What is a marketing strategy?

Sales and Marketing Huddles and 35 More Ways to Teamwork

I just got back from speaking at the New Marketing Summit and it was great. But it seems that I can’t attend a marketing conference without hearing marketers swap complaints about their sales teams. I don’t know about you but I’m fed up with the same old story. Companies continue to waste millions of dollars […]

The Difference Between ROI and Marketing Accountability

What’s the difference difference between ROI and marketing accountability? My post a few weeks ago, “On B2B Demand Generation tools and Lead Generation Dashboards,” started an email exchange between me and Jeffrey Eisenberg on the subject. Our exchange spawned an article by Bryan Eisenberg over at ClickZ. Bryan writes, “Measuring the ROI of lead generation […]

Closed-Loop Marketers More Likely to Reach ROMI Goals

As I’ve written before, I’m a big proponent of using closed loop feedback to improve marketing and lead generation ROI. I came across a recent report by Aberdeen Group entitled, “Creating a Customer-Centric Marketing Organization,” that reinforces the point with broader empirical data. Aberdeen found, “Companies that adopt closed-loop marketing processes are more than three […]

Going beyond the sales lead

Ultimately, the purpose of B2B marketing is to help the sales team sell. But marketers often get so wrapped up in driving activity that they seem to forget it’s about driving sales conversion. For example, ask most executives and marketers what sales people need and they will say, “more leads.” Your sales people don’t want […]

Podcast: What Sales Really Needs From Marketing

John Jantsch, small business marketing expert and author of Duct Tape Marketing recently interviewed me and sales expert Jill Konrath, author of Selling to Big Companies about what sales really needs from marketing. This podcast was conducted for the marketing alliance partners for Sage Software, makers of ACT!, Peachtree and SageCRM software. John originally hoped […]

Podcast: Sales and Marketing the Six Sigma Way

It’s been well documented that the quality of collaboration between sales and marketing directly impacts ROI. The challenge that many organizations face is that their sales process is a black box. No one except the sales team knows what is going on inside the black box until a proposal or sale happens. Worse still, 80% […]

Avoid wasting your Pay-Per-Click lead generation budget

Thanks to Jim Berkowitz and his CRM Mastery E-Journal for pointing me to the MarketingProfs article, Five Proven Ways to Waste Money With Pay-per-Click Advertising by John Grant. I think this article does a nice job pointing out some of the most common pay-per-click mistakes and some easy fixes to help convert more clicks into […]

E-Book: What Sales Really Needs from Marketing

The biggest challenge most sales pros with a complex sale face is getting access to executives, especially those in BIG companies. To be successful, sales and marketing efforts must be better aligned. Jill Konrath just wrote an e-book that gives practical advice on how to align your sales and marketing efforts. In “What Sales Really […]

Sales Leads Are Too Valuable For Sales People Alone

David Meerman Scott’s blog post, “Sales Leads Are too Valuable for Sales People,” is worth a read. He shows the folly of marketers who throw sales leads over the wall and expect sales people to catch them. This is an ongoing pattern for lead generation failure. I’ve written that consistent, patient, long-term contact with sales […]

Direct mail for the complex sale that really works

With the proliferation of e-mail and its resulting abuses, direct mail has become almost a novel approach by comparison. Because it performs so well in other arenas, many marketing practitioners believe that direct mail will do the same for their B2B lead generation programs. But when it comes to the complex sale, not only is […]

Sales and Marketing as a Team: Five Tips to Improve Performance

The best mindset, strategy and tactics – and the most astute sales and marketing individuals – are for naught without the collaboration of everyone involved. The unrealized potential can be likened to the batteries in a flashlight. If the batteries aren’t inserted in the right direction or are otherwise out of proper contact, their latent […]

Why CEOs Must Be Actively Involved in Lead Generation

Jeff Thull, author of Mastering the Complex Sale, recently published an article, “Sales and The CEO,” that puts CEOs at the head of the sales department. I like the article because it emphasizes the key role that CEOs play in developing a successful go-to-market strategy. I think biggest obstacle to go-to-market success is the absence […]

Customer Referrals and Your Sales and Marketing Department

For the complex sale you need enthusiastic referrals to help you build your reputation, differentiate yourself, demonstrate your value proposition, shorten your sales cycle, and drive revenue. So how do you ask for referrals? I wrote a post called, “Asking for referrals does more than Generate Leads,” based on the Harvard Business Review article, “The […]

Lead generation and 'the number'

Many financial executives still view marketing as an expense a.k.a. cost center rather than viewing it as an asset that creates revenue. Does this describe your current situation? Dale Wolf over at the Context Rules Marketing Blog writes a thoughtful post on how marketers can positively influence executives who see marketing as a liability rather […]

Seth Godin's speech on Marketing at Google

Six time best selling author Seth Godin speaks to Google as part of their [email protected] series. His talk is 48 minutes long and includes questions and answers from Google employees and hey, it’s free. Watch video “All Marketers are Liars” – Seth Godin speaks at Google

Consistent Lead Generation Pays Over Long Term

In many ways, the disiplines of B2B and B2C marketing and lead generation are different. But, Scott Mason’s article in DM News, written primarily for B2C marketers, illustrates an important truth for us all: Lead generation isn’t just about instant gratification. Mason writes: The perennial rewards of lead generation are reaped from patient tending to […]

Marketing That Reaches Decision Makers In Big Companies

I was quoted in an article on B-to-B marketing in Marketing News, a publication of the American Marketing Association. The article entitled, “It Takes a Committee to Buy into B-to-B,” by Staff Writer Allison Enright, focuses on how marketers can connect with decision makers in big companies. If you’re doing marketing or lead generation for […]

Marketing Spend Shifting to Below-the-line

This article is a little hard to read if you aren’t up on buzzwords. However, it points to the fact that marketers are realizing that using traditional brand focused media isn’t enought to move the sales needle thus companies are spending more on lead generation. Link: Marketing Spend Shifting to Below-the-line.

This Years Hot New Lead Generation Strategy is Thinking

I finally caught up on a long overdue “to read” pile on my desk. Each year, it seems, a few hot new lead generation tactics get lots of media attention. Based on the recent headlines, it’s safe to say that online lead generation (search, podcasts, RSS, etc.) will remain hot topics in 2006. I say, […]

Embattled CMOs share strategies to improve marketing influence

I liked today’s article by Kate Maddox, “Embattled CMOs share strategies,” which gives highlights from the CMO Summit last month. During the summit, senior marketing executives were challenged to improve the influence of marketing by building more efficient and accountable marketing organizations. Sridhar Ramanathan (a CMO Council Member), over at the Pacifica Group Blog, shares […]

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