B2B Lead Blog

Have you had some great marketing successes this year? Then you’ll want to let my colleagues at MarketingSherpa know. They’re compiling their ninth annual MarketingSherpa 2011 Wisdom Report. It shares the best thoughts, ideas, anecdotes and takeaways from marketers in 2010. 

In fact, even if you’ve had disappointments, and are willing to share, they’d like to hear from you as well. After all, failure is often the best teacher.

Tell us, what are some of the best lessons you learned this year?   

Great marketers are always working so diligently to put everything and everyone else in the spotlight. That effort deserves attention. That’s why I strongly encourage you to take advantage of this opportunity to attain some very positive publicity. 

Share your wisdom here, but you’ve got to do it soon because the deadline’s December 21.

B2B Telemarketing, CRM, Cold Calling, Current Affairs, Direct Marketing, Email Marketing, Event Marketing, Human Touch, Lead Generation, Lead Management, Lead Nurturing, Lead Qualification, Lead Scoring, Leadership, Marketing Strategy, Public Relations (PR), ROI Measurement, Referral Marketing, Sales, Sales Leads, Social Media, Thought Leadership, Trigger Events, Web/Tech, Webcasts/Webinars, Weblogs, Word-of-Mouth

In just a couple of days, I’ll be in Barcelona speaking at the Cisco Partner Velocity Conference. 

To say I’m looking forward to this opportunity is an understatement. I’m honored to be asked to share my insights with their channel partners from around the world. And I can’t wait to hear firsthand the challenges and opportunities these marketers are dealing with.

The timing of this event couldn’t be better. Marketing is undergoing a remarkable evolution at this moment. The multitude of mediums we can use to speak to our marketplace is revolutionizing how we work. I believe the days of campaigns – where we start-stop-measure-tweak and start all over again – are over. Today, for marketing to effectively drive revenue, it must be a continuous, meaningful conversation. 

The most successful marketers will know how to lead that conversation both internally and externally so they can communicate to their customer the right things in the right way at the right time. Here’s a snapshot of what I mean and some of what I plan on sharing in Barcelona: 

You speak through channels: make sure what you’re saying makes sense 

If you’re going to say something to customers, make it meaningful to them. Here’s the acid test: anything you tweet, email, or blog should be valuable to them even if they never buy from you. And if you lure them in with that tweet, email or post, make sure that conversation stays on track throughout the sales process. Consider an experiment that the MECLABS Conversion Group conducted with NetSuite: 

• They optimized a pay-per-click (PPC) ad to specifically outline what makes them stand apart: the world’s #1 on-demand software with 6,459 customers worldwide.
• They changed the landing page that customers were directed to from the PPC ad. The page’s messaging and images continued the conversation by directly connecting to key messages on the PPC ad. There was no question that customers knew they were in the right place doing the right thing.
• They changed the order form, a place where many clients experience anxiety about whether they should proceed, to reiterate what motivated them to start the transaction in the first place. 
• The result: a 272% increase in responses to their lead generation form, 268% more projected revenue and a 302% increase in monthly profit.  

You use channels – in this case, the PPC to landing page to order form – to converse with the customer. Make sure the entire channel is optimized, not just an ad, not just a web page.  When you conduct marketing in a vacuum, you start a different conversation in a different way over and over again with the same audience.  If someone did that to you in real-life, real-time, you’d get annoyed and walk away. 

Pinpoint the best time to bring sales into the conversation

Read more…

Email Marketing, Lead Generation, Lead Management, Lead Nurturing, Lead Qualification, Marketing Strategy, ROI Measurement, Social Media, Thought Leadership, Web/Tech

When I asked members of the B2B Lead Generation Roundtable on LinkedIn how companies can improve alignment between sales and marketing, our discussion board was inundated with keen insight and brutal honesty.  Marketers and sales professionals were clearly eager to square off about why we too often miss the mark and what we can do about it. 

