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B2B marketing, at its’ most effective, requires a balance of inbound marketing and outbound marketing.

Business will try to squeeze more out of limited marketing and advertising budgets in 2011. The MarketingSherpa 2011 B2B Marketing Benchmark Report examined which marketing tactics work – which don’t – and identifies trends which may separate winners and losers in the competitive B2B space.

This caught my eye: A chart showing the effectiveness of 11 different marketing tactics from most effective to least effective:

1. Website design, management and optimization (inbound marketing)
2. Virtual events / webinars (inbound marketing)
3. Email marketing (inbound marketing)
4. Search engine optimization (SEO) (inbound marketing)
5. Telemarketing (outbound marketing)
6. Public Relations (outbound marketing)
7. Tradeshows (outbound marketing)
8. Paid search (PPC) (inbound marketing)
9. Direct mail (outbound marketing)
10. Social Media (inbound marketing)
11. Print Advertising (outbound marketing)

“The growing trend of utilizing inbound marketing tactics is demonstrated in the list where the top four tactics are generally inbound in nature and two of the three least effective tactics are outbound,” according to the report’s executive summary.

“Social media is undervalued in terms of effectiveness and this is a result of the infancy of this marketing tactic and the low level of experience organizations have in execution when compared to more seasoned marketing tactics. As B2B marketers become more mature with their social marketing practices, their perceptions on the effectiveness of this tactic will improve,” MarketingSherpa concluded.

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