Random musings...

It's been 3+ months since I wrote a blog post.  Some of it involved being busy and the other involved not quite knowing what to write about.

Like a clip show is to a television program, when all else fails, I present: random musings.

Account Based Marketing and Lead Generation-

Hasn't ABM been around forever?  I've noticed particularly in IT related companies, marketing leadership is rehashing this definition and principle.  I spoke with a Director of Marketing that targets his messaging toward certain enterprise customers. A big surprise was they wanted more enterprise customers but they hated the term "lead generation."

When did lead generation receive the cold shoulder that "cold" calling receives?  ABM is still lead generation--It's just highly targeted and focused lead generation.

Funny...

Sales vs Marketing- Who eats first.

The chicken or the egg conundrum.  Sales and Marketing in 2017 still has a hasty relationship.  They speak nice of each other when things go great.  Once opportunities are lost, and pipeline is shrinking they begin to build scapegoats.  Sales complains about collateral(or lack there of) and next thing you know, you've got sales people going rogue.  Marketing believes with its inbound leads coming from the website, these must be "Red hot!"


I've been saying for the longest, both teams need a lead or point person that understands the other departments needs and psyche.

Sales emails suck.

They do.  I've written sales emails and in the end, I hate them.  There's a lot of paranoia with being too human and coming off too creepy.   Predictable revenue had some email templates that were very effective.  That effectiveness is questionable now.  Usually when people use a formula, it becomes played out.  Subject lines that used work were:

"Appropriate Person"
"Quick Intro"
"____-Quick question"

I've completely scrapped these subject titles. Spam filters have gotten much better at detecting "unsolicited content"

  There's no secret to high response rates and if I were to guess it would be.

Your voice + strong value prop + some personalization = better response rate.

It's been a minute

I used to write multiple times a week.  My contact was passionate and relevant to the times.  I tried to maintain my goal of writing 2-3 blog posts a week.

Why am I talking in past tense?

Coming up on two years at my company, I've learned so much about marketing and sales.  I can explain best practice better than I ever did.  It's been a minute and the fortunate thing I am thankful for is being to have another minute. I realized writing content was more than just my attempt at thought leadership--It's therapeutic.

I'm rejuvenated with a better mind for the future and also, the sales and marketing pulse!

I look forward to presenting more content again!

Follow the "now" or "future?"

Every industry has a Mount Rushmore of thought leaders that influence exactly how a business is run today.  With this Mount Rushmore of thought leaders comes boxes that are created from similar view points.

When you think of Content marketing, you automatically think of Joe Pulizi.

When you think of Sales prospecting 2.0, you automatically think of Aaron Ross.

When you think of Digital transformation,  9 times out of 10, Brian Solis comes up.

These people are instrumental to change in marketing and influencing how we all think and approach our marketing campaigns and results.  There's a lot of respect for these people and other people that have positively impacted their industry and/or profession.

On Twitter and LinkedIn, these people are at the top of the list that everyone follows.  Their word carries so much weight that some organizations would most likely stop what they were doing if they were told something entirely new.

I don't follow these people on social media.  It's not because I'm trying so hard to be "different."  The main reason I don't follow is them because there are other disruptors out there that could be changing and influencing what marketing looks like 10 years from now.  I like to be ahead of the curve.

"Who's next"

Back when I was in music,  I always made the effort to network and reach out to talented people I felt would be "next."  The next person to lead a trend or change someone's thinking.  The people at the top already had immense influence and were tougher to get a hold of so by introducing myself to the hungry talented people that were "next", I was able to build natural rapport and even learn from those people.  I apply the same concept to marketing thought leaders.  You can learn so much from marketing professionals with ideas that deserve an ear to listen.

"The future rehashed"

The future is hard to predict.  Marketing and technology change so fast that I'm not so sure a 5 year marketing plan is even as necessary as the ability to be flexible and adjust.  Stakeholders grow impatient and still confuse marketing and sales.  Ultimately, marketing is cyclical.  Over the last three to five years, I've head thought leaders bring up various marketing strategies that move in cycles.  When you think for a minute from the customers eyes, you notice saturation in one marketing channel creates opportunity voice in another.  By opportunity voice, I mean one channel becomes "the trend."

"What do you follow?"

I love blue oceans and clear skies.  I make sure I know where the "now"is but  I also follow where customers may not be going yet.  I can't personally predict the future in marketing but what I can do, is look at my industry and figure out where everyone is in their journey.  Once I know where everyone is, I can figure out other road maps some of those people may travel to.  We all capable of building on existing strategies and making them our own.

I read the past and present--I follow the "now." 

True value of Networking

You just never know where people will be in their careers.

Story time:  I've been going to the same bar for 6 years running.   One of the bouncers there made getting in one of the biggest challenges.  I don't know what happen but it took maybe the first year for him to see I wasn't going anywhere and I planned to keep coming back.

Let's fast forward to today,  This bouncer went from low on the totem pole to now Director of Security at a new bar.  The relationship and struggle I had with him, carries over into his new career where he gives me dap and is always glad when I make an appearance.  I also don't have to wait in line at this new bar either--Thanks to the relationship that was built with him.

Who knew?

We talk about the importance of networking for your personal development but it also works for your business.  It's got to be genuine though.  Many times I see like minded professionals give each other the proverbial "F off" because of "competition."  You just never know where people will be in their careers.  I've seen former co-workers from 3 years ago head into promotions where they can make decisions on if they want to do business with my employer or not.

