Times have changed. The power in a B2B transaction has shifted dramatically to the buyer. Gone are the good old days where if you had good sales people, you typically won the deal. Back then the salesperson drove the sale because she had the customer relationship, the information on how to solve the customer’s problem, pricing authority, and the ability to manage the sales cycle from lead to deal.
Today, the buyer dominates. Once he realizes he has a problem or opportunity for improvement, he immediately begins to research the problem online via search engines, social media, analyst reports, etc. The answers ultimately come from vendors, educators, analysts, pundits, and consultants. Through this research process, the buyer comes to rely on one or a few “trusted advisors.” He will look to them when he determines the type of solution he wants to pursue. This means suppliers/vendors must become trusted advisors in the virtual world prior to any direct conversation between buyer and seller. This is now the role and domain of marketing.
The best companies are implementing a four-pronged demand generation strategy:
- Implement and build a marketing funnel.
- Generate leads through traditional and newer mechanisms.
- Nurture and manage leads until they are qualified for sales.
- Measure what matters.
Building a marketing funnel
In Part 1 of this series, we will examine the first practice above: building a marketing funnel. It is no longer sufficient to have a one or two stage marketing process (i.e., marketing generates leads and hands them off to sales). Driving efficiency and growth requires more precision. Marketing should implement and manage a funnel that generates, nurtures, and qualifies leads prior to handing them off to the sales team. This way, expensive sales resources can focus on the most highly qualified leads.
Advisory firm MarketingSherpa and marketing automation vendors, such as Marketo and Eloqua, encourage marketing teams to implement a multi-stage lead management funnel that sits on top of the sales funnel. See Marketo’s stages illustrated and described below:
- All Names – This is the marketing/prospect database. Names do not equal leads.
- Engaged – Here a buyer shows real engagement, such as downloading content or attending a webinar.
- Prospect – Qualified prospects may buy in the future. This means you have identified the right person at a legitimate, good fit company.
- Marketing Qualified Lead – These are prospects that show enough intent that an outbound call can be triggered to them.
- Sales Qualified Lead – Finally, a scored lead is deemed sales ready.
After moving through these stages of the marketing funnel, the lead flows to the traditional sales process (opportunity management) and becomes an opportunity when the sales person accepts the lead.
By building a marketing funnel and corresponding process, the marketing team is one step of the way towards implementing best practices in demand generation and lead management.
