It’s funny how so many business-to-business marketers take themselves so seriously. And ironic, how the world at large doesn’t.

Unfortunately, B2B seems to have an image problem. But the thing is, it’s never been a more exciting time to be on this side of the industry. Fact. And there are lots of them.

Metrics. Measurement. ROI

Three little things responsible for marketers across the world waking up in cold sweats at night.

The thing is being a b2b marketer is not easy at the moment.

Your customers’ buying behaviours are changing, industry experts are shoving social and digital myths down your neck and worst of all your CEO is losing patience with woolly results from marketing campaigns.

Then came along big data. The measurement super hero. Ready and waiting with his team of insight tools, analytics experts and reams of spread sheets to give the answers marketers have been yearning after for so long.

However, as was clear from a recent debate hosted by ABBA and IAB, there’s a sticking point or two that is shadowing marketing from the shining light of insight

There is nothing quite as tedious as reading yet another blog about what makes the perfect post.

If I’ve read it once I’ve read it one thousand times.

600 – 800 words is the optimum. Always tweet about it on a Tuesday. And definitely start with a joke. Everyone loves a joke.

Last week, presidents, prime ministers, business leaders and their entourages gathered in a Swiss ski resort to set the world to rights. Well kind of.

The World Economic Forum Annual Meeting, also known as Davos, is now in its 40 something year. It’s raison d’etre: to provide an unrivalled platform for leaders from all walks of life to shape the global, regional, industry and business agendas.

Here’s the rub.

As a marketer, you’re now under more pressure than ever to prove your worth – and demonstrate ROI.

Your budget is under scrutiny – and no doubt, you need to put forward a strong case to justify your spend.

So what do you do?

As you may have gathered at Earnest we are in the business of B2B Marketing. Unfortunately we are not in the business of soothsaying. For that reason we have avoided the traditional list of 2013 predictions and taken a look back at what we can learn from the year that was.

Here’s our top 5

Our latest animation, Vital Statistics for B2B Marketers 2, pulls together all the latest facts and stats for B2B Marketers.

We have always said that great content should be re-purposed, so we put them all into an infographic: The top 5 game changers for B2B Marketers.

Download it here.

‘I have read and agree to the terms and conditions’. This is a very common little white lie told on a daily basis by people around the world.

When you next download an app to your phone, however, think twice before ticking that little box before you have read the small print.

This week Juniper released its research into the security of mobile apps and the findings were quite shocking.

There’s a book that’s been doing the rounds here at Earnest these last few weeks. Not Fifty Shades of Grey, but a book about a little known agency man from a bygone era who’s influence on marketing cannot be understated.

The book 'Changing the world is the only fit work for a grown man’ by Steve Harrison charts the life and times of one Howard Luck Gossage. Billed as '1960s Amercia's most innovative, influential and irreverant advertising genius', Gossage was arguably the inventor of interactive marketing and the concept of social media as we know it.

Not long ago, being a B2B marketer was simple. The more you pushed out there, the better your pipeline. But then something changed.

Here are all the latest facts and stats B2B Marketers need to build the case for a balanced inbound and outbound marketing strategy.

As always use and abuse at your leisure and feel free to share your own Vital Statistics using #b2bvitalstats

Pinterest has rapidly shot up the rankings to become a major contender in the social media marketing world, ranked third behind only Facebook and Twitter in terms of popularity. B2C marketers have been the quickest to move into this previously uncharted territory by taking advantage of the channel’s emphasis on visual communication.

As a result many B2B marketers have been left behind in the Pinterest marketing rush, unable to determine how to market their services effectively on it.

In this blog post, we look at who has been pioneering the use of Pinterest as part of their content marketing strategy and what B2B marketers can learn from them.