Powering Marketing Automation with Targeted Leads - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #251
Monday, June 22nd, 2009Written by Steven Woods, CTO of Eloqua and the author of the recent book Digital Body Language.
Amy was kind enough to ask me to write a post to the B2B Lead audience to answer a question that frequently comes up. What is the relationship between Demand Generation/Marketing Automation, such as what we provide at Eloqua, and Targeted Contact Discovery, such as Reachforce’s service.
It’s a great question, and the answer touches on a number of areas.
The key relationship is the critical importance of understanding your target audience. The cost of raw, untargeted data continues to drop. With various social or data scraping services in the market today, the cost of a raw name, even a name with title information attached, has been reduced to pennies.
However, this has led to a market dynamic where untargeted marketing messages are prevalent, and the ability to precisely target the right buyer with the right message at the right time is the most important differentiator.
Role-based contact discovery is a crucial step in understanding who is a potential buyer of your product or services. Going beyond title to discover actual functional role allows you to precisely identify the individual who would, when the time is right, progress through a buying cycle and purchase your product or services.
And this is where demand generation, such as the platform we provide at Eloqua, comes in.
The key synergy is that by using a demand generation platform to understand the digital body language of our buyers, we can identify the critical second piece of the equation - where each buyer is in their buying cycle. By understanding the stages of a buying process for your product or service, and then using scoring to map each potential buyer to the stage of the buying process he or she is at, you can see whether they are at the education and awareness stage, are discovering potential vendors, or are validating a vendor as their final choice.
With a clear understanding of the “who” (based on role-based discovery) and the “how interested” (based on reading their digital body language), targeting the right message to the right person at the right time becomes possible.
However, there is another crucial link. Even though the differentiated value of understanding role, vs just title, is clear to most marketers, the difference may be lost on the CFO. Demand generation processes allow you to paint a much clearer picture of the value of one name over another.
With Eloqua, you can rethink your marketing analysis around the full buying funnel. By taking a top-down view of your marketing analysis, you can begin to get a clear picture of where each buyer is in their buying process. As you do this, you can begin to push your analysis of the value of a name further down the buying funnel. Determining, through using lead scoring, which source of names actually turns into Marketing Qualified Leads and revenue opportunities allows you to view the value of the incoming names more clearly. If a targeted name costs more by a factor of 5, but converts into revenue opportunities at 10X the rate of untargeted names, it is clearly more valuable. Demand generation allows you to prove that value further down the buying funnel.
A third critical link is in sales understanding. Sales needs to engage with individual buyers in individual conversations. The only way to do this is for them to understand the interests of each buyer. Targeted discovery allows you to provide your sales team with insights into what the potential buyer’s role and major focus areas are, while Eloqua allows you to provide your sales team with insight into their area and level of interest through giving them insights into the buyer’s digital body language.
With these approaches in place, it is even possible to reverse the standard approach of seeking, through targeted lead discovery, folks in the right roles, followed by using lead nurturing to cultivate and generate interest. Interest may already exist, and can be identified through seeing individuals from ideal target companies anonymously visiting your website. In this case, these companies, where interest has already been seen, can be passed automatically to Reachforce for targeted lead discovery. This provides you with an immediate win, as you have a person in the right role, at a company that is already showing interest in your product or solution.
Together, targeted lead discovery through Reachforce and demand generation through Eloqua form a powerful combination that allows you to find the right person, at the right company, showing the right level of buying interest. For your sales team, there can be no better lead than that.
Fear Factor Direct Mail - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #247
Friday, June 12th, 2009
I am always looking for ideas on how to stand out in the crowd, so when I saw this idea on two different blogs, I had to share it. In case you missed Dianna Huff or Drew McLellan sharing this interesting direct mail they received themselves, both were sent a FedEx package with chocolate covered grasshoppers inside.
