Small Business Today Magazine JUL 2014 PHENOMENAL PRODUCTS | Page 15
EDITORIALFEATURE
Sweet Leads are Made of This –
Marketing Automation Works!
By Craig Klein, SalesNexus.com CEO
L
isten to salespeople in any industry
and you will hear about how everything has changed in the way customers buy. Most of the comments are
in the form of whining and complaining…
or worse yet…making excuses for failure.
Companies that have implemented
marketing automation using their online
CRM coupled with an effective email campaign are singing a different tune. Let’s use
some lyrics from a Eurythmics single that
was released in 1983, “Sweet Dreams are
Made of This,” to make our point.
Who Am I to Disagree?
Using CRM software to deliver email campaigns can really bring “Sweet Dreams.”
According to a new study conducted by
the Chief Marketing Officer Council, 87%
of B2B buyers claimed that content had
either moderate or major influence over
their selection of a vendor or product.
These B2B buyers had predictable
opinions about what they liked and disliked too. The quality of the content was
important to them with 77% saying that
blatant promotion or uninformed content
turned them off. What they found valuable was breadth and depth of the information (47%); readability and ease of access (44%); and original thinking with good
ideas (39%).
Clearly, your buyers are no different. Yet
many small to medium size businesses still
resist the idea of using content to build a
customer relationship. One of the reasons
for this resistance is they don’t know what
content to create or how to make it work
for them. It is much easier than you think.
Dig into your CRM software and look
at current customers. Isolate your ideal
Your CRM software
will be stuffed with
frustrated buyers who are
not likely to consider
your company.
client and recognize why you are valuable. What was their struggle before you
provided your solution to them? Answer
the questions asked by those companies
in the initial stages of your relationship by
creating a content piece. Launch an email
campaign with a link to the online content
for the purpose of helping the sales leads
become educated.
Everybody’s Looking for Something
hype. This is where marketing automation can help.
Hold Your Head Up
Let me remind you, if your email campaign is all about your product or service,
you will send today’s buyer running. Your
CRM software will be stuffed with frustrated buyers who are not likely to consider
your company.
However, interesting content that informs and educates will be welcomed. If
you want the internet-enabled consumer
to hear what you have to say, use your online CRM to create email marketing that is
digestible, visually appealing, and gives them
information they need to make a decision.
This is the type of marketing that can
make your company proud on four important levels:
1. Don’t you simply feel better being generous educating sales leads instead of
using aggressive sales tactics?
2. Well-planned use of your CRM for
email marketing and lead nurturing
yields a highly qualified lead to your
sales team.
3. Buyers will be ready to make a decision based on the real facts you
have furnished them rather than the
Sales cycles are much longer because
rubbish they might find without your
the buyers want to research their options
content.
without having to talk to a salesperson.
They feel responsible for doing their own 4. TRUST is the big result of building a
customer relationship over time with
research, comparing the features and benmarketing automation. Trust has long
efits on their own. They select the proterm value to your company.
vider that offers the best combination of
Sweet Dreams!
both – plus – an element of TRUST.
We are becoming a consumer-driven
world. Before the internet, consumer economics were driven by sales organizations.
People charged with finding buyers were
taught to stop flogging buyers with features
and sell the benefits. Their sales methods
were solution-based…and it worked flawlessly for awhile. Offering the benefits of
your company’s so