Your company gives you a marketing budget every year. That covers your marketing efforts – everything from the costs of white papers, case studies and articles you produce to promotional items, sponsorships, etc., Probably the biggest expense is your cost for the information produced (white papers, case studies and articles.)
How well is your marketing performing? If the executives of your company asked you for a report showing what their return was for the money they gave you for marketing, what would you tell them? Could you tell them your marketing efforts returned $5 for every $1 spent? Could you show them how many sales your marketing efforts produced and what the total dollar amount was from those sales?
Surprisingly many marketing departments cannot. You see – for years many companies looked at marketing as a necessary evil. They had to have it. Marketing efforts got the company’s name in front of prospective customers. However, their sales reps got the sales and marketing had little to do with actual sales themselves. So Marketing never had to track the results of what they did.
Now the buyer is in charge. They screen their phone calls closely. It’s almost impossible for a sales rep to get anyone they target on the phone. Many companies have done away with receptionists. When a sales rep walks into an office, there is a phone on a desk with a phone directory. It’s almost impossible to see a prospect without an appointment. What does a company do to make a sale?
Most buyers are doing the research on products and services they need on their own. They are normally 60% through the process before they get in touch with a vendor. They’re only contacting those companies whose product or service makes their short list.
So now more than ever before marketing plays a greater role in making your company known to a potential buyer. It also helps to educate the buyer on the product or service you offer. When they are ready to contact vendors they will choose your company as one to contact.
The role of marketing in the sales process is far greater than it ever has been. CEO’s, presidents and the executive team are looking more closely now to make sure their marketing is doing the best job for them. The easiest way to do this is to look at the return on dollars spent they’re getting.
How do you give them that information?
The easiest way is to create a report showing them the cost of your marketing and the dollar amount of the sales generated. In addition to this you should have a Marketing/Sales funnel. This is similar to the old sales funnel many sales reps had. It shows where each company targeted is at in the process of becoming your customer and buying your products or services.
When it comes to the marketing/sales funnel, you want to make this funnel as simple as possible. If it is complex, it will be difficult for your people to update and is most likely to be abandoned fairly quickly. The easiest funnel has five categories:
Prospects
Leads
Great Leads
New Customers
Customers Buying Additional Products or Services
Prospects are all the companies out there that may buy a product or service from you at some point.
Any who express an interest in a product or service becomes a lead.
A great lead is any company requesting more and more information. At that point the company is turned over to a sales rep to make the sale.
At the time a company buys the product or service they become a new customer.
When a company buys an additional product or service they are moved into that category.
Each time a company transitions from one level to the next, they are put into that level of the funnel. The date on which that happened is indicated.
When your executive team asks you for a report on the results of your marketing it is very easy to produce.
If you would like to discuss creating Marketing/Sales funnels in more detail, please call me at 630-517-0570 or email me at bob@wordcraftersb2b.com.