This was precisely the frontline reality I was seeking before presenting “Playbook  
for Marketing and Sales Alignment: How to Collaborate to Optimize Lead Generation Programs,” at Frost & Sullivan’s Growth, Innovation and Leadership Conference last month in San Francisco.

Even though, as most of you know, I intensely study this issue, business transforms itself  at light speed; that’s why I appreciate the thousands of professionals who make up the B2B Lead Generation Roundtable. They’re in the thick of it, dealing with the challenges, seizing the opportunities. For them, there’s no time for philosophizing; it’s all about driving revenue. That’s why the roundtable is my favorite sounding board and a powerful source of inspiration.

If you review the pages of responses – they’re a lively read, trust me – they all point to what Doug Kessler, Creative Director of Velocity Partners, UK, summed up in his statement, “This feels like the next big frontier in B2B.”

Doug nailed it: where there’s room for improvement there’s room for opportunity and the revenues that come with it.

If the discussion is any indication, savvy marketers and sales professionals are well on their way to making the most of that opportunity: they know when they’ve gone off track, but they definitely know how to get to where they need to go. Here is a small sampling of some juicier tidbits:

If you don’t have strong leadership, you won’t stay on track. “It starts at the top,” explains Andrea Courtin, Marketing Consultant for TrusteSolutions in Houston, TX. “For sales and marketing teams to truly align, they need a mandate from the executive team.”

Read more…

Lead Generation, Lead Management, Lead Nurturing, Lead Qualification, Marketing Strategy, ROI Measurement, Sales Leads

If you didn’t get a chance to attend MarketingSherpa’s B2B Summit in San Francisco a last week, you missed an excellent opportunity to gain knowledge you could  have used right away for better results. I had a great time.

For me, what was most valuable was learning and connecting with fellow attendees and hearing about how they’re driving results for their companies. I’m looking forward to gaining even more insight at the B2B Marketing Summit in Boston, October 25-26.

If you haven’t signed up for the B2B Summit, I  encourage check it out, since they’re offering a special rate saving you $400. Register here.  

If you want to find out what you missed and could use some fresh ideas to immediately improve your lead generation check out the following posts:

• B2B Marketing Summit ’10 Wrap-up: Seven takeaways to help you engage potential customers, generate high-quality leads and more
• Lead Generation: Drive better ROI from your marketing campaigns
• Nuggets of Wisdom from Marketing Sherpa’s B2B 
• Our 14 Favorite Take Aways from MarketingSherpa #B2BSummit
• Seven Sales & Marketing Insights From Recent Events
• Four takeaways from Marketing Sherpa’s B2B Summit

If you did get a chance to attend, it would be great to hear from you about what you considered most valuable. You can also follow the conversation on Twitter at #b2bsummit

Lead Generation, Lead Management, Lead Nurturing, Lead Scoring, Marketing Strategy, ROI Measurement, Sales, Sales Leads

Everyone’s getting squeezed for ROI. This is nothing new but the pressure is even higher for marketers who are looking at proving their revenue contribution. We’ve all heard the stories about the accolade-winning marketing campaigns that didn’t move the sales needle. CEOs want far more than just awards and pretty brochures. They want proven results. 

They’re demanding marketers demonstrate – beyond a shadow of a doubt – that they’re driving revenue. So, ideally, marketers set before them spread sheets proclaiming high lead-conversion and even better expense-to-revenue ratios; the CEO smiles with satisfaction and pads the next year’s marketing budget.

But should they?

That’s the essential question of Dave Green’s whitepaper, Measuring Lead Generation Effectiveness: a Case for a New Approach. He challenges marketers to be painfully honest: do they really deserve the credit they’re taking? Are their fabulous campaigns the primary reason deals are closing, or are the wins a reflection of the blood, sweat
and tears of tenacious sales professionals?

