501 Questions Every B2B CMO Needs To Ask

1Copyright © 2017 All rights reserved worldwide.

TODD EBERT

501 QUESTIONSEVERYB2BCMO

TO ASKNEEDS

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Purpose ..........................................................................03

Corporate Strategy .......................................................05

Marketing Team ...........................................................11

Brand .............................................................................14

Customer Data .............................................................19

Customer Experience ...................................................22

Web Presence ..............................................................26

Content .........................................................................32

MarTech ........................................................................38

Product Marketing .......................................................42

Sales Enablement ........................................................48

Demand Generation ...................................................54

Brand / Reputation Building ........................................64

About Me ......................................................................71

Appendices ..................................................................72


WHAT’S THE PURPOSE OF THIS BOOK ?

As a marketer who has joined several new companies over my career I’ve tak-en over new teams and had to quickly learn everything they do, identify gaps, and develop a plan to deliver more value to the company. I must admit it’s a daunting task to meet dozens and dozens of people and get a clear picture of all the roles, processes and technologies plus the interrelations with the other teams in Product, Sales and Service. What does the team do well? What do they not do well? What do they not do at all? Its damn hard to be systematic and thorough in capturing all the information needed so I started an Evernote with my list of questions and just kept adding more and more over time. This eb-ook is the product of that list which became too long to manage in Evernote.

• Market & Customer Analysis• Go-To-Market Process• Launch Strategy & Planning• Positioning & Messaging• Sales Training & Demos• Sales Tools & Content• PR & Analyst Briefings• Pricing, Bundles & Offers• Product Evangelism

• Search Engine Marketing & Retargeting• Integrated Acquisition Campaigns• Inbound Marketing • Lead Nurturing & Drip Email Campaigns• Trade Shows• Webinars• Seminar Series & Workshops• Customer Renewal, Upsell & Winback• Analytics & ROI Dashboard

• Data Cleansing & Enhancement• Lead Scoring• Lead Management• Collateral & Tools• Presentations• Sales Portal & Communications• Channel Partner Marketing• Contest Support• Event Support• Social Selling Tools

• Display Campaigns [Persona, Behavioral, etc.]• Search Engine Optimization [SEO & ORM]• Content Marketing [ebooks, infographics, etc.]• Blog & Social Media• Customer Reviews & Advocacy• Employee Reviews & Advocacy• Employee Social Sharing• Media & Analyst Relations• Speaking Opportunities

DEMAND GENERATION BRAND / REPUTATION BUILDING

BRANDPosition

MessageIdentity

Creative

WEB PRESENCE

CX/UX

CONTENT MARTECH

DATA

PRODUCT MARKETING SALES ENABLEMENT

But, before I jump into the list of questions let me explain the structure of the document. It largely follows what I call the B2B Marketing Flywheel [diagram above] with my POV on the key components of the marketing organization. Naturally the brand is at the nucleus of the organization as it powers everything in marketing, and the whole company for that matter. Surrounding the brand nucleus are the five essential elements for executing proper marketing. And, like the definition of a flywheel, this hub “stores kinetic energy and smooths the operation of the engine” while providing power and speed to all marketing efforts including the four functions on the outer ring of the diagram.

https://www.slideshare.net/ToddEbert/building-a-b2b-marketing-flywheel


It is important to note that my diagram is simply intended to show the key attributes required to build a high-performance marketing team and is NOT intended to be an org chart or to show the many interrelations between all the functions. There are many ways to structure a marketing team and yours may be totally different, but no matter, you must have these elements in order to succeed. So regardless of how your team is structured this ebook provides the questions you’ll want answers to in order to identify strengths and weaknesses, gaps and opportunities.

It seems common sense to start the fact-finding mission by interviewing the C-suite to learn about the corporate strategy and to assess the Marketing team’s structure, roles, competencies, projects and budgets.

During those sessions with execs and the marketing team I also do a deep dive into the brand since it is the nucleus of everything the company does. Why? Because if you don’t get the brand right then nothing else matters. Once I have a firm foundation in the brand, I move outwards on the diagram to evaluate all the other key aspects including the web presence, customer experience, technology stack and so on and so on.

