16 Nov |
The expanding social landscape – integral to lead generation? |
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Is Social Technology Integral to B2B Lead Generation? The scope of social technologies and their potential to help maximize B2B lead generation efforts is real and valid. But marketers must look beyond the eye-candy. Having a bunch of social media medals (logos and icons on your website) won’t do much for your sales team that’s out in the field trying to close the sale on a hot lead. But being active socially will definitely help establish greater credibility and increase visibility; both important factors that positively influence prospects about to make a purchase decision. It looks
Read more...09 Nov |
Is There More to Social Media than Meets the Eye? |
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Social Media and B2B Lead Generation In the spring this year, I wrote in one of my blog posts, that “social media is new and evolving”. That was in late April 2010. Today, in the fall of the same year, I have to say that social media has indeed evolved with great speed! This actually makes me want to caution marketers that social media isn’t like magic beans that will sprout into a lead generation beanstalk overnight. You still need a very strong foundation on which to build your demand generation efforts. Incorporating social tools and technologies into tried and tested target
Read more...19 Jul |
The Best Mailing List for B2B Lead Generation |
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When it comes to success in B2B lead generation, everybody knows that the mailing list is the most important ingredient in any campaign. A poor list will always produce dismal results, no matter how brilliant the offer and creative. Conversely, good lists often produce acceptable results even with mediocre execution. Consequently, companies are always looking for the “silver bullet” of mailing lists for their next B2B lead generation campaign— that perfect source of fresh, highly targeted, super-hot prospects just waiting to be contacted. Sadly, this is an exercise in futility and
Read more...30 Jun |
Customer Referrals Act as CRM Catalysts across Social Media |
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Nurture existing customers in CRM with social media to get repeat and referral business One happy customer is worth a hundred (or more) in your CRM system. Sounds like a cliché? Well, maybe; but it’s one of those eternal truths which, if you believe in and remember, will take you a long way down the road of successful customer relationship management. It’s easy to pour enthusiasm, effort, ideas (and money!) into B2B lead generation because there is that gleaming pot of gold to aim for – revenue and profits. But the repeat and referral business you can get from existing customers is
Read more...25 May |
The Missing Link in Lead Qualification Systems: Sales |
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Demand generation marketers often spend countless hours designing and fine-tuning their lead handling systems. Complicated flow charts are created, lead questionnaire content is debated endlessly, forms are designed, and telemarketing and email scripts are reviewed ad nauseam. Yet, many of these sophisticated marketers overlook the single, most crucial element of a successful lead qualification system. What is it? Field buy-in is crucial For some reason, the sales force is often left “out of the loop” when it comes to lead planning. This only adds to the age-old distrust and outright
Read more...04 May |
Social Media for Demand Generation….Is it more of a B2C than a B2B phenomenon? |
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My most recent post on social media’s pros and cons drew a lot of feedback. So, I thought we should continue the “conversation” by offering a few more opinions from this admittedly old-school but open minded marketing professional about the value (or lack thereof) of social media as a demand generation medium. As always, I welcome your continued comments. Better for Small B2C Marketers? If you look at the biggest and most successful users of Twitter and Facebook, they seem to be B2C marketers. For example, Starbucks (@Starbucks) and Zappos (@Zappos) are using Twitter apparently to
Read more...19 Apr |
Effective B2B demand generation should not be complicated |
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Resurrecting the KISS Rule for Successful Demand Generation Richard Branson certainly doesn’t need more publicity, but when I read this Q&A article in Time Magazine, one of his answers really caught my eye: Q. Has your dyslexia hindered you in the business world? —Skye O’Brien, Dartmouth, Mass. A. Strangely, I think my dyslexia has helped. When I launch a new company, I need to understand the advertising. If I can understand it, then I believe anybody can. Virgin speaks in normal language instead of using phrases that nobody understands, like “financial-service
Read more...24 Mar |
Why Most “Spike” Marketing Campaigns Fail |
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Understanding 10-60-30 Rule of Demand Generation Companies often initiate tactical “spike” marketing campaigns to overcome a quarterly sales or lead shortfall. “Spike” programs are a series of “one offs” that may yield short term numbers. However, they are largely a self-perpetuating, wasteful mistake that can be avoided if you understand the 10-60-30 rule. Anytime you initiate a demand generation campaign that includes outbound telemarketing, you will discover that the prospects you contact will always fall into three categories: 10% are right time, right place audience,
Read more...16 Mar |
ALEA’s Universal Definition of A Lead |
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When Does a Lead Become a True “Sales Lead?” Your demand generation campaigns are bound to generate responses. But are these all leads, worthy of follow-up by your sales reps? Even inexperienced marketers know that the majority of responses are simply inquiries: people seeking more information or responding to a promotional offer. Distributing raw inquiries to your sales reps without at least some basic qualification mechanism to categorize the ones that are true sales leads can be a suicidal experience. So, the real question is: how do you identify a legitimate “sales
Read more...10 Mar |
Break Your Lead “Pusher” Habit for More Sales |
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“Pushing” sales leads out to field reps and resellers is a traditional industry habit for most B2B marketers that is terribly inefficient. Sales people, like all human beings, simply don’t value something as much if it is given to them without cost or condition. As a result, leads that are “pushed” to the field are often not followed up in a timely manner, resulting in poor conversion rates and lost sales opportunities. Implementing a “pull” lead management system, on the other hand, can produce dramatically better results. Because the lead has been specifically requested by
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