What We're Thinking

Mind blowing marketing ideas never start with a plan to stick a logo on an oversized coffee cup, but somehow, a whole lotta marketing tosh gets produced right?

4 things to consider
Before starting Account Based Marketing

Posted on May 27, 2021November 4, 2022 by Diana Stanislavova

4 things to consider before starting Account Based Marketing In today’s increasingly competitive and disrupted market, more and more businesses are turning to one of the most successful B2B marketing strategies: Account-Based Marketing (ABM). ABM is a collaborative growth strategy that gets marketing and sales teams working together to deliver tailored buying experiences to […]

B2B marketing: Let’s #keepitreal in 2023

Posted on January 3, 2023January 4, 2023 by Hugo Thomas

Lockdown lifesavers: four positives to pick you up this week

Posted on January 6, 2021March 14, 2022 by Ken Ross

It’s pretty hard to see the positives in weeks like this. We’re bracing ourselves for what looks like the most stringent lockdown so far and even the most resilient of us are dog tired with all the “bouncing back” the new “work-from-home” normal demands. So it’s OK to feel fed-up. It’s OK to be despondent, and […]

Why social selling and account-based marketing (ABM) is our answer to thriving post-Covid

Posted on December 22, 2020July 19, 2021 by Diana Stanislavova

Why social selling and account-based marketing (ABM) is our answer to thriving post-Covid The pandemic has shaken the business world to the core – a whirlwind of restrictions, increasingly changing markets, and an accelerated shift to remote working have all driven marketing teams around the world to pivot and transform how they operate. In the […]

The 3 easy steps
To getting started on LinkedIn Campaign Manager

Posted on October 12, 2020June 16, 2022 by Diana Stanislavova

The 3 easy steps to getting started on LinkedIn Campaign Manager Paid advertising on LinkedIn should be in every B2B business’ marketing arsenal because of the flexible audience builder that allows businesses to target very specific audiences that would otherwise be out of reach. Here’s how to get started on Campaign Manager. In LinkedIn Campaign […]

Don’t rush into paid ads! Boost your organic reach on LinkedIn first

Posted on August 13, 2020June 16, 2022 by Diana Stanislavova

Don’t rush into paid ads! Boost your organic reach on LinkedIn first Last time, we launched the first blog entry in the Social Savvy B2B series on how social-savvy B2B businesses should leverage social media networks to flourish. This time, we’ll examine organic reach opportunities on LinkedIn before looking at how to create paid ads […]

B2B businesses: accelerate your sales cycle with social selling

Posted on August 11, 2020June 16, 2022 by Diana Stanislavova

B2B businesses: accelerate your sales cycle with social selling If you’re trying to keep sales numbers up for your B2B business: listen up. With face-to-face networking opportunities declining, we need to sit down and rethink our sales strategies to answer that all-important question: What is the best way of securing quality leads online to rival […]

What B2B tech companies should do on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter and why

Posted on July 23, 2020June 16, 2022 by Diana Stanislavova

What B2B tech companies should do on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter and why In the B2B marketing world, LinkedIn is almost the must-have priority for top-of-the-funnel (education-driven) leads because that’s where businesses connect with other businesses. But, in 2021, is LinkedIn really still king? According to Statista’s 2020 report, a whopping 46% of B2B marketers […]

What’s Step Two of One Step Marketing?

Posted on July 2, 2020October 12, 2020 by Hugo Thomas

For all the businesses that have taken their first step to pivoting into the world of digital selling: what comes next?

We’re the creative media business of the year

Posted on February 10, 2020February 10, 2020 by Ken Ross

Brad Pitt, Joaquin Phoenix and Renee Zellweger: you can keep your Oscars! This weekend, down at London’s Twickenham Stadium the bright folks from West London Business named us Creative Media Business of the Year. Why us? Well from what we heard at the after-party, bagging the Creative Media Business of the Year award came down to […]

Why do so many marketing directors green light tosh?

