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If your lead generation process isn’t producing the results you need to meet your goals, you’re not alone. We’ve worked with many marketers who have encountered challenges in this area.
Taking time to assess your lead generation with a marketing expert and to take steps to improve it can make all the difference. The most common lead generation challenges often have to do with a lack of clarity.
Do you find yourself with the following lead generation problems? Our lead generation assessment may be able to help you.
Problem: Not targeting the right audience
If you’re not targeting the right audience, you won’t be able to generate leads — or those you do generate will not be qualified for contact by sales.
Solution: It sounds like you need to get specific about your ideal customer. Find out who they are, what they do, what they need. Once you really get to know the people you’re trying to reach, tap into the right channels to reach them — the ones where they are most receptive to hearing your message and taking action.
Problem: Not having a clear strategy and sales funnel
Without marketing and sales plans, you won’t know where you’re going or whether you’re making progress.
Solution: Set up your strategy and map out your sales funnel. Start with the end in mind: What is your ultimate goal? Then work through the consumer journey: What do you want people to do in each step of the sales process? At each point, think about how you will attract their attention and how you will incite them to take action. Make it easy for them to take each “next step” by providing a clear, captivating call-to-action.
At Movéo, we are strong believers in marketing-sales alignment. If you suspect that this is a weak point in your lead generation, a member of the Movéo team can talk through it with you to get at the heart of the problem.
Problem: Not creating compelling content
If you’re reaching the right people but your content is not relevant or compelling, you won’t engage and convert your audience.
Solution: Get to know your ideal customer’s needs, challenges and interests. Then, provide value with content they can understand, use and share. It takes multiple “touches” before a person will take action, so plan to nurture these relationships over time with consistently valuable content. In assessing the role of your content in lead generation, a Movéo representative will ask about the different content types in your toolkit and how you are using them to grab attention and foster engagement.
Problem: Not tracking or measuring results
If you don’t have analytics and reporting in place, you won’t have the information you need to track and optimize your process.
Solution: The solution to poor measurement is to take time to determine what a qualified lead looks like, based on marketing and sales data to date. Put tracking in place for each step of the process so you can best optimize messaging, channels and more. Establish metrics of success and review results on an ongoing basis.
If you are encountering any of these problems and would benefit from a more personalized solution, we encourage you to reach out for a lead generation assessment.
Our lead generation assessment is free of charge with no risk and no obligation. You’ll start with a 30-minute call with a senior member of our team to assess your current process, identify issues and compare what you’re doing to the strategies and tactics of other companies who are finding lead generation success.
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Many of our clients are looking to drive business growth through lead generation. When electronic manufacturing leader Sparton Corporation came to us looking to improve lead volume and conversion rates, we used the following tactics to transform their results. These steps can also be adapted and applied to your own organization. Let’s take a closer look.
Step 1. Identify your point of differentiation.
Sparton specializes in manufacturing highly complex electronics and electromechanical products at low volumes. Through our market research, we found that Sparton’s focus on complexity could serve as a point of differentiation within the contract electronic manufacturing industry. We translated this value proposition into a campaign theme: Conquering Complexity.
Identifying your business’s unique position within the market is one way to create a competitive advantage. Then, you must communicate that point of differentiation as a value proposition for your audience. This approach helps you attract leads who would benefit from your offering.
Step 2. Create content based on buyer pain points and distribute to targeted audiences.
To execute Sparton’s campaign, we crafted content that addressed research-validated buyer pain points. This series of content assets was distributed to highly targeted audiences across a range of digital channels. By reaching the right people with content that spoke to their unique needs and challenges, Sparton was able to generate and nurture more leads.
To replicate this success, consider your target audience, audience members’ biggest pain points and the best channels to reach them. Develop new content that addresses these pain points to show that you understand what your audience members face and that you have the solutions they need. Then distribute that content through the media channels where your ideal buyer is already looking for information.
Step 3. Track and optimize your campaign.