Honestly every time I do this the order of questions changes as I follow the path that presents itself during the interviews with key executives and stakeholders. And to be clear, I’ve included many more questions than you would typically ask during an interview. It’s up to you to choose the ones that work best for what you are trying to learn.


If you’re like me, you asked a ton of questions when interviewing with the executives for the CMO role at your new company. While you’ve probably already asked the questions I list below I’ve included them here in the interest of thoroughness. And it certainly doesn’t hurt to ask these same questions of everyone on the extended management team to make sure they are aligned and identify any gaps. If the management team is not aligned on the core vision, strategy, and value proposition then you’ve got a lot of work to do before crafting your new marketing plan.

The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself.

Peter Drucker

Martin Luther King did not say ‘I have a mission statement.’

Simon Sinek

CORPORATE STRATEGY

Source: The Strategic Sweet SpotHarvard Business Review

CONTEXT (technologies, industries,

regulations, etc.)

COMPETITOR OFFERINGS

CUSTOMER NEEDS

COMPANY CAPABILITIES

SWEET SPOT


The first two questions are probably the simplest yet the most important: y Why do we win? y Why do we lose?

You can knock yourself out with all the follow-ups to the responses to those two questions. But if you want to get answers to specific areas of the strategy then move onto the following.

Strategy and Business Model y Who are the 20 people in the company that I should meet over the next

two weeks to get a full understanding of how we do business here, along with our strengths, opportunities and challenges? These need not be executives but the indispensable people who are at the backbone of running the company.

y What is the company’s business model?o Do you believe in it? Is it still viable?

o Where is the market, and more specifically the company, in it’s life cycle?

o Is it maturing and needs to be repositioned or are we a new entrant needing to create awareness that we exist? Or is it somewhere in between? Describe.

o Do consumers ask, "Who are you and what do you do?" Or do they ask, "Why should I buy from you versus all the choices available?"

y What’s our strategic battleground? Which of the three choices below are we best at? You can only be truly excellent at one of the three.

y How does our strategy compare to competitors?

Product Leadership

Operational Excellence

Customer Intimacy

Thre

shold

value

Operational Competence

Customer Responsive

Product Differentiation

Lead

ersh

ip

value

Source: The Discipline of Market Leadersby Michael Treacy and Fred Wiersema


Vision / Core Purpose / Mission y Can I get a copy of the official written corporate brand and messaging

document that everyone uses to inform all internal and external communications? The doc should contain the following:o Vision, mission, company values, company purpose, company story,

pillars that define the brand, key message themes, etc.

y What does our brand name stand for? [I’ll do a deeper dive on the brand questions in the Brand section]

y What is the company’s overriding vision and core purpose?o What is our raison d’etre? Why do we exist?

o What big problem do we want to solve for the world?

o What is our big hairy audacious goal [BHAG]?

y What is the company’s mission for the next 3 years? o This is not the vision – this is the mission we actually want to accomplish

and it dictates the marketing plan [i.e. which markets and products to focus on that are growth drivers, etc.]

y What two or three words would you personally use to describe the company culture? Why?

y What are the company’s core values? i.e. 3-5 words and descriptions that describe the company’s approach to doing business and it’s culture.

y How/why are these different from the couple words you used in the question above?

y What are the businesses’ core skills and assets that help us do stuff better than everyone else? i.e. What is the company’s definitive competitive advantage?

y What is the single biggest obstacle in the way of hitting it big? Others? y What is the company’s TOP objective for next 6-12 months? y What is your top personal objective for next 6-12 months? y What obstacles stand in your way? y What “words of advice” do you have for the executive team?

Target Markets & Customers y What are our lines of business? o Describe each LOB in detail, markets/customers served, products,

revenues, market share, etc.

o Are we entering new LOBs in the near future that impact the brand and marketing strategy?

o What is the total addressable market [TAM] for each LOB?


