March 14th, 2011 by Mark Galloway

There is a lot of talk in the market right now about how marketing automation platforms (MAPs) and toolsets can help marketers solve all their lead generation and nurturing problems.  But marketing automation alone is no silver bullet.  And lets face it, software that automates processes comes with an inherent but unstated assumption – all assume there is an existing process to automate.  This reality 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 17th, 2010 by Mark Galloway

CSO Insights invests a great deal of time surveying the sales profession across a wide range of organizations globally.  One of the areas they drill down on is Lead Generation.  Their latest 2010 Lead Generation Study finds: Over 49% of marketers report that 25% or less of the deals closed resulted from marketing-generated leads. 49% of marketers said that sales would say the quality of 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

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 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

July 29th, 2009 by Mark Galloway

The phone is, and always will be, an extremely important weapon in any sales person’s arsenal. There is no faster way to identify, qualify and secure opportunity than a personal connection with a prospect. However, since the economic downturn, using the phone has become even more difficult to drum up business. Every sales person knows the challenges inherent in cold calling: dialing and not connecting Read More

March 4th, 2009 by Mark Galloway

In my last post I suggested that Marketing should not give up control of the lead qualification process as it minimizes their ability to optimize lead generation efforts and investments. The common belief and tradition is that marketing should just generate more leads and sales will figure out who is ready to buy. This traditional approach worked great in days where the economy was growing and there were plenty of “ready to buy” prospects. In a shrinking or flat market, the “ready to buy” prospects are all but non-existent.