Sparton tracked each visitor from the time they landed on a web page to the time they became a new customer. Through integration of Sparton’s marketing automation software, CRM system and analytics, we were able to measure marketing performance by channel and optimize as needed.
In order to track the success of your lead generation process, gather information from your own technology and reporting systems. Pinpoint which areas are working and which are not so you can make changes in real time.
Step 4. Work with the sales team to determine what makes a qualified lead.
To improve conversion rates and strengthen the revenue cycle, Sparton’s marketing and sales teams worked together to identify what exactly made a qualified lead. We created a lead scoring system and assigned values to the specific demographics, activities and behaviors that indicated a sales-qualified lead.
Only about half of organizations have a formal definition of a qualified lead that both the marketing and sales teams follow, but those that do are more likely to advance a lead to an initial discussion. Bring together your own marketing and sales teams to determine the characteristics of a qualified lead. Then develop a scoring system so your sales team only receives the leads that are most likely to convert.
Step 5. Establish metrics to measure effectiveness.
By tracking and optimizing each step of the lead generation process, Sparton experienced year-over-year improvement across a number of key metrics:
- Volume of leads and opportunities
- Conversion rates
- Velocity with which leads and opportunities were progressing
- Closed opportunities
Ultimately, Sparton’s lead generation campaign produced 9,325 CRM-verified and accepted leads and $152.2 million in qualified sales opportunities. Its close rate on nurtured marketed sales wins improved 144 percent, resulting a contributed revenue of $58.3 million.
Build your own set of performance metrics and use them to track success over time. These numbers will also provide insight into how you’ll need to optimize your campaign moving forward.
If you need some guidance on creating a lead generation process for your B2B business, tap into Movéo’s expertise and capabilities. We can help you capture and cultivate qualified new business leads through our holistic approach to response-driven marketing. Contact us today.
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We’ve written plenty about the pressing need to align marketing and sales, but what about the other departments in your company? After all, branding begins internally. Pledge to improve communications between marketing and these three departments in the rest of 2015 and as you prepare for 2016:
Align marketing and the IT department
IT and marketing may not be the first departments most people associate with each other, but that doesn’t mean they can’t work together for the good of the organization. Given the number of digital tools marketing uses every day, from internal ones like CRM systems to external ones like mobile apps for current and potential customers, a strong partnership with IT is critical.
There are a number of areas in which strong marketing-IT alignment is critical, including:
- Improving back-end functionality of your website, including its data collection capabilities and integration with CRM and marketing automation tools
- Addressing marketing department needs to ensure the security of all customer and lead data
- Vetting the best tech tools for the marketing department to use
- Making sure servers are able to handle the traffic from large marketing campaigns
Make it a priority to discuss these areas with the IT department as you wrap up 2015 and move beyond it.
Align marketing and customer service
The customer service team has great insights into what your current customers want and need — and that’s a perfect source of guidance for the marketing team’s strategy. Connect with the customer service team to gather this valuable information and use it as you craft a content marketing strategy that keeps current customers engaged and provides appealing outreach to prospects.
In addition, great customer service is your best source of brand advocates, who can be your biggest asset when it comes to spreading the word about your organization. To foster customer loyalty, work with the customer service team to discuss best practices for interfacing with prospects and current customers, encouraging feedback and more.
Align marketing and product development
In the marketing department, you have great insights into what prospects are searching for — the exact insights that the product development team needs. Your team also has insight into objections that potential customers sometimes offer, which the product team can use to inspire new developments that will eventually allow your products to serve the needs of a new set of customers.
In return, the product development team can give marketing behind-the-scenes details on the new offerings that are coming soon, providing your department a head start on planning for effective launches.
Marketing-product development alignment is also critical in crafting a continuous experience for your audience. Discuss your brand voice and brand style so that usability and visual style can be coordinated from product to messaging, giving your audience a clear taste of what their experience as a customer will be like.
