by Glen Springer | Dec 18, 2013
It’s time to get something straight.
2013 is about to wrap-up and 2014 is around the corner.
There are hundreds (if not thousands) of articles out there that profess that “2014 will be the year of …{insert technology/strategy}”.
On the first page of Google, terms include: e-engagement, innovation, small data, wearable technology, internet of things and other non-business predictions.
Even the editors at CMO.com put out a market research piece asking top marketing leaders what they believe 2014 will be the year of…and you’ll get answers across the spectrum of marketing topics: mobile, video, social, privacy, curation, relationships, branding, etc.
That’s great – 2014 will be the year of everything.
However, Gabriel Sales is of the belief that there is an underlying element that fuels all of these predictions for 2014 (and what fueled the predictions over the past decade and what will continue to be the fuel many years into the future).
Before I give away the answer, think about this…
How do you e-engage?
What do you feed a system of innovation?
What is small data?
What will people access using wearable technology?
What does the internet of things output?
Content.
Plain and simple, content is the main fuel of all of these ‘2014’ predictions and so many more.
Content is the necessary gas for marketing automation, a previously crafted analogy by Travis Arnold of Kapost, found here.
Content supports all of your marketing efforts – SEO, PPC, email marketing, nurturing, banner ads, remarketing, social and more. Without content, you are not providing any substance or value to your audience. You’re just trying to sell by being a ‘pretty face’ or the ‘smartest person in the room’. That doesn’t work anymore.
The year of 2014 isn’t just about content or content marketing, but about providing such valuable content to your audience that they can’t help wanting to buy from you because you’ve given so much value already for free.
Think of developing your content this way.
You are educating your prospects so much they feel that they have become an expert in your space. In turn, they’ll realize that if your company is providing this kind of value prior to the sale, imagine how much value your company provides to their customers.
This kind of thinking is what many call ‘viral marketing’. The content you deliver publically is so good, people want to share it to help spread that good to others. And, the service/product you deliver to your customers is so much improved that you’ll create company evangelists on both sides of the dollar sign.
For more on creating valuable and relevant content for your 2014 B2B sales/marketing efforts, read our recent blog series titled, “5 Reasons Your Content Isn’t Converting.”
This is what we do at Gabriel Sales – create and share content that supports all of your marketing and sales efforts – attracting leads, educating prospects and helping you close deals.
Feel free to contact us with any questions.
by gabriel_sales | Dec 17, 2013
A few weeks ago, we published a blog suggesting that you not slow down your B2B marketing efforts this holiday season. Software Advice recently released data collected from more than 6,000,000 unique visitors that supports and reinforces that Christmas advice.
Looking at the data, it seems the commonly held belief that ‘no one is in the office during the holidays’ may no longer be true. Or perhaps, it is all of the new mobile devices allowing businessmen to keep up with business from home while their kids are unwrapping presents.
Whatever the reason, the takeaway is clear: if other people are working during the holidays, you should be too.
We are not suggesting that you have your entire sales and marketing team come into the office on Christmas Day, but Software Advice’s research found that in terms of both web traffic and conversion activity, the days before and after Christmas see higher averages than one may expect:
(Source: Software Advice)
This graph shows that just four days before Christmas, the average web traffic is 7% higher than the monthly average. Additionally, web traffic is only slightly below the monthly average in the days following Christmas, showing that even if people are out of the office, they are still doing research on work-related purchase decisions online.
In terms of conversion (which is defined in this survey as submitting contact information via web form), the averages vary in the days before Christmas but are much higher than one would expect on the holiday itself as well as the days following. This suggests that Christmas Eve or Christmas Day are great times to send out nurture emails or a ‘holiday gift’ like an eBook download to initiate conversion. Additionally, because the B2B sales cycle is now typically three to six months, the more prospects you can convert in December, the better your sales pipeline will look at the end of Q1.
The data also shows that in terms of lead qualification, rates only deviate slightly from the monthly average in the week surrounding Christmas. Both three days before and three days after Christmas see a 12% higher conversion rate than the December average. This reinforces one of our own findings discussed in a previous blog: people who are in the office during the holidays have less work to do, and are therefore more likely to pick up the phone and be open to sales/marketing messages.
Summary:
- When it comes to B2B sales and marketing during the holidays, Software Advice’s research shows that companies stand to gain an advantage by putting in a little bit of extra effort.
