What are the most effective lead-gen programs for CSBs?

Copyright MSPexcellence 2013

A CSBcommunity PresentationBy MSPexcellence

October 2013

Sales & Marketing:What are the most effective lead generation programs?

Page Copyright MSPexcellence 20132

Lead Generation Methods

• Webinars & ground seminars

• Outbound telemarketing

• Events and speaking events (exhibits, conferences)

• Email marketing (news letters, promotional offers)

• Internet marketing (SEO, PPC, Banner ads, etc.)

• Social Media Marketing (SMM)

• Referral programs and agent partners

• Integrated marketing programs

• Budget and effectiveness measurement


Lead Gen Starts with Compelling Content Based on Your Value Proposition

• First: Determine your CSB value proposition & your target audience• Identify the top problems/concerns of your target audience

– Cost control: operating and capital expenses

– Productivity improvement: worker productivity, operational efficiency

– Business growth: customer acquisition & retention

– Business risk: downtime, data loss, security breach, regulatory compliance

• Articulate your solution for these problems– How do your cloud services address the concern

– What is the role of technology used, services delivered and people involved

• Demonstrate the business value of your solutions– Present an ROI for your solution (typical engagement)

– Compare in-house/competitive costs to your managed services fee

– Back it up with customer proof points(customers from same vertical)

• Call To Action – Offer a white paper or other educational resource

– Offer a free assessment, evaluation or an ROI analysis

– Provide a demonstration or “Proof of Concept”

• Your Role: Educate –> Recommend –> Sell –> Deliver


Webinars and Seminars

• Excellent vehicle for communicating a complex message

• Educational, but showcases your solution and business value

• Access to 45 minutes to 1 hour of your prospect’s time

• Held online, on neutral ground & no travel time

• The goal: convert interest into action (strong call to action)

• Pros:– Education is valuable – especially about the cloud

– Webinars are cost effective and can be held frequently

– Almost anyone can execute them – they can also be used for seminars

– Produces high quality leads

• Cons: – Require a lot of preparation

– They are time consuming

– Low volume lead source


Outbound Telemarketing

• Uses a dedicated inside sales resource . . .

• Or the simply the owner/principle “dialing for dollars”

• Or your sales reps calling their rolodex

• Or farmed out to an outsourced telemarketing firm or even a college kid that needs some money

• Pros:– A numbers game: “X” Dials per day = “Y” appointments per day

– Can be effective when combined hit list (e.g., vendor list, prior customers, industry association membership)

• Cons:– Difficult to get to the real decision-maker (get around “gatekeepers”)

– Costly to outsource

– Often produces “future buyers” (interested, but not now)


Events and Speaking Engagements

• Trade shows, industry conferences, associations

• Targeted events are best (your target verticals)

• Try to get the attendance list or some way to market to attendees at the event at low cost

• Leverage the event - schedule customer/prospect meetings around your presence at the event

• Pros:– Networking opportunity to build awareness and collect business cards

– Face-to-face marketing is always more valuable

– Speaking opportunity enhances the value versus an exhibit-only event

• Cons:– Can be expensive (booth space, properties, equipment rental)

– Can produce a lot of unqualified leads (e.g., badge swipes are not leads)


Email Marketing

• Can be effective, but entirely dependent on the list….

• Use a purchased list based on criteria that match your target audience (geography, size, industry, title, etc.)

• Communicate with your prospect/customer database on a recurring basis (i.e., nurturing campaign)

• Be sure to provide educational content and/or promotional offers that represent real value

• Very effective when combined with other marketing programs (e.g., webinars, events, social media, etc.)