As with marketing-sales alignment, alignment between marketing and these three departments demands communication and cooperation. Schedule regular times to discuss needs and strategy with the heads of each department to facilitate better communication with each team.
Better internal alignment can drive increased customer loyalty. For more guidance on customer loyalty, download our white paper: The million dollar question: how loyal are your customers?
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Over the past few weeks, we have taken a deep dive into the top lead generation tactics and provided tips on maximizing your campaign. As you may have realized by now, there are a host of practices — both good and bad — that are widely used by marketers. Today, we will help you discern best practices from those that aren’t quite as successful.
Do include calls-to-action in all materials
A successful content strategy focuses on driving user engagement with your brand. Without a strong call-to-action, you are at risk of losing prospects’ attention. Over 90 percent of prospects that read your headline also read CTA copy, though only about 30 percent of organizations include CTAs on their materials, including their home page. That means that many organizations fail to convert prospects who are engaging with content, ultimately losing out on the value content can bring. Don’t pass by this key opportunity to collect qualified lead information and set your organization apart from competitors.
Don’t confine your thinking to digital tactics
Of course, maintaining a strong digital presence is essential to any modern marketing campaign. But there are other lead generation tactics to consider that can help you propel your brand and improve your success. Telemarketing still lands in the top five B2B lead generation strategies in terms of highest return on investment, and direct mail isn’t far behind. While it’s true that digital tactics have become increasingly important in campaigns that see success, failure to complement your efforts through other channels could negatively impact your campaign in the long run.
Do use analytics to identify areas for optimization
The most successful lead generation campaigns employ various tactics. However, without a reliable analytics system in place it becomes impossible to track which solutions are paying off. Only 44 percent of CMOs have implemented accurate analytics systems and a whopping 84 percent of marketers are unable to measure ROI from their campaigns. This means that the vast majority of marketing efforts are going untracked, with no way of differentiating successful tactics from those that are failing. If this sounds familiar, there is truly no time to waste. We recommend Google Analytics, which can easily be used in tandem with marketing automation software like HubSpot and Act-On.
Don’t email your contacts too frequently
This is one of the easiest best practices on the list, though one that is frequently ignored by marketers. Lead nurturing is one of the most successful techniques for getting prospects to convert to sales, but users become wary if they are being inundated with emails — regardless of whether they chose to opt in. In fact, about 35 percent of contacts name email frequency as the top reason to unsubscribe from a mailing list. Finding a regular email cadence can be challenging, but a general rule of thumb is to send no more than two emails per month, though this figure largely depends on your specific industry. In short, if you are noticing a spike in your unsubscribe figure, it is a safe bet to decrease your frequency.
Did you enjoy our list of dos and don’ts? Contact us for even more insights.
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As many marketers know, it’s almost impossible for just one marketing tactic to result in a sale. Nurture marketing has become critical to having informed, personal conversations once an interested prospect has passed to the sales team. Marketo defines nurture marketing as the “process of developing relationships with buyers at every stage of the sales funnel, and through every step of the buyer’s journey.” Here are a few reasons your business needs to nurture leads.
Early verification of new business leads
Besides giving your audience members ample time and information to move down the funnel and qualify as MQLs, nurturing leads also gives your marketing team the insights they need to verify whether or not a lead is likely to convert to a sale. Fifty-six percent of B2B companies verify business leads before passing them to the sales team. This verification ensures that leads are ready to be sold to, while allowing both your sales and marketing teams to best manage their time.
Once a prospect’s lead score has hit the threshold necessary to pass to sales, it is likely an early indicator that a prospect is interested and ready to make an informed purchase. Regularly monitor prospect lead scoring and get a sense of the actions a prospect has taken. Are they most interested in sales materials? Or are they mostly responding to content like demo videos that would allow them to further their own goals internally? By reviewing the content prospects have engaged with, your sales team will be best prepared to have an informed conversation with prospective buyers.