- While many companies believe it is ineffective to staff sales reps and run marketing campaigns during the week of Christmas, average web traffic, conversion rates and qualification rates during this time suggest otherwise.
by gabriel_sales | Dec 13, 2013
Building an emotional connection matters. While most people would assume that in terms of emotional connections with brands, B2C companies’ connections with their customers would be far stronger than those with B2B brands.
However, in a 2013 study by Google and CEB’s Marketing Leadership Council, the exact opposite was found:
“Of the hundreds of B2C brands that Motista has studied, most have emotional connections with between 10% and 40% of consumers. Meanwhile, of the nine B2B brands we studied, seven surpassed the 50% mark. On average, B2B customers are significantly more emotionally connected to their vendors and service providers than consumers.”
Google explained that while these findings may be initially surprising, the inner workings of B2B and B2C purchases give a clear explanation of why building an emotional connection matters: B2C purchases generally carry much less risk for the buyer than B2C purchases.
Most B2C purchases (a vacuum, a toothbrush, a pair of jeans, etc.) are returnable, and if they are not, the cost of a poor B2C product purchase is unlikely to affect someone’s overall wellbeing in any significant way. The same cannot be said for B2B purchases , which are generally much higher cost (i.e. a multi-million dollar software deal) and carry additional personal risks for the buyer:
-
Losing time and effort if a purchase decision goes poorly
-
Losing credibility if they make a recommendation for an unsuccessful purchase
-
Losing their job if they are responsible for a failed purchase
~Google
Because these personal risks carry a lot of emotional weight for the buyer, anything B2B companies can do reduce the level of perceived risk will strengthen the likelihood of a purchase being made. By highlighting the personal and emotional benefits of the B2B purchase (i.e. no more management headaches, opportunity to grow your career, etc.) in your early stage marketing content, you can help alleviate some of the emotional tension your prospects feel in their buying process. This is why this emotional connection matters so much.
To read more on reducing the perception of risk in B2B sales and why connection matters, click here.
Feel free to contact us with any questions.
by gabriel_sales | Dec 13, 2013
There comes a time for every B2B business owner where they must decide how to approach their sales and marketing. There are many different routes you can take: hiring part-time or full-time staff, purchasing consulting services, outsourcing to a third party or some combination of these.
The best option for your company is going to depend on your resources, your specific situation and your goals. If your goal is to dramatically increase revenue through your sales efforts, an outsourced sales team might be your best option. By leveraging a B2B outsourced sales team, you gain access to sales talent that you generally could not afford to hire internally. Additionally, the experience and expertise that comes with an outsourced sales team will help support and optimize your marketing efforts for greater effectiveness and efficiency.
Here are 5 ways an outsourced sales team can help your marketing team:
1. Content development
There have been a few articles recently that talk about the need for B2B companies to act like publishers in terms of their marketing content. For many companies, coming up with fresh content on a regular basis (that provides real value for prospects) is an extremely time consuming task.
At Gabriel Sales, one of the ways our sales outsourcing services support marketing teams is by providing detailed feedback from prospects on the value or effectiveness of different pieces of marketing content. Based on our analysis of phone calls with prospects and marketing analytics data, we provide recommendations for content that your prospects will find engaging and valuable (we can also produce the content for you if you have the need).
2. Augment your under staffed sales team
In recent years, budget limitations and other factors have left many B2B sales teams understaffed. In addition, cold calling just isn’t as effective as it used to be—making it much more expensive to succeed with this tactic. By going with an outsourcing option, you can gain access to an entire sales team for approximately the cost of one internal rep.
Despite how incredible an individual may be in terms of talent and skill, that person can never match the combined training, experience and established relationships that an outsourced sales team can provide. So, instead of spending money internally to hire someone new, it may be more cost-effective to outsource a whole team.
3. Leverage your investment in CRM and MA software
For many B2B companies, technologies like marketing automation and customer relationship management (CRM) software may still be relatively new and confusing. For an outsourced sales team like we have at Gabriel Sales, navigating these technologies is now second-nature. By leveraging an outsourced team, you can therefore bypass months or even years trying to figure it out on your own.
Additionally, one of the top two reasons for dissatisfaction with marketing automation is poor integration with sales. By leveraging an outsourced sales team with over 10,000 hours of marketing automation experience, you gain access to best practices and tips for better sales and marketing alignment. In other words, you let the experts show you how to succeed and what to avoid without having to go through all the headaches of learning on your own.
4. Provide qualitative and quantitative feedback on all tactics.
Every outsourced sales team needs to provide evidence of the value of their work. At Gabriel Sales, we provide our clients twelve different types of reporting on our efforts—from data on conversion ratios to verbatim transcripts of cold calls. We also have weekly meetings with each of our clients to discuss our successes and areas for improvement.
