Monthly Archives: February 2022

Intent data can have a huge impact on your business. Before implementing intent data, marketers need to evaluate the need of intent data for their business and the best possible ways to adopt it.  

Instead of rushing things, marketers can choose to go slow and take a step-by-step approach when integrating intent data into their marketing strategy.

Does your business need intent data?

The results most businesses get from intent data are incredible so every marketer today might want to integrate intent data into their marketing strategy. It’s quite easy to jump into it, however, marketers need to consider certain factors and take an informed decision about intent data.

Download our white paper on intent data here  www.intellitechsoln.com/insights?type=whitepaper

What’s your intent?

First and foremost, before you plunge into intent data initiatives, you need to evaluate all the reasons as to why you would want to integrate intent data into your business.  Without a solid plan, your intent data plans and strategy might most likely backfire, why? Because intent data needs to be a part of your overall marketing strategy! It needs to be an integral part of your sales and marketing initiatives and hence it needs to align with your business goals.

So first thing you need to evaluate is the need for intent data in your sales and marketing processes and whether it fits comfortably into your overall business plan. You also need to evaluate the results that you expect from this initiative and do you have the resources to pull it off. Once you have identified the purpose, the need of intent data and align it with your business goals then you can go ahead and build a smart strategy to implement it.

So how do you build the plan from ground up?

Once you have decided that your business needs intent data, you can start by listing out your sales and marketing processes that need intent data or can benefit from intent data. This will help you to get a clear idea of the need. Then compare the need with the larger business goals and objectives. A smart way of using or integrating intent data into your marketing plan is to start small. Instead of adopting it for the entire funnel, which eventually you will need to do; you can first take small steps while approaching intent data.

Take one step at a time:

Start small with some smaller projects or accounts that have the full support and resources to pull off new intent data initiatives. You will be surprised with how quickly you can get the results. This one-step-at-a-time approach will also give you and your team the confidence to pull off bigger intent stunts.

It will also give you the time to evaluate results and see the real need of intent data. It will also help you to decide which part of the funnel you need to focus on with intent at present. It will eventually help you to strategize intent data with better results each time. 

Educate:

You may have seen the potential in intent data and after evaluating the above factors you have reached the conclusion of integrating it into your strategy but what about other functions across the organization? Do they have the same knowledge about its benefits and how it’s going to affect the overall business of the organization, most likely not!

So the earlier you educate and let the others know that you plan to bring on intent data into the sales and marketing processes its better. Just like data, the importance of intent data needs to be understood well by all functions in the organizations or at least by the ones that work closely with sales and marketing.

Once all the parameters that might get affected by intent data are taken care of start building the actual strategy. Since intent data can have an impact on various things in your funnel it’s important to recalibrate some of your basic strategies.

Conclusion:

Intent data can bring incredible results if you take it one step at a time and then gradually scale it up to align better with other strategies. So, all you need to do is first understand what is intent data, why is it needed and how can it be aligned with your business model. Depending on these factors, you can then start adopting it step by step and implementing it with a solid strategy for best results.

B2B organizations often struggle with the lack of alignment between sales and marketing functions! While each team comes with their unique skill-sets, armed with relevant knowledge and insights, there still exists the infamous struggle between these two critical functions of the organization that ultimately impacts the business in a negative way. If the unique skill-sets and know-how of each team can be unified for the common goals and objectives, it can create higher chances of enhancing business.

Let us discuss why this peculiar b2b challenge exists and also see how the funnel dynamics could possibly have the solution you just needed.

The Challenge

Huge gap between sales and marketing alignment

The traditional funnel comes with some rigid territories that have been defined and followed by sales and marketing teams for ages. This could be one of the major reasons why there are hurdles in the alignment between these two functions.

The top part of the funnel is allocated to marketing and the marketing team works in the direction to get leads that have better chances of getting qualified. However, due to the rigid demarcation within the funnel, the sales teams are often left out of the picture up until this point. When the marketing team finally passes on these qualified leads to the sales teams, they may not agree with the lead quality or they are too engaged qualifying their own leads for faster results.

This demarcation of territories runs deeper in the overall approach and forms a part of the company culture. This can lead to in interaction, communication and collaboration between the teams, ultimately affecting business and ROI.

The Solution

How does one achieve alignment between sales and marketing?

Dismantling predefined territories could be the first step to instil a more collaborative approach for smooth functioning between sales and marketing teams. However, alignment starts at the core of the business when goals and objectives are defined and cemented. Therefore, the sales and marketing alignment should begin and grow as a company culture at the very core of how the business sells and how it intends to drive leads and convert them into business.

If you look closely, the ideal sales and marketing funnel is in reality a revenue funnel with clearly defined roles. Each stage of the funnel reflects the roles, responsibilities and accountability of both the teams.

Funnel stages and its dynamics-

The top of the funnel is where the seeds of collaboration can be ideally sowed.  Here, both the sales and marketing teams can define the ICP (ideal customer profile), the buyer personas etc. jointly. This is the stage where the buyers’ journey can be defined with inputs from both sales and marketing teams. Defining these parameters together can enable the sales and marketing teams to be on the same page with clear understanding of goals and objectives.

At this stage, the buyers’ journey can be the revenue map for marketing and sales alignment. Marketing teams can help build brand awareness with relevant messaging that can help customers relate to the sales outreach. It is like getting the customer acquainted with sales and warming them up to sales outreach.

