November 2011 Archives

As the holiday season nears and you start thinking about finding the best deals on gifts for friends and family, don't forget about your business. After all, shouldn't you be able to buy smart for your business too?

See our list of SuperDeals below to get discounted prices on your important business purchases for this holiday season.

• Intuit 20% off Quickbooks Pro 2012
• Save 30% instantly on a customized HP Pavilion laptop
• Edible holiday gifts from $9.99 to $99.99 at Staples.com
• Save 25% on signs and banners from FedEx Office
• Save 35% opening an online store with Yahoo Small Business

Happy Cyber Monday and happy shopping!

A few weeks ago, we covered the basics of marketing automation - defined as the use of technology to manage and automate processes such as lead nurturing, lead generation, email marketing, and lead management, and improve the measurement and analysis of results.

While the benefits are clear, a recent BtoB Magazine survey shows that adoption of this new technology is still lagging:

"While awareness of marketing automation platforms is high among marketers and the proliferation of digital channels increasingly demands the assistance of technology, only 44% of b2b marketers have implemented some form of automated marketing, according to a new study by BtoB."

Interestingly, the 44% adoption rate indicated by the survey results seems high, as Forrester Research claims marketing automation is used by only 5% of marketers.

Whatever the actual adoption rate is, at this point, the marketing automation wave is just beginning and it will be exciting to see how this technology further improves lead generation methods.

Read the full article.

There are plenty of stories about how employers are checking social media before hiring new employees, and of people who were fired for things they said on Facebook.Less common but likely to increase are cases where deals are lost because a simple Google search reveals embarrassing information about the seller. Here's a case in real estate -- and while racist comments like those are an extreme example, you can see the potential.

Building relationships is one of the key steps to B2B sales, and in addition to checking your references, buyers are increasingly googling both your company and your name. If a customer finds anything about you that damages their trust, your chances of closing the deal start dropping.

Here are just some of the types of information that prospects might find damaging:

• Obviously embarrassing images or comments: drinking, drug use, sex. Need we say more?
  
• Inflammatory political or religious opinions. A local political party or church membership is fine, but be careful of anything more than that.
  
• Negative comments about your employer, obviously -- and that's probably important for your own job -- but watch out for bashing your competitors, too. That's a turnoff for many buyers.
  
• Anything that could contradict what you've told your prospects. If you've positioned yourself as a long-time expert in your field, but your LinkedIn profile shows that you were selling in a different industry just a few years ago, that's a red flag to anyone checking up on you.
  
• Unhappy comments from previous customers. In many cases there isn't much you can do about these, other than avoid them in the first place -- but if you know they're out there, you can be better prepared to respond when a prospect brings them up. 
• Information about lawsuits, no matter what the result. Similar to the previous point, you can't do much more than be ready to explain the situation.

When looking for these types of information, make sure you check different types of Google searches, not just the basic web search: videos, blogs, and image searches can turn up very different results.

So what can you do about it?
One way to manage your online reputation is to think about it as a brand. Like a corporate brand, your reputation is -- fairly or unfairly -- shaped entirely by what other people think you are, not what you actually are. Your actions and words influence it, but reputation changes slowly, and a little bit of bad outweighs a whole lot of good. So it's essential that you're actively creating positive stuff and managing any negatives. Mashable has a great take on how to avoid sabotaging your personal brand.

Another concept to consider is keeping your personal online identity separate from your professional one. If you're the type of person who has strong opinions and wants to share them, a different persona can let you do that without damaging your career.

Finally -- keep in mind that this all applies both ways: googling your prospects can give you valuable information that might help you close a deal - or keep you from wasting your time on someone who's a bad match for your products.

Happy Friday. Hopefully you are gearing up for the long Thanksgiving holiday next week and thinking about all of the turkey and fixings to come!

While you count down the days to the big feast, here is a roundup of some interesting articles from the web this week.

• Does your sales team struggle with getting past gatekeepers? With lead generation, often there is an administrative assistant (or gatekeeper) who is specifically told to not let salespeople through the line to the actual decision makers. So how can you get them to transfer your call to the appropriate person? Read Quick thoughts on dealing with gatekeepers for some simple tips.
• Once you get past the gatekeepers and talk to the decision makers, how do you get what you need from them? Often, your contact won't even be an actual decision maker, but instead, you must convince his or her boss. Check out How to get what you need from your contact's boss 101 for three crucial steps.
• When you or your colleagues speak with potential clients or print marketing collateral, how do you position your products? Do you claim to be the lowest price, highest quality, and fastest service? Well, here is a great article on how to perfect product positioning and why you might want to focus on just one message.
• Does your business use lead nurturing? Are you even familiar with what lead nurturing is? So far we have some interesting results in our lead nurturing poll. Check out our Lead nurturing survey update and don't forget to vote!

Have a great Thanksgiving and a great Friday!

It looks like most of our survey participants have implemented lead nurturing or plan to soon. However, a surprising number - almost 25% - aren't familiar with the strategy at all!

Lead nurturing is a type of drip marketing (a planned flow of emails) that helps keep prospects engaged while they move through the buying cycle. Lead nurturing can come in many forms, including webcast invitations, white papers, newsletters, emails and phone calls. The key is to provide relevant, valuable information that is useful whether or not the prospect buys your products or services. And ultimately, it should position your company as a trusted, credible resource, so you are top of mind when prospects are ready to buy. Download our guide to read more about lead nurturing basics and decide if it's right for your business.

