Most important B2B Marketing Metrics For CEOs

Today CEOs expect marketers to provide metrics and to be accountable to meeting their numbers just like sales people. They do have a bunch of activity metrics and some squishy metrics like brand recognition.

At the same time, most CEOs agree that they aren’t getting enough activity at the top of the sales funnel. Thus their marketers are constantly reminded that more leads are needed...now! When the revenue doesn't immediately materialize, CEOs will lament, why can't I see ROI from marketing?

This is what CEOs should be asking?

1. What effect are our marketing investments having on sales productivity?
2. What can marketing do to lower the combined expense to revenue ratio of sales and marketing?

As marketers, I believe the key is to look at why are we measuring our marketing in the first place?

I'd love to get your input on what you believe are the most important B2B marketing metrics for CEOs?

The Three Big Marketing Mistakes to Avoid by Brian Casey

Getting it Right firts time in marketing on the internet is very rare. It can be a trial an error game, but a lot of people make the same mistakes over and over again People succeed at Internet Marketing every single day. They do it in a variety of different ways too. There is no one way to become successful with Internet Marketing. However, there are some Internet Marketing mistakes that you should avoid. In fact, here are the big 3 mistakes to avoid.

Mistake #1: Choosing the Wrong Niche

If you really want to be successful with Internet Marketing then all it's going to take is a few key ingredients. If you make sure all of these ingredients are present then you will make a lot of money online. Working for success with Internet Marketing really is that easy. Here's how to do it.

A Desire to Succeed

The first ingredient that's needed when working for success with Internet Marketing is a desire to succeed. This means more than simply wanting to succeed. This means being willing to do whatever it takes to succeed. You need to be willing to do absolutely everything right or you will be setting yourself up for failure.

Knowledge

The next important ingredient when working for success with Internet Marketing is to gather as much knowledge as you can. You want to know as much about your niche as you possibly can and you also need to know as much as you can about how to make money. Don't ever stop gathering knowledge either. You need to always keep being a student of Internet Marketing because you will always have more to learn.

Planning

When working for success with Internet Marketing you also want to make sure you're always planning. Plan how you will complete each large task and plan how you will spend each day. Plan every step of your journey to success. Without a plan you will have very little chance of achieving any success at all. But with a plan you can map out exactly how you will succeed with an online business.

Hard Work

The final ingredient when you're working for success with Internet Marketing is hard work. Don't think for one moment that Internet Marketing is your key to making lots of money without putting in any effort. It will take a lot of hard work in order to be successful with your online business. So, be sure you count on putting in plenty of effort when you're working for success with Internet Marketing.

Here's how to work for success with Internet Marketing. You need a desire to succeed, you need to have knowledge, you need to plan out everything, and you need to put in the hard work. If you do all of these things then you will succeed with your online business.

The first of the big 3 Internet Marketing mistakes to avoid is choosing the wrong niche. You want to choose a niche that you're interested in, a niche that's popular, and a niche that doesn't have a lot of competition.

Now, the least important of these criteria is the competition. However, if you do go into a competitive niche you better be prepared to work hard and to do things better than most of your competition. If you don't then you will have a very hard time succeeding.

Mistake #2: Getting Distracted

Getting distracted is the second of the 3 big Internet Marketing mistakes to avoid. Don't be one of those people who always chase the latest way to make money online. Choose a way that works for you and stick with it until you are successful.

Mistake #3: Quitting too Soon

Finally, another common Internet Marketing mistakes is quitting too soon. Success could very well be just around the corner. If you quit you will never succeed. 0% of Internet Marketers who quit actually succeed. Obviously the success rate for those who stick with it is much higher than that.

There are some major Internet Marketing mistakes you always want to avoid. The big 3 to avoid are choosing the wrong niche, getting distracted, and quitting too soon. If you avoid these mistakes you will have a much better chance of succeeding with Internet Marketing.

Best Marketing Practices in E-mail Marketing by - Kelly Flint

Building relationships with your customers is key to growing your business, especially in a down economy. Now more than ever, it’s vitally important to market to and communicate with your customers in order to stay top of mind.

Getting started with email marketing isn’t difficult, but there are some important elements you should address before you start.

Get Permission
One of the most critical elements of email marketing is a clean, permission-based list of email addresses. Permission is vital to the success of your email marketing efforts. Sending email to people who have not explicitly given you permission to do so is considered “spam.” It will result in spam complaints and unsubscribe requests. As a legitimate email marketer you have a responsibility to send spam-free email to your email list. But don’t let this challenge stop you from trying email marketing. Staying clear of a spam label isn’t that difficult to manage if you follow some simple guidelines:

• Use a recognizable "from" name
• Use a clear subject line
• Make your email relevant
• Maintain a clean email list
• Avoid spam-like words and symbols

If you follow these suggestions, your emails will evade the dreaded spam button, resulting in higher deliverability and open rates.

