Marketing Interactions

Juan Eloqua's Grande Guide to Sales Enablement

Changes to the way buyers are buying has put knowledge and data—and our ability to apply them to content creation in a way that resonates with buyers—at the forefront of successful B2B marketing programs. These changes to buying behavior have also made it a marketing imperative that content support and facilitate the salesperson's later entry into the buying process as well as help them increase momentum toward purchase decisions.

Last month you were introduced to Juan Eloqua with the first Grande Guide in the series on Lead Scoring. As the grower of coffee and revenues, Juan makes it clear in his latest video, Dinner with the Eloquas, that success is not related to luck—as his son, Diego reports learning from his teacher. With Sirius Decisions reporting that sales cycles have lengthened by 22% over the last five years, he has a point. Luck must be replaced with intelligence.

Effective sales enablement is dependent upon co-ownership of the funnel by both marketing and sales. Although not as simple as it sounds, creating a consistent process that sustains momentum throughout the buying journey is made easier with the visibility marketing automation provides.

Measuring marketing success falls short if it stops at counting the number of qualified leads salespeople accept as worthy for pursuit. Success that translates to revenues depends upon smooth transitions designed to eliminate stalls and step backs experienced during later buying stages by arming salespeople with the knowledge they need to have more effective meetings that move deals to close faster.

Download Juan Eloqua's Grande Guide to Sales Enablement (you won't want to miss my sidebar!)

Now let's tackle one of the points the guide makes about what's next for sales enablement: Getting Predictable

"Sales reps are always looking for a way to shorten the sales cycle. Soon they'll want you to predict the next best course of action with hot leads based on your analysis of how similar buyers responded to your content and website while still in research mode."

One of the goals of both sales and marketing is the ability to recreate successes on a consistent basis to create sustainable growth. When this becomes a singular goal across the entire buying process, results can be exponential.

With the insights gleaned from marketing automation in relation to prospect response to campaigns over time, patterns can be discerned that enable marketers to see the impact content assets have on driving momentum by reviewing the activity history of buyers who buy. Not only can we refine our nurturing programs in real time, but marketers can get closer to discerning which information is critical to creating pipeline progression with prospects in similar situations. Through arming salespeople with better insights, the value they add to meetings will keep them in conversations that produce more wins. Being able to prove marketing's contribution to driving downstream revenues is the ultimate in accountability.

What do you say? Isn't it time for marketing to apply focus to helping sales succeed as an extension to the creation of qualified leads?

Go Download the Grande Guide to Sales Enablement today.

Ditch the Weight & Drag Holding Your Business Back

As a B2B marketing strategist, I talk a lot about how to use marketing content to encourage prospects to move from status quo situations to realizing the issue they're facing is a priority that must be addressed. One of the reasons it's difficult to build momentum for buying is that people must be willing to embrace change. Well, status quo is not just a concept related to buyers, it's the equivalent of gravity—the weight and drag that keeps people and businesses from achieving their true potential.

It's with great pleasure that I recommend you read my friend and colleague, Rebel Brown's, new book, Defy Gravity: Propel Your Business to High-Velocity Growth.

Rebel says that, "Defy Gravity is about thinking differently, challenging our status quo and re-evaluating our business, our value and our markets.  The book includes everything a reader needs to learn the and apply the Principles of Business Flight that power high-velocity growth - from concepts and logic to tactical execution.

"The book offers a systematic approach to finding and ditching our Gravity – the status quo beliefs about our business, our value, our markets and ourselves – that limit our growth. Defy Gravity is every person’s guide to challenging their status quo. Once we challenge our beliefs and knowns – the sky is the limit."

I've worked on a number of projects with Rebel over the years, and she's never once failed to pinpoint the reason a company wasn't achieving its goals, or see a "flight plan" for getting them what they needed to put velocity back into their business. She has a knack for uncovering the true value a company provides and then positioning the company to advantage of all the opportunities their value affords.

Rebel points to some corporate legends as sources of gravity that we must continuously challenge and examine to become what she calls a "zero gravity" company. Some examples include:

• It’s our biggest seller. Without it, we’d lose our market position.
• They’re our biggest customer. We need them to grow.
• The competition has it, so we must get it too.
• He/She's a great guy/gal. We have to keep him/her.
• If we build it they’ll buy it. Our product is just too cool.
• We have to discount to beat that competitor.

Defy Gravity is not just a strategy book, it's a guide with examples, case studies, questions to ask and exercises to help you put her Principles of Business Flight into action. And yes, what she teaches will work—regardless of the state of the economy. In fact, you may just be surprised where the winds of change take you.