Read more…

Lead Generation, Lead Qualification, ROI Measurement, Sales Leads

In a recent post I talked about the most important B2B marketing metrics to CEO’s or what I believe CEO’s should be measuring. All too often Marketing is measuring one thing while the CEO’s are asking a question those measurements don’t answer. 

The biggest challenge for marketers is the quality vs. quantity tug-of-war. I think most realize quality leads are what sales wants (and the ones that will close) but the quantity of leads always seems to be top of mind with CEO’s which force marketers switch focus and bring in lots of leads instead of quality leads. What happens next? The CEO doesn’t see revenue (lots of leads don’t equal good leads) and then gets frustrated that marketing isn’t providing any ROI.

So, how do you build a lead generation program that generates quality leads, creates revenue, and meets your CEO’s goals? To answer this question I’ve invited Aaron Ross, CEO of PebbleStorm and the author of “PREDICTABLE REVENUE: Lessons Learned From Growing Salesforce.com’s $1 Billion Sales Machine.”

During the webinar you’ll learn: 

• How to build a lead generation machine that will predictably generate leads month-after-month
• How to ensure sales follows up on every lead
• The two things CEOs care MOST about that you must understand
• A simple 6-step call agenda to help salespeople convert new leads into qualified opportunities

Get the slides (no registration required)

Lead Generation, Lead Management, Lead Qualification, ROI Measurement, Webcasts/Webinars

The single biggest issue for B2B marketers is effective lead generation. I wrote an eight part series on building an effective lead generation program a while back. To help readers who missed the series, I pulled all the posts together in order.

In this series, you’ll read the following posts:

1: The Right Mindset: Conversations, not campaigns
2: Sales and Marketing – One Team
3: Develop and intensify your Ideal Customer Profile 
4: Clear and Universal Lead Definition
5: Treat your marketing database as a valued asset
6: A Multi-modal lead generation portfolio approach
7: Effective lead management
8: Lead nurturing for lead development

You may also find this ebook that connects with the series relevant.

Can you think of other critical success factors I’m missing?

B2B Telemarketing, Books, CRM, Current Affairs, Direct Marketing, Email Marketing, Event Marketing, Human Touch, Lead Generation, Lead Management, Lead Nurturing, Lead Qualification, Leadership, Marketing Strategy, Public Relations (PR), ROI Measurement, Sales, Sales Leads, Social Media, Thought Leadership, Web/Tech

Recently, I’ve been having more conversations with marketers about lead scoring and how they can use it as a part of the overall lead qualification and nurturing process.

The question “what is lead scoring?” also came up during the “Broad Reach + Intelligent Lead Nurturing = Increased Revenue” webinar I participated in yesterday with Scott Mersy of Genius.com, Andrew Gaffney of DemandGen Report, Ardath Albee of Marketing Interactions.

So, what is lead scoring anyway?
Here’s how I see it. Lead scoring helps quantify the value of a lead based on: the profile of the prospect, behavior (online and/offline), demographics and the likelihood to buy within a defined time frame. Often there is explicit User-Supplied Data (e.g., Registration Forms) and Implicit User-Tracked Behavior (e.g., what content have they engaged?) included in the scoring as well.

Lead scoring can be helpful, but when you have a complex sale, it’s just only part of what’s needed to qualify sales ready leads. It’s the human touch of conversation that provides the certainty that a lead is sales ready and that comes from the many nuances gleaned from a personal interaction.

I’ve noticed a lot of marketers with a complex sale are using lead scoring as the only means of lead qualification before they route leads to their sales team.

Lead scoring is not a substitute for human touch. Rather, it prioritizes where you need invest the human touch.

Still, the recipe for implementing a lead scoring program remains largely a mystery for most marketers. This subject deserves more attention than I am giving it in this post, but I will explore this in more detail in future posts.