Choose your Method
Once you have a clean, permission-based list, determine how you’ll conduct your email marketing efforts. While you could try to handle it yourself using your own email application, most experts agree it’s better to go with an email marketing service provider. Email marketing services handle all of the hard work, allowing you to focus on promoting your services. Good email marketing services deliver your emails with proper protocols and develop relationships with Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to be sure your email is delivered to all the inboxes on your list. In addition, these providers offer numerous tools to make your email campaigns as successful as possible, such as professionally-designed templates, list management, tracking and reporting, and much more.

Make a Plan
When you begin drafting the content for your email newsletter, it is important to think about the goals you want to accomplish, your audience, and your message. Spend some time determining which type of email you want to send and craft the message to fit your target audience and goals. Another important consideration is frequency; this is a tricky subject because every business and organization is different. Think about your recipients and how much they might want to hear from you about your programs or services. After that, let your click-throughs, unsubscribe rates and customer feedback be your guide.

Choose Your Content
Once you’ve established your plan and identified your audience and message, it’s time to create your email campaign. As mentioned above, most email service providers make it easy to develop an email with pre-designed templates and email wizards.

Email newsletters are uniquely suited to accomplish the long-term goals of customer retention and loyalty. By providing interesting, relevant information about your products and services, and other related topics, you’re educating and informing your customers. Your customers know you provide a good service, but they’ll be surprised and pleased to learn you are also willing to offer advice, interesting insight and valuable resources in your regular newsletter. Then, when they need a service that your provide, they’re more likely to turn to you because you’ve established a trusted relationship with them.

A newsletter is just one way to use email marketing. You can also send promotions, announcements, invitations and any number of other communications to your email list. Promotions tend to be popular choices for many organizations looking to achieve short-term goals such as signing up for classes or for an activity. It is also important to segment your list and only send promotions to those subscribers who will be interested.

Get Started
Remember the ultimate goal of any marketing program is to build your brand and reputation and ensure your customers think of you when they’re ready to take action. Email marketing is an easy, inexpensive and effective marketing method. The specific rules and guidelines all email marketers should follow are designed to help you accomplish your goals. With a permission-based email list, targeted, relevant emails, and interesting content -- your email marketing efforts will generate more and better leads and improved customer satisfaction.

Email Append: is it a Hot Online Marketing Strategy or Too Hot to Handle?

