B2B Lead Blog

As the MECLABS Research Partnership analyst team, my colleagues and I speak with professionals who attend our events (like the next month’s MarketingSherpa Email Summit in Las Vegas), purchase our publications, and want more information about how MECLABS can help grow their business. So every day we hear about the challenges they’re facing.

One issue that surfaces all too often is optimizing databases: When you have a database of thousands upon thousands of names, how do you help your team easily and effectively prioritize who to contact? Nearly every company I talk to does some kind of lead scoring, but rarely do those lead scores align with their database in a way that allows their sales teams to determine – at a glance – which prospects are the right fit at the right time.

This hit way too close to home. Here at MECLABS, my team was struggling with the same issue. Through events, publications, and general inquiry, we add hundreds of interested potential partner inquiries to our database every few weeks, sometimes even thousands. We have an ace IT team that has set up platforms so we can quickly identify who fits our Ideal Partner Profile, and we’d contact them as soon after they express interest in our Research Partnership program. We are very well aware of the importance of timeliness for marketers who are struggling to optimize their sales and marketing funnels. And we’d follow up based on the next action that was associated with their file.

But it took Brooke Bower, our data-analysis whiz, to help our team look at our database from a new perspective, one that would help us get the highest return on our time by focusing on the most promising potential partners, as opposed to merely the most urgent.

What we realized was missing was a comprehensive at-a-glance snapshot that basically shows us the key factors that define a successful research-partnership engagement:

• If the individual making the inquiry is a decision maker or an influencer
• How many events the individual, and his team, have attended and publications they’ve purchased compiled in an easily sortable list
• Their organization’s firmographic details – such as revenue, marketing budget, sales cycle and size

We enlisted the IT department to add fields to our existing platform to bring together these details into a single “opportunity grade” that would be applied to each potential partner’s account. (The concept of an “opportunity grade” was recommended to us by Dr. Flint McGlaughlin, Managing Director and CEO of MECLABS.) The higher the grade, the better fit for a long-term, strategic research partnership.

Within just a few days, through the teamwork of IT, marketing and sales, we have sorted our database so that it reveals to us that “opportunity grade” for each partner. It wasn’t rocket science, just taking the time to ask the hard questions (thanks Brooke), and look at what we do from a fresh perspective, to give IT the parameters they needed to bring it all together. This is a project that will never be completed, of course. We’re going to continually work with Brooke to analyze what qualities make up our most qualified research partners and make sure our database can easily and accurately help us identify them.

Great results happen when people and departments with different skill sets take time to put their minds together — in this case it was Brooke’s data savvy combined with my hands-on experience talking to potential Research Partners about their challenges.

I’d really like to hear about your experiences in building a database that helps you engage more efficiently and effectively. I welcome you to share them in the comments.

B2B Telemarketing, CRM, Human Touch, Inside Sales, Lead Scoring, Marketing Strategy, Sales

I can’t stress this enough: when it comes to marketing, if we’re not constantly learning, we’re going to find ourselves left behind faster than ever.

Some people say I’m an expert in B2B lead generation because I wrote a book on it, but you know what? I am astonished by what I didn’t know then compared to what I know today. This past year has been especially illuminating thanks to the brilliance of smart marketers who are expanding and perfecting the lead-generation concepts I wrote about years ago.

This year’s B2B Lead Roundtable webinars are testament to that.

In February, Paul Teshima, SVP of Product Management at Eloqua, set the tone for the webinar year. He defined the tenets of the new world of marketing in Revenue Performance Management. “We’ve seen a problem now where, even though marketing is doing a great job of generating leads, sales still cannot handle the volume and they slip away,” explains Paul. “Some of the leading companies today are really focusing on this idea of managing and bringing marketing sales together, in a more effective way, now that they’ve solved some of the tactical problems.”

Paul explains how here: The Future of Marketing: The Evolution from Demand Generation to Revenue Performance Management

In March, Michelle Mogelson Levy, Associate Vice President of Global Marketing at ECI Telecom, detailed how she executed an ultra-successful content strategy campaign and how that transformed their entire marketing strategy.

