BtoBlog: Marketing strategies, tactics and insight

At some point in this video blog—the first entry in a series humorously titled, "Better Marriage Through Big Data"—we'll discuss the importance of selecting a series title that actually makes sense. For now, I'll honor rule No. 2 of b2b content marketing: "Never underestimate the value of the nonsensical."

Rule No. 1, of course, is, "If you don't have an interesting story to tell, show pictures of sharks."

For our pilot episode, I'm joined by Ann Handley, coauthor of "Content Rules: How to Create Killer Blogs, Podcasts, Videos, Ebooks, Webinars (and More) That Engage Customers and Ignite Your Business" (Gildan Media, 2011), and chief content officer at MarketingProfs, to explore ideas on how b2b marketers can become better storytellers. We also sit down with author Steve Shepard, who shares a few gems about storytelling.

Tim Washer is a comedy writer and video producer who has worked on such TV shows as "Conan" and "Late Show with David Letterman," IBM's smarter planet campaign, and within the pages of The Onion. A senior manager of social media at Cisco Systems (www.cisco.com), he can be reached at www.linkedin.com/in/timwasher.