To maximize these advantages, nonprofit organizations are becoming more and more a tactic to allow them to drive the growth of its email archiving: email add. Email appending is quick, relatively inexpensive and it works. Some nonprofit organizations report incredible return on investment (ROD, as well as donations of $ 15 for every $ 1 spent on email append. Despite this success and increasing popularity, e-mail add also its detractors. Challenge reviews the ethical question of practice and we believe it violates the implicit trust between a nonprofit and its supporters. Some even consider as an invasion of privacy of donors, should be considered spam limit. The process add an e-mail name and mailing address is not new, but as mentioned, has gained in popularity and legitimacy in recent years. fans all that when done correctly, the process more than meets all requirements of the CAN-SPAM and is fully compatible with professional organizations like the Direct Marketing Association (DMA). The procedure is simple. A copy of the database data of the organization (or part) is sent to an appropriate provider and email add processing. When an exact match is found, the email address is added to the file. When an individual can not match 't be, most vendors offer the ability to deliver results at the home, and -mail to say John Smith attached to e-file husband of Mary Smith. "Welcome e-mail is then sent to donors attached, also commonly known as e-mail" permission. "It has the advantages of receiving mail home help email, and gives the person an opportunity to be removed from the list if you want no part of the database of email. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] All of the exclusion clauses are removed , and all mail not delivered (outputs). The file that contains the documents are returned with the original post is current, accurate, addresses of opt-in e-mail. The DMA has issued guidelines on adding email addresses files on consumers, largely based on CANSPAM settlement. Support practice as well as several key requirements are met: * There is an established relationship with the donor, whether online or offline * The data used in the process of adding from sources that provided notice and choice regarding the acceptance of receiving email offers third party and the consumer has not opted out. For example, many databases annex are filled with records of consumers who completed guarantees Product or online surveys. During this process are provided with a choice - the rent of the parties. * e-mail addresses will never be manufactured, to guess or harvest. * Although not necessary, a message Welcome is highly recommended. That is true of all email communications, the donor must accompany the opportunity to be removed from the email archive nonprofit, in both the initial welcome message and subsequent submissions. DISAGREE some critics are not affected by the approval of AMD. So they could accept the addition of email followed by the "letter of the law, violates the spirit of practice, ie the" spirit of law "to the it was created. detractors argue that a person completing a questionnaire online or on the Internet has taken measures on other, and always a kind of consent to receive offers from third parties really do not understand the consequences of that consent. Indeed, there some validity to this argument. During the performance of its online survey to receive a lot of coupons, Ms. Jones Heartland, United States probably did not realize that "agreement to receive offers from third parties, had a day to receive an email from the organization that has donated $ 10 direct mail. The time periods to increase by consent, the giving and receiving emails, the worst crime, critics claim. At some point, say, e-mail this contact with the donor is no different from spam, not a designation of more spam. Append supporters violently disagree. To them, consent is an element of consent. For the most part they are right. Almost all email communications of the third part is based on the exact type of consent Electronic messaging bases, are constructed. They come to the logical conclusion that if you're not a fan of adding e-mail, can not be a fan of any other third party or by post e-mail the location, co-registration, etc. In fact, support preach holders, adding that the email is legitimate mail is sent to a known donor of the organization, not a cold prospect. Some critics would admit that point, but ask, "Well, you follow the proper procedure and joined the CAN-SPAM rules when it comes to individual games e-mail. But you do not have relations with others in the household. There is you must add email addresses in the home. "fans tend to agree but also disagree. Common sense must prevail, stress, and suggest the need for" home help to consider just a few questions to determine the legitimacy of the game logic of the house. These topics include: * When someone contributes to your organization, how many times the name on the check or credit card, but merely the channel through which the donation was made? * Is the gift as much a gift from the family as a special gift: * Your question is one that raises many different views among household members? * This is your call to a specific demographic or lifestyle? Depending on the Answers to these questions, it is easy to decide if the donor is purely related to the individual donor or really only brings one to the family. When in doubt, add the proponents suggest starting with the parties of a single individual and subsequently home test matches. No matter which side of the barrier is a suite - append supporters or add comments - in general all agree that adding e-mail almost always offers a very favorable ROI, often outstanding . E-mail add relatively little cost. However, as is the case with most forms of online lead generation and acquisition costs can vary greatly from provider to provider and customer to customer. the cost of a constant is how to determine the payment, allowing the nonprofit to compare prices and make an informed decision. Nearly all reputable suppliers only charge for their accuracy, given, has opted in emails. This is e-mail at their deployment have been delivered to the recipient's inbox. All jumps and email undeliverable are removed and not subject to payment. Also, donors who opt out after receiving the welcome message also deletes thus not subject to compensation. The price per e-mail attached is normally determined by the size of the original input file. This is where we find very big differences of less than 10 cents for every game in a quantity of 1 million or more more than 20 cents per game at a starting price of less than 100,000. usually calculated on each individual project, although it is often possible to negotiate a favorable price based on a project, the annual volume. Of course, the e-mail obtained are the providers of existing funds. However, consider buying more online and direct the efforts of generations will cost the nonprofit at least $ 1 per lead and for many, often $ 2 to $ 3 per person. That's as much as 15 times Donors cost attached. It is not uncommon for nonprofit to establish 5 to $ 10 in contributions for every $ 1 spent on processing the email add. more questions If you've weighed the pros and cons and decided to make an addition of a project, here are key questions that potential providers: * What is your type of opener? * What is the bounce rate? * What is the price per pound, not included in the e-mail: * Are there any additional cost, including costs of settlement? * Can you help create a welcome message? * Who are your regular customers to add? nonprofit nonprofit that found success online have one thing in common: the group has developed an e-mail files and donors is a priority to grow steadily and consistently. If everybody is not sold the practice of many e-mail add plays a key role in building this all-important foundation.

When Testing Doesn't Work by - David Baker

There are probably thousands of articles on the Web about how to test marketing campaigns effectively. You have a hypothesis, you have test variables, you have test segments, and you have some view of statistical probabilities associated with the outcome. That's a perfect world. Let's first assume you actually have the time to build a proper test and the resources to create the many versions -- and you can actually deliver on the test program and keep the program sterile. What do you do when the tests don't tell you what you want to hear?

