Outbound telemarketing’s place in modern lead nurturing

If you’ve been playing Buzzword Bingo at any time during the past 12 months, you know you can score the easy win with “social media,” “digital marketing” or even “tweet.” If social media is so wonderful, why would B-to-B marketers want to continue with the more traditional model of making outbound telephone calls? Is outbound telemarketing still a viable option for driving business marketing success?

While it might seem an easy fix to cut a more expensive channel such as outbound telemarketing, the intrinsic value and potential for ROI continues to make it an effective choice for B-to-B marketers today…Read More »

New York, NY, June 20, 2011 – KBM Group, the global leader in knowledge-based marketing solutions, announced its latest marketing optimization tool, the Digital Neighborhoods® 2.0 Segmentation Suite. This new service was showcased at All for One, The Integrated Marketing Summit, presented by DM Days and the Direct Marketing Association at the Hilton New York, June 20 and 21.

Digital Neighborhoods 2.0 is a rich and robust data suite that segments consumer audiences by their attitudes toward, adoption of, and ongoing engagement with all kinds of digital devices. It is a predictive tool marketers can use to identify consumers by their likely interest in and usage of digital devices, as well as to provide indicators of their level of digital sophistication.

Unique in its comprehensive analysis and detailed descriptions of consumers’ digital attitudes and behaviors, Digital Neighborhoods 2.0 allows marketers to better understand customers and prospects. With this customer intelligence, marketers can adjust messaging, offers and media channels by understanding:

• Why consumers chose the digital devices they use
• Whether they will re-purchase and/or upgrade
• If they are early technology adopters or more conservative
• What their digital activities are – professional, entertainment, educational, buying

A considerably expanded upgrade to KBM Group’s existing Digital Neighborhoods segmentation, Digital Neighborhoods 2.0 not only takes into account levels of technology sophistication, income and lifestyle (e.g., urban, rural, single, family) but also evaluates attitudes and behaviors across a comprehensive range of technologies and devices. For example, Digital Neighborhood 2.0 provides insights into consumer usage of: TV (e.g., cable, satellite, fiber optic); phone (e.g., landline vs. mobile, cell vs. smart phones, DSL, VOIP); Internet (e.g., DSL, dial-up, hot spot usage); personal computers; DVD, Blu-ray and MP3 players; gaming systems vs. online gaming.

Dennis Kooker, president and COO of KBM Group, notes, “With the proliferation of digital products in the marketplace, media and communications companies — as well as consumer electronics marketers — need improved customer intelligence across the variety of digital product offerings for better marketing management and performance. Our clients need more specific audience data about not only device usage but also about buyers’ technological sophistication and aspirations, cross referenced with their demographic profiles. Thanks to our extensive data assets, marketing and analytics expertise, and marketing technology, KBM Group is able to provide just such a segmentation suite with our new offering.”

The Marketing Benefits of 3-Tiered Approach
Instead of a single segmentation, the 3-tiered approach offers highly precise segments for improved customer intelligence, allowing marketers to deliver more relevant offers and messaging to consumers in their preferred media. Marketers can also use the Digital Neighborhoods 2.0 suite to segment their existing customer base and then identify top prospective new customers based on the resulting insights.

This highly customized approach to defining digital consumer segments has a wide appeal to a variety of marketers. Media and communications companies such as cable, TV and Internet providers, as well as consumer electronics and device manufacturers, can better understand when to target consumers with upgrades or new devices. Marketers selling online media will find relevant customer intelligence regarding content consumption.

Digital Neighborhoods 2.0 includes three distinct groups of consumer clusters:

• Digital Devices – Segments consumers by their level of sophistication and by their attitudes towards adopting other services and devices. Consumers are described as “basic,” “evolving,” or “highly evolved.” Based on 18 segments of AmeriLINK®, KBM Group’s highly reliable database known for its comprehensive consumer data coverage, this segment describes whether consumers subscribe to bundled services, how they purchase movies, the likelihood of their buying other services and products, and other details of their decisions regarding digital devices.
• Digital Destinations – Derived from click-stream data, this segment identifies consumers by their digital activity indicated by online destinations and behaviors – for example, whether their usage involves tasks, such as paying bills; research; shopping; online banking and financial services. Including 45 clusters in 15 groups, it also captures detailed information on social media, including Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and others.
• Digital Neighborhoods 2.0 – A combination of Digital Devices and Destinations, this high-level segment provides a multi-dimensional picture of consumers by how they are consuming which digital technologies, as well as likely future consumption.