Preparing leads to make the jump
Companies that choose to forgo the lead nurture process entirely are at risk of never converting prospective buyers to sales. In fact, the failure to nurture leads is responsible for 79 percent of marketing leads that don’t convert to sales. This means that the bulk of sales depend on nurture marketing.
While the majority of your leads will not be ready to immediately invest in your product or service, education during the buyer’s journey is key for a prospect to ultimately decide to make a purchase. Eighty percent of bad B2B leads go on to make purchases within two years. Many of these leads continued to receive resources regularly, even when they weren’t initially ready to make a purchase. If you are considering a lead nurture campaign, remember that although every action you take may not immediately result in a sale, it still can pay off dividends when prospects are ready to convert.
Are you looking to master your lead nurture efforts? Read our case study on Sparton Corporation for more insights.
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Many components go into crafting a successful lead generation campaign. We’ve discussed the importance of coordinating with your sales team, as well as making sure a lead scoring system is in place to track your success. In this post, we will take a look at two additional considerations your lead generation campaign should have.
Lead costs
Understanding lead cost is key to running successful B2B campaigns. The average cost of a B2B sales lead varies by industry. For example, a engineering industry lead costs an average of $95, while a technology lead costs an average of $43. It’s important to know the costs associated with your industry specifically to get a better sense of how you are performing.
Combating overly high lead costs is necessary to remain profitable. We have regularly discussed using an inbound lead strategy versus an outbound lead strategy as one viable option to attract new leads through content while keeping costs low. Prospects who interact with your digital marketing content will ultimately earn higher lead scores than unqualified leads and will ensure that your sales representatives are contacting only those who have previously engaged with content. It will also help your organization better understand a prospective buyer before personal contact is made.
An inbound strategy is just one way to complement your lead generation efforts. Keep in mind that promoting your content on outlets your audience is likely to view will also be crucial to gathering supplemental information your campaign needs to see success. We recommend collaborating with your sales team to identify what outlets and content prospects may find most valuable to making that final purchase.
Content marketing
Ninety-three percent of B2B companies say content marketing generates more leads than traditional marketing strategies. According to the Content Marketing Institute, a successful campaign is an “ongoing process” that requires you to continuously create new content to enhance the user experience. As a marketer, that means providing your target audience with useful content that will entice potential leads to interact with your organization online. Consider gated content on your site, which requires interested individuals to offer contact information in exchange for your insights.
Remember, 61 percent of B2B marketers find generating high-quality leads their biggest challenge. Contact us for advice on running a lead generation campaign.
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Difficulty measuring the success of lead generation is surprisingly widespread, even among experienced digital marketers. In fact, 46 percent of marketers cannot confidently tie marketing ROI to specific lead generation campaigns. In the data-driven world of digital marketing, that’s a remarkable number.
The metrics that measure ROI
Although campaign delivery metrics (such as the number of impressions) and response metrics (like click-through rate) are important in understanding the penetration of a message, the real value of analytics is that they allow the management of a campaign at a much deeper level. That’s where efficiency metrics such as cost-per-contact and cost-per-MQL come into play.
At Movéo, we use these data points to focus our lead generation campaign optimization efforts, because they reveal the true effectiveness of a campaign. These metrics show when tactics that may be effective at generating contacts for the marketing database are in fact less impactful in terms of driving leads that convert to sales opportunities.
As a marketer, these ROI-focused metrics allow you to evaluate the quality rather than the quantity of leads generated. Especially in a B2B context, a small number of leads that are squarely in your organization’s target audience and are ready to buy can be far more valuable than a much larger number of unqualified or poorly matched leads.
How reliable ROI measurements help you
A strong understanding of campaign ROI will benefit you and your department in two ways. First of all, as we’ve discussed, it’s a key part of understanding how your campaigns can improve. Insights into the most and least successful aspects of your lead generation efforts give you the power to identify and fix the weak links in your marketing, and replicate the most successful aspects in the future.