A consumer marketer I know with a really large database decided to test the cadence of their email programs. They developed several test cells: a high frequency cell, a low frequency cell, a control group that was exposed to the same cadence they've run for a year, and then a hold-out group. Seemed like a pretty straightforward test. The group with the highest revenue would lead to some conclusions on how often they should send promotional email. Well, what they found was that the hold-out group actually performed better in terms of revenue than any of the other test cells. At first glance, you'd think, our email program stinks and all this work we put in is wasted energy. We can generate these sales without email.

This test somewhat backfired on the CRM team; now they had to now justify what they do day in and day out. But they realized that the frequency of communications wasn't an indicator of their program's success. The problem was at the root of their program: early lifestage messaging. They had a very progressive offer strategy for new customers and people who signed up for their product/service, and they were effectively numbing their audience to their email promotions. It wasn't that they had declining revenue for their retention audience, but email was not as effective at driving conversion under their own terms, and increasing offers didn't increase sales at the same rate as the increased offer value.

What do you do in a circumstance like this? Would the senior team actually believe this new hypothesis and be able to deal with the subsequent costs of ripping apart the company's s early-stage promotional strategies? Could they migrate away from "crack marketing," where you're so addicted to doing the same things that you are afraid to make wholesale changes?

The challenge with a scenario like this is, the CRM team didn't think about all the possible outcomes and dynamics that might influence the results -- and they weren't ready to react to the results.

Another story involves a company that decided to test the effects of direct mail and email through different scenarios: email only, direct mail only, and a combination of the two. Seems like a fruitful exercise. If you can prove that email has a better influence as a standalone channel, you have a winner from a cost savings perspective. If you show the combination of email and direct mail have an influence on increased revenue value, you can potentially leverage this to be very timely in your launch and communications. But what if every scenario pays off? What happens if revenue is down all around? What happens if you find that a large portion of your loyal customers are no longer buying through the email channel, but your paid search numbers have increased dramatically?

Testing is a funny exercise. It's hard to contemplate all the potential outcomes, and it takes a lot of energy to put together good tests. Is the trade-off to do it poorly and risk outcomes that you can't justify? That is almost worse than not testing at all.

I won't belabor the point. The only time tests don't work is when you aren't prepared to react, haven't thought about all the potential outcomes, or take no action at all on the results.

Reverse Email Adress By - MyFreeEmailSearch.com

Find Someone's Email Address

Reaching out to someone you have not spoken with in a long time might be easier if you use email. There are many reasons why people lose touch. The reasons why people drift often dictate how they reconnect in the future if they reconnect at all. Those that have simply slipped away because life got busy may not mind picking up the phone to call someone with whom they have not spoken in a while. However, when you have lost touch due to argument or other circumstances, it might be hard to call. When that happens, email may be a better choice, at least at first.

If you know someone's email address, you can just shoot of a message and wait to see if they respond. This can be hard because an email address may not be something that someone uses any longer. You won't know if they are ignoring you, or if you sent something to the wrong person. Someone who does not know you may not bother to reply to tell you that you have the wrong person.

Take an old email address to what would be called a reverse email address lookup. There you can enter the email address to see if you can find a name to go with it. That can better tell you if you have the right one or the right person. You can also see if you can search by name through a forward search. You put in the name to see if a matching email address comes up so that you can reach someone that way.

Once you have the right email, the only thing you can do is email them to see if they respond. If you left on good terms, they may respond as soon as they get something from you. Just remember some do not check email each day so it may take them a bit to get your message. If you left on bad terms, they may not wish to respond. It is better to know that through email than by calling and having them hang up on you.

If you have to know if someone has gotten your email address, try to use an email service that has a return receipt. This is something that works just like registered mail through the post office. When they open the email, you will get an email confirming that it was opened. You may not be able to do this with your email, but if you can, it helps to know if you felt it was important that your message was received.

Email Appends: A Powerful Tool for Email Marketing

Are you interested in expanding your business' potential by entering the exciting world of email marketing? Email marketing allows your business to reach both current and potential customers via email, which is certainly more effective than old-fashioned "snail mail" marketing tactics.

The Benefits of Email Marketing vs. Snail Mail Marketing

Traditional business owners may wonder why it is necessary to obtain email lists through email appends. Email marketing - despite what you may have heard about "spam" - is always preferential to "snail mail" marketing.

Email marketing is cheaper, since you don't have to pay for printed and mailed materials. Thankfully, you don't have to worry about expensive marketing materials being immediately thrown into the garbage can without being read. In addition, email marketing is far more eco-friendly.

