B2B’s Innovation Gap, Marketing Budgets Rise, New Trust Barometer Report, & Google Showing More FAQ Snippet Results

The Growing Innovation Gap Is Costing B2B Brands
Despite 68 percent of B2B marketers noting that they considered themselves “advanced,” a mere four percent achieved scoring at that level, according to newly-released report data, also showing some of the reasons that fostering innovation can be more difficult for B2B marketers, creating an innovation gap. ANA

How Well Do B2B Firms Handle Routing Sales Leads? [Report]
Some 32 percent of B2B professionals said that greater automation was the lead management capability they most desired, while 60 percent noted that leads were occasionally assigned to the incorrect owner within their organization — two of several statistics of interest to B2B marketers contained within recently-published survey data. MarketingProfs

US Digital Ad Spend Grew Faster Last Year Than At Any Point in the Previous 15 Years
A 2021 rise of 35.4 percent in digital advertising spending from those seen in 2020 was the swiftest since 2006, with digital audio the top performer when it came to growth rate, while search remained the dominant digital ad format, garnering 41.4 percent of total digital ad revenues, according to newly-released report data. MarketingCharts

Gartner: Marketing budgets up, focused on hybrid channels
Organizations have dedicated an average of 9.5 percent of total company revenue to marketing budgets, a figure that was up significantly from the 6.4 percent rate observed in 2021, while average budgets remained behind pre-pandemic levels, according to recently-published CMO survey data. SmartBrief

Trust Barometer: Geopolitics Becomes Top Priority For Business [Edelman Trust Barometer]
59 percent of adults surveyed in 14 countries said that they wanted businesses to add geopolitical issues to their agendas, with CEOs being seen as the role expected to shape such issues, while journalists saw the biggest gains in trust, according to newly-released Edelman data of interest to B2B marketers. PRovoke Media

“Great marketing isn’t about who arrives. It’s about who stays. No amount of awareness matters if you can’t earn affinity. This is a game of trust, and it’s a long one. Play it the right way, or not at all.” — Jay Acunzo @JayAcunzo Click To Tweet

How Are Execs Measuring UX? [Survey]
63 percent of digital experience professionals have said that customer satisfaction is tops when it comes to measuring user experience (UX) performance, with some 60 percent pointing to sales retention business metrics, and 51 percent identifying product or site analytics, according to recently-published survey data. MarketingCharts

Report: Google Showing More Search Results With FAQ Rich Results
Some 27 percent of Google search query results now feature Google’s frequently asked questions (FAQ) snippets, a figure that represents a five percent rise during less than a week, and could portend a push to even greater expansion of the FAQ-rich result format, new report data suggests. SEO Roundtable

Advertising Drove $7.1T In 2021 U.S. Sales, Ad Coalition Study Finds
Some 18.5 percent of the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) can trace its roots from advertising, with $7.1 trillion in 2021 sales attributed to advertising, while also supporting 28.5 million jobs in the U.S., according to recently-released report data of interest to digital marketers. MediaPost

Meta’s Adding More Ad Targeting Information to its Ad Library Listings
Facebook parent firm Meta has made more targeted advertising information available via its Ad Library feature, with additional ad usage data that could help B2B marketers detect trends and conduct competitive analysis, Meta recently announced. Social Media Today

Advertising to Gen Z? Personalize it
81 percent of the Gen Z demographic have said that they liked personalized digital ads — an amount that was nearly double that noted by baby boomers, while a leading 43 percent of consumers said that being relatable was the top characteristic of a good ad — two of numerous findings of interest to digital marketers contained in newly-released survey data. SmartBrief

ON THE LIGHTER SIDE:

A lighthearted look at “False Choice Between Brand and Performance” by Marketoonist Tom Fishburne — Marketoonist

Man Paying $15 A Month For Streaming Service to Listen to Same Five Songs — The Hard Times

TOPRANK MARKETING & CLIENTS IN THE NEWS:

• Joshua Nite — This Week in Marketing: Content Marketing Evolution — LinkedIn (client)
• TopRank Marketing — B2B Influencer Marketing – How to Embrace the Future — Marx Communications

Have you found your own favorite B2B marketing news for the week? If so, please don’t hesitate to let us know in the comments below.

Thank you for taking the time to join us for this week’s TopRank Marketing B2B marketing news, and we hope that you will return again next Friday for another selection of the most relevant B2B and digital marketing industry news. In the meantime, you can follow us on our LinkedIn page, or at @toprank on Twitter for even more timely daily news.