The package said, “You’re a risk-taker, a dream-realizer. What’s left to do that you haven’t already done? Eat a grasshopper. They’re farm raised, covered in chocolate and rich in protein. So, not only will you be breaking boundaries, but you’ll be eating healthy, too.” A note was attached with the real promotion, “Entrepreneurs can change the world. Join the movement now! grasshopper.com/idea”
According to a Fox News video, a company in Needham, MA sent the grasshoppers to 5,000 “of the most influential people in the U.S.” in the hopes that these people would then talk about the company and its campaign.
Drew and Dianna seemed to have different takes on the success of the campaign.
Drew loved the campaign - Bottom line — it worked. 3-D mailings may cost a little more money — but they deliver big results when they are done well.
The folks at Grasshopper.com decided to send out 5,000 of the attention-hopping packages to entrepreneurs, bloggers, celebrities, journalists and customers. They spent 3 months assembling the list and made sure the packaging and cross promotion (Twitter, YouTube, bloggers, their website, etc.) were all in order.
This was a very well thought out and executed campaign. Bravo to the Grasshopper gang.
While Dianna seems to have mixed thoughts - So, the company got me and lots of other people to write about its campaign — which according to the Fox News video, was the company’s objective. But, it didn’t get me to buy — or even consider its service. Is the campaign a failure or success?
To me, 5,000 doesn’t seem to be a particularly targeted audience but it did seem to get the company the coverage they were looking for. After all, I didn’t even get the chocolate covered grasshoppers, and I am writing about them.
Obviously this campaign worked best because the name of the company is Grasshopper but the idea of a bold direct mail piece is possible for anyone. Something else to learn from the campaign is to not just focus direct mail on prospects. You might get more bang for your buck with bloggers and thought leaders.
Photo credit: Drew’s Marketing Minute
Repurposing Lead Generation Content You Already Have – Sales, This is a TIP for you too! - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #242
Monday, June 1st, 2009Creating new content on a regular basis is tough and very time consuming. Here at ReachForce with almost everything we create we create a plan on how we are going to make use of the content in as many places as possible. Things like converting eBooks or whitepapers into blog posts and vice versa or using surveys for lead information gathering as well as trend mapping.
Well, nurture marketers and sales teams out there here’s a GREAT idea! I got an email from an Account Executive at MarketBright (see his picture below) that simply invited me to visit the MarketBright blog. Then he went on to list a few of the most popular posts. I thought this was brilliant. He wasn’t trying to sell me anything, well maybe he was in the last paragraph but it was subtle. He was just letting me know they had a resource I may be interested in. No customization was needed, just a simple introduction and a list of the resources. Easy as pie.
Here’s what the email looked like –
Ok, I must admit I think the picture is a little cheesy. But it did make me giggle so I guess it worked, it caught my attention. But otherwise, his hook worked. Now I’m sure with the MarketBright email tracking, Jon was able to tell what I was interested in and now he knows what to follow up with next.
If you have a blog, steal some content from there. Big change your prospects missed it the first time it went out. If you don’t have a blog, pull out highlights from eBooks, whitepapers, webcasts, basically anything else you have and put together an email that links back to each of these.
I’m stealing this idea and going to do something like this for our pipeline nurturing program. No selling from me, just trying to be resourceful for our decision makers and help encourage further interaction. Jon, your email worked. You caught my attention and I acted. Thank you for the great idea.
Market Like it’s 1999 - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #237
Thursday, May 14th, 2009Remember 1999? The tech bubble had yet to burst, times were good and our biggest worry was Y2K. Back then marketers had a positive attitude and spent time tailoring messages to their audience around how the benefits of their product would help the prospect.
We all know that times have been tough this year, we don’t need to be reminded in every email, direct mail, blog post and webinar invitation we get. If I want to be reminded, I just look at my stock portfolio :(. This is a plea to all marketers out there, STOP talking about the recession. Don’t remind your audience that their budgets have been cut or that they are now a man down.
If your prospects have had budget cuts and layoffs, there is no need to remind them of the current economic state; they live with the reminder every day. Instead, now is the time to focus on the positives.