To start, here are the main elements of lead scoring:

1. Targeting/Messaging/Calls-to-Action (right people, right companies?)
2. Explicit User-Supplied Data (e.g., Registration Forms)
3. Implicit User-Tracked Behavior (e.g., what content have they engaged? online and offline)
4. Phone Qualification & Discovery
5. Sales Qualification & Discovery

Points 4 and 5 are areas that often get overlooked and may lead to the expectation that leads are sales ready, when they may not be. Lead scoring and automation support a process of lead qualification, but there are more fundamental aspects of lead management that often get overlooked.

Share your thoughts or questions on lead scoring in the comments.

Related post:
B2B Lead management is far from an easy task

B2B Telemarketing, Human Touch, Lead Generation, Lead Management, Lead Nurturing, Lead Qualification, ROI Measurement, Web/Tech

Today CEOs expect marketers to provide metrics and to be accountable to meeting their numbers just like sales people. They do have a bunch of activity metrics and some squishy metrics like brand recognition.

At the same time, most CEOs agree that they aren’t getting enough activity at the top of the sales funnel. Thus their marketers are constantly reminded that more leads are needed…now! When the revenue doesn’t immediately materialize, CEOs will lament, why can’t I see ROI from marketing?

This is what CEOs should be asking?

1. What effect are our marketing investments having on sales productivity?
2. What can marketing do to lower the combined expense to revenue ratio of sales and marketing?

As marketers, I believe the key is to look at why are we measuring our marketing in the first place?

I’d love to get your input on what you believe are the most important B2B marketing metrics for CEOs?

CRM, Current Affairs, Lead Generation, Lead Management, Lead Nurturing, Lead Qualification, Leadership, Marketing Strategy, ROI Measurement

Sometimes in an attempt to vamp up lead nurturing efforts, misguided and well-meaning organizations simply start sending out more emails. When email is misused in this manner, companies are really just training prospects to ignore or delete their messages. 

See What IS and ISN’T Lead Nurturing

If your organization lacks a well-defined process for nurturing early-stage leads and building relationships before the buying process, you are missing out on opportunities. True lead nurturing involves creating and maintaining relevant and consistent dialog with viable potential customers – regardless of their timing to buy. Your content should help you become a resource to prospects.

A true lead nurturing program will always include:

• A relationship building mindset
• A multi-modal approach
• The human touch continue a relevant dialog and make appropriate offers based on behavior and engagement.
• Lead nurturing automation tools that will support, personalization, lower volume and ad hoc delivery while tracking all touch points such as phone, email, online efforts and personal contact.

The measurement of nurturing results such as:

• Depths of contacts in sphere of influence
• Contacts that “opt-in” for nurturing
• Contacts that become “sales ready” leads

This can seem like a complicated ordeal. It’s easy to see why organizations get overwhelmed by the time and planning required for developing an effective program, so I’ve broken down the process into eight steps.

1. Define the Ideal Customer Profile: Make sure you are nurturing relationships with the right people and organizations.
2. Define the Universal Lead Definition: Higher standards on qualifying inquiries to actual leads positively impacts conversion with lead to pipeline and lead to sale.
3. Lead qualification: Marketers have a tendency to require too much information from their inquiries at the first touch in an effort to qualify someone right away. The process can be broken down into steps that balance out the process.
4. Understand and Capture Audience: You need to understand who’s involved in the buying process so you can build a database based on your prospect’s role. The goal isn’t to build the biggest database, but to build one that is going to be most relevant.
5. Message Development: Message mapping is a great way for organizations to tie in what they are selling with what the buyer’s key issues are.
6. Build Lead Nurturing Library: Gather content that you can use to set yourself and your company up as thought leaders.
7. Develop Lead Nurturing Tracks: Map out tactics for sharing your content. Remember to start out slow and build your program slowly.
8. Executing Multi-Modal Lead Nurturing: Track all touch points (email, web, phone, social media etc.)

Human Touch, Lead Nurturing, Lead Qualification, ROI Measurement, Sales Leads, Webcasts/Webinars