“We had to put ourselves in line with our buyers’ journey so we knew how to engage them at the right level,” she points out. “We had to provide value to our prospects, who have never heard of us before, and position ourselves as a company that understands their marketplace and their business issues – a partner as well as an expert.” Learn more here: How ECI Developed an Entire Content Marketing Program from Concept to Completion and the Surprising Results

In April, John Johnston, eBusiness Marketing Manager for Volvo North America, outlined how he streamlined, integrated and automated lead generation for a marketing program for 20 different heavy construction segments for dealers in 125 countries.

“We took online marketing activities, leveraged their analytics and optimized – measure, take action and repeat. It’s a continuous loop that makes the database and the lead-generation process better and better.”

Watch the webinar to find out how John’s efforts are providing customers and prospects the precise information they need to make a smart purchasing decision, and dealers a much more detailed, useful picture of who they’re selling to. And much of this is happening in real time. Learn more here: How CRM Revolutionized Marketing and Lead Generation at Volvo North America

In May, Brandon Stamschror, Senior Director of Operations for MECLABS Leads Group, and I expounded on the powerful combination of excellent data and the human touch to make the best use of sales time and resources.

According to MarketingSherpa, 80% of marketing leads are lost or discarded because even though someone may have provided basic contact information, they may not be ready to talk to a salesperson. Teleprospecting bridges the gap.

Make sure you’re setting a strong foundation for your campaigns with an accurate list. Brandon revealed the outcomes of a breakthrough experiment that tested how higher cost/high quality lead data affected the cost per lead. The results were astounding – the difference between the best- and worst-performing lists was $581 per lead. Learn more here: Teleprospecting that Drives Sales-Ready Leads and How One Company Slashed Their Cost Per Lead by More than Half

In June, Sergio Balegno, Director of Research, MarketingSherpa/MECLABS Primary Research Group, shared why inbound marketing – a strategy where the prospects find you as opposed to you finding them – is critical, and how integrating social media and SEO drives it.

“Companies with integrated social media and SEO achieve 60% better conversion rates…Search rankings are driven by relevance, relevance enhances an organization’s credibility, and this credibility helps to drive conversion rates,” says Sergio. “It’s an essential ingredient to a B2B marketing program.”

To prove it, Sergio shared five steps that helped an email marketer pull in 70% more leads and doubled revenue in one year. Learn more here: How to Integrate Social Media and SEO to Drive More Leads and Increase Marketing ROI

In July, Dave Elkington, Chairman and CEO of InsideSales.com, revealed how companies are leaking significant revenue in their sales and marketing funnels – knowledge gained through analyzing two billion communications with 80 million customer profiles. He outlined astonishing facts like 43% of companies don’t even respond to inbound leads! But for those that know how to respond, the opportunities to make the sale grow exponentially – 78% of sales goes to companies that respond first, not to the company with the best or cheapest product.

It’s no wonder that Dave points out that venture capital firms want companies in their portfolios to have inside sales departments. “They’ll recruit, train and transplant inside sales teams into their portfolio companies,” he says. For more data that will show you how to speed leads into your sales pipeline, go here: Research from Harvard, MIT Pinpoints Hard Lead Conversion Lessons with Easy Solutions

Find out how:

• Clarifying value proposition helped one company decrease cost-per-acquisition by 66% and multiplied monthly profit four times over
• Re-engaging clients helped one company attain grow its business by 64%
• To quickly and easily choose the best lists
• To time lead-generation activities to attain the highest possible return on investment of resources
• Closed-loop feedback makes sales professionals worship their marketing department

Find out much more here: Finish 2011 Strong: Six Funnel Focal Points to Maximize Time, Resources and Revenues Part 1 and Part 2

It all came full circle in October, when Jen Doyle, MarketingSherpa Senior Research Manager and Lead Author of the 2012 B2B Marketing Benchmark Report, discussed what more than 1,745 marketing organizations had to say about their lead generation efforts in 2011.

