Building the Next Generation of Modern B2B Marketers

There’s no question that B2B marketing has become increasingly complex and sophisticated. To keep up with it all, today’s top marketers have also become more complex and sophisticated. They possess a wide range of skills that blur the lines between marketing, product, brand, sales, and analytics.

With all of these layers and specialties to consider, we at Flawless Inbound started to build a different model of skill set, and we'd like to share what you should be looking for to build a proper B2B marketing team for your organization.

You need to make sure that your Marketing Department has the following skills:
Business First, Marketing Second.

They contribute beyond marketing and know how to convert marketing lingo into terminology the CEO cares about. They focus on business metrics (MRR, net dollar/logo retention, and customer satisfaction) more than vanity metrics (CTRs, impressions, etc.).

Data: They make decisions based on data, not just on feeling. They understand how they'll measure impact before they enact change (and what the next set of experiments will be).

Collaboration: They serve as shuttle diplomats with low egos, not lone wolves. They know how to work well with sales, product, engineering, and operations.

Repeatability with Scale: “Nail it and scale it” is their mantra. This applies to their processes, technologies, and teams.

Innovation: They contribute to how the business will win tomorrow, not just today. (Note: some tension exists between innovation and repeatability, find the right balance).

Customer: They always have a pulse on the customer and are constantly honing in on an ideal buyer persona profile. They can orchestrate the whole customer experience from awareness to education, from usage to advocacy and they know when to leverage other teams’ expertise.

Accountability: They share a revenue number with sales and understand the importance of a tight marketing to sales handoff.

Technology: They build the marketing technology stack to automate, scale and optimize marketing efficiency. They evaluate new technologies with a level head and don’t succumb to the shiny object syndrome.

Content: They understand the power of content and can empower a team to build a content engine to educate and engage, not just sell.

Brand: They understand the role of brand in fuelling growth. They can build product positioning, messaging, and industry marketing.