February’s a Big Month for Relationships: A Blog from Dr. Orvid Nussbaum

The relationship business is getting hectic. As the premier (and to the best of my knowledge, “only”) relationship therapist working in marketing today, agencies are clamoring to get a piece of the Doc.

Representatives from Ciena Corporation recently visited the office of my favorite relationship marketing agency, Babcock & Jenkins. These partners gather once every year for an annual planning session. I had a chance to speak with Bill Rozier, Ciena VP of Marketing, while he was in Portland. Watch the short interview now. We discuss relationships, annual planning, and marketing-sales accountability for 2009.

2009 is proving to be financially challenging for companies and their agencies. Having a consensual annual plan is vital to maturing the pipeline and achieving marketing efficiencies.

Sales cycles are extending*, and companies who excel at relationship building and nurturing will emerge strongest from this recession. This is a superb opportunity to lay extensive groundwork for relationships. Strengthen trust. Reinforce thought leadership. Make a statement in the marketplace.

The healthiest approach to your relationships is to be honest and genuine, so when it comes time to pop the question (”Will you buy from me?”), you’ll have the best odds of getting the answer you wanted from the time you first met (”Of course I’ll buy from you.”).

* MarketingSherpa and Babcock & Jenkins, Year-End Surveys, January 2009. 62% agree that negotiations are taking longer than they did a year ago. (Methodology: Surveys of 247 B2B Marketing Organizations with over $250 million in revenues)