“It’s increasingly challenging for marketers to achieve success, and challenges are growing in pertinence year after year,” she explains. “Perceived effectiveness of tactics is declining severely. It’s getting more difficult to achieve the same results from the same marketing activities.”

She points out, however, that may be due to the fact that marketers still aren’t optimizing their funnels:

• 68% haven’t identified their sales or marketing funnels.
• 61% send leads directly to sales.
• 79% haven’t established lead scoring.
• 65% haven’t nurtured leads.

Learn how to make 2012 a better year here: 2012 B2B Marketing Benchmark Report: How Marketers are Transforming Mounting Pressures, Challenges into Revenues.

We are in the process of planning our 2012 webinar year. What would you like to know more about? What information would help you generate more leads? How can we help you stay on top of lead-generation innovations? Leave a comment below.

B2B Telemarketing, Content Marketing, Inside Sales, Lead Generation, Lead Management, Lead Nurturing, Lead Scoring, Leadership, Marketing Strategy, Social Media, Thought Leadership

Longer selling cycles and stalled deals are impeding sales funnels everywhere. Use these three practices to convert more leads into revenue:

Use Funnel-Specific Market Research
If you really want to understand what’s happening with customers at a particular point in your funnel, then you have to ask them while the last interaction with you is relatively fresh in their minds. As such, an interview or survey should happen close enough to the event that the prospect will recall the context of the decision. Be sure to include questions on customer decision dynamics. In many industries, for example, executives are scrutinizing much smaller transactions, so lead generation, lead nurturing and sales enablement tactics must address this shift in buying behavior. Typically, such research reveals a few issues that can be addressed relatively quickly.

Integrate this research into your demand-generation and lead-nurturing framework by making such surveys or interviews automated trigger events. For example, let’s say you’d like to gain a customer perspective of your teleprospecting operation. Here’s how you can go about it:

1. Create an automated rule - on the first teleprospecting conversation send an email to the prospect moments after the call.
2. Reference the conversation and the name of the representative, then ask for confidential feedback.
3. Provide a link within the email to a simple survey that asks about the knowledge and professionalism of the representative. The web form might also allow for free-text feedback.

Use this type of feedback to improve training for the individual or team. Similar context-sensitive surveys could occur when customers download a white paper or a case study, attend a webinar or visit a tradeshow booth. Use this kind of information to improve white papers, case studies, webinars, or other specific marketing outputs.

Use Teleprospecting to Re-Engage Your Stalled Prospects
Professional teleprospecting representatives should consistently approach “dead” leads as an informal market-research project. The message can be straight and true. The representative is trying to find out what went wrong to better serve customers in the future. The rep should ask the customer to be as candid as possible, then listen and thank the customer for his candor. Open-ended questions should be used at the outset, with probing and clarifying questions thereafter. In many states, B2B calls can be digitally recorded so key stakeholders can actually hear what customers are saying.

Obviously, for this approach to work, the teleprospecting team must be listened to as a voice of the customer. The company can then use this intelligence to develop incentives that address the problems of delay. For example, if prospects lack capital budgets, perhaps a “buy-now-pay-later” program will get the sale back on track. Commonly, nothing has happened because the project was never a priority. In such cases, lead nurturing and campaigns targeting more senior executives can be of value.

Make this type of effort a two-part campaign. In the first phase, the team does the research. In the second, after huddling with product marketing and sharing the answers, the team reaches back out selectively to offer solutions that respond to the prospect’s reason for stalling. Of course, the solutions can then be applied moving forward to all stalled prospects.

Update Your Ideal Customer Profile
Sometimes, less is more. If your research reveals that your product or services is not a particularly good fit, you might want to revisit the ideal customer profile for each product or service, and adjust your targeting and qualification tactics accordingly. Better targeting won’t salvage stalled leads, but it will allow you to allocate more sales and marketing resources where you can win more frequently. That strategy, in turn, may buy your company more time to change the product or service to make it more competitive.