"Who wouldda known?"

In prospecting, we are taught to target decision makers at the top and work with influencer's and gate keepers at the bottom.  That may be true, but most professionals try to get past the gatekeepers instead of keeping them in the loop.  My experiences has taught me some gatekeepers are always in the know with the business.  If you get on their good side, good things will happen for you.  Sometimes what you think is impossible becomes the possible from just being genuine.


Who whoudda thought?

Chasing appointments

It's been a while since I... posted some content.  I was almost tempted to recite lyrics to Staind. 

A lot of you can identify with this scenario.

Scenario

You've been talking with a prospect about why they should have a meeting with you.  You understand a base line about their challenges and you know you offer a solution that solves that problem.  The dialog reads in a very pleasant tone.  The only issue is they are busy and they want you to call them back same time next month...

You want to respect their time so you nudge one more time and then you set a reminder to contact them the same time next month.   Next month rolls around and now what was once an appointment, is now a pursuit.  The month keeps getting pushed back.  It's a trap, don't fall for it.

What's frustrating about this situation is every time you call, you find out more information and it leads you into a chase.  I always say embrace the chase, but to an extent.

Embrace that Waldo is in the room and you have to find him.  You have to find Waldo and point him out.  If the prospect had 0 interest, they usually would tell you flat out they are not interested.  There's something more going on...

Sometimes it's not about the chase

Interrogation is never a good feeling for a prospect.  People naturally raise their defense if they are uncomfortable.  TONE is everything and remaining calm is key.  I like to feel that prospects "test" you with their personal evaluation of you..  Naturally, I like to be the hero of their problem and push my story.  My previous posts have always said there has to be a story with an antagonist (problem) and a protagonist (hero)


Well, sometimes there's no antagonist.  People just don't see their problem or want to realize it. Sometimes the fairy tale ending is not what people want. To paraphrase Steve Jobs,

" A lot of times, Prospects don't know what they want until you show it to them."

 Stop chasing but don't lose contact.  Don't ever lose the contact. Every prospect has something that makes them "feel."  By feel, I mean get out of their programmed responses and demeanor.  They care about something and it's our jobs to figure out what that is.

How do you define marketing?

If you were to take multiple professional marketers in B2B, their definition of marketing would vary. The term "marketing" leads to multiple answers and also, multiple concerns.  The one common denominators for them all would be: Growth and Revenue.

But how do you set your parameters for growth and revenue?  Is it just marketing involved in this conversation?

I'm not talking about marketing objectives or goals-Those should be clear and concise.  We should be SMART after all right?  What I am talking about is how you define marketing and how it supports sales.  There's a blurry line between sales activity and marketing activity.  I come across Marketing professionals with more experience with sales and they can't really define their parameters of how marketing impacts their business.

Story time

I had a recent discovery call with a Senior VP of marketing.  When asking him about what he did for marketing, he simply responded by giving me hundreds of salespeople on his team and briefly explained rudimentary marketing.   Marketing to him was having his small team create PDF's for email blasts. This prospect has a website with a lot of content.  He mentioned the website represented only 5% of their business.  He didn't seem comfortable explaining the effectiveness of their e-commerce site.  My team was able to see that  their marketing efforts go to supporting their sales people that send quotes and close deals.   Sales enablement was actually more vital than their E-commerce site.  Their industry relies on wo(man) power and the motivation of their sales people.  While it's questionable they do nothing with their e-commerce, they at least have defined what the value of marketing is for them.

IT has a loud voice

Some industries are behind when it comes to marketing and also, technology.  Technology is now a big part of marketing.  Data and insights are just as important to CMO's as overall brand recognition.  They actually work hand in hand.  Multiple articles have described the relationship alignment between CMO's and CIO's.   The digital side of marketing is making it a necessity for both Marketing and IT to define their success online. 

Marketers are tasked with understanding how they should define marketing.  It's not quite cut and dry as it used to be.  No matter what type of marketing you do, it has to translate to sales and growth.  How you do it only matters if it isn't working for you

The toughest words to say

When people get married and the priest says: "Do you take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband?"  The woman doesn't say Yes.  She says, "I do."

When you buy a product from someone and you both agree that it is going to help you, I'm willing to bet you rarely hear the word "yes."  The litany of responses will be: 
-Let's go with it.
- When can you deliver it?
-This makes sense.
-I'm on board.

In your professional life, you have so many people that are scared to tell people they can't do something that they avoid the "No" Response.

You know who will give you a straight yes or no?  Little kids.

When we all were little kids, if we didn't like something we weren't shy to say how we felt.  There were no filters.  A kid can "No I don't want to" and not feel pressure to be PR friendly.  Now these filters are important as we get older, but why is it so hard to elicit a simple yes or no?

I can only think of the medical profession where people are given a clear 2 options but even then, you're never given a yes or no.  It's positive and negative.  Positive can mean a bad diagnosis.  You're given suggestions. (Thanks to insight from my friend in healthcare)

No seems to scare people because it signals the chance of losing an opportunity.  Even if that person is not interested, the thought of saying No could mean never.  Saying Yes shouldn't be hard but if you say Yes too much, people question your backbone.  

People avoid situations where they have to say Yes or No.  If you were to google "Yes or No",  You will see blogs and articles with people giving advice on how to avoid saying Yes or No.  ( I did the homework for you- "Yes or No")