Here are some reasons why you should NOT highlight the recession in your next marketing message:
- Stand out from the crowd. If you are sending out the same ways to recession-proof your X, as everyone else, your message will be lost. I automatically delete any email or webinar invite I get that has the word recession or economy in it.
- You are subtly reminding your prospects that their budgets are shrinking and that they should be spending less. FYI- your goal is to sell them something meaning you want them to spend more.
- Now is the time to really highlight how you are going to save your prospects time and money. Make them feel like your product is the one thing that cannot be cut from the budget.
- Perception is reality. As long as the media and we as marketers continue to propagate the idea that we are in a recession, then we will be in one. We can all do our part to be more positive.
My point is that we all know we are in a recession and although things are beginning to look up, we don’t need every marketing message to remind us of our budget cuts and staff losses.
Easy Newsletter Content - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #232
Tuesday, May 5th, 2009Newsletters have come a long way. They have evolved from printed pieces that were once mailed to e-Newsletters of many different flavors. Some use newsletters to communicate with their customer base, some use them to grow their in-house database and some use them as a promotion vehicle for upcoming events, content or announcements. If you’re considering putting together a newsletter, here’s a few tips to keep in mind as you putting together your program plans and goals.
- Repurpose content you already have - Here at ReachForce we send out a monthly newsletter of the best B2B Lead tips from the last month. We live in a busy world and we realize that people can’t stop by everyday and some people just prefer to have the content delivered to their inbox so we give them highlights once a month. It seems to work, our newsletter list grows by 10% every month.
- Event invitations and news announcements - Let them know what are you up to – whether it be a webinar you’re hosting or a live event your sponsoring and exhibiting at. Newsletters are a great way to get the word out about where you’ll be.
- News – make sure everyone knows when you’ve released a new version of your product. Remember to highlight benefits not product features. Also be sure to include a call to action to drive interest for cross selling and upselling opportunities as well as new customer interest.
- Customer case studies – pick 1 and highlight your results. Be sure to include a link to the full case study on your website.
- Want to know what your prospects or customers are thinking? Ask them in a quick poll or survey. People like giving their opinion and this says you’re interested in it. You can post the result in the next newsletter.
- Social networks or a blog? Are you out there? Do they know where to find you? Here’s a great place to spread the word.
- Don’t make it all about you. The majority of the content should be useful and compelling to the reader and not a company promo. Otherwise, you risk an increase in unsubscribes.
- Don’t forget the newsletter sign up on your website, put it in as many places as it makes sense. Remember this is helping grow your inhouse list for lead generation.
Bottom line is whatever you decide to do with your newsletter, the goal is to keep communicating!
Targeting Someone Other Than the Cs and VPs - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #229
Monday, April 27th, 2009By now you know that there is more than one person involved in a B2B buying decision. The DMU (decision making unit) typically consists of the end user, key influencers, management, a financial buyer and others that have their hands in the decision to buy or not to buy.
It’s pretty easy to find the management decision makers with just a little research, but what about the others? Here’s a few tips to help you identify and build out lead generation programs for those other than the Cs and VPs.
- Where have you been winning? This is always a good place to start. Hopefully your sales team helped you out a little here and included notes about everyone they talked to in the buying process. If so, are you able to define their roles? If not, don’t despair, you’re not alone and this is not the end of the road for you.
- Profile your best customers – talk to your best customer implementation team, talk to the sales person that sold the deal and if possible interview a few customers to better understand who all was involved in the decision to buy.
- Once you have your roles defined, do you have these people in your leads database? Remember you are matching roles, not just titles. If so, tag them with a role identity. If you’re missing roles, call ReachForce, we can help you fill in the gaps. (Sorry for the shameless promotion…sometimes it just happens…)
- You’re finally ready to start marketing to these people. You are now able to build out very targeted programs focusing on key influencer and end user issues. Here’s an example –
- Nurture – not all buyers are ready to buy at the same time so be sure you are nurturing all of your prospects as well as those involved in a sales cycle. Here’s a few ideas for offers for your nurturing programs -
- Email analyst reports supporting the pain and possible solutions
- Email customer case studies
- Invite to webcasts
- Be sure to share any new content you roll out (whitepapers, eBooks, etc.)