While no one can change the economy, you can increase the yield from demand-generation investments by using these three practices. They’ll help you attain a better understanding of the buying behavior and obstacles that prevent customers from moving forward. This approach will help you identify the best tools to move them down the sales funnel or reallocate resources that will yield a better return on investment.

B2B Telemarketing, Inside Sales, Lead Generation, Lead Management, Sales, Sales Leads

Too many marketers think that their inside sales teams are alchemists. They dump data that’s absolute garbage into the top of the sales funnel and expect sales lead gold to come out the other side.

This came to mind when my teleprospecting team was struggling with one of our lead-generation clients.

They had promised us a “high-quality list” from their database: tens of thousands of names of c-suite executives who were in their target-market sweet spot.

The reality: nearly half the contacts had disconnected phone numbers and another 30 percent definitely wasn’t in the target market for this particular product. Think fast food joints and mom-and-pop businesses. The remaining contacts had missing or inaccurate information. My team spent at least 80 percent of their time doing research and investigation to make the list usable so they could do what they were actually hired to do – generate leads.

Unless you want your inside sales professionals to be mere data entry clerks, test your lists! It takes about 30 hours of calling to attain a fairly accurate understanding of list quality by answering these questions:

• Is there duplicate data?
• Is the information current and complete?
• Are the contacts truly in your product’s target market?

If more than 1 out of 20 contacts fail this test, I advise cleaning this list before you pass it along to a lead-generation team. Unless, of course, you don’t mind your team spending their time tracking down and entering data instead of generating leads.

Here’s the crux: you may think you have this awesome, robust database, but only a small segment of it may actually be the customer you want to reach. Unless you’re constantly updating your lists, too much of the data is likely old and unusable.

Your team may, indeed, be alchemists, and generate impressive numbers of leads regardless of the garbage you’re giving them. My team did. They ended up giving the client with the horrifically bad list an 800 percent return on investment, but not without a lot of extra work and stress. I can’t help but think how much higher their ROI would have been if we were given a better list. Think about what your teams could achieve, too.

B2B Telemarketing, Human Touch, Inside Sales, Lead Generation, Lead Management, Lead Qualification

Since 2007, InsideSales.com has been partnering with leading academic institutions to analyze data gathered from two billion communications with 80 million customer profiles. During Tuesday’s B2B Lead Roundtable webinar, Dave Elkington, Chairman and CEO of InsideSales.com, shared the juiciest statistics and trends from these analyses to help B2B marketers optimize inbound lead contact, qualification and close rates. Here’s a taste of what he presented:

• 78 percent of sales goes to the company that responds first
• An average of 43 percent of companies never respond to inbound leads
• Most sales professionals give up trying to reach a lead after an average of 1.29 attempts, but 61 percent of leads go into the pipeline after the second call.
• If you set an appointment, expect a 20 to 45 percent no-show rate. Decrease no-shows by 20 percent by using Google or Outlook calendar invitations.

Not a minute passes in this webinar without Dave presenting some type of data you can use to speed leads into your sales pipeline. If you’re serious about driving the highest ROI from your inbound marketing investment, be sure to watch the video replay below.

View and download slides via SlideShare.

Want to jump ahead to key points fast? Review these timestamps.

2:20 – Dave outlines the history of InsideSales and why organizations like MIT, Harvard and Stanford are eager to partner with them.

7:00 – There is a revolution in sales, says Dave. In 2009, there were 800,000 inside sales departments. In 2013, there will be 2.3 million. Meanwhile, outside sales will have flat growth. Venture capital firms want companies in their portfolios to have inside sales departments, so much so that they’ll recruit, train and transplant inside sales teams into their portfolio companies.

9:33 – When does a web lead cold go? Immediately! Contact rates decrease 100 times if you wait 30 minutes, as opposed to five minutes, to call back. If you think your company is good at responding, think again, says Dave. InsideSales.com has conducted more than 5,000 audits for leading companies, and the average response time is 44 hours! An average of 43 percent didn’t respond at all.