If you haven't taken our quick survey yet, let us know what your marketing team is up to in the poll in the sidebar to your right.

For my most recent post on defining the sales-ready lead, I reached out to BuyerZone's social network to find out about how other marketers and sales reps define a sales-ready lead. Surprisingly, I got a mixed bag of responses. Some people argued that a lead needs as much context as possible from the marketers (the more information about the lead, the better), and others believed in passing the lead to sales as soon as possible. But is there a right or wrong answer to this question? While the exact process depends on your business, here are a few best practices.

Before we can determine if a lead is sales-ready, we need to look at where the lead came from to gauge the prospect's level of interest. Then it becomes easier to determine next steps - whether it be mailing a brochure, emailing, or passing the lead to sales for a call. By looking at where leads have come from and how they interact with your website, you can determine if they will soon be ready to buy your product or service.

Inbound marketing is when you are found by your customer. An example of this might be if someone fills out a form on your website and implicitly says, "Yes, please give me information about your product or service". Another example is someone that comes to your booth at a tradeshow who adamantly wants you to follow up with them once they get back to the office. These are automatically sales-ready leads because they are asking for information.

Lead generation experts Leads360 recently did a secret-shopper style survey where they submitted leads to a number of leading for-profit schools, then graded each school on their responsiveness: how soon and how often they called and emailed.

We've told you before about the importance of speed to call -- but in this survey, it's as if these schools had never even considered the fact that a prompt response might improve their chances of enrolling a student. 93% of schools in the study took more than 12 hours to call -- and 40% took more than 24 hours. The schools at the bottom of the rankings took 3 to 5 days, on average. And the email results tell a similar story.

Look, it's ok if you can't always respond in the first 20 minutes after a lead comes in. But taking days to place a simple phone call is a pretty clear indicator that you're not getting the most out of the leads you're generating or paying for.

Which group do you fall into? Confess your time lag sins here -- we'll forgive you.

Download the whitepaper to get the detailed results.

(h/t LeadCritic)

Common question: "How many leads should you be producing for your sales team?"

A marketing leader would probably answer: "We're generating as many leads as we possibly can!"

A sales leader would probably answer: "We're not getting nearly enough!"

Sound like a typical conversation in your business? You're not alone. This question comes up all the time. Marketing generally says they're generating plenty of leads, while sales counters that it's not enough. Well, what is the answer? How many leads does marketing need to generate in order for sales to hit their goals? Getting to the root of that question could solve a lot of the marketing-sales conflict.

We've covered the keys to marketing and sales alignment before, but have yet to touch on the golden number: how many leads do you really need to generate? It sounds like a difficult number to arrive at, but its easier than you think.

Here are two ways (there are more) to arrive at your number:

• Fusion Marketing Partners have put together a quick 7-step process for calculating this number.
• Inbound Sales Network recommends using historical data to calculate the number of leads your sales team needs.
  

Remember, it's not necessarily how you come to calculate the total number of leads needed for sales, but that both marketing and sales agree to the approach and to working together to achieve results.

The power of listening has been on my mind recently. As a long-time editor for BuyerZone, I like to think that I know what our buyers want: timely, accurate information that helps them make the right purchasing decisions. But it's been a while since I really listened to what they're asking for, and a current research project is reminding me I should do that more often.

Survey says
We recently did a buyer survey and I asked about the types and sources of information buyers look for as they're researching a major purchase. Some of the results were consistent with my expectations: the number one answer is pricing examples, and detailed product specs and vendor web sites are also at the top.

The second most popular result surprised me: user reviews. I would have expected that in a B2C environment, but not in the B2B world of BuyerZone. Another surprise: other than user reviews, the rest of the social media options I included are all at the extreme bottom of the list. Blogs, Twitter, even discussion forums all got less than 10% support as an information source for B2B purchasing.

That may seem strange in a time when headlines like New Research: 60% of B2B Decision Makers Use Social Media are common -- but if you read more carefully, that study is simply saying that the decision makers use social media in general, not that they regularly use it for making their decisions. Score another point for long-time social media skeptic The Ad Contrarian.

Listen to succeed
Listening doesn't have to mean conducting formal surveys to gather opinion. I've also been calling BuyerZone users and asking them to tell me about their research.

I'm always cautious about taking up too much of their time on these calls, but they're often eager to talk about their plans and to tell me all about why they need to replace their old equipment, how the sales guy down the street is a weasel, or what new features they've heard about and would really like to take advantage of. Simply letting them talk is giving me some good insight into how they work and what we can do to help them out.

A great Harvard Business Review article (Marketers, Calculate Your Talk-Listen Ratio) makes the point that the simple act of directly listening to customers can be good for sales results:

Being listened to makes people feel good -- it signifies to them that they are interesting and what they have to say is valued. Imbued with the confidence this brings, they reveal more about their beliefs and feelings. It is no surprise then that successful salespeople are frequently described as great listeners.

Bad examples aren't hard to find
Finally, a couple of recent high-profile examples show how not listening to your customers can backfire -- or, depending on how you interpret the message, that belatedly listening can help you correct a business blunder.

First Netflix announced, then recanted their plans to separate their DVD-by-mail and online streaming businesses, in a great example of how not listening to customers can backfire. Then in an even more surprising blunder, Bank of America announced a $5 monthly fee for using a debit card, and was forced to reverse that decision based on the customer outcry.

What  are you doing to listen to your customers and prospects? Are you going to step into the same trap as BoA and Netflix, or do you have the finger on the pulse?