in New York City.(News)(American Business Media)(Creative Excellence in Business Advertising awards)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: KATE MADDOX OgilvyOne Worldwide last month won the Grand Creative Excellence in Business Advertising (CEBA) Award from American Business Media for a campaign for client FM Global. The agency received the award at a ceremony...

Cut to the Chase: Print.(Chasers)(Nokia USA)(Brief Article)
October 11, 2004... Company: Nokia USA, Irving, Texas Agency: Grey, San Francisco Market: Information technology Quick chase: Server manufacturers face the unenviable challenge of making their black boxes look visually appealing. Most of the ads for the low-slung...

October 1944: To quote Emerson; Hindsight A b-to-b time capsule.(Opinion)(Brief Article)
October 11, 2004... Long-time Industrial Marketing columnist Keith J. Evans cited a line by Ralph Waldo Emerson in addressing a reader's concerns about a competitor's exaggerated claims for its equipment: "We do not believe that it ever pays to exaggerate or...

By Design.(NetMarketing)(www.bostonscientific.com)(Brief Article)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: Nadine Youssef Company: Boston Scientific, Natick, Mass. Web site: www.bostonscientific.com Agency: AKQA, London Launch date: Initial launch in January 2002, with ongoing updates and subsequent addition of several...

Return to spending; Direct marketers feeling the pressure from spam filters and the do not call list are going back to basics with a big increase expected in traditional direct mail.(Direct Marketing Special Report)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: Carol Krol Direct marketing spending is on the rise for many in the industry, which is welcome news, but the real excitement is centered around good old-fashioned direct mail. Despite indications that direct mail has taken a...

Guest Column: Online advertising lessons learned.(NetMarketing)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: Andy Sims Over the years, we've focused on helping our b-to-b clients capture more leads-and eventual sales-from online marketing. In each case we found that if you map the message, offer and media to each stage of the customer's...

Surround them with brand.(Opinion)(immersion branding)(marketing campaigns of business enterprises)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: Ed King Imagine if you could spend a fraction of what the largest companies spend on their marketing campaigns yet still create as much exposure to your target market. It's possible with a method I call "immersion branding.'' ...

Marketers join the blogging dialogue.(News)(Microsoft's new website Channel 9)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: SEAN CALLAHAN If you don't believe in the power of Weblogs, ask Dan Rather. The CBS anchorman found his journalistic reputation in tatters after several blogs helped expose as forgeries the documents Rather used on a ''60...

MRM Partners Worldwide landed consolidated Microsoft account, expanded into services.(Direct Marketing Special Report)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: KATE MADDOX MRM Partners Worldwide, the relationship marketing agency of McCann Erickson Worldgroup, has been named BtoB's Direct Agency of the Year based on its growth in b-to-b business, new client wins, outstanding campaigns and...

Hooray for Hollywood ads that know showbiz.(Chasers)
October 11, 2004... Beneath the glamorous veneer of show business is some serious business-to-business. Paging through the trade books read by Hollywood's producers, directors, distributors et al., we found that the smart marketers seemed especially conscious of...

Goat or Gloat.(Chasers)(Brief Article)
October 11, 2004... Company: Sony Corp. of America, New York Agency: N/A Market: Value-added resellers Quick chase: Granted, Sony is selling an entire line of projectors in this ad, but the problem is the reader doesn't get a good look at any of them. A series of...

Reaching customers the right way.(Opinion)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: Ellis Booker `You can't do in subject lines what you can do with imaging and direct mail packages,'' says David Hughes, manager of database marketing for Canon USA. Hughes, who is quoted in this issue's comprehensive Direct...

Cut to the Chase: Television.(Chasers)(Brief Article)
October 11, 2004... Company: Konica Minolta Printing Solutions USA, Mobile, Ala. Agency: Cronin & Co., Glastonbury, Conn. Market: Information technology Quick chase: It's the dialog between two co-workers that carries the day in this well-produced, 30-second spot....

CMOs losing influence at the executive table; CMO Council report outlines how to use metrics to bolster credibility.(News)(marketing performance measurement)(Chief Marketing Officer)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: SEAN CALLAHAN In the wake of the branding fiascoes of the dot-com bubble, marketing departments at technology companies are losing their place at the "executive table,'' according to a report released Friday by the CMO Council. ...