The Legalities of Email Appends

If you haven't yet established a long list of customer email addresses, you can still enter the email marketing game. Through a system called email appends, you can hire a third party company to perform an email search for your customers by using their current mailing address and personal information. These email lists are extremely useful in reaching your customers directly.

If you already have your customers' personal information, it is legal to utilize email appends to develop your email lists. By relying on email appends, a business can immediately begin the process of email marketing, instead of wasting precious marketing time manually compiling a new email list.

Advantages to Email Appends

Using email appends has a wealth of advantages over just sending paper materials to the individuals on your list of customers. While it may seem like a waste of money to obtain email lists for customers whose physical mailing addresses you already possess, you will end up saving much more money than you would having your next round of direct mailers printed.

Disadvantages to Email Appends

Some people may consider these email marketing tactics to be spam, even if they did at one point provide your company with their address and personal information. However, even if a customer immediately deletes an email from your company, it is still preferential to that same customer immediately throwing away a piece of traditional mail; none of your advertising money has really been wasted in the aforementioned scenario.

Obtaining Email Lists without Email Appends

There are other ways to obtain customer email addresses besides utilizing email appends. For example, you can include an email autoresponder on your website, which allows customers to fill out a virtual form. The potential customer then receives an email from your company immediately afterwards.

The world of email marketing offers a wealth of methods for reaching your customers through electronic mail. It is time that your business stops wasting money on paper mailers and finally enters the digital age.

Read More on - http://www.myfreeemailsearch.com

Done right, email prospects flourish By - by Jere Doyle

As brands look to engage consumers online, marketers are re-discovering the value of email marketing.

Emailing your in-house list is now the number one or two top online marketing tactic to drive sales. And it makes sense. Who better to target and engage than the very consumers who have asked for more information about your brand? Growing lists of quality customer names is more important than ever, and becoming a crucial part of every brand’s marketing mix, presenting opportunities for online performance marketing companies.

Within the last few years, brands have turned to online performance marketing companies to grow their inhouse email lists to help them engage consumers in a meaningful way. Sometimes referred to as “Co-Registration,” the leading and more reputable performance marketers are now employing the next generation of consumer engagement and opt-in. I call this “Non-organic Consumer Acquisition”, and it presents a real viable option to successfully add a large quantity of quality names to your in-house lists, thus delivering high ROI.
Co‐Registration fared well in the ExactTarget study, especially compared to other commonly used non‐organic customer acquisition tactics such as list rental and email appends. 78% of email marketers who have used coregistration in the past will continue to do so in the year ahead (see figure 1a), compared to 63% for list rental and 67% for email appends.

Five practices that will lead to much higher quality registrations are:

1. Single Brand Registration: Make sure that consumers register for brands email list one advertiser at a time. In fact, this is why I don’t like the name Co-Registration. The best consumer acquisition programs drive users to exclusive landing pages, and ask the consumer to input their information for each specific list they are subscribing to. Live by the rule that consumers opt-in one advertiser at a time.

2. Give Value, Not Coercion: Make sure that consumers are not falsely coerced to join your email list in any way. Present real value and allow the consumers to decide if they want to opt-in to your list.

3. Never, Ever Share Data: Be certain that there is a clear policy never to share data with any other company - and make that policy clear to your consumers.

4. The Right People on the Right List: Make sure your partner is using the most sophisticated targeting methods so that the right consumers are driven to sign up for your email list. At Prospectiv, we’ve seen a lot of success using PrismPro™, our proprietary technology that ensures consumers only see offers that are relevant to them.

5. Track and Evaluate: Be sure you track where all of the consumers who are subscribing to your list are originating from, and evaluate the performance of the source on a timely basis.

Unfortunately, not all Co-Registration campaigns are run the same way. Co‐Registration has gotten a somewhat poor reputation within the industry because of some questionable and even aggressive practices by certain performance marketing companies. “Using ‘one advertiser at a time’ method help ensure that customers acquired through co-registration are qualified and likely to return a high ROI,” shared Stewart.

Sticking to the practices above will maximize the quality of registrations and safeguard your email marketing investments.

How to Double Your Income By Warming Up Those Cold Calls By - By Silvia Quintanilla

Salespeople are under a lot of pressure to win new business. This fact hit home last week when I spoke to a salesperson who uses our research.

She's expected to perform 5 demos every week. In fact, someone from HQ calls her every Monday to find out specifically what she has lined up that week. And just 2 weeks before, her company laid off a slew of under performing salespeople. I have to admit, just speaking to her made me a bit nervous, and I don’t even work there!

