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Thriving in Challenging Financial Times

Estimated Reading Time: 2 minutes Why visionary leaders see opportunity when others see challenges. It’s officially here. 2022 ushered in the first US economic recession since 2009. So how should you, as a business leader, respond?  The data says, quickly and decisively, if you’re to take advantage of this opportunity and limit risk.  Marketing leadership’s outlook. In their annual Pulse Survey, PwC provided a glimpse into how other CMOs and Marketing leaders view their organizations' challenges as we enter an environment we haven’t experienced since 2009.  On average, marketing leaders had a 10% bleaker outlook on how the macroeconomic environment would impact their company across all categories compared to their C-suite colleagues. The top concerns reported were tax policy changes,…

How CMOs Can Emerge Stronger During an Economic Downturn

Estimated Reading Time: 2 minutes According to Gartner, 70% of companies don’t regain their pre-recession growth levels in the 3-years following a recession, and only 5% of companies consistently achieve profitable growth above their competitors coming out of recession (simultaneously growing revenue and profit margin quarter-to-quarter). These are staggering numbers. The question is, WHY? Analysts like McKinsey have deemed that digital leaders are 3x more likely to achieve above-industry revenue and margin growth during a recession. But what defines a ‘digital leader’ and how, during a recession, do you pivot to achieve these necessary accelerations that allow you not just to survive but thrive? What is a Digital Leader? Digital transformation is the adoption of digital technology to improve efficiency,…

Sales & Marketing Alignment in Today’s 4D Environment

Oct 6, 2022

Why Labs Need Interactive Digital Tools to Handle Rapid Change

Lab Design Tool Gone are the days when clinical labs had to rarely or with long timeframes make changes to the configuration of their workspaces. Today, frequent and rapid change to clinical lab workspaces is the rule and not the exception. Skilled labor shortages. Rapid advances in assay development and authorization. Innovations in instrument technologies. Dynamic and variable demand for unpredictable volumes of tests. Changing requirements for sample and consumable storage environments. Evolving safety standards and protocols. Lab operations managers are facing these challenges and more in the market, leading to a need for new ways to manage and configure labs. With constant change and new requirements, lab operations and configurations must be prepared to adapt. Lab managers need to plan for…

Missed Opportunities at AABB 2022

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes Our thoughts are with the residents of the communities impacted by Hurricane Ian. The cancellation of the AABB 2022 Annual Meeting, due to extremely unfortunate circumstances, sent exhibitors, sponsors, and attendees scrambling. After two years of virtual trade shows and events due to the global pandemic, we are getting back to traveling for in-person, face-to-actual-face events finally. Now, this. If we have learned anything from the past two years, it’s that we hope for the best and plan for the worst, which means always having a business continuity plan (in this case, an event continuity plan) in place. Virtual Product Demos – It’s Past Time for A Contingency Plan Did you know that the number…

ITSMA | Marketing Vision 2022 – The Year of Marketing Enablement

Sep 29, 2022

Harnessing the Flow State to Increase Buyer Engagement

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes By now, we all know there is no benefit to multitasking – though it’s often necessary – it hampers productivity and knowledge retention. But, have we learned to focus on a single task?  Maybe, you have experienced a condition known as a flow state. When your mind focuses on one task, you are at your most creative and most capable of retaining what you learn. So, how does this apply to the buying and selling process? Your buyer’s world is full of distractions – some welcoming, but most counterproductive. As the day progresses, these distractions can lead to directed attention fatigue, an overall lack of interest due to mental fatigue. Mental fatigue leads to decreased…

Overcoming the Elevator Pitch: Buying into the Buyer Experience

Estimated Reading Time: 5 minutes Before technology became ubiquitous in every aspect of life, the buyer-seller relationship was much more of an even exchange. The door-to-door knife salesperson would demonstrate how their cutting solutions could slice through an empty can of cola and point out how the old, outdated implement you were holding couldn’t. There would be the talk of a singular pain point, a singular solution, and a price point. It was personal. It was relevant. Or perhaps you’ve heard of the “elevator pitch,” where the seller has about 30 seconds to quickly sell you a product (or a screenplay or a shoe-shine), and you’re presented with two options: shake hands to seal the deal, or walk off at…