Investment firm to acquire Thomson Media.(News)(Brief Article)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: SEAN CALLAHAN Investcorp, a global investment company, announced Friday that it won the auction for Thomson Corp.'s Thomson Media properties with a bid of $350 million in cash. The deal for Thomson Media, publisher of Bond...

Online ad sales expected to keep growing in '05; Double-digit increase for record third quarter in a row surpasses '90s boom.(Advertising)
October 11, 2004... Byline: KATE MADDOX There was good news for the online ad industry at Interactive Advertising World last month: Internet ad revenue reached $4.6 billion in the first half of 2004, up 39.7% over the first half of 2003. The Internet ad...

Case Study: Lanier takes on 'The last frontier'.(Vertical Insight: Health Care)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: ROGER SLAVENS Though health care providers spend considerable amounts of money handling documents-everything from sensitive patient records to insurance claim forms-Lanier Worldwide discovered in a series of focus groups that...

Is there a doctor in the house? Physicians, medical institutions now more business-savvy in wake of managed care.(Vertical Insight: Health Care)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: ROGER SLAVENS Most industries still have far to go to rebound from the economic downturn of the past three years. That's not the case with the health care industry, which by most accounts is recession-proof and has been posting...

Industry Outlook: Focus messaging to docs on cost, time benefits; Sarah Wilcox, Senior VP, group account director, Draft.(Vertical Insight: Health Care)(Interview)
October 11, 2004... Byline: Roger Slavens Having worked for more than 20 years as a marketing executive and management consultant for biotechnology companies and hospitals, Sarah Wilcox brought significant expertise in the health care field when she joined...

Quick Hits; 'Wall Street Journal' plans 'Weekend Edition'.(Briefs)
October 11, 2004... Dow Jones & Co.'s The Wall Street Journal announced it will begin publishing a "Weekend Edition,'' starting next year on Saturday, Sept. 10. The edition will include business news as well as a new section, "Pursuits,'' which is intended to...

Study quantifies bottom-line value of loyalty.(News)(Column)
October 11, 2004... Byline: CAROL KROL The link between loyal customers and an IT vendor's balance sheet is quantified in a new report by research company Walker Information. The study, published last month, found that nine IT brands deemed "loyalty leaders''...

Canon develops sales through traditional mail.(Direct Marketing Special Report)(Canon USA)
October 11, 2004... Byline: CAROL KROL Score one for traditional direct mail. Canon USA has found the medium far more popular and more effective than e-mail when marketing its office equipment to new and existing customers. "The traditional approach is...

Correction.(Corrections)
October 11, 2004... An incorrect figure for Cisco Systems' b-to-b ad spending in 2003 was published in the Sept. 13 issue ("IDC: Tech spending on the way back up,'' page 1; "Top Advertisers Special Report,'' page 23). Cisco spent about $60 million on b-to-b...

Direct marketing services consolidation heats up; With more money to spend, firms are making strategic acquisitions.(Direct Marketing Special Report)
October 11, 2004... Byline: BETH SNYDER BULIK Acquisitions in the marketing services industry cost money-lots of it. From 2001 through the beginning of last year, client belt-tightening left few extra dollars for intra-industry purchases. But now, with the...

7 ways to make online advertising work for you.(NetMarketing)
October 11, 2004... Byline: Karen J. Bannan It's official: The online advertising world is in love with search engine and e-mail marketing. In fact, they are expected to grow more than 41% and 25%, respectively, this year. In contrast, the use of banner ads,...

Taking content seriously as a marketing tool.(Opinion)
October 11, 2004... Byline: Jay Habegger B-to-b marketing professionals, including those in the technology industry, routinely rate content-driven activities, such as their Web site, Webcasts and white papers, as their most effective means of generating...

Beyond the Biz; AAF to celebrate centennial in '05.(Briefs)(American Advertising Federation)
October 11, 2004... The American Advertising Federation (AAF), Washington, D.C., turns 100 next year. The group is the longest-running advertising trade association. Special 100th anniversary versions of its signature programs-such as the Advertising Hall of Fame...

Guest Column: Winning over the small-business owner.(Direct Marketing Special Report)
October 11, 2004... Byline: Laurence Boschetto There were 23 million small businesses in the U.S. last year employing half of all private sector employees. While a small business is independent, with fewer than 500 employees, who is a small-business owner,...