This much transparency and visibility allows your marketing team to easily understand how best to support sales with content and determine what campaigns would be most effective. With the detailed reporting of an outsourced sales team, determining how and where to optimize is greatly simplified.
5. Convert quality inbound leads to qualified prospects
Even when inbound leads come in with a high level of perceived interest, they still need to be qualified. By using an outsourced sales team, you can follow up on inbound leads and nurture them until they are sales qualified for a much lower price than handling it internally.
With a dedicated and experienced outsourced sales team at your service, your marketing team gains the data, technological skills and overall expertise they need to do their jobs as efficiently and effectively as possible.
You can learn more about the value of a B2B outsourced sales team here. To learn about the outsourced sales solutions we offer, visit our services page. Feel free to contact us with any questions.
by Glen Springer | Dec 13, 2013
There comes a time for every B2B business owner, where they must decide how to approach their sales and marketing. There are many different routes you can take: hiring part-time or full-time staff, purchasing consulting services, hiring an outsourced sales team, or some combination of these.
The best option for your company is going to depend on your resources, your specific situation and your goals. If your goal is to dramatically increase revenue through your sales efforts, an outsourced sales team might be your best option. By leveraging a B2B outsourced sales team, you gain access to sales talent that you generally could not afford to hire internally. Additionally, the experience and expertise that comes with an outsourced sales team will help support and optimize your marketing efforts for greater effectiveness and efficiency.
Here are 5 ways an outsourced sales team can help your marketing team:
1. Content development
There have been a few articles recently that talk about the need for B2B companies to act like publishers in terms of their marketing content. For many companies, coming up with fresh content on a regular basis (that provides real value for prospects) is an extremely time consuming task.
At Gabriel Sales, one of the ways our sales outsourcing services support marketing teams is by providing detailed feedback from prospects on the value or effectiveness of different pieces of marketing content. Based on our analysis of phone calls with prospects and marketing analytics data, we provide recommendations for content that your prospects will find engaging and valuable (we can also produce the content for you if you have the need).
2. Augment your under staffed sales team
In recent years, budget limitations and other factors have left many B2B sales teams understaffed. In addition, cold calling just isn’t as effective as it used to be—making it much more expensive to succeed with this tactic. By going with an outsourcing option, you can gain access to an entire sales team for approximately the cost of one internal rep.
Despite how incredible an individual may be in terms of talent and skill, that person can never match the combined training, experience and established relationships that an outsourced sales team can provide. So, instead of spending money internally to hire someone new, it may be more cost-effective to outsource a whole team.
3. Leverage your investment in CRM and MA software
For many B2B companies, technologies like marketing automation and customer relationship management (CRM) software may still be relatively new and confusing. For an outsourced sales team like we have at Gabriel Sales, navigating these technologies is now second-nature. By leveraging an outsourced team, you can therefore bypass months or even years trying to figure it out on your own.
Additionally, one of the top two reasons for dissatisfaction with marketing automation is poor integration with sales. By leveraging an outsourced sales team with over 10,000 hours of marketing automation experience, you gain access to best practices and tips for better sales and marketing alignment. In other words, you let the experts show you how to succeed and what to avoid without having to go through all the headaches of learning on your own.
4. Provide qualitative and quantitative feedback on all tactics.
Every outsourced sales team needs to provide evidence of the value of their work. At Gabriel Sales, we provide our clients twelve different types of reporting on our efforts—from data on conversion ratios to verbatim transcripts of cold calls. We also have weekly meetings with each of our clients to discuss our successes and areas for improvement.
This much transparency and visibility allows your marketing team to easily understand how best to support sales with content and determine what campaigns would be most effective. With the detailed reporting of an outsourced sales team, determining how and where to optimize is greatly simplified.
5. Convert quality inbound leads to qualified prospects
Even when inbound leads come in with a high level of perceived interest, they still need to be qualified. By using an outsourced sales team, you can follow up on inbound leads and nurture them until they are sales qualified for a much lower price than handling it internally.
With a dedicated and experienced outsourced sales team at your service, your marketing team gains the data, technological skills and overall expertise they need to do their jobs as efficiently and effectively as possible.
You can learn more about the value of a B2B outsourced sales team here. To learn about the outsourced sales solutions we offer, visit our services page. Feel free to contact us with any questions.
It’s time to get something straight.