Posted on April 26, 2022April 27, 2022 by Ken Ross

Sometimes marketers can be their own worst enemies don’t you think? Too often, it feels like all we produce is just cheap smoke and mirrors baloney that over promises and under delivers. As marketers, we’re as guilty as anyone here. We know it’s tosh, our clients know it’s tosh, and when no one cares enough […]

Everything about the digital ID & cybersecurity business has changed…except marketing

Posted on April 29, 0022June 20, 2022 by Ken Ross

It’s pretty stressy being a B2B marketing agency in the digital identity industry.

Quiet Please! How do sponsors ever make a racket in a tennis tournament that bans branding?

Posted on July 1, 2019July 2, 2019 by Ken Ross

Whether it’s the FA Cup or Formula 1, watching archive footage of almost any major sporting event brings one thing to the fore for people like us: The impact of sponsorship and marketing has transformed the game… except that is, down at SW19. While logos and branding have popped up on the shirts, the turf, […]

Small business marketing:
Why do so many SMEs think word-of-mouth isn’t marketing?

Posted on May 30, 2018September 21, 2021 by Ken Ross

We’re a B2B marketing agency based in Chiswick. We’re in one of these trendy workspace buildings where lots of SME’s and start-ups live. We’re all highly proactive social types, so we get talking with the neighbours quite a bit. Since we’re a B2B marketing company, many of these chats get onto the topic of marketing […]

Why “Fit” is so critical when choosing a B2B marketing agency

Posted on April 10, 2018November 19, 2020 by Ken Ross

Having worked agency and client-side during my marketing career, I’ve seen a wide variety of briefs for agencies ranging from Financial PR and Annual Report provision through to consumer facing web design and exhibition stand builds. Yet despite the diversity of the projects – in terms of budgets, deliverables and the profiles of client organisations, […]

Is your marketing department redundant?

Posted on March 11, 2018January 11, 2019 by Ken Ross

Isn’t it exciting when all the rules change every day and no one’s really sure about what they should be doing anymore? We’ve noticed this in the B2B marketing we do recently. Maybe it’s not happening everywhere, but we’re pretty glad it’s happening on our patch. The defining lines between product development, B2B marketing and […]

5 and a half things to try after you’ve exhausted all your list blogging options

Posted on October 3, 2017July 11, 2019 by Ken Ross

We’ve been addicted to lists ever since Moses published the “Top 10 things thou shalt or shalt not do” post, and for busy copywriters on multiple deadlines, they’ve been a Godsend ever since. Lists posts, or “listicles”, are the bloggers’ get out of jail card. They work because they promise something really specific in the headline: […]

Power of pre-suasion, or “telling it like it is in marketing”

Posted on August 22, 2017September 19, 2017 by Ken Ross

If we told you that over 95% of our clients would recommend us to a friend or colleague, would you believe us? If we said “we’re a small creative B2B marketing agency that strives to innovate. Some people like our innovative ideas more than others and we know we’re not for everyone” is that easier […]

What can the Oscars awards teach us about winning business awards?

Posted on February 22, 2017March 24, 2022 by Ken Ross

What can the Oscars awards teach us about winning business awards? Benedict Cummberbatch, Nichole Kidman and Will Smith might make the business of award winning look easy, but as the marketers amongst us know too well, the media machines behind the big studios they work for have been beavering away for months to make sure […]

Learning Technologies Exit Poll 2017

Posted on February 3, 2017September 6, 2017 by Ken Ross

Look, up in the Hammersmith sky. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Nope… it’s a Growth Engineering Superhero! Assembling at #LT17UK to save the L&D industry from dull online learning, Growth Engineering’s mighty avengers win top five places in four of our most wanted #LTexitpoll categories this year. Welcome to the Learning Texhnologies […]

London’s illuminated river project sheds new light on our services

Posted on December 9, 2016September 6, 2017 by Ken Ross

Isn’t it annoying when creative B2B marketing companies come up with fancy product & services names you don’t understand. Overall we try to avoid this, but a while ago we set up a web hosting service called “Enterprise Cluster”. It’s not a service most B2B marketing companies bother to offer. Frankly, we got fed up […]