But that conversation inspired this article. Hopefully, by using the tips below, we can help your sales team meet their metrics, whether it’s demo appointments, in-person meetings, or opportunities in the pipeline.

Finding a Good Prospect
When we do research for our clients, we’re always looking for a “way in.” In other words, we’re looking for a project or challenge the prospect is facing that matches our clients’ solution set.

Here are some of our favorite ways of finding that information:

Tip #1: Use the Job Postings
Using job postings to find sales opportunities is a true “gem” of an idea. It’s helped us find hundreds of sales opportunities for our clients. The key is to use a site that aggregates job openings from many places (like Career Builder, Monster, Dice, etc).

Jobposting A good one we like is Indeed.com. Once there, go to the Advanced Search function. Next, type in a few keywords that apply to your service/product.

For example, let’s say you offer business intelligence (BI) solutions. Type in that keyword or similar keywords that indicate a company is working on a BI project.

You’ll likely have to sift through a few postings, but it could prove very worthwhile. Once you find a company that's starting a project in this area, you’re chances of engaging your prospect improve significantly.

Tip #2: Regularly Review Vertical / Functional Periodicals
No matter what you sell, there’s probably a monthly eMagazine that matches it. There are online magazines dedicated to IT professionals, HR, Marketing, Finance, Legal, etc., as well as magazines devoted to verticals (e.g., Banking, Healthcare, Retail). There are even online magazines devoted to a specific geographic regions.

Each magazine is packed with stories and news events for that specific area. We recommend reviewing them regularly to find timely prospects.

For example, many of our clients focus on selling to the financial services vertical. Here are the top 3 online magazines we like best for that space:
1. Waters – www.watersonline.com
2. Bank Systems & Technology – www.banktech.com
3. Bank Technology News - www.americanbanker.com/btn.html

There’s an online magazine(s) for nearly every area. If you need help finding one that fits your solution, feel free to send an email at silvia@industrygems.com.

Tip #3: Read the Earnings Transcripts
Earnings If your salespeople are really looking for the six-figure (and potentially seven-figure) sale, have them read the company’s quarterly Earnings Transcripts (if the company is public).

Every quarter, public U.S. companies must present to shareholders and investors. Those meetings are recorded and later transcribed to written word.

At those meetings, the executive management talks about their future strategies, upcoming projects, as well as any issues or challenges they’re trying to resolve. It’s a great way to find out the more “hidden” type of information that’s not being reported in the news.

You can find a company’s earnings transcripts at Seeking Alpha:
http://seekingalpha.com/tag/transcripts

We truly hope the above tips can help your salespeople meet their metrics!



Read More on - http://www.sellingtobigcompanies.blogs.com/

CRM - Social media's impact on web forms and landing pages By Brian Carroll

More marketers are embracing social media and inbound marketing practices for lead generation. That's a good thing.

I’ve written about how you can leverage social media tools like blogs, twitter, LinkedIn, etc. to drive interested visitors to your website or landing pages to register for educational content and other assets. It works.

But remember most people coming to your website aren't coming to your website to buy. They are coming to your site for information. People start to question the value of giving up too much info on forms before you've earned their trust.

Have you thought about your web forms? Are you asking for far too much information before you've earned their trust? I wrote about this in my post, Why Most B2B Sites Fail to Convert Sales Leads. I would add that you need to leverage a robust lead qualification process too.

Earlier this week, I came across a relevant post by Chis Koch (@Ckochster) on “how old-school data capture is poisoning marketing and what to do about it.”

In his post, Chris dares us to rethink how and if we should gather information from prospects. He writes, “As social media becomes more prevalent in marketing, we’re going to have to rethink how we gather information from prospects.” Check out his post. I agree.

You'll do better by thinking of lead generation as a process of micro-conversions that build an opportunity profile over time, such as requesting an email address, then asking for first and last name, later requesting a phone number, and so on.

I read of one company that trimmed down the registration to include an extremely simple, two-field form. Conversion rate more than tripled with this simplification. At the same time, the company expanded their email follow-up process and was able to increase the total amount of personal data collected over time.

Read more: http://blog.startwithalead.com/weblog/crm/#ixzz0OQgsXAUT

Looking for a little marketing wisdom? BY- Brian's Carroll focused on B2B lead Generation

Well, I’ve got, oh about a hundred suggestions for you all courtesy of MarketingSherpa’s latest Wisdom Report.

Sherpa’s free report is filled with mini-stories from our colleagues in the marketing world who have learned through trial and error. The topics of this year’s report touched on just about every aspect of marketing out there – from tradtional tactics to Web 2.0 and mobile marketing.