Go buy the book! If you buy the book today, Rebel is giving away an 80-page workbook for Defy Gravity to provide you with even more exercises, examples and templates.

Juan Eloqua's Grande Guide to Lead Scoring

Eloqua has released the first in a series of B2B marketing guides labeled the Grande Guides. This first one is on Lead Scoring. To have a bit of fun, they've also created Juan Eloqua - who's quite a Bold and Smoky guy whose specialty is growing fine coffee and, of course, revenues. If you haven't met Juan, you should.

The Grande Guide to Lead Scoring is a nice educational piece. There's plenty of explanation about what it is, why you need it and tips for creating a lead scoring model of your own.

So I won't cover it here - go get your own copy.

What I want to discuss in this post is one of the predictions Eloqua makes at the end about the future of Lead Scoring. The second item on the list is content scoring:

"Content-based scoring. Companies that regularly refine their scoring models begin to notice patterns in lead quality that can be directly tied to the content that is accessed during the buying process. Advanced organizations are experimenting with scoring models based on content type – like whitepapers, product information and customer testimonials – instead of the download activity itself."

I'd like to add a few ideas to their definition of content scoring. Learning more about content type is great. It can guide you to the types of content you produce, but that's not nearly enough to help your content impact the buying process overall.

I suggest that we start looking at content groups or tracks - whatever you'd like to call them.

There are a couple of ways to think about content groups:

• The content you use across the duration of a nurturing program. If your content is designed to answer prospects' questions at each stage of the buying process, which content assets are getting the most attention? Take a look at what the content addresses. Find out from sales if this is a sticking point, slowing momentum. Perhaps you'll need to create more of it. Also look at which content is getting the least attention. Is it in the wrong place in the track? Or is it answering a question your prospects don't have?


• All the content you have that addresses one problem-to-solution scenario, whether in your nurturing track or on your website, blog, etc. Are prospects seeking out related content in other locations? There should be a way to tag content so that marketers can say - show me the response to all the content that covers problem X. We should also be able to determine individual interest levels based on topic, not just types of content read.

Knowing that a prospect downloaded 5 white papers and 3 customer stories and 2 data sheets is one thing. Knowing that all of those resources are related to solving problem X can impact when you reach out as well as the quality of the conversations you'll be able to have with the prospect.

With buyers expectations growing much faster than our abilities to engage them with added value, we need insights that help us to have better conversations, build our credibility and convince them that our company is the best choice to help them solve their problems.

The interest part of lead scoring needs to be based on a solid content strategy.

Get SNAP Selling and Stay Out of the Dreaded "D" Zone

My excellent friend, Jill Konrath, has done it again! Her new book, SNAP Selling, has launched to much well-deserved acclaim. If you haven't read it yet, I urge you to go get a copy -  Do it right now.

Whether you're in sales or in marketing, one of the things most of us struggle with is getting to  know our buyers well enough to engage them effectively and get them to buy.

Jill pulls back the curtain on the buyers' world to expose why what we've been doing is no longer good enough to get the job done. To reverse this trend, Jill shares fresh sales strategies—including the 4 SNAP Rules—and shows you just how to apply them to drive sales.

SNAP stands for:

Keep it Simple
Be iNvaluable
Always Align
Raise Priorities

One of my favorite things in Jill's book is her Buyers' Matrix. It's a take on the buyer persona that will help salespeople (and marketers) get to know prospects at the level necessary to apply the SNAP rules effectively. Prospects are busier than ever, protective of their time and taking control over just when they'll engage. This means that marketers and salespeople need to approach the buying process from a new perspective. 

In a business environment driven by online dialogue that must flow into offline conversations, the lessons and examples in this book provide real-world applications that will serve to create consistently valuable interactions between companies and customers. Gaining a clear understanding of your prospects is truly the foundation for exceptional selling and marketing in action. But Jill doesn't stop there. She shows you just what to do with that knowledge to create a dramatic difference in sales results.

Oh, yeah. And that dreaded D-Zone? That's when your prospects delete your messages, derail your sale, delay their decisions, and dismiss you. In the D-zone, you're as good as dead to them. Not a great place to be.

Yet another great reason to go buy the book!

Jill shares more fresh sales insights in an interview with Christopher Doran about closing the gap between marketing and sales over on the Funnel Focus blog.

In case you're still not sure - go read Jill's article, Are Your Prospects Suffering from Frazzled Customer Syndrome?

Marketing Automation Must Support a Business Process

Manticore Technology and Bulldog Solutions have released a new white paper that addresses some misconceptions that B2B marketers may have about marketing automation. As they point out, it's terrific when an application is intuitive and easy to use, but marketing automation must be used in support of a business process if it's going to produce the desired results. More sales and revenues.

