December 4th, 2010 by Mark Galloway

How many times have you heard a sales colleague say they need more leads?  It seems like a very familiar mantra, especially in this constrained market.  Funny thing about “leads”, they are not always ready to buy when we are ready to sell.  Some are not destined to be, others have possibilities, while a few are probably in the “red zone” and are in fact Read More

October 4th, 2010 by Mark Galloway

Given that we are in the business of generating and nurturing B2B leads for our clients, we get the opportunity to discuss the value of a lead quite frequently.  The scrutiny of marketing spend ever increasing, I thought I would share three common mistakes that marketers (and their bosses) often make in evaluating the ROI of their lead generation tactics. 1. The credit for a Read More

August 4th, 2010 by Laura Monn Ginsburg

According to the “2010 Lead Generation Optimization Key Trends Analysis” from CSO Insights, more than 91% of companies worldwide reported increasing new customer acquisition was one of their top strategic marketing objectives for 2010. Sure sounds like rounding a corner to me. However, expectations and outcomes from lead management programs are changing. Based on the quantity and quality of leads generated, companies said email was Read More

March 9th, 2010 by Mark Galloway

I saw this in a recent Sirius Decisions Blog post and thought it was worthy of posting on our blog. “…Too many marketers still treat a “response” like it’s a lead. The simple act of responding to a marketing offer is just that: a response. An inquiry. In and of itself, the act of responding does not signal readiness to move into an active buying Read More

January 22nd, 2010 by Mark Galloway

For B2B marketers who resolve to implement lead nurturing, the results are significant: 20% more sales opportunities, according to Demand Gen 2x increase in bid-win ratio, according to Aberdeen Group 47% higher average order values, according to Aberdeen Group 150% increase in contact-to-lead conversion rate, according to ShipServ Nuff Said…

December 24th, 2009 by Mark Galloway

Wow, we woke up this morning to some serious white stuff – it will no doubt be a very white Christmas in the Twin Cities of Minnesota.  I had two choices this morning, fire up the snow blower or grab a cup of coffee and catch up on my favorite blogs.  The choice was obvious. One of my favorite blogs is Garth’s World the co-founder Read More

December 16th, 2009 by Mark Galloway

There is certainly a lot of interest by marketers in a new category of software known as “Marketing Automation.”  This category of software has seen double-digit growth in 2009 and doesn’t seem ready to slow down at all.  It reminds me a lot of the go-go days of “sales force automation” back in the early 90′s.  Back then, “SFA” as it was known, was the Read More

December 8th, 2009 by Laura Monn Ginsburg

It is true, your buyers don’t need you anymore … at least until they are ready to seriously consider buying. In the olden days executives needed sales people to understand their problems, the potential solutions and who they should really do business with (you of course!). Now with the invention of the Internet (thanks Al) and Social Media like LinkedIN, not only can executives explore Read More

October 29th, 2009 by Mark Galloway

I got a call this morning from a well intentioned fellow from the large Midwest baby bell asking me which service provider I was using for voice, data, and long-distance.  I was a bit taken back by the call because we are already a customer of his company. So I asked the sales guy if he had access to a CRM system that his company Read More

February 4th, 2009 by Mark Galloway

Catchy title, isn’t it? Does the fact that some stranger somewhere is asking you if your marketing sucks piss you off? Or does it actually resonate with you insofar as you believe your marketing really does suck?