13:15 – 78 percent of sales goes to the company that responds first – not to the company with the best or cheapest product.

14:00 – Sales professionals will attempt an average of 1.29 calls to reach a lead and give up after that. However, in the B2B environment, 30 percent of leads go into the pipeline after the first dial attempt, 61 percent go into it at the second. It’s worth calling back until the eighth attempt. Some companies see leads move into the pipeline even after the 12^th call.

16:18 – Higher-ticket items require more research before calling the customer. The more you research, the less you will have to dial.

19:00 – Efficient sales reps tend to leave more voicemails because they’re making more calls. That means they can spend more than two and a half hours a day leaving voicemail. However, about four percent of those voicemails result in a call back which goes directly into the pipeline. Script voicemails to ensure more call backs, and even automate them.

22:11 – Make the most of every call by capturing permission to communicate with them in the future. A single rep can capture 7,500 permissions in the course of a year, “That’s enough contacts to fill a webinar without making another phone call,” Dave points out.

26:23 – No-show rates to appointments can be as high as 50 percent. Prevent that with a “hot transfer” – ask if they would have 10 to 15 minutes to talk immediately.

27:42 – Build a direct dial database. Contact rates increase by 300 percent when using direct dial.

29:21 – If you can’t do a hot transfer, do appointment reminders via Google or Microsoft Outlook, there will be a 20 percent greater chance that they won’t cancel.

30:32 – If you call between 8 and 9 a.m. and 4 and 5 p.m., you’re 150 percent more likely to connect. If you call on Wednesday and Thursday, you’re 80 percent more likely. Always call before emailing. And don’t limit communication to email – leverage Twitter, LinkedIn and fax. Dave reports fax pulls seven times better than email.

33:53 – Show a local presence. When callers used a local number, there was at least a 60 percent increase in contact rates. Emails sent with a local number received a 40 percent higher response and 33 percent lower negative response rate.

39:08 – Review of key takeaways

41:08 – Q&A begins

B2B Telemarketing, Human Touch, Inside Sales, Lead Generation, Lead Management, Lead Qualification, Webinar Replay

According to MarketingSherpa’s 2011 B2B Marketing Benchmark Report, almost 70 percent of B2B organizations increased their inbound marketing budgets this year. This includes website design, management, and optimization, as well as inbound-marketing tactics including social media, virtual events and webinars, SEO and pay-per-click.

If you’re making the same investment, you will definitely want to attend our next B2B Lead Roundtable Webinar on July 19, Research from Harvard, MIT Pinpoints Hard Lead Conversion Lessons with Easy Solutions. David Elkington, Chairman and CEO of InsideSales.com, will share how his company has joined forces with these academic leaders to study how companies are managing the leads they’re generating through inbound marketing efforts.

The results are going to surprise and may even alarm you.

Consider this: merely responding to the leads you receive will put you ahead of 40 percent of B2B organizations! Companies are spending more money than ever to drive leads through their websites and the Internet, and yet, nearly half don’t follow up! That means there’s outstanding opportunity for those who do. David will give you practical, easy-to-implement ideas, underscored by case studies, to make sure you hold onto leads once you get them. The discussion will include:

• The speed at which leads go cold – it’s a lot faster than you think – and what to do about it
• The average time it takes companies to respond to leads
• The average attempts sales people make before they give up
• Why caller ID matters – even for B2B sales calls
• The best time of the day and day of the week to follow up with prospects

Watch the webinar replay:

B2B Telemarketing, Lead Management, Webcasts/Webinars

When Brian Carroll and I present webinars on adding the human touch to lead nurturing, like the ones last month for the B2B Lead Roundtable and Marketo, we inevitably get these questions:

“How often should we call? How often should we email? What should we do first?”

The last question always guides me to the best responses for the first two. That’s why I always call the prospect before sending an email.