� What portion/segment of the market are we going for?

y For each major market/segment we serve how would you describe our current customers? [in detail] o Firmographics: industry segments, geographic regions, revenue size

range, employee size range, etc.

o Technographics: systems used that indicate they are a good prospect – software, hardware, etc.

o Economics: average initial deal size, retention, lifetime value, cost to acquire, etc.

o Motivations and need states

y Who is our ideal target customer? [of the ones you described above]o What are the aspects of the companies/people that are best suited to

need what we have?

o Ideal means that they need what we have, they spend a lot, they retain and loves us and eventually become an advocate [if multiple segments define the ideal persona for each]

� How many of these ideal customers are there? Numbers are key here – are they in our database or do we have to develop the market?

y Are current customers and ideal customers the same or different -- why? y What critical / important problem do we solve for them? o Do they know they have the problem?

o Have they budgeted for solving it?

y What research/input do we have on how prospects feel about us? o Perceptions – good and bad?

o By current customers?

o By prospects who didn’t buy from us [lost deal analysis]?

Customer Personas & Buying Journey y Who are the people in the decision-making unit [DMU] at the types of

customers we want to target? o Describe all the key people and draw a map/org chart of how they

fit together in the buying journey: functional buyer, economic buyer, approver, users, influencers, etc.

o Obviously this differs greatly by market segment/tier so what are the key differences in your main lines of business?

o What are the written “personas” for each of the key people involved in the decision?


The B2B Buying Journey Is Not Linear

Mobile Web Company website Events Sales Peers Social Email Print

Discover

Hear

Share

Share

Share

Peer review Decide

ResearchResearch

Compare Leam

Advocate

Trust

BrowseExplore

Buy

Engage

Use

Ask

y What does the customer buying journey look like? [for each business unit or market segment] See the appendix for my chart with the high-level stages of the buying journey. o Has it been officially mapped and documented by those in Sales/

Marketing with significant enough experience working with customers?

o If not, when can we get the right people in a room and draw the detailed journey stages on a whiteboard so we can then document it and vet it?

o How long is the journey? Who from the decision-making unit is involved at each stage?

o Where do the people in the decision-making unit go to research issues, solutions and vendors?

� What are their “go to” sources of information they use regularly?

� Which industry gurus, trade associations, publications, websites and blogs?

y How many vendors do they consider? o Which ones are always in the mix?

o How do they go about comparing them?

Source: Forrester Research. This version of the buying journey shows the non-linear complexity of the B2B buying journey. Given that buyers conduct a large portion of the journey online before contacting ven-dors, it’s critical to have a strong web presence [see that section for more detail].


o Do they do a competitive bake-off?

o Do they issue an RFP?

y How do we win? y Why do we lose?

Check out my ebook,

The B2B Buying Journey that you can

y What is the unique value proposition we provide? o What would you tell a friend if they asked you? i.e. your elevator pitch.

o Is it impactful enough to get them intrigued in 30 seconds so they have a 3 min conversation with you and then agree to a 30 minute meeting?

o What is the compelling reason why they should believe in us?

y If prospects don’t choose our solution then… o Who do they buy from instead?

o Why do those companies win and not us?

Dashboards & Internal Communications y Who keeps the executive calendar with the key dates for leadership

meetings, board meetings, all-hands meetings, company outings, etc.? y What are the key executive comms and internal comms that I should

receive? y What are the executive dashboards and reports I need to receive? y What are the dashboards and reports that I need to deliver to the exec

team? y What are the marketing comms that have been delivered in the past to

the sales force and the entire company? o Are they useful and well received? Should I continue them?

y What else do I need to know that I might have missed?o Company traditions?

o Culture?

o Company events?

o Etc.

Check out my ebook, The B2B Buying Journey

https://www.slideshare.net/ToddEbert/the-b2b-buying-journey


MARKETING TEAM

Good marketing makes the company look smart. Great marketing makes the customer feel smart.

This section is pretty self-explanatory. Upon joining your new company you’ll certainly want to learn everything about the marketing team and what they do. The questions below will help you evaluate gaps, build out the team, and deliver more value to the broader organization.