According to the editors at Sherpa, there were three main trends represented in this year’s edition:
1. Email - It’s clear from this book that email isn’t dead. In fact, it’s far from it. Sherpa editors noticed that marketers are looking for ways to tweak their email correspondence. Marketers are personalizing messages more than ever, segmenting their lists to create the most focused targets possible, and are testing to the hilt. You could learn a lot from the stories included in the email section.

2. Build Social Networks - Marketers are starting to see the value of building relationships using LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and blogs. There are some interesting “Case Studies” that will hit home for marketers investigating ways to integrate social media marketing into their 2009 plan.

3. Search Engine Optimization - It seems that more and more marketers are focusing on making their websites search-engine friendly. Marketers give advice on everything from making PPC more affordable to concentrating on niche keywords. One marketer shares how 2008 was the turning point that made him realize that after 25 years in the business he had to get with the program.

Read more: http://blog.startwithalead.com/weblog/email_marketing/#ixzz0NxrlAAlg

The Long Forgotten Unique Selling Proposition By Author: Flyn

Flyn has made a most interesting discovery. Most salespeople don’t really know what a unique selling proposition is. In fact, most companies don’t seem to know. This sounds incredible but it appears to be true.

Since the unique selling proposition is a critical aspect of selling not to mention selling on the phone, I though I would share some information on unique selling propositions that will help you sell more.

Before I begin let me recommend a book that I recommend all the time and in my book lists to salespeople. (See the recommended reading section of my free sales resources page.). The book is called “Monopolize Your Marketplace” by Richard Harshaw. In this book, as well as Jay Abraham’s “Getting Everything You Can Out of All You’ve Got,” you can learn all about unique selling propositions and how to tell a powerful story that will hook prospects.

What is a Unique Selling Proposition?

Before I reveal the secrets of the unique selling proposition let me ask you to write yours down on a piece of paper. Then you can go through the exercise with me as I lay this out.

A unique selling proposition according to Hershaw should make the prospect feel, and I quote from page 21 of his book:

“I would have to be an absolute fool to do business with anyone else but you – regardless of price.”

As you can see a good unique selling proposition has to be pretty darn powerful. Most of the propositions you hear aren’t propositions at all but platitudes.

What’s a platitude? A platitude is something that is stated as if it were important or unique when in fact it is not. Here are some examples.

“We fix your car right the first time.”

Why is this a platitude? Because anyone getting their car fixed would expect this to be the case. No one is going to the guy who says – “We fix it right the second time.” This is a “Well I would hope so” platitude.

And that is the first test of a good unique selling proposition – Would a normal person looking for your product or service simply expect as common what you claim.

Here’s another example of “I would hope so.”

“We give you a free consultation visit.”

This is a common benefit stated in ads for lawyers – but everyone does it so it is expected anyway. It’s a platitude.

Look at your selling proposition, is it a “Well I would hope so?”

The second platitude is “Who else can say that?” If someone else can say what you said, then it’s not and unique selling proposition as it’s not unique.

If you say “Were the best in town.” you very well might be, but any other company could simply make the same claim. If your competition can say with confidence based on their belief what you are saying, it’s not a unique selling proposition.

It’s not about who can do what you do, but about who can say what you say.

A great example of all of this is found by looking in the phone book at say lawyers. In most cases you could switch the names and phone numbers between the ads (as long as you kept with in the specialties) and the claims would be true or at least legitimate. There are very few unique selling propositions in the phone book, most of the ads contain platitudes instead.

Summary

Now that you have a better understanding of what a unique selling proposition really is you can see why having one will likely generate call backs to your messages in your cold calling efforts and get the attention of those you engage on the phone.

Behavior key when scoring online leads - BY Jon Miller

Question: How does one best track lead behavior to achieve the best results in an e-marketing campaign?


Answer: The Internet has fundamentally changed how people research and buy b-to-b solutions. Buyers today keep tight control over their buying processes and expect to be able to get the information they want without talking with a salesperson. They use search and other online tools to identify their requirements, build short lists and evaluate vendors.

As a result, b-to-b marketers meet prospective buyers earlier in the buying cycle than ever before. This means that most leads (as high as 95%, in fact) from e-marketing campaigns are still in the research phase. Prematurely passing these early leads to sales can lead to disaster since it annoys the buyer with an unwanted interruption and makes the salesperson even less likely to follow up on future marketing leads. That's why lead nurturing, the art and science of building relationships with qualified prospects regardless of their timing to buy, has become such an important topic in the last few years.

