Top 10 B-to-B Lead Generation Mistakes
MarketingSherpa has released a report entitled “Top 10 B-to-B Lead Generation Marketing Mistakes.” This top-10 list is very different from the first one that MarketingSherpa published a couple of years ago. In this day and age of electronic marketing where technology is changing rapidly, that’s not surprising. The game is always changing, and it’s a constant struggle to keep up.
Here is their list:
- Mistake #1: Calling a monthly email newsletter a “nurturing program”
- Mistake #2: Telephoning leads to qualify them…days later
- Mistake #3: Big booths at the big national shows (year after year)
- Mistake #4: Using a free trial or free demo as your mainstay offer
- Mistake #5: Focus on “we, us, our”
- Mistake #6: Stock photos and hard-to-read type
- Mistake #7: Referrals not working
- Mistake #8: Lack of investment in PR
- Mistake #9: Blocking search engine spiders from your best content
- Mistake #10: Time-consuming registration forms
It’s a rather daunting list once you start to analyze it in detail. I’d recommend starting small by prioritizing the impact (costs weighed against benefits) of fixing each “mistake,” then proceed to fixing those mistakes with a positive ROI in priority order.
Rather than exhaustively discuss each of the mistakes in turn, I thought I’d instead pick out some of the more interesting mistakes and provide my take on each one..
Mistake #1. In a previous article, I talked about the fact that with all of the spam filters out there, companies should not place too much dependency on email marketing as the primary or only means of staying in touch with customers and prospects. MarketingSherpa’s report points out that up to 40% of permission-based emails (meaning emails sent to folks who give you their permission to do so) are blocked by spam filters (!!). That’s why you need to utilize other vehicles for communicating information to your audience, including direct mail, phone calls, face-to-face meetings and websites/blogs. A cost-effective approach for smaller companies is to create content such as articles and case studies ONCE, then use that content – perhaps with slight variations – in multiple communication vehicles. I call this multi-dimensional marketing, and I’ve discussed this in more detail in a recent article.
Mistake #2. The mistake of not telephoning leads until days later is nothing new, but it keeps happening. The potential that a lead turns into a sale decays with each passing day that it is not followed up. The report points out that in very competitive industries, lead quality decays by the hour. How can companies speed up how quickly they follow up on leads? The only way that I know how to do it is to set up a repeatable lead follow-up process, then stick to it over the long-term and enforce it to drive sales person behavior. Better yet, automate the process with contact management or customer relationship management (CRM) software. With automation, leads can be distributed lightening-fast, the software can guide users through the lead follow-up process, and the built-in tracking tools can assist companies with managing and enforcing the process.
Mistake #4. Prospects reside at all stages in the sales cycle, and will buy (or not buy) on their own timetable. Using a free trial or demo as the only offer in your arsenal forces all prospects through the same hole, and some of those prospects just might not be ready for it. Often, it’s because their company isn’t ready yet for what you have to offer, or they simply don’t have the time to consider it. Patience is a virtue in those cases (but keep checking in, of course!). Variety in the type of information that you offer, and the vehicle through which that information is communicated, are critical elements in providing prospects with information that’s appropriate to where they are in the buying cycle.
Mistake #5. Put yourself in the shoes of your customer or prospect. Do they really care what you do? No. For them, they’re always thinking “what’s in it for me?” (otherwise known as WIIFM), and they want to know how you can solve their problems or help them achieve their business objectives. Take the focus of the content on your website and other marketing materials away from what you do, and place it on how you are able to address the problems, objectives and even dreams of your customers and prospects.
Mistake #7. What’s your best source of business? For most B-to-B businesses, referrals rank at the top of the list. I know that this is certainly true for our company. Are you enabling and encouraging referrals from your customer base? In most cases, if you ask for referrals, customers will generally be happy to provide them. You might also think about a formal referral program that rewards those who refer future customers. The reward itself, although nice, probably won’t motivate customers to refer prospects to your company; hopefully, your solutions provide the necessary motivation. However, setting up and promoting a referral program alerts people to the fact that you welcome and encourage referrals. Hopefully, this awareness leads to an increase in referrals from your customer base.
Mistake #8. Hand-in-hand with focusing on referrals is emphasizing PR (public relations). Are prospects more likely to take what you say more seriously, or are they more likely to trust what others say about you? Hands-down, your best marketing is what others say about you. If you’re not already focused on PR, perhaps you can start by targeting a couple of journalists with whom you can begin the education process or, as mentioned by MarketingSherpa, you can hire a part-time PR freelancer or college intern. In any case, position yourself as an information resource to the targeted journalists – don’t try to push or sell anything – and make sure that you are available if and when they decide to seek you out for assistance.