Transcending Old Sales Patterns: 5 Advantages of Virtual Events

Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutes In recent years, virtual events have made their importance known. While first used for convenience, then out of necessity, long-lasting benefits were made clear through the continued use of virtual events as part of an engagement marketing strategy. A buyer’s takeaway from traditional events (walking from booth to booth or room to room) doesn’t necessarily have a long-lasting impression and there is a significant cost required.  Travel, in-person networking, pounding the expo floor, and decision fatigue – not to mention all those emails piling up in their inboxes – can keep potential buyers from retaining the information they want to take home with them. Sales strategies benefit from including a digital presence. While not necessarily…

Engagement Vs. Disruption in B2B Marketing

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes An unfortunate reality for engagement marketing is that a long-term strategy is a hard sell to a client that wanted results yesterday. Conversely, a flash-in-the-pan strategy is often an easy sell.  But quick fixes are not viable long-term solutions. While urgency and execution may be needed up front, we need to think about both depth and distance for continued results over time. A solid marketing strategy should be seen as a marathon and not a sprint. Agility over long periods of time will always have a stronger ROI over a reactive focus on the now. So you’ve found your audience. Now what? We’ve seen disruptive marketing technologies and tactics be the hero of the day…

Demand for B2B Engagement Selling Soars

Kaon Interactive Surpasses Growth Milestones MAYNARD, Mass., Aug. 15, 2022 -- With enterprise selling seeing its biggest paradigm shifts in decades, Fortune 1000 B2B companies have unprecedented demand for technology and platforms that enable complex storytelling and sales in hybrid work environments. As the leading interactive B2B sales and marketing customer engagement platform, Kaon Interactive has reached historic growth milestones throughout 2021-2022 in its efforts to simplify complex selling in an increasingly complex environment for the world's largest companies in life sciences, manufacturing, IT and more. The launch of Kaon's LiveShare® solution at the beginning of 2022 as the first metaverse-driven B2B sales collaboration tool has accelerated growth. LiveShare changes everyone's role from observer to active participant during virtual meetings by enabling real-time, multi-user, interactive collaboration.…

Hybrid Customer Engagement Strategies for 2023 Omnichannel Selling

Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutes The B2B buying environment has drastically changed over the past few years, so our content and digital collaboration strategies must change with changing buyer expectations. The most important difficulty to overcome is keeping your customer engaged with you throughout their buying process to discover the value your solution offers. To do this, you need to make your content available to them whenever and wherever they are looking for it.  Realign digital marketing strategies to meet buyer expectations If the pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that sellers have benefited by pivoting to a multi-channel, strategically hybrid environment. With potential buyers wanting to take the reins on their own experience, delivering highly engaging, value-driven content and…

Why 3D Virtual Demonstrations Help Sellers and Buyers

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes Innovative products and solutions benefit from innovative demonstrations. An interactive virtual 3D product demonstration enables your sales team to get prospective buyers interested and engaged with your solution in a way that’s both practical and reliable. It is also an effective way to address the prospect's specific product-related concerns in real-time while acquiring important information from the buyer. Amplify your marketing strategy and your sales through virtual demonstrations Virtual demonstrations allow for interaction that may not exist with the physical product itself. Enhanced access to products can offer differentiated value to buyers and secure or increase deals you may have lost otherwise. Interactive 3D product tours are photo-realistic and animated to mimic the physical product…

Win More Deals with Sales and Marketing Alignment

Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutes Image Credit: Austin Chan, Unsplash We all have heard the jargon about sales and marketing alignment. It’s one of the latest B2B terms everyone is talking about and writing into objectives. It’s urgent.  But, what does it even mean? Why is it so important? How do marketing and sales leaders find this rainbow unicorn that is sales and marketing alignment? How do you know when you’re there?   What is Sales and Marketing Alignment? “Sales and marketing alignment is a shared system of communication, strategy, and goals that enable marketing and sales to operate as a unified organization. Working together, aligned teams can deliver high-impact marketing activities, boost sales effectiveness, and ultimately grow revenue.” -- Highspot…

Lab Design Tool (LDT) Training Videos and FAQ

LDT Training Videos Whether you are a seller or marketer using Kaon's Lab Design Tool for sales effectiveness or you manage a range of agile lab spaces, these videos will guide you in how to optimize the use of your LDT application. Note that your specific version of LDT may look slightly different and may or may not have all the features in the training videos below. LDT Frequently Asked Questions Do you have a question about the Kaon Lab Design Tool that you don't see here? Email it to David, LDT product manager, and he will provide your answer.