2008 Lead Management Study 62.5% of Study Participants Cannot Track ROI for Marketing Programs
By Mark Friedman, Co-Founder SLMA President of The Velos Group
For the past year, the Velos Group and the SLMA have asked visitors to the Sales Lead Management AssociationSM web site to complete a quick survey on their existing Sales lead Management practices. The results from 140 companies continue to demonstrate that ROI is still not being done and CRM and marketing automation program are not delivering.
Major Findings/Executive Summary
62.5% of the respondents could not track ROI for their Marketing programs.
87.4% of the respondents were not very happy with their current Sales Force Automation (SFA)/ Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software.
55.5% of the companies do not qualify their marketing inquiries before they are sent to sales.
27% of the companies have no formal process to forecast sales and 24% are still using Excel.
These results do not paint a pretty picture of how to weather the current economic storm.
BOOK REVIEW: Convergence Marketing: Combining Brand and Direct for Unprecedented Profits
Reviewed by James Obermayer, Sales Lead Management Association/Sales Leakeage
If you consider yourself a brand manager or a brand creator, you must read Richard Rosen's book. If you believe yourself to be an expert on direct marketing and shy away from anything that smacks of brand, you must read Rosen's book.
Convergence marketing respects branding with all of it's goals and then makes a case for deliberately using and integrating direct marketing's aggressive tactics into brand tactics to create sales. By introducing his Rosen Velocity Scale he inserts into language and lexicon a thinking process that the neophyte and the most sophisticated marketer can grasp and instantly use.
When your solution is expensive and the sales cycle is long, it is essential that you find ways
to help your sales channels be more productive. Providing them with highly qualified leads
when the prospect is ready to talk to sales helps move the sales activity from prospecting to
selling. The key is making sure that the lead is truly qualified. There is no substitute for a
live discussion with a highly skilled teleprospecting manager to insure that the prospect is
ready to talk to your sales person.
With the advent of automated lead scoring systems that measure and score both the
firmagraphic and behavioral attributes (Digital Body Language) is there still a role of
physical interaction from a teleprospecting manager with the prospect? The answer is yes
if the value of the opportunity is high. Teleprospecting is not inexpensive and for maximum
productivity, it needs to be consistently fed with warm inquires and managed effectively.
Dennis Head -
eDemand Leads Consulting
303 329 4637
email: [email protected]
Nationally recognized for vision and expertise in closed loop quality lead generation and management. He is the principal at eDemand Leads a lead management consulting firm.
Formerly the Director of Avaya's eDemand lead generation program which was one of the most sophisticated Lead Generation / Database marketing programs in the country. Denny has established a national reputation for his innovative work in generation, qualification, and closed loop management of high quality sales leads.
Prior to Avaya, Denny was the VP of Channel Marketing for Lucent's Messaging Group, National Channel Manager and Regional Vice President for Octel Communications, has over 20 years of Vice President / General Manager experience with Octel, IBM, Rolm and Xerox.
Dennis is a graduate of Michigan State University, where he received a BA and MBA in Marketing.
Many salespeople confuse the establishment of a pipeline with establishing a
pipe dream. I don't mean to be harsh with this statement. We are all naturally
optimistic and, sometimes, this optimism gets us into sales trouble – specifically,
when we confuse a prospect who is willing to talk to us with a prospect who has
a set of needs that can be satisfied by you and your company. These needs
must be expressed in terms of some level of discomfort that the prospect is
currently experiencing.
When you have the ability to help your customer achieve a permanent improvement
in one or more circumstances within their business, then your pipeline is
indeed a list of potential new deals. Following are some questions that I suggest
you examine for each opportunity in your current pipeline. If you can't answer
these questions, then you don't have a pipeline but, rather, you have a pipe
dream.
Is there an opportunity? No, seriously. Are you working with an organization that has a real opportunity to address real needs, and will they do it in the timeframe that makes sense for you? Do they recognize that improving or
remedying the situation will have a tremendous impact on their business? Are you talking to all of the people who have the ability to authorize a release of funds, changing processes, changing vendors, etc.? If not, you may not
have an opportunity.
Can you compete? Sometimes, circumstances are such that competing for the opportunity is not feasible. Would you need a level of sales support that cannot be provided due to scheduling and/or other conflicts within your
organization? Or, is the opportunity of such a magnitude that your organization cannot handle it by itself?
There are many issues that can impact an organization's ability to compete. You need to clearly understand all those issues as they apply to your organization as well as to the potential opportunity you are reviewing. In the event
you cannot compete, you should withdraw the opportunity from your pipeline.
If you have any questions or would like to discuss ideas for possible marketing messages, feel free to contact Gil Cargill by phone at (877) 597-9267 or by email at [email protected].
Does it really make sense for your sales team to be conducting their own
lead management program? There is something to be said for dividing your
sales operation. We've already talked about the difference between lead
generation and lead management. Now I want to discuss a bit about how lead
management differs from your sales effort.
As
we've seen, lead management demands a fairly long-term strategy. Sure,
some might result in immediate sales, but others might take a little
finessing over time. The first question I want you to consider is whether
it's fair to ask your sales force to undertake lead management. Most sales
people have varying levels of computer experience, little time for an
extra load of administrative work at the end of 55 hour week, and are not
paid to think long range (they make most of their money on sales they
write this week, month or quarter).
Al Davidson is the
President and Owner of SSM (Strategic Sales & Marketing, Inc. http://www.manageyourleads.com), which he founded in 1989. Under
Al's direction SSM provides major account lead generation services.
They have implemented new business development programs for
thousands of B2B companies nationwide.
Since their inception SSM's
calling center has completed over 50 million cold calls to high
level business decision makers and generated over 7 million sales
leads.
Since we posted the
first Blog entry the reception has been great. We
have discussed how Marketers are the Builders of Wealth, Sales Lead
Management Week, and how Closed Loop Lead Management Systems = Lead
Quality and Lead Management (guest author Danny Head from Avaya).
When you subscribe to the Sales Lead Management Blog, you get immediate
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comments - anytime, day or night!
SLMA accepts
original articles on the subject of inquiry management (including CRM), fulfillment, telemarketing, inquiry nurturing, etc. We will also publish articles that have been previously published if the author submits proof that he or she has permission from the magazine, newsletter (print or on-line) or book publisher to reprint the material. Please submit content to [email protected].
If you consider yourself a brand manager or a brand creator, you must read Richard Rosen's book. If you believe yourself to be an expert on direct marketing and shy away from anything that smacks of brand, you must read Rosen's book.
Dennis Head -
eDemand Leads Consulting
About
the Author
About
the Author
ActOn Software
Applied DM Research, Inc.
CartoonLink, Inc.
ClickPoint Software
eti Sales Support
Event Technologies
The Hill Group
ITN International
Invenio Solutions
InterlinkOne
LeadLife
New Business Strategies
The Pedowitz Group
PointClear, LLC
Sales Benchmark Index
SalesFUSION
Sales Leakage Consulting
Sandler Training
Validar Inc.
The Vanella Group
VanillaSoft
Velocify
The Velos Group, Inc.
Vorsight