The ability to demonstrate ROI is just as critical to proving marketing’s worth to the C-suite. Marketing is a key aspect in the success of your organization, and if you have ever experienced pushback from leadership, you understand the need for more proof of your impact. Proper measurement and documentation of your ROI can show not only the role of marketing overall but also the need for specific initiatives, marketing software and more.
To learn more tools for success, read our newest white paper, Lead generation: Learn how to build highly effective lead generation campaigns.
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Now that you have started to consider the strategy behind your lead generation campaign, you’ll want to develop a standardized scoring system to assign points to incoming leads so that you can begin to track lead value. Today, we will be going over some basics of lead scoring and how it can help you get the most out of your lead generation campaigns.
Lead scoring defined
Lead scoring assigns a numerical value to every action a prospect takes. The end goal is for a prospect to earn a high enough score to “qualify” as a marketing qualified lead (MQL) and eventually convert into a sale. We’ve discussed before how establishing a concrete definition of your ideal MQL is step one in creating an effective lead generation campaign. Lead scoring does just that by matching new prospects to your ideal MQL profile based on their industry, company and more.
After determining whether a prospect is qualified, scoring will help determine if they are truly interested in your product or service by tracking engagement and assigning each prospect action a score. This can include email opens and clicks, as well as interactions with content on your site. For example, a prospect who opens your email might earn 15 points, but a prospect who opens and clicks a link would earn the 15 plus an additional 35.
While lead scoring can seem complex at first, every successful lead generation campaign uses lead scoring in some capacity. The good news is that it doesn’t take long to master and can significantly boost sales numbers. In fact, 68 percent of marketers name lead scoring based on user engagement the main driver of improved ROI.
A standardized process
While lead scoring is a useful tool to boost sales, it quickly becomes ineffective if your lead generation campaign does not take marketing and sales alignment into account. In the example above, we assigned 50 points to a prospect that both opened and clicked a link in an email. But without collaboration with your sales team, could you conclusively say how much these actions impact sales?
Before implementing your lead scoring strategy, collaborate with your sales team to decide what score value a prospect needs to become an MQL, as well as what actions are most important in predicting an eventual sale. Make sure to regularly assess this number during your campaign, especially if you are not receiving as many MQLs as you anticipated.
Are you looking to improve a lead generation campaign through lead scoring? Contact us for more advice.
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Do you ever find yourself with an influx of inbound leads only to realize that none of them are qualified? This problem has plagued almost every marketer at some point or another. As a general rule, 25 percent of your leads should be ready to make a purchase at any given time. However, if your sales numbers are regularly coming up short, it may be time to reexamine your lead qualification methods. The following are a few ways you can improve the lead qualification protocols at your organization.
A clear data process and strategy
Data collection is one of the most important considerations when nurturing leads into sales. Sixty-seven percent of the buyer journey takes place online, so many marketers choose to use online forms to secure this information. When beginning your lead generation campaign, figure out the most important prospect fields you need to plan a comprehensive campaign. This is key to segmenting your database later on. Strategize what data will be the most valuable for your campaign, keeping in mind that the more fields you request, the less likely a prospect will be to fill out the form. We aim to keep forms around 3 to 5 fields, which leads to a 20 percent conversion rate.
A standardized scoring process
Setting realistic lead scoring for your prospects is also key to improving your lead qualification processes. We’ve written before about the basics of lead scoring: assigning a numerical value to every action a lead takes. Lead scoring helps match a prospect to your ideal buyer profile through data like industry, company and job title. But without standardization between marketing and sales, this data means very little. Collaborate with your sales team to decide how heavily your campaign should weigh each option. Is clicking an email link more important than downloading a content piece? Is watching a demo the most important? Making these scoring decisions will give your sales team the tools they need to best sell to marketing qualified leads (MQLs) and provide you with the framework for content strategy.
