Marcom B2B or not to be, that is the question...

As this recession lingers like a bronchitis, robbing oxygen and decision-making willpower from many B2B organizations, marketing communication managers are in an especially unhealthy situation. The problem for many of these professionals is that they have dug themselves into holes, or roles, they can't easily climb out of now.

"Marcom" and "marketing communications" have become insider terms seldom used outside of marcom office cubicles. Marcom has become a mysterious cost center, tolerated due to its vague connection to sales; and as anyone in sales will tell you, the real action happens a safe distance down the hall from marcom, in the offices of the CEO and the VP of Sales, where plans for next year's growth have been well underway, with little thought as to the relevance of marcom.

This new level of endangerment is what every marcom manager needs.
It is certainly what every B2B company needs.

Marketing and branding communications are essential to business growth, because they are essential to building internal value definition and external value recognition. They are the tools an organization uses to become a preferred brand, to reach its full potential and to stop selling itself short.

But such progress requires change on both sides: Top management and marcom managers alike, are challenged to at last put "marketing" into the marcom equation: Marketing, as in the creation of customers, not the creation of routine marcom tactics and expenses.

It's time for marcom managers to stand up, walk down the hall and get in the game. CEOs and VPs of Sales must do the same.

jb
www.centrifuge-now.com