First, a phone conversation is a prime opportunity to gain opt-in. You can hear Brian and I role play how it’s done at timestamp 47:34 in the webinar replay from the B2B Lead Roundtable event. Listen in and you’ll be surprised at how natural it is to gain permission to send more information, which, of course, requires an email address.

Second, emails cannot do discovery. An email can’t tell you:

• Whether recipients are influencers or decision makers
• Their roles in the company
• What they’re most interested in knowing
• Their buying process

In contrast, a thoughtfully planned conversation is the ultimate discovery tool. It can reveal the answers to all of these points so you can identify the best:

• Follow-up cadence and frequency: You’ll know their buying cycle and how to ideally align contact – phone calls and emails – to it.
• Content: You’ll know what they care about and why, that’s the knowledge you need to create emails that are meaningful to them.

Third, real-life conversation is the best way to build connection. Thanks to your conversation, prospects will be looking for your email and will be more likely to open it because they know it will have content they can use. Your relationship will be off to a flying start. And, remember, whoever has the strongest relationship ultimately wins the sale.

B2B Telemarketing, Cold Calling, Inside Sales, Lead Generation, Lead Nurturing

Last month’s webinars on leveraging the human touch to drive leads, presented for the B2B Lead Roundtable and Marketo, prompted a great question: “What should I look for in a teleprospector?”

Unfortunately, that can’t be answered with a fast, convenient sound bite. That’s why I’m going to do my best to respond here in my inaugural blog post.

Over the past 15 years, I’ve been involved in hiring hundreds of teleprospectors. Along with Brian Carroll, I was one of the co-founders of InTouch, now MECLABS Leads Group. Fortune 100 companies from a broad base of industries hire us to do teleprospecting for them; they know the value of the human touch to optimize their lead generation efforts. It seems like we’re always on the lookout for powerful teleprospectors to support these accounts, and over the years, we’ve pinpointed some of the critical traits that are inherent in every top performer:

An abiding desire to serve. Teleprospectors must sincerely want to help others, because that’s what they’re going to be doing all day, every day. When they conclude a conversation with a prospect, we want that prospect to feel like the call added value to his day – regardless of his timing to buy. To make that happen, teleprospectors must have an attitude of service, a sincere eagerness to help others. Furthermore, not only must teleprospectors serve the people they call, they must gain real satisfaction from serving their colleagues as well. There’s no room to be territorial, because they’re going to be passing leads to someone else who will take them to the next level
in the sales process.

The focus to follow process. A full-time teleprospector can expect to make 80 to 100 calls a day. This entails far more than simply smiling, dialing and spouting a script. After all, we use call guides, not scripts; read this or watch our most recent webinar to find out why. Our team must be fully engaged in each and every call to successfully execute proven, tested tactics that drive opportunity. It doesn’t matter how clever or charming a candidate is; if he’s unwilling to follow process, you don’t want him calling.

Tenacity and patience. We’re not bell-ringers here; people aren’t getting leads every three minutes. It can typically take 8 to 19 calls to reach a prospect. Teleprospecting is not for someone who thrives on instant gratification.

Empathy and strong listening skills. They must be able to put themselves in their prospects’ shoes and anticipate their needs. That means listening intently to pick up on the subtle signals that indicate where a prospect is on the buying process. You would be impressed at the engagement we get from prospects who can sense that our teleprospectors are paying close attention. People know when they’re genuinely being listened to.

Curiosity coupled with a love of learning. People with this combination like to be informed; they’re well-read and take pride in keeping up with what’s happening in the business world. This is a key trait for our teleprospectors because they can ultimately work with a variety of clients. While we train and coach them extensively, they must be ready to intelligently discuss any number of topics ranging from manufacturing devices to educational programs.

A clear, measured, confident speaking voice. This is lower on the list because, more than any of the other qualities, it can be taught.

Obviously, you’re not going to be able to scan a resume and identify these skills, and you can’t take someone from outside sales, plop them down with a headset and a script, and expect success. Road warriors are accustomed to closing; hunting for opportunity requires a completely different skillset and very few people have both.