Process and skillsets are holding marketers back:

"Recent Executive Benchmark Assessment data from Bulldog Solutions and Frost & Sullivan, the Growth Partnership company, shows that process is the number one roadblock BtoB marketers face in implementing marketing automation, with skillsets and content right behind."

Considering that Sirius Decisions predicts that 50% of B2B marketers will have marketing automation within the next 5 years, it's imperative to go about deploying it the right way, the first time. As we're hearing more and more - companies who implement marketing automation successfully can achieve stellar results.

What I like about this paper is that for each "truth" it presents, marketers are offered action points and links to related resources so they can hone in on the areas where they need the most help.

To whet your appetite, the 6 Truths addressed include:

Truth 1: Marketing Automation ISN’T Easy

Truth 2: While Lacking Sex Appeal, Marketing Process Is the Key to Marketing Automation Success

Truth 3: The Buying Decision Is Well Under Way by the Time the Prospect Gets to Your Web Site. Act Accordingly

Truth 4: Content Is King — And Not Necessarily a Benign Dictator

Truth 5: Think Beyond Lead Generation: It’s Not Quantity, It’s Quality

Truth 6: You Don’t Know What You Don’t Know

Download Your Copy
[fairly painless registration is required]

B2B Buyers' Use of Social Media - BUYERsphere Report

There's a new B2B Buyer survey hot off the presses from Base One and B2B Marketing Magazine. Marketers will find a view of the big picture as the report shows an overlay of both online and offline informational sources in comparison to social media use. The report also breaks out the differences in informational use and reliance between buyers under 31 and those more mature. Some of the differences are not what you may think.

Although web searches and vendor websites remain two of the top methods for finding information, word of mouth holds a lot of influence throughout the buying stages. What's interesting is to note that although some of the sources drop off in influence as the buyer progresses toward purchase, social media remains influential from start to finish - for those who have embraced its use in their buying process.

You can download the report (direct link to PDF) and see the charts and breakouts for yourself.

I'd like to point out a couple of findings that B2B marketers should pay attention to:

"There is a notable decrease in the influence of supplier websites after the early stages of the buying process. At the need identification stage 58% described websites as influential or very influential, a figure that dropped to 43% by the final supplier selection stage."

This high influence for vendor websites at the beginning of the buying process indicates a need for educational and thought leadership content prominently displayed and easily accessible. Take a good look at the content your website provides and make sure it's primed and ready for early stage buyers.

Because web search is so highly relied upon (we know this, right?) it's imperative for marketers to ensure the content on their website is being indexed for search by keywords and phrases early stage buyers will use. Do you need more of a reason to get to know your buyers better?

In addition to buyers' predictions about changes to their future buying processes, the report also includes commentary submitted by buyers during the survey. Here are a few snips of buyer perspectives that marketers would be well served to consider:

“Probably blogs and online community websites will play a bigger part in the decision making process.”

“Forums, panels and blogs are the way ahead, using Google for searches can be a tedious task, taking up too much time. Comparison websites are mainly useless and filled with unwanted information and supplier/manufacturer websites take up time. Going straight to user forums or specialized blogs saves time.”

“I will always sample new methods but it’s the reliability and context that is important in order to understand the accuracy of the information.”

“I will utilize more web areas but generally be careful and limit to particular proven sources.”

Download Your PDF copy of the Report

*"The survey was conducted online, administered and analysed by market research specialists McCallum Layton, among business respondents provided by online panel provider Toluna." The survey was conducted in March 2010 with buyers who had participate in the decision-making process for the purchase of a business product or service offering during previous 12 months of over £20,000.

CSO Insights eBook: Sales Management 2.0

I'm pleased to be able to share the new CSO Insights eBook: Sales Management 2.0 - Optimizing Sales Performance Volume 2 that's hot off the presses with the conclusion of their 16th annual Sales Performance Optimization Study (SPO).

It couldn't be better timed as we roll into 2010, focused on exceeding our hard-won accomplishments in 2009. In fact, the 8% drop in sales plan attainment from 2008 to 2009 has put many of us under the gun to turn strategy into results.

This year's SPO study found that the top sales effectiveness issues for 2010 include:

• Revising/enhancing our lead generation programs
• More closely aligning sales and marketing
• Enhancing sales team communications
• Analyzing our customers' buying process

[It goes without saying that all of these are near and dear to my heart.]

This eBook showcases four companies, sharing real-world experience about how they're finding success by optimizing their sales processes. Here's a taste:

Joe Demmler, from Aon, shares the story of how his company consolidated 30 different CRM systems to, "create one way of doing sales and marketing, and implement one system to support this way of doing business."

