Buoyed by renewed confidence in the US economy and higher expectations for new business, CMOs say they plan to boost marketing spending over the next 12 months, with B2B products and B2B services marketers leading the way, according to the CMO Survey. more

More than one-half (52%) of surveyed small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) say they use social media to promote their businesses, and 49% purchase online advertising (including SEM products) themselves, directly from websites, according to a new report by BIA/Kelsey. more

When measuring the success of online display advertising, agencies tend to place great importance on performance metrics such as conversion, even for branding awareness campaigns, according to a survey from Maxifier. more

Businesses that use primarily inbound marketing strategies for lead acquisition consistently report lower cost-per-lead (CPL) rates than those using outbound-centric strategies, according to the 2012 State of Inbound Marketing report by HubSpot. more

The year 2011 was pivotal for the mobile industry, marked by a near doubling in smartphone ownership, consumers' growing appetite for mobile social content, and tablets emerging as a formidable fourth screen, according to a new report by comScore. more

You probably optimize the content at your website—but what about SEO for less formal interaction at blogs and social networks? "B2B marketers should be looking to expand the reach of their social media efforts to drive more traffic back to their websites (and their calls-to-action)," writes Jeffrey L. Cohen at the ... more

Total US mobile and social media revenues—including business and consumer content, access, and advertising and marketing—reached $45.38 billion in 2011, up 30.2% from a year earlier, according to new data from PQ Media. more

To say that marketing execution has changed dramatically over the last 10 years is about the grossest kind of understatement. Then why do all the models of the marketing function look about the same as they always have? more

Consumers use various digital devices—smartphones, tablets, and desktop computers—at many points along the purchase path, from researching product information and pricing to finding retail outlets or completing transactions electronically, according to a survey conducted by Ipsos for Google, which explores consumers' shopping behaviors during the 2011 holiday season. more

More than one-half (55%) of social media users in the US say they are uncomfortable sharing credit card information with a known brand via secure payment on a social networking site such as Twitter or Facebook, according to a new survey from Digitas. more

Facebook ad spending among clients of Kenshoo Social grew 109% in the fourth quarter of 2011 over 3Q11 levels, dwarfing the 27% growth recorded in paid-search spending over the same period, according to a report by Kenshoo. more

Senior-level marketers don't seem to believe their digital partners are adequately extending their service capabilities in the digital age. So how does an agency demonstrate that it "gets" digital? Glenn Engler, CEO of Digital Influence Group, answers that question in this episode of Marketing Smarts. more

Fully 40% of all US mobile subscribers, or 97.9 million people, owned a smartphone during the three months ended December 2011, as Google Android expanded its dominance in the market and Apple gained ground among handset manufacturers, according to data from the comScore MobiLens service. more

Super Bowl XLVI is only days away—and so is the debut of those iconic ads that run during the big game. Learn which industries led the way in ad spending last year, and which ad was named the best Super Bowl ad of all time by Forbes.com readers. more

Ad campaigns that target consumers on the basis of their social media activities and interest-based connections—or Brand Graph—perform better than ads without such targeting capabilities, and they generate large gains in brand lift and key direct-response metrics, according to a study by 33Across. more

In a post at the Renegade Search blog, Lindsay Atkinson ponders the clichéd adage that content is king. "I can't say that I'm a fan of using this relatively grating term, but I can definitely defend its power," she writes. "Having fresh and unique content is an increasingly important factor ... more

When searching for the best holiday deals, one-quarter (25%) of surveyed consumers say they prefer visiting brand websites over other channels such as print media (15%), email newsletters and notifications (13%), and Facebook (3%), according to a survey from Crowd Science. more

"When consumers hear of a local business that is not well known, it's only natural that they conduct some research before making a purchase," writes Nathan Hanks in an article at MarketingProfs. And when they do, they're most likely to choose results that appear first. "Thus," Hanks continues, "'owning' the first page ... more

Tech brands Microsoft and Motorola generated the most Twitter buzz at the 2012 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) held January 10-13 in Las Vegas, each accounting for 5% of #CES-tagged Twitter mentions during the annual event, according to a study by Simply Measured. more

Why is it that so many books, supposedly about marketing and business, seem more focused on self-actualization and personal empowerment? Author Julien Smith answers that question in this week's Marketing Smarts podcast. more

"While Google has ended its Realtime Search deal with Twitter, search engines are still using social media sites for ranking purposes," says Jillian Stira at the Scholes Marketing blog. And Twitter remains a critical part of your search strategy, she notes: "Twitter has pulled ahead of many other social media platforms, ... more

We all know that our marketing materials solve our problems. But do they solve other people's problems? I invited Laura Fitton, founder of oneforty, to explore the idea of useful marketing in our latest Marketing Smarts podcast. more

Paid-search spending among high-tech and consumer-electronics advertisers grew 28% in the fourth quarter of 2011 over the same quarter a year earlier, and up 7% over strong spending in 3Q11, according to a report by Covario. more

Despite continued business volatility, global executives plan to increase corporate spending cautiously in 2012—particularly the areas of IT (information technology) and marketing—according to a survey conducted by Doremus and the Financial Times. more

US retail e-commerce spending for the first 46 days of the November-December 2011 holiday season reached $30.9 billion, up 15% from the corresponding days in 2010, according to data from comScore. more