• Pros:– Drive higher traffic to your website (is your site designed for conversion)

– A compelling offer or call-to-action can generate leads cost effectively

• Cons:– Can be perceived as SPAM by recipients (don’t get blacklisted)

– Email addresses are expensive to purchase (about $3 per address)


Internet Marketing

• Website leads driven by multiple traffic sources (e.g., SEO, Google adwords, PPC, banner ads, etc.) and converted to leads via offers and registration/landing pages on your site

• Pros:– Inexpensive and potentially high volume lead source

– Can be a good source of new email addresses to add your prospect database

• Cons:– Can result in lots of unqualified leads

– Can be difficult and costly to qualify these leads

– Usually requires expertise to formulate an efficient process (SEO, keyword selection, banner ad placement, site conversion strategy)


Social Media Marketing

• Build a community of online followers that share a common interest in the solutions, technologies and values of your company through held via social media outlets

• Enables a “thought-leadership” approach to building your brand and connecting with new potential customers

• PROs:– Can be an inexpensive and effective way to build quality leads over time

– Allows nurturing of future buyers and self-qualification of prospects based on how closely your content matches and their interest and needs

• Cons:– Very time consuming . . . requires frequent and consistent contributions to

blog posts, twitter feeds and other SMM platforms with quality content

– Can take a long time to build up a following


Referral Programs and Agent Partners

• A reward system that provides an incentive for customers (and others) to refer business to your company

• Rewards can take the form of cash (most common), service credits or contributions to local charities

• Usually awarded after the lead becomes a customer

• Example: $500 awarded for any referral that becomes a customer within 90 days (positioned as customer referral program)

• Pros:– Can be a very effective lead gen program that runs itself

– Referrals an be very qualified leads

• Cons:– Requires some level of administration (for tracking and payouts)

– Requires some rules and restrictions (who, how long, minimum deal size)


Integrated Marketing Programs

• Integrate multiple programs into one integrated campaign– Email campaign to announce webinar

• Targeted list (purchased or from a recent event)

• Outbound telemarketing follow-up

– Webinar with content tailored for a target audience

• What will they learn, what is the call-to-action

• Held one-time, weekly, is it recorded

– Reinforce with Internet and SMM

• Blog posts to build interest – tweets to get the word out

• Promote on your website – lots links to the registration page

– Follow up with email fulfillment (literature, slide deck), call-to-action/offer, online discussion of topics, telemarketing follow-up to attendee list

– Use the webinar for a face-to-face ground seminar (lunch & learn) for existing customers and known prospects


Building a Lead Generation Machine

• How many leads/quarter do you need to feed the pipeline?

– You need to supply enough fuel for your marketing machine

• What are your conversion rates?

– You should implement basic lead tracking & pipeline management

• What type of marketing campaigns should you run?

– Maximize conversion rates to save money and operate efficiently

• How often should you run them?

– As often as possible to meet your targets

• How much should you budget?

– Measure the metrics and invest in the most effective programs

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ClosedDeals

SalesOpportunities

QualifiedLeads

1st LeadSource

2nd LeadSource

3rd LeadSource

QualifiedLeads

LeadGenerationCampaigns

ResponseRate %

QualificationRate %

ConversionRate %

WinRate %

10 Deals

10/WR% Opportunities

10/(CR% x WR%) Qualified Leads

10/(QR% x CR% x WR%) Reponses

Quality Leads Will Maximize Conversion Rates & Produce the Most Deals

TrackingPerformance

SettingTargets

Metrics for Measuring Effectiveness


Using Lead Gen Metrics to Drive Revenue

500 Contacts Your list from your target vertical market

(5% Response Rate) Response to your webinar campaign

= 25 Leads The number of attendees for your webinar

(30% Qualification Rate) Attendees who meet the qualification criteria

= 7 Opportunities Progress through 4 stages of the sales cycle

(30% Close Rate) The number that covert to customers

= 2 Deals Assume an average deal value of $1,000/month

2 Deals x $1K/mo x 12 months = $24K annualized revenue from 1 Webinar

If the total program cost $2K and you earn 40% margin from services, then your cost for the program is recovered in less than 3 months

2 Webinars/rep /quarter = 16 deals per year = $192K/year/rep

What if... you doubled your average deal value? Or increased your response rate? Or increased your qualification rate? Or increased your close rate?

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Webinar-Generated Leads, Opportunities and Customers


Lead Generation Measurement


Questions & Comments?


Thank You!

Contact MSPexcellence:Website: www.mspexcellence.com

Todd Hussey: [email protected]

Dave Zwicker: [email protected]

Voice: 800.785.4620

Fax: 800.714.9645

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What are the most effective lead-gen programs for CSBs?

Marketing

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