Mercor constructs new foundation with merger; Small publisher follows bigger firms' lead in adding information services.(Business Media)(Mercor acquires ZweigWhite)
October 11, 2004... Byline: SEAN CALLAHAN It's no secret that business media companies are striving to limit their dependence on cyclical advertising revenue by attempting to increase subscription fee-based products. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the...

OgilvyOne's stellar b-to-b run.(Direct Marketing Special Report)
October 11, 2004... Byline: KATE MADDOX OgilvyOne North America has had a stellar run of late, winning new business, growing revenue and launching successful campaigns for b-to-b clients. The agency is the direct marketing business unit of Ogilvy...

Marketers hold line on spending, boost measurement.(Direct Marketing Special Report)(Panel Discussion)
October 11, 2004... Refining marketing techniques, selectively targeting the most profitable customers and measuring campaign effectiveness were common themes that emerged during a roundtable discussion BtoB hosted last month at the Direct Marketing Association's...

SAP ads debunk mid-market myths.(Top Marketers)(Brief Article)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Beth Snyder Bulik In 2004, when SAP set out to focus on mid-market business customers, it started with an initiative to dispel some misconceptions this target audience seemed to have about SAP. Enter SAP's "Myth Busters'' marketing...

Xerox focuses on services, consulting.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Mary Ellen Podmolik Two years after repositioning the company's image, Xerox Corp. capped its efforts in September by altering its logo and dropping the 10-year-old "The document company'' tagline. The change recognized that...

IBM's strategy keeps it in and on demand.(Top Brands)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Kate Maddox IBM Corp., which was called a "big blue dinosaur'' in the 1999 Fortune 500 issue, ranked third in this year's BusinessWeek/Interbrand report on top global brands, demonstrating a remarkable ability to turn its brand...

Brand gives Intel inside track.(Top Brands)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Kate Maddox Intel Corp. has turned its unique brand challenge--being a parts manufacturer--into an asset with its long-standing "Intel inside" slogan. The company, which was founded in 1968 and introduced its first...

Merrill ads show unit's unique approach.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Sean Callahan In early October, Merrill Lynch & Co.'s Global Markets & Investment banking group launched its first advertising campaign in six years. The campaign debuted in The Wall Street Journal, BusinessWeek and elsewhere. ...

Google sees brand as key to expansion.(Top Brands)(Column)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Carol Krol Google has always done things its own way, zigging when others zagged. And its brand-building efforts, going back to day one in 1998, have been no exception. "The simplicity of the Google experience [for users] was...

CDW research segments audience once, then twice.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Mary Ellen Podmolik For CDW Chief Marketing Officer Diane Primo, it all boils down to customer segmentation. If CDW gains better insight into its customers, the technology seller can better manage contact with them and forge a...

UPS promotes commerce, supply-chain capabilities.(Top Marketers)(United Parcel Service)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Mary Ellen Podmolik The marketing mission for UPS in 2004 was to aptly market a broader set of capabilities that go along with its new slogan "Synchronizing the world of commerce.'' To reinforce that message with multiple...

Verizon bolsters broadband services.(Top Marketers)(Brief Article)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Beth Snyder Bulik Broadband capabilities got a lot of attention this year in the revived telecommunications industry, and Verizon, the No. 1 business-to-business advertiser in 2003, took a lead in 2004 in creating marketing and...

Dell emphasizes servers and service.(Top Brands)(Michael George)(BrandX)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Roger Slavens Since its inception in 1984, Dell Inc. has striven to become synonymous with value and reliability in the PC industry. The company struck gold with the "Dell Dude,'' who first appeared in the company's TV spots in...

Office Depot targets small-business sector.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Beth Snyder Bulik Small business meant big business for Office Depot in 2004. In May, the company decided to take Small Business Week to the next level by using it as an opportunity to launch a major integrated ad campaign. ...

Microsoft unifies marketing messages.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Kate Maddox Mike Delman, general manager of advertising and events at Microsoft Corp., had a goal for 2004: Keep it simple. That's a big challenge for a company as large and diverse as Microsoft, which had a reported 2003...

Winner: FedEx; Agency: BBDO New York.(Best Creative)
October 25, 2004... Small business is serious stuff, but sometimes it's downright comic, says Steve Pacheco, director of advertising for FedEx. In a campaign to launch the FedEx Kinko's Office and Print Centers, the company used a series of hilarious slices of...

