What velocity do you need? And what does your current velocity tell you about what you should change?

The digital marketing disconnect: The vaccum facing business leaders

"There is a digital disconnect in executive ranks, a leadership vacuum created by a mismatch between expertise and authority." So says Jake Scrofman in The Harvard Business Review Blog. This pithy summary hits the nail on the head. In many, many of our meetings with prospective and current clients the senior team are aware, in principle at least, of the potential of digital, inbound marketing to drive increased revenue, improve sales and marketing efficiency and a reduction in their cost of sales. But they don't know what and how to change. The result is they cling to READ MORE ›

By |Tactics, Velocity|
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How to size your funnel on the back of an envelope

  “Perfect is the enemy of good.” So said Voltaire, an 18th century French philosopher. If we cycle forward to the 21st century, our problem is we drown in detail. We get so caught up in the statistics of conversion rates and click through rates and sales conversion rates that we lose the clarity of what is actually going on in our funnel. In most businesses you can ask the sales leader what their closure rates are, and they'll know and you can ask marketing what their click through rates are and they'll know that too. However, READ MORE ›

By |Tactics, Velocity|
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How to set quotas and improve the yield from Sales

What's a normal quota per sales rep? Half a million, 1.5 million per annum? Or is that revenue or gross profit? Is it lifetime value or one time value? Or somehow a one year value? If we want to improve our yield per rep, do we decide better ones? To me, quota setting is all a bit well kind of looking over the shoulder. Isn't there some better way to do it than that? When you look at what a normal sales quota is, and for a start I want you to think about sales value not READ MORE ›

By |Tactics, Velocity|
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How to build a business case for content marketing

  By now you should know that just because your buyer doesn’t want to progress right now, doesn’t mean they never will. Recycling is mandatory, and in order to make the most of your list and establish a successful funnel, leaked buyers must be carefully nurtured through this process. What many Sales and Marketing people don’t realise is that recycling can actually be the difference between a 2% and 20% share of the market. The reality is: if you aren’t doing it, you should be! In this blog, Hugh explains the four keys to effective recycling. He READ MORE ›

By |Tactics, Velocity|
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How to close more deals by closing less often

  The harder you work on closing, the less successful you are at it. That has always been true for sales and I am going to show you why it's true for marketing, as well. In a recent blog I showed you why trying to make your funnel flow faster is folly. Apologies for the alliteration, but basically, we can't go faster or slower than the buyer wants us to go and I showed you why that was the case in a recent blog. In this blog, I am going to show you why our focus shouldn't READ MORE ›

By |Tactics, Velocity|
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Why business leaders must shift budgets from Sales to Marketing

The simple answer to this question is because the way your customers are buying is changing. But here is the explanation. Multiple respected research firms such as Forrester, Gartner, The Corporate Executive Board and IDC are finding that today's buyer is 'self serving', finding the information they need to help move along their buying cycle without any intervention from the vendor at all. Research has shown that B2B buyers are completing between 60 - 90% of their buying journey before contacting any vendors. They are downloading content, joining in discussions on social media, such as LinkedIn, watching READ MORE ›

By |Strategy, Tactics, Velocity|
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How many zombies are lurking in your sales pipeline?

Have you ever felt that you might be in the presence of the living dead? Even if you are not a horror movie fan, it might be worth taking a closer look at your organisation’s sales pipeline. The things you are likely to uncover could disturb you. That’s because many of today’s sales pipelines contain deals that are destined to never close - and yet the sales people responsible seem strangely unwilling to acknowledge the fact. Many of the deals were never alive in the first place - and many more are beyond any hope of resurrection. READ MORE ›

By |Sales, Velocity|
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How to make your funnel flow faster

Yes, you can speed up the time it takes for a potential buyer to make the purchase of your product or service. But not by skipping steps along the buyer's journey. You do it by looking closely at the time they take to move through each step - the lag - and helping them to progress faster through one or two of these stages. An analysis of this process - or journey - will result in knowledge of when a buyer is gone and should be "leaked" and when they are in need of another tactic READ MORE ›

By |Velocity|
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How to choose measures you can act on

If you don't know what's working, how do you know what to change? So measure inputs (not outputs), measure buyer progression, and - don't measure what you're not prepared to change (or can't). To most ears, "Measuring Sales and Marketing effectiveness" sounds like a low priority. It may be on your B or C list, even on a good day. If you're feeling less generous, you might even call it an academic indulgence and not consider it a priority at all. But if you don't know what's working, how can you know what to change? If you READ MORE ›

By |Velocity|
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How much money should your business be spending on Marketing?

B2B Marketing's core role is to generate leads that convert to revenue. Therefore, it's self evident that investing in marketing is important to your business growth. Well quite. But exactly how much is enough? Business leaders are struggling to understand: In what type of marketing should you invest? Should you switch to digital tactics? if so, how? How do you measure marketing? Here are some key statistics from a survey on marketing spending from a new Gartner offering called "Gartner for Marketing leaders." The data is revealing. More money is being spent on marketing to attract and acquire new customers. READ MORE ›

By |Velocity|
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