Mid funnel is the stage when prospects start becoming more aware of their needs. This is the stage where the sales and marketing teams can strategize to nurture the leads and drive them to further engage with the brand.

The bottom of the funnel belongs to sales and it involves creating and providing high value content assets to the customers and to motivate them for taking the buying action.

Conclusion-

It may not be possible to fully align sales and marketing, and the conflict or tussle between sales and marketing may continue to exist. However, by bringing a change in approach and breaking down traditional practices that have conditioned marketers to think a certain way; alignment between sales and marketing can definitely be achieved and with promising results too.

Lead nurturing is an important strategy used in lead generation which can effectively convert leads into paying customers. It can be used to shorten the sales cycle and also build strong relationships with the customers. To make b2b less challenging, you can invest in lead nurturing or partner with an expert to help drive your leads toward the buying decision early on.

Leads that land on your website may or may not be inclined to buy from you. However, certain actions such as downloading of content assets, form-fill or high e-mailer open-rate can indicate that the leads could be potential buyers or customers in the near future. Marketers must soon respond to such leads and have a comprehensive strategy drawn out to nurture these leads.

Lead nurturing is can be an ideal method to build relationships with your prospects. Think of it as an opportunity, that can not only enhance lead conversion, but could also give you a chance to win loyal customers.

Lead nurturing makes it possible for your customers to see that you are interested in truly understanding their needs and challenges and provide valuable solutions that are aligned with their business goals. This is an important development in lead generation, because it can have a direct impact on sales and ROI. 

Let us see some of the techniques to nurture leads so that you can convert more leads into business.

Know the ideal customer

As a b2b marketer, it’s important that you simplify the b2b process by breaking down complex processes. Begin by understanding who your ideal customer is and also your ideal target audience. This will save a lot of your time and effort. Understanding the buyer persona can help you to map the likes and dislikes, preferences and other data of the prospect that can help you to customize your solutions. Also invest in mapping the buyers’ journey to nurture the leads at every stage effectively.           

Knowledge is power and learning the finer nuances about your leads can make personalization effective. The more you invest in personalizing the messages, offers and communication with your prospects, the better will be the results.

Lead nurturing is thinking from the prospect's perspective and preparing to deliver what the customer needs, way ahead of time.  This readiness can develop trust and confidence in the prospect and encourage him to ultimately buy from you.

Knowing the customer profile can also prepare you to create content assets that are in line with their needs. You can create customized content assets and create email marketing campaigns for better outreach.

Convince to convert

Lead nurturing is all about convincing the customer to ultimately buy from you or buy your services or products over your competitors. This is the stage of nurturing wherein you gather data and other valuable contact information from the prospect for further communication and engagement. Be prepared to offer valuable content assets, offers discounts, free demos etc. so that it’s a fair exchange and the customer feels valued.

Remember, lead nurturing is the beginning of a long-term relationship with the customer; in fact, it should help you to start this wonderful customer engagement journey for long-term business benefits.

Conclusion-

Lead nurturing can be one of the best techniques to convert leads into paying customers if you use the right strategy. Focus more on building relationships and keep nurturing leads throughout the customer journey for best results.

In order to achieve B2B marketing objectives, marketers need to be more focused and be able to narrow down the high-potential target audience and prospects that are most likely to convert. Account-based marketing or ABM should therefore be one of the mainstream marketing activities that can generate high revenue and create a more sustainable marketing business model with the best returns.

Let us see how one can optimize ABM initiatives for discovering high potential accounts, relationship building and higher conversions.

Discover potential customers

One of the critical things b2b marketers need to do for successful lead conversion is to identify their target accounts and know where the prospective clients spend their time online. Unless you know where to look, you cannot decide your future strategies like how to approach the prospect, which channels to use etc.

A healthy collaboration between sales and marketing functions will accelerate your efforts in targeting the potential clients. With both teams on the same page, you can collate to find important data through firmographics, demographics, geographical location for creating appropriate buyer persons. Apart from this, you also need to invest in research that will allow you to find out more about the latest trends, the buying preferences, competitor analysis and more.

Focus on key accounts

ABM is all about establishing key accounts so that you can dedicate resources, time and efforts to convert these high potential prospects into customers. The sales and marketing teams need to collaborate at every step for best results. The sales teams need to know the efforts taken by the marketing team and the details of various strategies being deployed by the marketing team On the other hand, the marketing teams need to know the information and details of the prospects that the sales team have with them.

This kind of exchange of information between the teams will allow both the teams to implement focused ABM initiatives for highly potential accounts that are most likely to convert. Also, focus on timing and relevance when it comes to these high value accounts. Things such as when to approach them, what channels you must use to communicate with them and the type of messaging to be used etc. will help you to achieve your objectives.

Adopt personalization

When high target accounts are in focus, generic messages do not work. You need to adopt and implement high level personalization in all your messaging and communication. This will not only help you develop strong rapport and build some solid relationships with the clients, but it will also increase your chances of conversion. Customized email messages and offers always work way better than robotic or generic messages.

Account based marketing will work only if you treat every single account on your list with high importance, focus and exclusivity.

Exclusivity through personalization could be the secret sauce of your ABM success.

Conclusion

ABM can bring great ROI if you focus on identifying the right target accounts, nurture the leads, adopt personalization, and when sales and marketing teams collaborate.

To fully understand ABM for your business, work with experts and save your time, money and efforts for more sales and better ROI. Get in touch with us for more insights and guidance on how to go about planning and implementing ABM.