Interview with Mathew Sweezey about Conversion Conference

Mathew SweezeyMathew is the next speaker I profiled who will be presenting at Conversion Conference London. Mathew specializes in B2B marketing research and is an active writer on leading industry blogs such as clickz and author of Marketing Automation for Dummies from Wiley . Mathew is an interesting marketer who balances theory and practice as the Manager of Marketing Research & Education for SalesForce company Pardot.

Mathew is presenting a session on day 2 from 2:50pm “No one cares about your content (yet)!

  1. How do you see attribution modelling as helping business get the value of great content? I’m not a big fan of attribution modeling because it is very tuff to say a single thing had a specific impact when you can not stop the world around a single person to hold that one action as a constant. It is better to look at other metrics, such as velocity, engagement, and other metrics which are more specific to business goals than attribution. Attribution is a baby sitting number used by management to check in on your spending. It would be better for a business to look at the speed at which revenue comes into the organization which is called velocity.
  2. What is more important for content? Being evergreen, current or complete perfection? All three need to be created. CNN uses all three on their blog every week, and you should too.
  3. How do you decide when a social channel gets to a critical mass and needs it’s own content strategy/resources? All channels need to have a specific goal. No channel needs it’s own strategies. If you follow this approach you’ll be left behind. Today there are over 60+ channels, with in 10 years there will be hundreds of channels. So specific channel strategies are not the best way to approach this. Having a goal of all marketing, then using each channel to help accomplish these goals is the best best approach.
  4. Thinking of targeting and automation how do you think the US/Asia sees the EU’s strict data protection directive? Will they follow the EU’s lead? Data privacy will always be a contested issue. The goal here is being respectful to your clients. If you are respectful with the data you have that is the key. It doesn’t matter how much or little data you have, if you are not respectful with your data you will never gain the engagement you desire. The US will not follow the EMEA data laws due to the free market economy focus of the US government. This has been proven by companies like Microsoft shipping new editions of IE with features such as options to browse with cookies blocked, and Google providing private browsing.
  5. It’s been a year since the EU cookie law, do you think business adapted well to the change? All businesses adapted well, I have not seen a single instance where it affected any business. Nor have I seen an instance of any business being fined for not complying with the law.
  6. How much does Salesforce.com put into conversion optimisation of their own products? We put a huge effort on to looking at conversions, but we put more emphasis on quality conversions not just conversions. It is better to have a smaller conversion rate on a white paper if a higher percentage of those make it to closed opps, rather than not.
  7. Do you consider the impact on lifetime value of a customer when evaluating conversion optimisation? Yes, the more engagement the higher the likelyhood of a higher LTV, but we do not track this specifically.
  8. What is one vertical/industry that you think always leads conversion optimisation? SaaS industries hands down.
  9. What is one vertical that always sets the pace and direction for what’s next in content marketing? SaaS technologies.
  10. What’s some new software/tools that you think people should consider trialing or exploring? This will depend on your current level of sophistication. If you are new to content just try content, if you are already doing content learn to craft content to your marketing stages, and if you are doing this learn to use online advertising to do lead nurturing and share you content to these people though re-targeting.
  11. What is the main points that you want people to get from your presentation? Conversions are key, and understanding your buyers is the only way to increase your conversions.
  12. Where can people find and engage with you online? You can find him tweeting from @msweezey

Thank you Mathew for your time in answering these questions.  So if you want to catch Mathew speak and save ££££ on tickets for Conversion Conference London you can use our discount code LOSTAGENCY13 and you can register and find out more here.