Top Brands.(Brief Article)
October 25, 2004... Our selections of the top b-to-b brands include the long-standing (Pfizer was founded in 1849 and American Express Co. the following year) and the fast-rising (Google was started in 1998). What all 10 of these companies have in common are...

A spoonful of branding helps Pfizer.(Top Brands)(Column)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Roger Slavens It's a difficult time to be a pharmaceutical marketer. Drug ads have come under fire from as high up as presidential nominee U.S. Senator John Kerry. Some drugs themselves-such as Merck's recently pulled arthritis...

Accenture turns to Tiger for global marketing effort.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Mary Ellen Podmolik Four years ago, a strike by the Screen Actors Guild interfered with James Murphy's handshake agreement with Tiger Woods to use the golfer in ads touting the company's rebranding. Murphy, who led Accenture's...

Intel connects by emphasizing simple use of complicated technology.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Kate Maddox Don MacDonald, VP-sales and marketing group and director of worldwide branding and campaigns at Intel Corp., is responsible for all of the company's marketing operations worldwide, including global branding,...

Pitney 'Centers' centralize marketing across business units.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Carol Krol Pitney Bowes overhauled its entire marketing and advertising strategy in 2003, for the first time in nearly two decades, including a multimedia ad campaign from Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide, with VP-CMO Arun Sinha at the...

Siebel found a way to speak to its customers: become one.(Top Marketers)(Brief Article)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Beth Snyder Bulik One of Siebel Systems' goals for 2004 was to demonstrate a model marketing organization. So Siebel used itself as an example and began showing customers and prospects how it effectively used its own software...

United Technologies builds on momentum.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Kate Maddox George Jamison, who joined United Technologies Corp. in 2002 as VP-communications, had the challenge of continuing a rebranding campaign for the company that was launched in the fourth quarter of 2003. The campaign,...

Runner-up: American Airlines Cargo; Agency: McKinney-Silver, Durham, N.C.(Best Creative)(Brief Article)
October 25, 2004... Precious cargo in the form of a blue-tinted rose with a delicate green stem stretching from Bogota to Tokyo is so arresting that it deserves a longer look. It's so subtle, so simple. It's an ad for American Airlines Cargo that seems to fly...

Celebrating the best in b-to-b marketing.(From The Editor)(Editorial)
October 25, 2004... Byline: ELLIS BOOKER Welcome to the inaugural issue of BtoB's Best 2004: Top Marketers, Brands, Creative. This special issue presents our selections for the top b-to-b brands, the year's best creative (integrated campaign, TV, print...

GE continues to develop 'imagination'.(Top Brands)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Sean Callahan For almost two decades, the General Electric Co. brand was embodied by company chairman-CEO Jack Welch, who delivered quarterly results that sated Wall Street. The GE that Jack built was cobbled together through...

Dell sees continued success with DM.(Top Marketers)(Direct Marketing)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Carol Krol Twenty-year-old Dell continues to market its PCs and an array of products and services using the direct marketing model with which it built its reputation. While that process has been paired with consistent branding, it...

GE's Comstock leads campaign to strengthen brand worldwide.(Top Marketers)(Beth Comstock)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Kate Maddox Beth Comstock, who was named CMO at General Electric Co. last year and named BtoB's marketer of the year in 2003, led an innovative marketing growth initiative at GE this year called Imagination Breakthroughs. The...

Runner-up: IBM Corp. Agency: Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide, New York.(Best Creative)(Brief Article)
October 25, 2004... The demands of a fast-paced, ever-changing business environment seem more manageable in a series of spots promoting IBM Corp.'s "On Demand'' concept. The spots-all appearing in the familiar IBM blue letterbox format-pitch more than just...

Winner: eBay Business; Agency: Slack Barshinger, Chicago.(Best Creative)
October 25, 2004... People running a small business need to make a dime work like a dollar: People like Randy Will, owner of Nevole's Pizzeria in Sandy, Utah. "I've purchased $30,000 worth of equipment-a freezer, ice machine, tables, seating and even my...

`BtoB' Best Awards.(Best Creative)(Brief Article)
October 25, 2004... Creative excellence in b-to-b advertising is celebrated once again this year with our BtoB Best Awards. Formerly known as the Sawyer Awards, BtoB Best honors are given out in four categories: integrated campaign, TV, print and interactive....