To find great teleprospectors, we have candidates undergo multiple interviews and tests, including role-playing and psychological analyses, to identify strengths and opportunities for growth. You just never know where you’re going to find out a stand-out employee. Case in point is Mark Wicka, our Senior Business Development Representative. He came to our company as a temp and had never worked in any kind of lead-generation role. Eleven years later, he’s still here. (And talk about work ethic – he’s never called in sick during those entire 11 years!)

He began his career here generating leads for our clients. But these days, we’re using his skills to generate leads for MECLABS while mentoring and supervising a team that is doing the same. He thrives on learning; when he worked for our clients, he dove into educating himself about their industries and products. Now that he drives business for MECLABS, he has become expert in all aspects of lead generation. Yet, he’s the most humble guy you’d ever meet; he never comes across as a know-it-all, just very informed and authentic. His spirit of service shines through in everything he does. Consider what he has to say about what motivated him to come to MECLABS:

“I feel like fate brought me here. I worked in print advertising, but it didn’t resonate. I didn’t think it was very effective and I wanted to work for a company where I knew their solution worked,” he recalls. “I was doing more than look for a job, I wanted to work for an organization that I believed in. I’ve found that at MECLABS.

“My goal is to be an intelligent follower. There’s no disgrace in following, the person who follows leaders most effectively is the one who develops leadership most rapidly. I’ve had great mentors here – when I started it was my program managers. Today, it’s Brian Carroll and Flint McGlaughlin (CEO and Managing Director of MECLABS). Their success is my success.”

I would love to hear your thoughts about the qualities you think are essential to be an effective teleprospector. Are you surprised by my conclusions? Are there other skills you think are just as important as the ones I’ve listed? Do you want me to expand on any of these thoughts? Feel free to comment below.

B2B Telemarketing, Human Touch, Inside Sales, Leadership

If you attended our most recent B2B Lead Roundtable webinar, you found out why Brandon Stamschror, Senior Director of Operations for MECLABS Leads Group, is passionate about investing in the very best data possible: it may cost more upfront, but the return is more than worth it.

During the presentation, Brandon details an experiment with a $3.6 billion Cisco partner where the difference between the best- and worst-performing lists was almost $600 per lead. They lowered their cost-per-lead by 60% by testing and improving the quality of their marketing lists.

Brandon expanded on this topic even further during an interview with David Kirkpatrick, a MarketingSherpa reporter. Brandon reveals why:

• Your database is probably not what you think it is.
• You should only collect the data you need.
• You’re never done cleaning lists.

For some insight on how to maximize the top of your marketing funnel and why that makes revenue flow faster, be sure to check out Brandon’s interview:

MarketingSherpa: B2B Marketing: Building a quality list

Let us know what else you would like to learn about attaining and maintaining data to drive more leads; we’ll be happy to address your questions here or in future webinars.

B2B Telemarketing, CRM, Direct Marketing, Lead Generation, Marketing Strategy, ROI Measurement, Sales, Web/Tech

New technology to connect with customers is emerging every day. But even so, nothing is as efficient and effective as a simple phone call for beginning the conversations that ultimately result in sales, points out Brian Carroll.

During the latest B2B Lead Roundtable Webinar, Brian and his colleague, Brandon Stamschror, Senior Director of Operations for MECLABS Leads Group, explained how to make the most of the oldest and best sales conversion tool: the human touch. They explain why:

• The human touch is essential, especially if you count on inbound marketing to drive opportunity and you want to make the best use of sales time and resources.
• Quality data is critical. Good data significantly lowers your cost per lead. In fact, it slashed costs by more than half for a multi-billion dollar Cisco partner.
• Teleprospecting is about connecting with people, and that requires making sure every call counts through thoughtful value-adding conversation.

If you missed the presentation, you can watch the replay below.

How One Company Slashed Their Cost per Lead by More than Half from B2B Lead Roundtable on Vimeo.

View and download slides via SlideShare

Here’s a summary with time stamps to identify key sections:

4:10 – Lead generation is about building relationships. Brian emphasizes that lead generation requires communication and conversation: identifying the right people in the right companies, and engaging them with memorable, relevant conversations.