Our Mission is Simple - Help Sales Grow Revenue

Joe Chernov

y How is the Marketing team currently structured? o Org chart with roles and locations?

o Strengths and weaknesses?

o Gaps that need to be filled?

y How would you describe the people on the team?o Where did they come from – inside the company, outside?

o What are their backgrounds? [marketing, sales, comms, etc.]

o Data analytics competence level?

o Content creation competence level?

o Demand gen competence level?


o Marketing technology competence level?

o Product marketing competence level?

y How well does the team function? o High, low or average performance level?

o Why and how could it be improved?

o Any issues between people?

y On a 7 point scale with 1 being very low and 7 being very high, how would you rate the level of respect that marketing has within the organization? Explain the rationale behind your rating.

y What are the team’s objectives? o Are they documented in a formal plan?

o How do you measure success?

o What dashboard/reports do you deliver to show the value the team delivers? How often?

y What stands in your way of success and achieving the goals? o people, process, technology, budget, etc.

y What projects are on the marketing roadmap?o How are projects selected and prioritized?

o What collaboration and project management tools do you use? [e.g. Slack, Basecamp, etc.]

o How are projects measured and optimized in order to hit dates?

o How is project status communicated to stakeholders?

y What is the marketing team’s operating model? o How do you prioritize projects?

o How do you allocate resources?

o How do you go about getting projects done rapidly, checking results, and then optimizing to get better results on the next project?

o Do you use a traditional approach with a series of sequential steps or do you use an agile approach with small sprints and adjustments along the way as described by McKinsey Consulting in this video and this article.

o How do you get feedback?

o How do you gather and analyze data?

o How do you use all that to make decisions?

y What project management/work flow tool do you use to keep track

http://www.mckinsey.com/Videos/video?vid=5201898077001&plyrid=2399849255001

http://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/marketing-and-sales/our-insights/agile-marketing-a-step-by-step-guide


of everything on the marketing roadmap and to collaborate with key teammates and outside resources? o E.g. shared google doc or a SaaS like Slack, Trello, Basecamp or

Redbooth?

o How often do you report to management on the marketing roadmap, resource allocation and projects completed?

y How well are you aligned with the Product/Tech team?o What is their current opinion on the value of marketing?

o What would they want changed?

y How well are you aligned with Sales?o What is their current opinion on the value of marketing?

o What would they want changed?

y What else should I know about the team? o Team traditions?

o Team outings?

y What is the budget for the year and the past three years?o Have the team been on budget, below or above? Why?

o How does the budget align with the objectives?

y How is the budget broken down by…o People costs?

o Program costs?

o Technology costs?

y If you got a 50% increase in budget tomorrow where would you invest it? Why there?

y What communications has the team received in the past from the CMO? y Are they useful? Do people read them? Should I continue with something

similar? y What are the communications the team/CMO sends to the rest of the

company?o Communications to Sales about new tools or programs?

o Communications to the entire company about new content/advertising?

o Are these communications well received? Should we continue doing something similar?


BRAND

Our job is to connect to people, to interact with them in a way that leaves them better than we found them, and more able to get where they’d like to go.

I’ve spent my entire 25-year career in technology industries marketing to business buyers. And during that time, I’ve also been married to a consumer marketer who’s run some of the most iconic brands in the country at General Mills, Pepsi and Dr. Pepper. So, both at work and at home, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about brands and how important they are to attract and keep the best employees, partners and, most importantly, customers. While consumer marketers have known for a long time that great brands are essential to success, the B2B market has just recently caught on to the power of a differentiated brand that achieves a unique position in the mind of customers. There are four ways to build a brand position, but by far the most powerful is purpose. Check out Simon Sinek’s video “Start with Why” to see the power of purpose. It’s rare to find a strong brand built on what benefits the company provides or the way they go about their business [i.e. their craft] since those are easily copied by competitors.

Create a Differentiated & Meaningful Position

PURPOSE – Why are we in business?Social Issue| Category Problem | Brand Values

IDENTITY – Who are we?Aspirational | Personality | Affiliation

BENEFITS – What do we offer?Performance | Experience | Occasion

CRAFT – How do we do it?People | Process| Technology

Seth Godin

https://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action


I believe that what separates the winners from the losers in today’s hypercompetitive markets is great marketing and that starts with a great brand foundation. Many B2B execs that I’ve worked with have not invested in building a great brand because they thought that having the best technology was the key to success. Maybe that was true 30 years ago but it’s certainly not true today when almost every market has parity of products and price.