Winner: DHL; Agency: Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide, New York.(Best Creative)
October 25, 2004... In a challenger campaign as bold as its new yellow and red corporate colors, DHL picked a fight with FedEx Corp. and United Parcel Service of America to let U.S. businesses know that it too can deliver. DHL's integrated campaign takes on...

American Express OPEN gets real.(Top Brands)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Sean Callahan American Express Co. launched its small-business services unit in 1987, but by the end of the 1990s, the company believed that its marketing message had become too similar to those of all the other companies that were...

Look what brown has done for UPS.(Top Brands)(United Parcel Service)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Sean Callahan For most people, United Parcel Service of America's brown trucks and brown-uniformed drivers embody the company's brand. But UPS has spent the last several years, quietly at first, waging a campaign to extend its...

IBM makes the most of many media.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Kate Maddox As VP-worldwide integrated marketing communications for IBM Corp., Lisa Baird is responsible for all strategic brand, product and services advertising at IBM, as well as media, direct, interactive, events and...

JPMorgan capitalizes on name.(Top Brands)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Sean Callahan How strong is the JPMorgan brand? Not many brands that date back to 1862 can endure mergers with two powerful and more modern brands, but that's exactly what JPMorgan did. In fact, when Chase Manhattan Corp. agreed to...

eBay makes big push for small-business market.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Beth Snyder Bulik About two years ago, eBay executives were surprised to note that small-business owners were using eBay for capital equipment buying and selling. And not just in typical categories such as computers and office...

BT revamps brand after restructuring.(Top Marketers)(Column)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Beth Snyder Bulik BT Group came out of the millennium with more than a few broken parts. Its Concert effort to offer global communication services in conjunction with AT&T Corp. had dissolved, its debt load was overwhelming and its...

Hewlett-Packard + Johnson = results; Marketer of the Year.(Top Marketers)(Column)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Kate Maddox Allison Johnson, senior VP of corporate marketing at Hewlett-Packard Co., has been named the BtoB Marketer of the Year for leading innovative enterprise marketing efforts at HP, including a major new b-to-b campaign,...

HP demonstrates power of partnerships.(Top Brands)(Hewlett-Packard)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Kate Maddox Hewlett-Packard Co., which was started in 1939 in a Palo Alto, Calif., garage by Stanford University classmates Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard, has retained its legacy of inventiveness through changes in the business...

Avaya establishes position as a leader in IP telephony.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Beth Snyder Bulik Avaya has a long history of brand strength, being spun out from under the brand powerhouses of AT&T and then Lucent Technologies. However, it is still a "newbie'' itself with only four years of marketing under the...

FedEx campaign touts new unit.(Top Marketers)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Mary Ellen Podmolik Marketers at FedEx had little time this year to heed their own 2003 slogan and relax. With the acquisition of Kinko's completed in February, Laurie Tucker, senior VP-global marketing, and her team had to...

DHL's bold drive against bigger competitors.(Top Marketers)(DHL Americas)
October 25, 2004... Byline: Mary Ellen Podmolik Richard Metzler, exec VP-marketing for DHL Americas, enjoys the freedom that comes with being an underdog, like being able to talk about, even take jabs at, the competition. [The DHL campaign is the winner of...

Winner: American Express; Agency: Digitas, New York.(Best Creative)
October 25, 2004... Small-business owner, renowned LA hair stylist and reality TV star Jonathan Antin was the big draw, but visitors weren't clicking through to a special Web site for American Express Open to get hair-care tips. They were looking for ways to...

Runner-up: Palm Treo; Agency: AKQA, San Francisco.(Best Creative)(Brief Article)
October 25, 2004... Although the product is all whistles and bells, the interactive ad is all simplicity and elegance. In a narrow tower-style ad, the palmOne Treo 600 wireless handheld glides gracefully across the field of white. Above it appears the...

Expert insight.(Top Brands)
October 25, 2004... We asked industry experts at three prominent brand consultancies for their insights into the strengths and challenges of each of our top 10 brands. Comments from Jim Gregory, CEO, CoreBrand; Al Ries, chairman, Ries & Ries; and Hayes Roth,...

Runner-up: Hewlett-Packard Co. Agency: Goodby Silverstein, San Francisco.(Best Creative)(Brief Article)
October 25, 2004... It's a lament expressed by businesspeople around the globe: Change is happening too quickly. "The consistent message we heard in our research from businesspeople in four regions of the world was that things were moving very quickly and...