About KBM Group
KBM Group is the global leader in knowledge-based marketing solutions. Expert in both digital and traditional direct marketing, KBM Group helps companies manage, analyze and optimize marketing data to engage more effectively with their customers and prospects. KBM Group’s integrated, world-class solutions include strategic consulting, digital services, database services, analytics, marketing management, response services and data. The company has 14 offices in nine countries serving global, enterprise and B2B2C-focused companies. KBM Group’s parent company, Wunderman is part of Young & Rubicam Brands and a member of WPP (NASDAQ: WPPGY). www.kbmg.com.

View Article»

Erin is asked every day: ”What is the best email frequency? How often is too often?” and her answer is invariably, “It depends.” Find out why she is right by reading this article by Blue Sky Factory:

View Article»

Jeff Yowell, President of DATACORE, notes, “Sarah fills a critical role in providing value-added response solutions for our clients based on a thorough understanding of their business to create strategic services that help them achieve their business goals. In addition, she serves as an ambassador to the companies we are affiliated with – KBM Group and Wunderman – to maximize collaboration, enhance growth and leverage deployment of our solutions throughout our company network.”

Throughout her career, McElwee has achieved high-performance results across various aspects of customer service and satisfaction and contact center operations, including technology integration, performance and quality improvement, program development and implementation, and planning. Prior to joining DATACORE, McElwee managed H&R Block service centers in Kansas City, Missouri and, most recently, Salt Lake City, where she was Vice President/General Manager. Before joining H&R Block in 2002, McElwee was with America Online, where she directed a team in one of six domestic call centers, and before that, Discover Card Services.

McElwee has a B.A. from Ohio Wesleyan University and holds Series 7 and Series 24 certifications from NASD/FINRA.

About DATACORE Marketing
DATACORE uncovers data insights to drive best-in-class marketing strategy that makes an impact on their clients’ businesses. The company delivers integrated multi-channel marketing solutions, its expertise as part of KBM Group, the global leader in knowledge-based marketing solutions. Expert in both digital and traditional direct marketing, KBM Group helps companies manage, analyze and optimize marketing data to engage more effectively with their customers and prospects. KBM Group’s integrated, world-class solutions include strategic consulting, digital services, database services, analytics, marketing management, response services, data and marketing outsourcing. The company has 14 offices in nine countries serving global, enterprise and B2B2C-focused companies. KBM Group’s parent company, Wunderman is part of Young & Rubicam Brands and a member of WPP (NASDAQ: WPPGY). www.kbmg.com.

According to the report, KBM Group consistently delivers strong service and gets positive feedback from its clients. The company delivers “strong capabilities across the array of database, analytics, data, strategy and operations.” The report further cited the fact that KBM Group had the highest percentage of clients responding that they are extremely satisfied with “the strategic contribution they make to our business.”

In addition to the category rankings, Forrester further recognized KBM Group as one of the leaders in the evaluation because of their analytical and strategic approach to the business, coupled with broad capability and strong delivery.

“We are extremely gratified to receive what we feel is an important validation of our capabilities,” said Gary S. Laben, KBM Group CEO. “We believe the ranking is a testament to the experience, quality and client-focused attitude of our team members. I am justifiably proud of each and every one of them and what they have accomplished for our clients.”

Forrester collected data from clients of the companies evaluated in this report by interviewing more than 40 reference clients and surveyed a further 137 clients in an online survey.

Since the research was conducted, at the end of the fourth quarter in 2010 KBM Group broadened its capabilities with two acquisitions, I-Behavior and Marketing Direct, Inc. (MDI).

Acquired in November, I-Behavior is a market leader in consumer and business transaction data. The company helps multi-channel merchants market more effectively through a cooperative database that includes over 8 billion SKU-level transactions. MDI, acquired in December, was merged with KBM Group’s healthcare business to create KBM Group: Health Services. This move broadens KBM Group’s existing products and services for the healthcare market, augmenting the company’s core capabilities with a wide array of agency services such as creative and media placement, including digital media channels.