100 best websites in Security & ID (the special Trustech edition)

Posted on December 1, 2016July 9, 2018 by Ken Ross

Scouting the halls of #Trustech last year we couldn’t help but notice the sparse, barren area where you might expect a big shiny Gemalto stand to be. Whether it was a logistics screw up or a strategic decision to go basic we don’t know, but the scene got us wondering. In a world where senior decision […]

ICE 2017: 5 takeaways for trade show success

Posted on October 21, 2016January 11, 2019 by Ken Ross

It’s just four months away and it’s the biggest gaming and gambling expo on the planet, so if your marketing game plan for ICE Totally Gaming 2017 is not underway yet, it’s time to get started. Specially created for B2B sports marketers keen to maximise ROI on the trade shows they attend, our 5 takeaways for […]

Why is Uber promoting services that don’t work?

Posted on October 21, 2016September 7, 2017 by Ken Ross

Last month Uber generated world-scale, earth shattering publicity by putting driverless cars on the road in downtown Pittsburgh. They don’t work. They can’t even do a right turn at a junction. Uber passengers using these cars find themselves Uber Pooling. There’s a human driver at the front who takes the wheel every time the car’s […]

Can you replace bad sales people with great marketing?

Posted on June 29, 2016September 7, 2017 by Ken Ross

This week, as we were deep in the midst of one of these sparkly presentations that B2B marketers tend to do for large clients, one particularly hard nosed business person in our audience piped up with an idea: “Couldn’t all of this marketing automation, analytics driven, demand generation stuff actually help us single out bad […]

The relationship between sales & marketing needs to change

Posted on June 22, 2016December 19, 2018 by Ken Ross

Marketing Automation’s role is to navigate prospects through the sales pipeline and pass well qualified, high definition leads over to the sales team, but you can’t just bolt sophisticated web based demand generation tactics onto the existing sales process and expect things to work. The relationship between sales and marketing needs to change. Change 1 […]

Will’s Website Wisdom: Shakey’s top 5 tips list for B2B marketers

Posted on April 22, 2016January 7, 2019 by Ken Ross

“What a piece of work is a website” – William Shakespeare Act 1 Scene 1: We’re slap bang in the middle of a client meeting earlier this month when the business development expert in the room starts quoting Shakespeare. He’s not trying to show off and go all Patrick Stewart on us, it’s just that […]

Scrumdiddlyumptious – Post Easter Scrum Retrospective

Posted on March 29, 2016September 6, 2017 by Caroline Sangster

That’s what you get when you combine ScrumMaster certification with Easter. I am now a Certified ScrumMaster. This achievement involved attending the two day course, absorbing a massive amount of well delivered theory, actively demonstrating Scrum method within teams, and passing a multiple choice exam when I got home (although I did have 60 days […]

Before Scrum: A Project Padawan’s story

Posted on March 18, 2016September 6, 2017 by Caroline Sangster

This isn’t my first rodeo. I’ve run things. I’ve produced media projects and websites, and I’ve led creative teams. I’ve managed actors and writers, cinematographers and editors, executive assistants and publicists. I’ve delivered big projects. And all of it flying by the seat of my pants. So now it’s time to get better at this. […]

Winning Without Spinning: Why it’s always B2B Award Season with #NoFluff marketing

Posted on February 26, 2016September 6, 2017 by Caroline Sangster

It is finally Leo’s moment. One of the internet’s best loved memes reached peak velocity this week. With five nominations and no wins, Leo DiCaprio was the world’s most celebrated Oscar underdog. With an epic and varied catalogue of work behind him, some said it was only a matter of time – this sixth nomination for his role in a Best […]

Learning Technologies Exit Poll 2016

Posted on February 5, 2016January 11, 2019 by Ken Ross

To our squad of relentless pollsters who just kept on questioning; To the event organisers who simmered down the gents on security when they wanted to frog march us off the premises; And to the hundreds of enlightened LT16 visitors who stopped to tell us all about their visit, We thank you. The LT exit […]