Another mistake I’ve seen is when people think that branding is just about the logo design or the look of the latest advertising. I’ve addressed that issue head on by asking them a simple question – “If you were planning to open a new restaurant would you work on the decorations for the walls or the ad for the grand opening before you completed the blueprint with the architect, poured the foundation, and put up the walls?” It’s the same in brand building, you don’t rush into designing your identity/logo before you've put down the building blocks of your brand foundation – your core purpose, positioning, value proposition and differentiated messaging. Here’s my diagram of the approach I follow to develop a new brand or tackle a rebranding project.


Brand Development Framework

Brand Foundation y What is the company brand? What does it stand for? y Would you say that the prospects we are currently targeting/selling to:o know the company?

o like the company?

o trust the company?

o If not, why?

Check out my ebook, Rebranding, A 4-Step Plan for B2B Marketers

Download

https://www.slideshare.net/ToddEbert/rebranding-a-4-step-plan-for-b2b-marketers


y How would you describe the company’s personality? [often this insight on culture informs how the brand really is versus how it aspires to be]

y What other companies/brands do you admire? Why? [this can be any company, not just those in your industry]

y Would you say the company has an aspirational vision/purpose? o Why? Why not?

o What big problem are we solving for the industry/world?

y What is the company’s raison d’etre? Purpose? BHAG? [big hairy audacious goal]o How do we make a difference – to our customers, employees, the

community?

o Why do we exist? What value do we bring to the world? [It must be authentic and real not just a slogan]

o Why should/do people care about the company?

y In an ideal world, where money, time and competitors are not a factor, what would you say is the perfect brand position in the market? o What is our current brand position?

o Be brutally honest on where we stand now relative to where we want to be. You can’t make a plan to improve if you don’t know where you’re starting from.

y What is the market perception of the brand of each of our competitors? o How do we stack up against them in terms of the key customer values

in our industry, for example: product line breadth/depth, quality, technology, innovation, service excellence, price value, etc.?

y How have we validated our position through primary research with people outside the company – our prospects and customers, industry analysts and media? You cannot trust internal stakeholders who typically are biased.

y What are three story headlines you’d love to see 5 years from now in a leading publication covering a major impact the company has made? [see exercises listed in the appendix]

y Are we as a company ready, willing and able to pursue the vision? [i.e. vision and beliefs are hollow without people who have the will to execute on them]

y How do we want customers to feel when they buy from us, employees when they come to work, etc.? What’s stopping us from delivering that experience/feeling?

y If you drew the company’s story as a comic book who would be the hero in your story? The products? The results/ROI? The technology? The customer?

y If you could only use one word to describe the company’s essence what would it be? [e.g. Subway’s one word is FRESH]

y What are the 3 brand pillars you use to describe the company? o Unique strengths that distinguish the company in the eyes of the

customer.


y Does the brand story/promise ring true in every aspect? Does it resonate with customers and employees who know us best? Does it meet a rigorous test for being: relevant to the market, compelling, valuable, believable, and sustainable.

y What do we do really well but have not communicated clearly to the market?

y How do we make people care about the company/product? [Rule #1 of marketing is “make me care”]

Brand Essence y When is the last time that we updated or changed the logo and look/style

of the brand? y Are you personally happy with the look and feel of our current brand

identity? Why?o How do customers and employees feel about it? o How does it compare to our competitors?o Does it represent and support our vision and business aspirations?

y Which brands use a look/style that you like? Why? [any brand not just ones in our industry]

y What is our brand archetype? [see chart in appendix for various archetypes]o Why did we land on that as our archetype?o How does it compare to competitors?o How do we support it and build it with our messaging and

communications? y What tone of voice do we use in our website, marketing and

communications? o Formal versus casual? Enterprise versus personal? Why?o Does it resonate with our target customers?o What tone of voice do competitors use?