About KBM Group
KBM Group is the global leader in knowledge-based marketing solutions. Expert in both digital and traditional direct marketing, KBM Group helps companies manage, analyze and optimize marketing data to engage more effectively with their customers and prospects. KBM Group’s integrated, world-class solutions include strategic consulting, digital services, database services, analytics, marketing management, response services, data and marketing outsourcing. The company has 14 offices in nine countries serving global, enterprise and B2B2C-focused companies. KBM Group’s parent company, Wunderman is part of Young & Rubicam Brands and a member of WPP (NASDAQ: WPPGY). www.kbmg.com.

Founded in 1997, MDI has been ranked one of America’s fastest-growing private companies by Inc. Magazine in its annual Inc. 5000 survey for 2008, 2009 and 2010. The company’s growth has been driven by providing direct and interactive marketing services primarily to the healthcare industry, but the company has experience in retail and financial services as well. MDI’s capabilities span marketing services end-to-end, including: consulting services, developing and optimizing direct market channels, facilitating the sales process through sales force automation, determining the best mix of online and offline media, performing analytics and testing to ensure results, developing creative campaigns from messages to branding, optimizing websites and online strategies, and media placement and execution. Providing these multichannel marketing services to targeted industries has given MDI industry-specific expertise that has allowed it to help its clients acquire millions of customers and engage them to improve healthcare outcomes.

With the combined strength of the acquisition, KBM Group is also officially announcing the launch of KBM Group: Health Services, a new business practice focused on improving how companies across the healthcare continuum engage with consumers and healthcare professionals. KBM Group: Health Services will immediately intensify its focus on helping organizations within the healthcare ecosystem create more meaningful engagements with consumers for the ultimate goal of improving healthcare outcomes while reducing the overall cost of healthcare services. Dennis Barnes, Jr., President & CEO of MDI, will become President, KBM Group: Health Services. The new unit will remain part of Enterprise Services within KBM Group.

“While KBM Group and MDI have been recognized and established leaders within healthcare for several years now, current and impending changes to healthcare require a more holistic approach to multi-channel engagement if we are to substantially reduce costs while improving outcomes,” says Dennis Kooker, KBM Group’s President & COO for Enterprise Services. “Combining KBM Group’s industry standards for data, analytics, and database services delivered through its Consumer Healthcare Engagement Platform (CHEP) with MDI’s expertise in blending creative content and program design with analytics was an obvious combination. MDI has also invested heavily within innovative digital channels that mark the future of consumer engagement. The fundamental beliefs of our organizations and how to serve the healthcare ecosystem are very much aligned.

Dennis Barnes, President & CEO of MDI, says, “We look forward to contributing our successful record of growth and healthcare expertise to KBM Group, and to integrating our capabilities with KBM Group’s superb data and analytics capability. As an agency specializing in healthcare, we are impressed with the level of healthcare subject matter expertise and the vision that KBM Group has created for the healthcare ecosystem. I am thrilled to have the opportunity to lead an organization with the combined resources and capabilities that KBM Group Health will possess; not to mention how exciting it is to be able to prove our more fundamental goal of driving down the cost of healthcare in this country without needing to make villains out of the healthcare providers.”

New York-based mergers & acquisition firm AdMedia Partners acted as exclusive financial advisor to MDI in the transaction (www.admediapartners.com). For information about MDI and its transition to KBM Group: Health Services, go to www.marketingdirect.com.

About KBM Group
KBM Group is the global leader in knowledge-based marketing solutions. Expert in both digital and traditional direct marketing, KBM Group helps companies manage, analyze and optimize marketing data to engage more effectively with their customers and prospects. KBM Group’s integrated, world-class solutions include strategic consulting, digital services, database services, analytics, marketing management, response services, data and marketing outsourcing. The company has 14 offices in nine countries serving global, enterprise and B2B2C-focused companies. KBM Group’s parent company, Wunderman is part of Young & Rubicam Brands and a member of WPP (NASDAQ: WPPGY). www.kbmg.com.

Download Target Marketing Article >>