Dave Zuchowski, from Hyundai, reveals how the company managed to increase sales by 6% during a time when the automotive industry as a whole was seeing a 23% decline in revenues.

Tom Blondi, from Spin.com, discusses how companies get the performance they reward. He applies the impacts to performance to 3 categories: compensation, recognition and involvement.

John Williams, from StorageTek, talks about how improving productivity gains enabled the company to grow from $700M to $2.2B in annual revenues over four years—and they did it without adding a single sales person during that time. 

These stories are all rich with detail and can provoke innovative ideas to help all of us improve and innovate our sales and marketing strategies. Thanks to CSO Insights for allowing me to share the eBook with you. Download your copy.

Key Content Marketing Trends & Predictions 2010

Click Predictions whipped out their crystal ball and passed it to 39 experts in content marketing, B2B marketing, email marketing, social media and asked them to answer one question:

What is your key marketing trend
and prediction for 2010? 

Take a look at who's included:

You're going to love the story that unfolds as you flip through each trend and prediction. You'll notice that some key themes begin to emerge across all the disciplines of the experts who contributed.

I won't spoil your fun, but think focus, conversations, long-term and meaning.

Hat tip and BIG thanks to Click Documents for pulling this together, and to Marketo for sponsoring!

Download Your Copy Here

Get the Guide: Design Nurturing Programs to Drive Sales

I thought I'd start the New Year off by sharing a guide that I've written about lead nurturing. I hope you enjoy it!

	Design Nurturing Programs to Drive Sales With longer buying cycles, unprecedented information availability and buyers delaying sales conversations it's imperative to continuously evolve your lead nurturing programs to parallel their needs.

In this guide you'll learn:

• How lead nurturing differs from lead generation.
• The 7 Stages of the buying process and how to address them.
• What a Buyer Q&A is and how it helps you map content to buying stages.
• Why a style baseline is important.
• The three types of content that influence buying decisions.
• And much more...

Download your copy

eBook: The Art of Social Sales

The Customer Collective has released a new eBook with contributions from some truly insightful sales leaders to help us understand just what "social selling" means in today's marketplace.

Although we all know that our buyers have changed, business is moving so swiftly these days that its hard to know just how we need to adapt to keep pace...and keep selling. This eBook shares some great perspectives on what's required...and what's working.

As a preview, I decided to pick some of my favorite insights from a few of the featured experts - but this is just a taste. You really should go download the eBook. It's good stuff!

Paul Greenberg, President of The 56 Group and author of CRM at the Speed of Light has been one of my favorite people to follow for a long time. His turns of phrase often spark light bulb moments for me.

"...it’s no longer good enough for a sales person to have a great relationship with an individual. The customer or prospect is expecting the entire company to be a 'person like me.'"

"And this must be the case throughout not just the transactions, but all interactions, regardless of whether it’s an in-person visit, a website visit, an email marketing campaign, or a mobile text message. Doesn’t matter. The “company like me” is what makes or breaks the successful sale."

Anneke Seley, CEO of PhoneWorks and author of Sales 2.0, is someone I've gotten to know personally this year. She's doing some revealing work into how the execution of selling is shifting to address our buyers' growing social appetites. She showcases two case studies in her article. Take a look at one outcome:

Dan, the Regional Director of Sales at a sales productivity technology company "claims 80% of his qualified leads now come from referrals, social networking and social media, which he considers technologies that enable communication with his personal referral network." 

Jay Dunn, VP of Marketing for Lane Bryant, discusses how to build market value through social networks. He offers up an interesting take on how to apply value to the followers of your followers. He calls this Dunn's Equation:

"Annual Value X Network = Network Value"

The example he uses is if there's an annual purchase value [$50] and your customer has 5 followers that share similar interests in your products, then the network value is $300. It's an interesting premise and one I'm mulling around for B2B demand generation - maybe related to cost per qualified lead. Hmm.

Jouko Ahvenainen, a co-founder of Xtract, the world first social network analytics company, and Grow VC, the first global peer-to-peer micro-funding service for startups. Among other things, he talks about Social Intelligence and targeting Alpha users.

Social Intelligence: better understanding consumer preferences and peer-to-peer networks and influence so companies can help people find offers that are relevant to them.

Alpha Users: the most influential customers within a social network - the ones who can spread the word and market/sell for you.

The articles written by these experts (and others) go into a lot more detail about successful sales strategies in today's social world. Go download the eBook: The Art of Social Sales, today. [registration is required - but worth it]