6:28 – Teleprospecting and email are the two most effective lead generation tools. Brian explains that while emails are a great way to support a conversation, they’re not a good way to start one. “What’s needed to drive conversion into the complex sales is the human touch,” says Brian. He notes that the fastest-growing companies, the companies that are fueling huge amounts of growth, look to teleprospecting and inside sales to maximize effective selling time.

8:11 – Qualify leads accurately and make the most of your sales team’s selling time with teleprospecting. Eighty percent of marketing leads are lost or discarded, according to MarketingSherpa. The biggest reason? They’re not ready to talk to a salesperson. The prospect may have responded to marketing campaigns and provided basic contact information, but sales professionals need much more than that. They need a valid business reason to talk to them and you’re not going to get that on a web form.

10:03 – Quality data is critical. Brandon reveals the outcomes of a breakthrough experiment the MECLABS Leads Group just completed with a $3.6 billion Cisco partner. They tested how higher cost/higher quality lead data affected the cost per lead. The outcome: cheap data is very expensive. The difference between the best- and worst-performing lists was an astounding $581 per lead! Listen to the webinar to find out the details.

22:58 – There are six teleprospecting rules that produce leads. The emphasis is always on building relationships. Teleprospecting is not about talking, it’s about listening.

24:55 – Rule 1: Sustain the calling. Developing relationships is a serious micro-conversion. Therefore, teleprospecting should be long-term and consistent. While most sales people give up after three times, it can take 8 to 19 calls to reach a prospect.

27:21 - Rule 2: Make every call count. There’s no such thing as a wasted dial; every call is an opportunity to learn. Brian advises taking a top-down approach. When you start calling at a higher level, the person you’re speaking with is more apt to confirm contacts and provide referrals. Know the specific role you’re calling for so that if you get voicemail, you can “zero out” to get another referral. Be in the moment. People are open to cold calls if they’re relevant. Five to 10 percent will be ready to speak to you about what you’re selling. With the rest, be prepared to add value to their day regardless of whether they’re ready to buy. After all, 70 percent of brand perception comes from direct contact with a salesperson.

36:28 – Rule 3: Throw away the scripts. Conversation is the goal. Outline the first 30 seconds of the call, briefly explain who you are, your company, the purpose of your call and how you’re going to add value. A call guide is a living document that should be flexible and assume multiple outcomes. It should outline the call’s goal, how you can add value, the important questions that you need answered, and the business issue you need to help solve. Remember: it may take several conversations to qualify someone as a sales-ready lead.

42:44 – Rule 4: Always be relevant. Sales training teaches that we need to follow-up. It doesn’t teach how. “I just want to catch up” or “I just want to touch base” is code for “Are you ready to buy yet?” That’s not being relevant; relevancy is connecting with people by understanding their priorities and their company’s priorities. MarketingSherpa found that 92 percent of B2B buyers are open to cold calls if the salesperson is relevant.

47:34 – Rule 5: Gain opt-in. Do this by sharing valuable information. Provide your teleprospecting team an email template with a valuable piece of content, it’s an easy way to gain email addresses. Brandon and Brian role play so you can hear how it’s done.

49:48 – Rule 6: Always follow up (with nurturing). This segment addresses how to deal with the 85 to 95 percent of prospects who aren’t ready to buy immediately. It outlines how to filter and find relevant content to keep them engaged, and how your teleprospecting team should present it. How do you know you’re nurturing? When what you provide offers value even if the prospect never buys from you.

53:53 – Put the rules into action. Remember, building relationships takes time. But when you add the human touch and bring all the pieces together, this is where conversion takes place. It takes conversation to achieve the discovery that qualifies leads at the level that most sales people need.

B2B Telemarketing, Cold Calling, Email Marketing, Human Touch, Inside Sales, Lead Generation, Lead Nurturing, Lead Qualification, Webcasts/Webinars, Webinar Replay