For best results, I recommend you engage with your sales team before launching your newly segmented programs and ensure they are onboard to provide guidance and feedback throughout the process. To execute a healthy, ROI generating program it’s important to map out each step of the building process taking into consideration budget, timing and appropriate follow up. Here’s a template if you need help.
Customer Marketing Segmentation - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #225
Friday, April 17th, 2009We all know, not every customer is alike. Customers buy for many different reasons. Some buy to solve an immediate need, some buy a cure a specific pain point, and others know they need it but not sure how to get the most value out of your solutions. As a marketer tasked with staying engaged with current customers, where do you start?
Start by segmenting your customers into groups that share common characteristics. Talk to you sales team, spend some time with your customer implementation team, stay in touch your customer support team. All of these people will help provide you more insight on how to reach out and target your communications with your customer base. Try and figure out who has the best relationship with each customer and make sure you get regular updates when possible.
Here’s a few ideas on how your might segment your customer base for more effective, targeted marketing.
- Who are your end users? What is their role in the organization?
- What pain points are your customers trying to address?
- Do you have multiple products? Do your customers use one or a combination of several?
- Do you have different editions of your software or platform? Each level will have different needs with your enterprise users having more complex problems and a higher level of sophistication.
- Do you have some customers that need more education to achieve success?
- Do you have some that are stretching the capabilities of your solution? You might need a more sophisticated message for these people.
- Are their multiple people in the customer organization using your solution? These people probably care about different things, you might consider doing more customized outreach here.
- Geographies/Firmographics - are their verticals or industries that are clustered together that use your product in a similar way?
- You probably have some customers who have gone dark on you too, your message and offers to these people are definitely going to be different.
Don’t forget your cross sell and upsell opportunities. You’ll want to be sure you are considering these things when crafting your messages.
Once you have segmented your customers, stay top of mind through monthly or bi-monthly communication. Here at ReachForce, we send a monthly newsletter and one targeted email or direct mail to each of our customers every month.
Aligning Sales & Marketing Objectives – It’s NOT just March Madness - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #220
Wednesday, April 1st, 2009Yesterday on The B2B Lead, we talked about how marketing’s job has changed over the last couple of years from generating general awareness to tracking leads from cold to close. Gone are the days of dumping lists of random names into the top of the funnel for sales to sort out. Well, guess what, it turns out they weren’t sorting them out.
According to SiriusDecisions, 79% of leads generated by marketing are not followed up on by sales teams. Of the remaining 21%, 70% are disqualified by sales because of lack of budget, timing, or other reasons. Furthermore, 70% of those disqualified leads go on to purchase the product or service from another vendor.
There’s a lot of talk about leaky funnels and marketing’s role in driving more leads to close but is this really possible if leads aren’t truly leaking out, they’re being rejected and kicked out by sales?
This makes me wonder. Can better targeted lead generation programs be the answer to everyone’s woes?
I think so.
Here’s a few tips to think about before launching that next great program:
- Before you kick off the next quarter, make sure marketing and sales TOGETHER define what a lead is. Marketing leads are different than sales leads. Be certain everyone on both teams understands this and how you’re handling the 2 groups.
- Ask the sales team what is working for them. Where are they winning? Who are the critical decision makers inside of these companies? Make sure you are targeting the right companies and the right buyers inside.
- What programs deliver the best leads? And not just the best leads but leads that convert to customers. Does this align with what sales says?
- Don’t forget to take a look at who is already visiting you. This can be a goldmine. Target your outreach efforts back at those visiting, don’t just sit and wait for them to come back and announce themselves.
