The news that Marketo raised another $50 million in new venture financing has turned the spotlight on to the marketing automation and Revenue Performance Management categories. While the new round, led by Battery Ventures, highlighted the continued growth of Marketo and the two categories, talk of a 2012 IPO has drawn increased scrutiny on the financial performance of the emerging sectors.

In announcing the new round, Marketo CEO Phil Fernandez pointed out that the company 2010 revenue came in at $14 million, and projected sales in 2011 would grow by 140%, putting revenue in the $35 million range. He also forecasted that Marketo’s revenue would double in 2012, and said there is a “strong possibility” of an IPO in the next 12 to 15 months.

In total, Marketo has raised $107 million since its 2006 inception. From the $107 million raised, Marketo said it has $70 million available in the bank, and plans to use this for growth, both internationally and in product development, in the coming year.

Many BtoB organizations rely on demo tools to help convert prospects into customers by providing immediate visibility into the solution’s value proposition. Atlanta, GA-based Reed Construction Data delivers targeted and timely project information, cost data and market intelligence designed to simplify decision-making for Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) professionals throughout North America.

Rather than using a manual demo, Reed had used a homegrown demo system that gave prospects access to its production data for a short period of time. Because the access was ungated, many prospects used the system to simply access the data they need without ultimately purchasing from Reed.

By Tony Tissot, Sr. Director of Marketing, eTrigue

An ever-larger slice of the billions spent on BtoB marketing is going to online marketing efforts; yet industry perspectives, including Raab Associates, assert that marketing automation adoption, while growing rapidly, still isn’t pervasive. 

By Tony Tissot, Sr. Director of Marketing, eTrigue

An ever-larger slice of the billions spent on BtoB marketing is going to online marketing efforts; yet industry perspectives, including Raab Associates, assert that marketing automation adoption, while growing rapidly, still isn’t pervasive. 

LoopFuse, a provider of sales and marketing automation for small-to-medium-sized businesses (SMB), recently announced its Custom Events Dashboard, designed to enable SaaS companies to take action based on when and how users are engaging with their products.

The Custom Events Dashboard builds upon recently released custom event functionality available via the LoopFuse API, designed to support user-defined actions inside SaaS applications or e-Commerce shopping cart experiences.

Pardot announced that its cloud marketing automation platform has been integrated with web meeting solutions for a more complete webinar planning experience. Pardot users can now access GoToWebinar, WebEx and ReadyTalk directly from Pardot’s platform, streamlining marketers’ efforts to register prospects for events, report on event attendance and display and score prospect activity.

“Webinars are clearly an important part of online marketing,” said Adam Blitzer, Co-Founder & COO, Pardot. “But like any other activity, if its not built into a company’s overall marketing automation initiative, the value of webinars is diminished. By integrating with the top webinar solutions, we’re ensuring that event data is clearly factored into marketing plans and campaigns. We’re also giving clients the freedom to choose a webinar system that is best for them.”

Marketo recently announced record results for Q3 2011, adding more than 150 customers in the quarter and growing revenue by 122% year-over-year. In the quater, Marketo signed customers across numerous industries, including Angel MedFlight Worldwide, Delta Dental of California and Affiliates, Generations Federal Credit Union and Ventana Research. With these new customers included, Marketo reported more than 1,350 customers have now adopted the company’s solutions in three and a half years.

Marketo also has more than doubled its employee count — expanding the number of customer-facing support and service employees by 150% and increasing engineering capacity by more than 50%. In April 2011, the company opened its European headquarters in Dublin, Ireland, to support its growing international customer base. Marketo is on track to more than double its 2010 revenue and has expanded its global staff to more than 200 so far in 2011, according to a company press release.

The BtoB market is increasingly migrating to demand generation strategies that leverage mobile and social channels, largely due to the growth of networks like Facebook and Twitter, as well as the rapid penetration of tablet technology.

Marketing automation and email provider Silverpop explored the impact of these channels on marketing, and how to capitalize on — rather than fear — the shareable, accessible nature of “mocial” marketing during the New York City stop of its Agent ROI Digital Marketing Tour.

The BtoB market is increasingly migrating to demand generation strategies that leverage mobile and social channels, largely due to the growth of networks like Facebook and Twitter, as well as the rapid penetration of tablet technology.

Marketing automation and email provider Silverpop explored the impact of these channels on marketing, and how to capitalize on — rather than fear — the shareable, accessible nature of “mocial” marketing during the New York City stop of its Agent ROI Digital Marketing Tour.

Infusionsoft, a provider of sales and marketing software for small businesses, recently announced its acquisition of CustomerHub, a web-based application designed to provide membership site and customer portal platform to small businesses that market and sell content online. One of the top app integrations in the Infusionsoft marketplace, CustomerHub is designed to allow users to share unlimited password-protected content with subscribers.

Infusionsoft serves more than 7,500 small business customers with software to manage CRM, email marketing and e-commerce, as well as automation to nurture and convert leads.