How to become a confident B2B marketer in five days or less: Day 5

Posted on August 14, 2015September 6, 2017 by Caroline Sangster

Day 5: the finale Today I pack up my desk, take my tea mug back to the kitchen and return my visitor pass to reception. So here are my Big Three recommendations if you’re looking to fill my space in a marketing internship: 1. Go somewhere with a Kanban board Monday morning, just as I was […]

How to become a confident B2B marketer in five days or less: Day 4

Posted on August 13, 2015September 7, 2017 by Caroline Sangster

Day 4: B2B goes big screen As the trendy marketing company NowComms is – and following the idea of a client’s Video Selfie project – we decided it was time to jump on and get the Camcorder out. For the purpose of this project, substitute Camcorder for my iPhone placed on a carefully constructed pile […]

How to become a confident B2B marketer in five days or less: Day 3

Posted on August 12, 2015September 6, 2017 by Caroline Sangster

Day 3: the long and short of successful B2B marketing Yesterday our Instagram (Now_Comms) went live, Twitter was inundated with links to the first blog, and another widely anticipated post went up. But did it make a difference? Today is the day to evaluate the success of this blog and increased social media in the B2B marketing world […]

How to become a confident B2B marketer in five days or less: Day 1

Posted on August 10, 2015September 7, 2017 by Caroline Sangster

Day 1: trending and amending Marketing internships are more searched in the UK than media, journalism and BBC internships according to Google trends. Therefore I realise I’m lucky in starting my first of a five-day placement – a marketing internship – with B2B marketing company, Now Communications. This is the first piece of work I’ve been […]

Is Net Promoter Score any good?

Posted on July 17, 2015January 11, 2019 by Ken Ross

Anyone who knows us knows that we’re pretty analytical here at Now Comms. We think that B2B marketing needs to be evidential if it’s ever going to support really effective lead nurturing campaigns. This reputation for data based decision making means we’re often asked about the Net Promoter Score System. Usually the discussion goes along […]

How to support L&D output with marketing that doesn’t stink

Posted on July 9, 2015January 11, 2019 by Ken Ross

The L&D industry’s best eLearning courses and resources are supported by some of the lamest marketing strategies we’ve ever seen. OK, so we’re a B2B marketing agency and our work is focused on marketing deliverables that bring new sales opportunities into the pipeline. We don’t usually get involved in the marketing activities that help L&D […]

What marketers can learn from the Football League

Posted on May 7, 2015January 11, 2019 by Ken Ross

Well, that’s another Football League season all but over with. There’s been some notable teams exceeding expectations (Bournemouth, Burton), a fair few underachievers (Fulham, Wigan, Tranmere) and an awful lot of teams being, well, just average. As a bunch of Brentford and Bristol City fans, here at Now Towers we’re all congratulating ourselves on a […]

Digital bastards like Kayvon Beykpour make our blood boil

Posted on March 27, 2015January 11, 2019 by Caroline Sangster

Digital bastards like Kayvon Beykpour make your blood boil don’t they? He sells his first start-up to learning business Blackboard for $4 mil before he’s even 21 and now, at the tender age of 27, he’s just banked $120 mil from Twitter for his latest brainwave Periscope, which he describes as being “like a mobile teleportation […]

Easy squeezy: how to get more from your B2B marketing budget

Posted on March 10, 2015January 11, 2019 by Caroline Sangster

There’s no shortage of statistical evidence to help out the B2B marketer who decides that now is the right time to pitch the board for a budget increase, and certainly many of the arguments we’ve read are incredibly well made (In their book “Sexy Little Numbers”, Dimitri Maex & Paul B. Brown make the strongest case […]

Our blazingly simple backlinking strategy

Posted on March 1, 2015September 7, 2017 by Ken Ross

Backlinking is probably the most important tool in the SEO toolbox these days. Sure, optimising everything you publish on your own site helps you get found, but having other quality sites link to yours: well that’s what Google really loves. These days Google’s algorithm is clever enough to sniff out sites using cheap SEO tactics […]

Is it OK to blow the whistle on your competitors?

