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Robin Hamilton of inEvidence. AKA referencegeek. Working in B2B advocacy marketing for around 13 years. Prior inEvidence Hewlett Packard customer reference program.

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Today time travel; from 1million years BC, to the near future, and talk about why you need an Advocate Marketing program,

15 mins well restrict the conversation to content

Why B2B marketing must change to remain effective. 3

Begin in the Palaeolithic era between one million and 400,000 years ago, when man first learned how to control fire

Fires allowed us to extend our days; fostering community

Clearly its not possible to go back to then, but there are Kalahari bushmen who still live a nomadic hunter-gatherer life, living as humans have for 99 percent of their evolution.

It turns out that when bushman gather around the fire at night, 81% of the conversation revolves around storytelling.

Sharing stories humans learn to share experiences, and stay alive.

My contention is that we are all hardwired with an innate trust in authentic, relevant and human stories

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Civilisation happened and for a long time you had to largely believe what you were told. Its no that we were more gullible then, its that getting information, and communicating was difficult

Then came the 1990s.

Google was born in 1995. Classic Nokia 5110 debuted in 1998, same year as iMac. A candy coloured computer. Whod have thought?

When historians come to define the Information Age, Id guess these dates will be important.

You could argue theyre the moments when we all started to be more inquisitive, more mobile and more connected to our technology. For the first time, we had the tools to quickly find and share information.5

And, as a consequence, were different people today. Were more ready to collaborate, to work wherever and whenever

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We also collaborate , we share, and we review

So the information age HAS changed how we make purchasing decisions, and this is mostly to do with trust

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30 years ago, who knew what spin was? Today, Id also suggest were more cynical. We simply dont take claims at face value.

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In 2012, Pfizer was forced to pay a $60 million fine when it turned out that its employees werebribing doctors to recommend their products.

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For over half a century, Cigarette manufacturers denied their products were addictive and dangerous, and suppressed their own research that confirmed it.

In a congressional hearing 30 years after the surgeon general confirmed you were 1000 times more likely to die from lung cancer, they admitted there may be some heath risks.

They also denied that cigarette's were addictive and that they manipulated nicotine levels to make them more so. Tea, coffee twinkie

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The interesting thing to me is that in many examples is that its marketing and media that are, to a degree, complicit

Anyone ever seen a big mac that looks like the advert? Does that wrinkle cream have the same effect as on the photoshopped model?

If youve ever read the Edelman trust barometer you will clearly see three things:

People trust figures of authority less and lessDistrust is increasing, and spreading

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And 3) the people we trust the most are PEOPLE JUST LIKE US

The need for customer evidence is increasing year on year12

But DONT trust ME on this!

Studies consistently show that:Peer endorsementcustomer evidencecustomer referencescustomer advocates

whichever term you use, is/are the most effective influencer of purchase decisions.

Close more business, faster

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Amongst other things, this lack of trust, and the availability of the truth of the customer experience IS impacting the effectiveness of traditional marketing.

Lets be clear. This is a real change from old marketing. What we call selfie marketing

We did this, arent we great, heres our messaging, trust us, it will all be shinier, faster, bigger, cleaner, with NOTHING EVER GOING WRONG

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This is new marketing. Advocate Marketing. Humans are hardwired for it

Strategies built on real customers, and real experiences. Customers are talking to each other anyway. How can they not be?

We know the customers word is trusted so our skill is to channel these positive customer experiences directly into our sales and marketing activities

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HERES A SIMPLE DEFINITION.

Advocate marketing helps some of the largest global organisations close more business, more quickly

Often if you don't have evidence you don't even make it onto the shortlistlist

Cisco UK 30% deal acceleration using customer evidence

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I can talk for days on advocate marketing. The simplest place to start is the humble case study. Who creates case studies?

Good! I never cease to amazed how much content consumption has moved on, yet case studies havent. much We create cases 92, 28, 6000

Lets take a look at some current examples of interesting CUSTOMER STORY formats17

iPDF rich contentVideo, audio, infographic

Broadband speeds have improved so much file size is very rarely an issue18

Customer Snapshot - the OneSlider for 2016

5mb video

Salespeople cannot play with the text

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Picture 100 words

Can you make an infographic move?

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Can you make an infographic move?

YES

Built on 7 or 8 customer case studies21

eStoryPushed to device. No need for web connections. Can combine video, audio, written, infographic, animation. Immersive. Oh and live webpage for the call to action if you have a connection 22

This is a WebStory.

Responsive design looks great on any device has HTML5 elements

Credential doc for healthcare vertical

Why use us? Because large corporate web teams move at the seed of a glacier23

The BoM all ref customers not equal. Right investment for story

Case studyVideoInfographicNewsletter image and textSocial Image

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Thats now.

Where next?

A couple of things that we can use and adapt25

2016 heralds the return of the silent movie

We all hate auto play, so our beautiful videos are now auto-played with the sound off

How does it make sense?26

You have three seconds. If someone watches the first three seconds they will watch ten seconds or more

Adding captions increases view time by average of 12%

Clarke's first lawWhen a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.

Clarke's second lawThe only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.

Clarke's third lawAny sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

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And as a result Facebook is auto-captioning video adds.. Just look for auto-caption fails

Humans of New York creator Brandon Stanton giving an address to UCD, Dublin

On how I approach strangers in the street.

it's all about the energy youre giving off, its 100%

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Twitter 30 second

Instagram adverts 15, 30., 60 superbowl.

BOM now normal to create 30-second teasers

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A film in 28 clips

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New marketing is advocate marketing. In your career the chances you get to reinvent how marketing works are almost zero.

We believe that new marketing is about building strategies based on the innate trust we all share in authentic, relevant and human stories.

The best brands make a promise and despite all of the cynicism and doubt, most of us, most of the time, want to believe those promises. It is the customers experience, their stories that make brand promises real.

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Three takeaways:

No-one trusts what you say. (but they want to)Tell customer stories (were hardwired for it)Embrace new channels and formats for storytelling, limitations can be liberating

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Three takeaways:

No-one trusts what you say. (but they want to)Tell customer stories (were hardwired for it)Embrace new channels and formats for storytelling, limitations can be liberating

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Three takeaways:

No-one trusts what your company says. (but they want to)Tell customer stories (were hardwired for it)Embrace new channels and formats for storytelling, limitations can be liberating

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