At the same time, if and when someone is actively looking for a solution, you want to be sure to identify them and pass them to the right sales rep as quickly as possible. Lead scoring lets you find the hottest leads, but too many companies use only basic demographic data (e.g., title, company size, etc.) in scoring. This is useful, but demographic data only tell how interested you are in the prospect—and nothing about how interested the prospect is in you.

Even BANT criteria (budget, authority, need and timing) have limited usefulness since buyers' answers to those questions are notoriously inaccurate (only 29% of respondents always fill that information out accurately, according to MarketingSherpa). In contrast, as we all know, people's actions speak louder than their words. This means you should also track and score a lead's behavior so you can measure their interest and engagement in your solution.

By setting a cookie for everyone who comes to your Web site (not just known visitors), you can track behaviors for anonymous visitors as well as for known contacts in your lead database. This is especially useful when a prospect does eventually register. At that point, you will already have more complete information on who is hot.

For example, say that two prospects fill out the “contact me” form on your Web site. The first has never been to your site before and found you today by clicking on your ad offering a free white paper. The second found you three weeks ago from Google AdWords; they didn't convert at the time but have since been back three times, spent time reading your blog and today got to your site by searching for your company name. Without the ability to track prospect behaviors, the two prospects may look identical, but add the behavioral dimension and there is a clear difference.

By monitoring and tracking online behaviors such as e-mail responses, completed forms and Web site visits, you can develop much more accurate and actionable lead scores. Assign a point value to each behavior, just as you would assign a value to each job title. Certain behaviors—such as using your company brand name in a search, visiting your pricing page or returning frequently to your site—indicate higher readiness to buy, so assign even higher weights to those behaviors.

Since b-to-b purchases typically involve six to 21 people, add up the scores for each contact at a given company to measure the total level of engagement for that organization. If you have more than one product line in your organization, consider creating different scores for each to track prospects' level of interest in each. Finally, be sure to lower the score over time if engagement goes down—or consider tracking recent engagement as well as total engagement.

Lastly, review the point values with the sales team and decide which scores indicate sales readiness. Be sure to also create “fast tracks,” that is, specific behavior paths that indicate a lead should be contacted immediately regardless of score. If the sales team determines a prospect is not yet ready, recycle the lead to marketing for additional nurturing. Finally, be sure to close the lead and refine your scoring rules and point values over time for continuous improvement.

6 Keys to Winning the Complex Sale - Recommended by Close Scott Miller Scott

I am often asked, “What separates a complex sale from a simple sale?” because working for a firm called – The Complex Sale, Inc. often sparks this line of questioning. The way I define it – a complex sale has multiple decision makers and multiple vendors. It usually is associated with a high price tag and a long, deliberative buying process.

Therefore, to win a complex sale on a consistent basis, we must first understand the organization as a single entity. I recommend we apply the 6 keys at the very beginning to understand what we are getting ourselves into. Consider this your first step in qualification.

1. Pain: Why Buy? Will our solution help forward strategic initiatives?
2. Prospect: Why Now? At what date can they no longer go without help?
3. Preference: Why Us? Do they acknowledge our differentiators?
4. Process: Who Cares? Do we know all the potential stakeholders?
5. Power: Who Matters? Do we know the decision-making process?
6. Plan: What’s Next? Is pursuing this opportunity the best usage of my time?

The best opportunities for us are the ones where we understand how our solution will forward a strategic initiative, which must have a solution, acknowledge our differentiators as important, where we know all the potential stakeholders, and understand the decision-making and approval process. Anything less becomes more of a judgment call based mainly upon the other opportunities you are working. If you cannot get any of these answered the way you like, it might be better for you to continue prospecting.

The second step to winning a complex sale is to shed the idea that companies buy form us. They do not; individuals by from us. Therefore since we know all the potential stakeholders and the decision-making process, we want to apply the 6 P’s again to every stakeholder.

1. Pain: What pain will my product solve for this person specifically?
2. Prospect: What personal risk does this person have with this project?
3. Preference: Does this person acknowledge our competitive advantage?
4. Process: What role do they play in the decision-making process?
5. Power: How do they influence the decision?
6. Plan: How do we earn the stakeholder’s vote or live without it?

By taking a “Stakeholder Analysis” you get a 360 degree view of all the potential players in your sales process and now you can devise a plan sell to the people in power. Since the process is long, we get a chance to build preference with the decision-makers. Since it is competitive, we get a chance to link our differentiators to solving their pains. Since it has a high price tag, we create a strategy around the risk of making the wrong decision.