Posted on September 11, 2014September 6, 2017 by Caroline Sangster

Last year, 70,000 users of international phone cards were left out in the cold when one major SIM card supplier allegedly went bust without warning. The new Wembley stadium houses some of the most advanced ticketing and security systems in the world – but according to some of the major players in the sports business, […]

Free newswires: The good, the bad and the ugly

Posted on May 12, 2014January 11, 2019 by Caroline Sangster

The constantly growing crop of free newswires springing up across the web is raising more questions than answers for many of the B2B marketing folks we talk to these days: “Do these sites work?”, “What’s the catch?”, “Should I bother using them and, if so, then which ones are worth the effort?” are amongst the […]

L&D industry loves mobile learning but hates mobile marketing

Posted on February 19, 2014January 11, 2019 by Caroline Sangster

How come the vast majority of the 100 highest ranking websites in eLearning still have websites that don’t work well on mobile? Despite usage patterns trending out the roof for mobile web access, less than 4 in 10 of the biggest players in the L&D industry have mobile marketing strategies that use responsive websites (websites that render […]

Not everyone likes our top 100 best L&D companies chart

Posted on October 20, 2013January 7, 2019 by Ken Ross

Since going live with the Top 100 best L&D companies chart, we’ve had flame mail from hard working marketing folks across the L&D industry. They’re keen to criticize because their company has not made the hotlist. Other calls come in from businesses ranked at the lower end of the chart who think they should be higher […]

Getting started with Google Adwords

Posted on October 4, 2012September 7, 2017 by Ken Ross

This week we look at the advertising phenomena that’s captured over 80 percent of the Pay Per Click market and pinpoint the AdWords’ pitfalls that are driving B2B marketers to seek professional guidance. “Google AdWords can be dangerous in its simplicity” Callum Bridgeford is director at online health and wellness business Energise For Life. Typical […]

Popular Services

Overview

Refocus your brand’s messages, benefits and advantages to ensure they address the new problems faced by today’s potential customers, right at their moment of need.

Nurture new leads down the sales funnel with emails customers actually find useful. Send customers relevant information based on the priority pages they visit on your own website. Use lead scoring to pinpoint the hottest new leads on your sales database.

B2B sales can be long and cumbersome. Traditional social marketing can take weeks or months to deliver a steady flow of quality leads sales teams can work with. Our social selling accelerator fast tracks the social selling.

Social media allows businesses to connect and interact with potential customers on many different platforms, across the internet.

A micro-site is a usually temporary asset that acts as a sub-site and is focused on a single campaign. It can either be an individual homepage or a small collection of webpages. The micro-site will have its own unique content and usually exists on its own domain.

The best stories in the world don’t amount to a hill of beans if your key prospects can’t find them. This hack programme bundles SEO research, keyword analysis and meta insights to ensure your blogs, products and offers get found when new customers are searching.

We make sure your products and services get right in front of new customers quickly, by setting up or refreshing your Google ads accounts and doing all it takes to make a new campaign live.

When compared to a full-fledged website, a landing page is just one page with a very specific purpose: getting visitors to click through to your desired outcome. Good landing pages increase your chances of success when they are done correctly.

Blog writing is one of the most effective ways of communicating information to large numbers of people.

Products

The brand and messaging refresh hack

Marketing automation setup

Social selling accelerator for Account Based Marketing

Social marketing starter

The lead magnet micro-site hack

The SEO makeover hack

The Google Ads starter (or reboot)

The landing page promo hack

The mighty blog month hack

Our agile marketing stack

Overview

Web design strategy for marketing managers who think websites should change as fast as their business.

Content production for marketers who know that big ideas get off the ground faster when they start small.

Social media, search and email marketing campaigns driven by data, managed by experts.

Brand identity design is more than just choosing a logo and a catchy strapline.

Co-work with our agile digital marketing experts to get the ongoing support, data and insights you need to deliver results-based agile marketing programmes.

Products

Agile Web design

Agile Content Creation

Agile Campaigns

Agile Branding

Agile Team

What We're Thinking

Legendary on the L&D marketer’s landscape

Fiona Tully, Sift Media