Received note from Clientek CEO www.Clientek.com

Paraphrased:

“Our second campaign with Good Leads was a bigger success than our first. In that 9 months we doubled our India staff and increased our monthly revenue run rate by 75%….Good Leads was part of that team effort.

Jim and Dick (Good Leads dedicated staff), were again very easy and pleasant to work with.

We are a bit past our capacity…this is a great problem to have…thank you for giving us this headache….once we catch up, we will give you a call for another campaign.

Kirk Hoaglund

We are often asked by prospects how we measure success. Our best measure is repeat customers. This summer we resigned a prominent women owned legal consultancy in the Boston area. Their original contract with Good Leads® was in 2010 and since then have come back six times for 4-5 month projects. Why the pause? Specifically to allow enough time to bid and win opportunities that we put in the sales pipeline via executive introductions to prospects we discovered had a need for outsourced legal contracts assistance in the pharmaceutical industry. Of course we have ROI calculator tools that we discuss before , during and after our program. Additionally, we build into our contract a written lead quantity guarantee after 30 days of market testing to reflect our customer’s value proposition acceptance. This is measurable. We also warrant the quality of all our introductions that they are per our client’s lead success criteria. This is measurable. And lastly, we can measure success by repeat decision makers who have moved on in their careers to new firms and opportunities for Good Leads and the automatic call to Good Leads is equally reassuring!

Save the date for the 5th Edition of Naturallia-Roberval. I encourage your direct call to secure discounted ‘Passport’ event and Exhibitor rates as we are a Head of Delegation. As past President of the New England Canada Business Council, I look forward to connecting on business opportunities.

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Every outbound demand generation starts with a list! The request goes something like this:

“We need leads for SICs 1234, 2345, 3456, employee size greater than 100. Titles containing operations, networking; levels of director and above. Must have direct dial phone and email. Let us try 500 records, if reps like it we will buy more”.

Sounds familiar?

It’s natural to start small, be cautious, make assumptions based on what we trust and go with the gut. However, it is not always a path to consistent, relatable and scalable success.
One of our customers, Verizon Connect, believes prospecting should be MUCH more strategic. They implemented three concepts that delivered a successful a demand gen program over the long term:
a. Understand the market. Every market is finite. It is further limited by segments that likely don’t need your product or where you may not choose to operate – let’s call this the non-targeted market. What’s left is the addressable market from which lists should be sourced.
For example, Verizon Connect targets commercial fleet owners. So we started with the market of all known fleet owners. Next, we removed new and used car dealers, who would not buy product because while they have fleets they are not the operators.
Takeaway: Get an idea of available market, hire optimal sales resources, plan SDR/BDR ratios and define pipeline stages.

b. Define the Ideal Customer Profile. This is where we define, from the addressable market who is likely to become your customer – quickly and profitably. In order to create this profile, you need to segment the buyer persona: their use case/industry, role and goals.
For example, Verizon Connect grouped the high value buyers by industry, and identified the top 10%, 10-20% of SIC codes (Standard Industry Classification). This was then overlaid with geographies with best traction, as well as company data to create a scored list.
Takeaway: Know which industries your best customers are coming from and number of sales touches needed. Track where you are most successful and refine data acquisition.

a. Build out the prospecting database. You know that not all eligible leads convert at once. So it is important to record lead disposition codes to guide future list selections. This will be very valuable in managing your multi-touch campaigns too.
For example, Verizon Connect curated closed lead reasons and acted on them this way:
– Bad data – delete, keep short term
– Not a good fit – filter, keep long term
– Not good timing – nurture, keep term
Takeaway: This lets you “memorize” and record past lessons so you continuously improve the selection of and outcome from each list.

Applying these learnings can put you on the path to roust demand generation. Because no matter which list you start with, you’ll now have a path to sustainable, predictable pipeline growth.

Parth R. Srinivasa
CEO
parth.srinivasa@valgen.com
valgen.com

No prospect just picking up a ringing telephone wants to listen to a cold caller carry on about their company, product, or service. The typical cold call is short (less than 5 minutes, more than 2 minutes if you are lucky), so the caller must capture attention quickly and establish why it is important for the prospect to listen.

• Your value proposition must be stated clearly and confidently, preferably referencing a success story with an existing client to establish credibility.
• Identify what topics or phrases excite the prospects you are trying to reach and engage with them in an unscripted conversation about these.
• Pre-prepared scripts are useful tools but should act more as guidelines for discussion so they do not sound like the typical 6^th grader delivering lines in the school play.

Cracking the code on the Right Message on a consistent basis may take a while and is likely to vary depending on the role of the individual prospect.  So keep calling and adapt your message to what resonates with your target prospects.

When a sales organization misses their sales goals is it because they didn’t close the deals they had in their pipe or is it because they didn’t have enough quality opportunities in the pipe to begin with? The best way to accelerate your sales process and achieve your sales goals is to place high quality leads in the hands of your sales team.  Many organizations focus on the quantity of leads they generate versus the quality of the leads.  Certainly focusing purely on the quantity reduces the overall cost per lead on the front-end of the process however this approach generates a significant burden on the sales team by increasing the amount of time/cost it takes to sort through the “leads” to find the real opportunities if any to take to the next step.

Many lead generation outsourced vendors fail to ask one very important question in the development stage of a lead generation project.  That question is very basic and can only be answered by your sales team.  And that question is “what is your definition of a lead”?  Many outsourced vendors simply say we’ll get you X number of meetings for your sales team.  On the surface the number of meetings may sound great however if the individual you are meeting with does not have a need or interest in your offering it is a waste of time for your sales team and it will not help you achieve your sales goals.  So if you want to move more opportunities into your pipe quicker and achieve your sales goals focus on the quality of leads entering you pipeline and not the quantity.