- For those that are disqualified by sales for BANT reasons, make sure sales is able to pass those leads back for more nurturing. Budgets and project timelines change all the time. Because they don’t need you now doesn’t mean they won’t ever (just make sure you have the right buyer engaged, marketing to the right company with the wrong buyer won’t get you very far).
At ReachForce, marketing and sales are 1 team. We know one can’t be successful without the other.
The Springboard Effect of Marketing - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #219
Tuesday, March 31st, 2009B2B Marketers have been going through big changes the last couple of years. With marketing automation tools/platforms coming on strong, so are the questions of ROI and the effect marketing really has on the top line.
Our jobs have changed, we are no longer responsible for just general awareness and filling the top of the sales funnel. Instead, we are tasked with moving leads from cold to close and building a closed loop feedback system with Sales along the way.
Eloqua, one of our partners, has a new whitepaper, The Springboard Effect, that does a great job of describing how our roles have changed and what is now expected of a best-in-class B2B Marketer.
Here’s a few interesting bites from The Springboard Effect:
- Jaap Favier, Vice President and Research Director for Forrester Research, emphasized that intelligence will be a key differentiator in the way companies survive a downturn. “The name of the new marketing game: targeting.”
We love hearing this, it’s what we’re all about here at ReachForce.
- Aberdeen Group says that “companies with best-in-class lead prioritization and scoring systems have a 192% higher average lead qualification rate than those that do not.”
- According to SiriusDecisions, 79% of leads generated by marketing are not followed up on by sales teams. Of the remaining, 70% of leads are disqualified by sales because of lack of budget, timing, or other reasons.
Ok – here’s the MOST INTERESTING part – SiriusDecisions goes on to say that 70% of those disqualified leads go on to purchase the product or service from another vendor.
WOW – look at all of the opportunity lost!
Interesting stuff here, be sure to check out the rest for yourself.
New Programs for Inactive Leads - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #213
Thursday, March 12th, 2009It’s a new year and here at ReachForce we are in the process of analyzing all of our programs to determine which ones drive the most sales conversions. Very quickly we realized that people that respond to our programs seem to over and over again. But what about those that never respond? They are killing our response rates and conversions.
With every program we as Marketers run we are able to bucket people into “responders” and “non-responders”. We typically do different things with these two groups. Responders can either move into other programs that try and further qualify the lead for sales or they go directly to sales/inside sales for more follow up and further qualification.
Now – what do you do with the non-responders and inactive contacts in your database? By leaving them in the current mix, you’re only hurting your program ROI and possible sales conversions. Continuing to do the same thing over and over again with these non-responders is insanity, right?
So instead of writing these people off, change up the mix and try something new with them.
In our 2.0 world, there are so many new possibilities for reaching your prospects in a way they respond to. Here’s a few ideas to consider:
- Webcasts – some people are visual learners and want to feel like they are interacting with live people. Email them an on-demand webcast or invite them your next live webinar.
- Podcasts – some people like to listen vs. read [a whitepaper or eBook]
- Survey – we use explicit surveys here at ReachForce to gather lead qualifying information. Now, yes we do incentivize people to take the survey but the results we get back are fabulous. It helps our lead gen and sales team to prioritize their follow up and it helps us weed out no fits (also helping increase our next program ROI).
- Social networks – where else are your prospects hanging out? Get out there with them and try and make contact. Remember you can’t enter the social world with your used car salesman pitch, people will roll their eyes at you and never interact.
- Channels – are your prospects also customers of some of your partners, see if they can help with introductions or more insight into the prospect account.
- Offers and Incentives – be sure to change them up and test what works best.
And if all else fails, it might be time to clean up your data. Make sure you have the right buying contacts in the right companies or it doesn’t even matter what you are sending or offering.
With every program we put together here at ReachForce, our #1 goal is to drive more hand raisers. That means we have to create programs using multiple vehicles. Is vehicles the right word here? Maybe not, but you know what I mean.
So how are you reaching those stubborn prospects that give you no signal of interest? Hopefully you’re not just giving up on them …
