Download this free e-book now: The Top 10 B2B Marketing Mistakes . . . and How to Avoid Them, a Crowdsourced E-book compiled by Dianna Huff

My colleague, Mac McIntosh, and I asked our respective networks to send us the top ten B2B marketing mistakes they see other marketers making. From email to social media, people expressed their opinions — and often quite passionately.

The Top Three Mistakes?
1. No marketing strategy
2. Website not optimized
3. Wasting lead opportunities

Are the results surprising? Yes and no. You can find reams of blog posts, reports, articles, etc. full of how-to-do-it-right information. Yet, despite all of this information, you can still find many B2B Websites that aren’t optimized and companies that throw their unqualified “leads” at sales.

The remaining seven mistakes include:
4. Wrong messaging
5. No offer
6. Not testing
7. Jargon
8. Not paying attention to details
9. Not taking advantage of how people process information
10. Not marketing the Website

I included a description of each mistake as well as information from top marketers on how to avoid each one. And since it’s a crowdsourced e-book, you’ll find many of the survey responses on each page. It was a fun book to compile and write — I hope you enjoy it. If you like it, please be sure to tell your social network about it.

Thank you to following contributors who filled out the survey or sent in email:

Ardath Albee
Bob Bly
C. Edward Brice
Katie Brown
Meghan Carmody
Kirstie Colledge
Sarah Farrer
Ed Gandia
Mark Gibson
Matt Heinz
Anne Holland
Adam Jacobson
Russell M. Kern
Rob Leavitt
Michele Linn
Jim Loadholt
Kim Cornwall Malseed
Barry D. Martin
Mac McIntosh
Raymond Ng
Mike Ortner
Ken Poray
John Rasco
Erica K. Rice
Geraldine Roy
Steven Sessions
Mark Schaefer
David Meerman Scott
Altaf Shaikh
Jim Somers
Kate Spiers
Jeremy Victor
Kurt Weisenberger
Ralf Weiser

Edited to add:
No stock photography was used in the development of this e-book (Mistake #8). The people you see are actual contributors. I originally wanted to use an image of a “crowd” on each page, but didn’t want to use a stock photograph. The designer tried to custom make one out of people’s Twitter photos, but they were too low res.

I tried connecting the mistakes with each contributor, but that was becoming time-consuming and not everyone sent me a photo. So, the designer and I made the executive decision to post pictures of contributors through out to illustrate that “real people” were used in the making of the e-book (i.e. “crowdsourced”).

If someone was quoted on particular page, he or she is placed on that page — i.e. Ardath Albee or Michele Linn. The result may seem confusing — as someone just emailed me said, “Who are these people?” But I believe it’s a small trade-off for pictures of real people. What do you think?

The e-book was designed by Sonora DesignWorks (for those of you who want to know).