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Hopefully in Part 1 of this lead nurturing series, you were able to use those stats to build a compelling case in your 2011 marketing plan for lead nurturing program investments. Since 3 out of 4 new leads generated end up buying at some point in the next 18-24 months, lead nurturing should no longer be a wish-list program, but a competitive necessity. But for most B2B marketers, figuring where to start is always a daunting task.

To make matters worse, many approaches tend to over-complicate things. Marketers develop complex multi-touch campaigns that overwhelm their opt-in audience with too many communications and too many messages. Buyers become not only confused, but suffer from subscriber fatigue.

So where do you start with a simple formulaic lead nurturing strategy?

Lead nurturing fundamentally starts with a sound Thought Leadership program, focusing content on the problem you solve with case studies of how your client solves the problem. To keep it simple, I try to break down the problem into 3-4 themes that relate to specific buyers. This thematic approach becomes the basis for the campaigns we will drive into your target audiences over a 9-12 month period.

Each quarter we focus on 1 theme. Why multiple themes? Because your target buyers each have their hot-buttons that draw them into a particular business problem. For example for a materials management software company with a focus on reducing costs and waste with indirect materials using Point-of-Use devices, one theme might be looking at the high cost for Industrial Manufacturers of waste in safety supplies or in tool usage. In our example above, one buyer may be interested in stories involving the control of safety equipment while another has a waste problem with tooling. It is all about delivering relevant messages to each buyer at the right time.

The formula to developing great content lies in having a variety of media tactics to deliver the primary message of the theme. For example one really good white paper (from a reputable 3rd party). Then develop a webinar on the white paper topic and have a client participate in the webinar (be sure to record so you can repeat and use in subsequent campaign waves). Also, develop one or more case studies, again focusing on that theme that can be dispersed via different mediums.

The key to lead nurturing programs lies in consistency so spend the entire quarter with bi-weekly outbound campaigns that highlight the theme, each with a different deliverable. First the white paper, then the webinar, then the case study, with links each time to the other content on that topic. We then repeat this process for at least two more quarters with various themes. You can listen to this podcast to hear more about this thought leadership approach and the results that were achieved for a client.

If you follow Brian Carroll and Ardath Albee’s approach to repackaging and re-purposing content, you will find that you already have most of the content you need to work with. The trick is how to package (or re-purpose) correctly to feed it to your target audience on a regular basis in varying ways (whitepaper, webinar, case study, blog post).

REMEMBER: it takes 7 to 9 proactive communications to get your buyer to opt-in and read the message or theme you are trying to deliver. Once they do that then your other complimentary content will have more appeal and increase the likelihood of launching the sales process.

It is very important to keep the approach of simplifying the lead nurturing process into something that is focused and meaningful to your potential buyers.

In our next installment of this lead nurturing series, we will discuss the other aspects of program development that you need to focus on to move from “average” to “good”.

Stay tuned.

Related posts:

Lead Nurturing is Coming of Age Part 1: Making the Case for 2011 Marketing Plans

Case Study: Lead Nurturing Through Thought Leadership Content

Lead Nurturing is Coming of Age Part 3: Moving From Average to Good

Lead Nurturing is Coming of Age Part 4: Moving From Good to Best

In this blog post, I sat down with Marcia Yudkin to talk about the issue of unqualified leads. This case study focuses on a company that markets and sells on-demand transportation management software to very large CPG shippers such as P&G and Quaker Oats. The entire interview can be heard here.  

Conquering unqualified leads transformed a costly multi-media campaign into a revenue generator [ 15:08 ] Play Now | Download (83)

The problem they presented
Management wanted to know how to generate more qualified leads, and mistakenly thought it was just a matter of producing more webcasts, white papers and thought leadership content and relying on a number of key media channels to deliver that content. Their lead qualification processes were mostly manual and were being performed by the sales team without automated tools. When any type of suspect inquiry occurred, marketing would handoff the inquiry directly to the sales team to qualify sales-readiness.

What was the real problem?
Upon further inspection, I discovered a number of symptoms that pointed to a bigger problem.

First, when prospects opted-in for their content, they could not tell if they were interested in them or just the topic. For example, when they downloaded a white paper, they had no real tracking methods to determine whether or not these were qualified leads, other than calling them directly.

B2B industry stats indicated that less than 10% of the leads were sales ready, but they were spending significant time to determine which were sales-ready and which were not. They had no lead nurturing process for the 75-80% of the inquiries that were qualified (right company/right contact), but not sales-ready. We called these leads “qualified contacts”.

Second they lacked tools to measure the various media outlets they used to deliver their content via sponsored webinars and white paper promotions. For example, they used Aberdeen to promote white papers, but had no way to determine the quality of the leads they were getting from the downloads and how Aberdeen stacked up against other firms such as ARC, AMR and industry-specific media players.

Finally, the company’s sales team consisted of extremely industry-knowledgeable reps when it came to logistics, who weren’t that adept at closing sales. They were good at educating prospects on the problems they solved, but more often they would get stuck educating those who were not real buyers yet. The process of moving these “qualified contacts” to qualified, sales-ready opportunities was labor-intensive and time-consuming. The company was spending hundreds of thousands of dollars in marketing programs, but was not optimizing the return on the marketing budget.

The Solution
In the podcast I break down a couple of implemented strategies involving process (lead management vs lead generation) technology (permission-based marketing automation) and people. The new marketing automation solution allowed them to execute multi-touch, multi-channel campaigns that filtered the sales-ready leads from those needing nurturing using existing marketing admin resources. The leads they were receiving from the sponsored webinars and white paper downloads were now channeled into monthly email campaigns that automated the previous manual process of filtering and qualifying leads.

The Results
The results were impressive:
• In just one year, their qualified contact database grew threefold to over 12,000.
• Their large “house” database allowed them to produce their own webinars at a savings of $10,000+/webinar with great attendance (over 800/webinar).
• They were able to hire sales reps who were not necessarily industry experts now that marketing was delivering large numbers of qualified leads to the sales force.
• Over 3 years, revenues grew 3-4 times.
• Marketing staffing stayed constant, while sales reps were added and the marketing budget as a % of revenues dropped significantly.

Lessons Learned:
We followed a strategy built on people, process and technology (in that order). The company was able to tap into their number-one strength, industry knowledge, and market it in a way that allowed them to firmly establish their reputation as such. They became the trusted advisor and market leader.

Listen to the complete podcast now.

Conquering unqualified leads transformed a costly multi-media campaign into a revenue generator [ 15:08 ] Play Now | Download (83)