A defined lead routing process
Simply identifying quality leads should not be the last phase in your lead generation campaign. Once leads have earned the required score to become a MQL, your entire campaign’s success will hinge on the ability to convert these MQLs into sales. Marketing and sales alignment will be key here, as you must together decide how these MQLs should be nurtured to sales. Should leads stop receiving all marketing content and only hear from sales once becoming a MQL? Or will a mix of marketing and sales content be exactly the push they need to drive them to purchase? Remember, 79 percent of marketing leads never convert into sales. Every message and decision during this lead routing process should focus on strategically providing leads with the best resources they will need to convert.
Are you ready to improve your lead qualification methods? For a more in-depth look at the process, read our e-book, Lead generation: Learn how to build highly effective lead generation campaigns.
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As we begin the new year, many organizations are eager to refine their lead generation practices and convert prospects into customers. However, each year, many marketers fail to meet their annual benchmarks and lose out on prospective customers. Today, we’re sharing the seven steps of lead generation that will help ensure your marketing success in 2017 and beyond.
1) Establish definitions for a marketing qualified lead
The term marketing qualified lead (MQL) is ubiquitous for marketers. However, defining it isn’t quite that simple. Before getting started on your lead generation campaign, collaborate with your sales team to define “MQL” for your organization. This will be vital to building a realistic campaign that will resonate with your audience.
Consider the key attributes of your prospective leads, such as company size and revenue. We suggest doing an audit of your existing customer base and defining a target. We’ve written before on account-based marketing and the same principle applies here. If you make the decision to only pursue accounts that align with your strategy, you will be putting yourself in the best position to convert the most leads into sales.
2) Establish lead qualification protocols
You will also need to decide what separates a qualified lead from one that is unqualified. This will require you to standardize your lead scoring process with your sales team. To create an effective marketing strategy, decide upfront what should happen after first contact is made. Will it be a lengthy nurture phase? Or will your lead be ready for a direct sales approach? Collaboration with sales is key in this step.
3) Identify the marketing automation solution
Finding a marketing automation solution that is conducive to your organization’s marketing and sales process will help you nurture potential customers. Not all systems are created equal, so make sure to clearly define your needs prior to making a selection. If you have not explored marketing automation systems, we recommend Eloqua, Pardot or Act-on.
4) Identifying the right content for engaging buyers
Certain content pieces or other downloads might not resonate with every individual in your target market. That’s why it’s important to use content mapping when first defining your content strategy. According to HubSpot, content mapping is the process of targeting content to “the characteristics of a person who will be consuming it [and] how close that person is to making a purchase.” Both of these considerations will increase your chance of offering content that resonates with your audience when they are most likely to act. We recommend using customer data or talking with sales to identify the most engaging content.
5) Architect the user experience and nurture flows
To convert leads into MQLs, you need to better shape the user experience through nurture flows. Once a consumer opts in to receive content, it’s important to provide them with the communications they will need to eventually convert and become a customer. Depending on your product, this could take weeks, months or even years. Try monitoring your content carefully and swapping out pieces that may not be working — it could save your campaign and work to convert leads you were missing previously.
6) Develop the campaign
After putting together this information, you are ready to start developing your campaign. While a good campaign can help build brand awareness, a truly great lead generation campaign will compel prospective consumers to take some sort of action like downloading a piece or taking advantage of a sales promotion. Developing your campaign also includes selecting the right tactics to promote it such as SEO, SEM or email marketing depending on your campaign. The good news is that many marketing automation platforms integrate directly with Google Analytics or other lead capture platforms so you will always have a full view of where your leads are coming from.
7) Deploy, measure, and optimize
Regularly checking in on the success of your campaign will help you see trends and measure what’s working. We recommend that all of our clients define metrics at the beginning of a campaign and track progress toward them. A successful lead generation campaign takes into account the cost of investment versus the revenue generated. If you are not seeing the results you expected, try viewing all of your data holistically and deciding if you can reasonably obtain your goals. We’re always ready to provide you with campaign recommendations.
Do you want more guidance on improving your lead generation? Take a look at our full ebook to learn how to build highly effective lead generation campaigns.
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