Establishes Credibility

Differentiates fromCompetition

Creates EmotionalConnection

Conveys Quality& Value

MotivatesAction

EncouragesLoyalty

What A Strong Brand Does For You


CUSTOMER DATA

Those with the best data on their customers win!

It’s not hyperbole to say that the success or failure of your marketing is determined by your data. You must continuously capture and enhance the data on your target customers in order to market/sell to the right people with the right content at the right time. A database with deep customer data and insights creates a big competitive advantage. So, you need to make it a strategic priority to capture all the data you can on customers and constantly clean and enhance that data every day. Failing to do so means it will degrade quickly and thereby reduce the effectiveness, efficiency and profitability of all your sales and marketing efforts. On the flip side, constantly feeding the data set on your target customers helps you perfect your lead scoring methodology and improve your predictive model showing the best accounts to pursue based on their potential value and likelihood to buy.

Jay Baer

Track Behaviors& Intent Signals

know what they read & add to lead score

Add Firmographics& Technographics

get details on every aspect of the company and the

systems they use

Add DMU Contacts

build total picture of everyone in the

decision making unit

Clean Everything

constantly check and update all records

y What is the company/team strategy for gaining deep customer intelligence?

y Who “owns” the CRM and the health and accuracy of the data in it? o Who is responsible for cleaning, deduping and updating it?

o What are the rules for reps regarding hoarding contacts outside of the database?

o Who is responsible for managing, cleaning and enriching all the data?

Build A Customer Intelligence Database


y What is his/her strategy for making it the one source of truth for everything about our prospects and customers?o Firmographics – location, revenue, employees, industries served, etc.

o Demographics – gender, age, location, education, title, etc.

o Psychographics – goals, frustrations, challenges, interests, etc.

o Technographics – systems used, competitor products used, etc.

o Behaviors – emails opened, website pages viewed, content downloaded, etc.

y What is the plan for the next 12 months?o Objectives and key projects?

o What are the key issues or barriers to the health and success of the database?

y What do the sales reps think about the quality of the data? o How would they grade it?

o What issues do they complain about?

o How well do they adhere to the rules about data input?

y What is our [sales & marketing] definition of the ideal customer profile?

o What all is included in it – what fields of info?

y How many records are in the database? o How many would you say fit the ideal customer profile?

o How many new records do you add each month?

y What are all the sources of data you mine to build robust profiles on each prospect/customer? [see vendor list under MarTech section]o Primary sources? e.g. data.com, Hoovers, Dunn & Bradstreet, etc.

o Enrichment sources?

y When is the last time the database was cleaned and de-duped?

o How frequently is that done? [data decay is a huge issue]

y What data sources are used for enriching each account and building intelligence that can be used to segment and target the best prospects? o industry vertical and sub vertical [SIC / NAICS]

o revenue and employee size

o geographic locations

o website URL and social profiles

o technologies used

o association memberships

o other key attributes important in your industry


y How do we mine and include data from all the various systems that the marketing, sales and service teams use to interact with prospects and customers?o Engagement with marketing content [website, marketing automation

system, etc.]?

o Interactions with sales on the phone, email, demo portals, etc?

o Interactions with service on the phone, customer web portal, ticketing system, etc.

y How have we used the data to segment prospects and customers?o By industry vertical, size, location, technology used, etc.?

y Have we created a predictive model using the data to score and rank the accounts on their:o Spending potential [value]?

o Purchase probability?

y What do the sales reps think about the accuracy of the scoring model? y What data analysis do you do to validate the accuracy of the scoring

model?o How often do we make adjustments to that model?

y How do we get the contacts for the decision-making unit at each prospect?

o Which data sources do we use?

o How do we “house-hold” all contacts from the org into one account record [so you can understand the full decision-making unit]

o How often do we clean and update the contact information [title, email, phone numbers, etc.]?

o Have we included social media accounts [LinkedIn, Twitter, etc.] for each contact in order to support social selling?

y How many contacts [and % total] have given opt-in permission?

o Are they the right ones we want to get deals from?

o When is the last time we validated contact email addresses and deleted the undeliverables?

o How many opt-outs do we process each month and what is the process to ensure they are removed from all lists?

y What does your dashboard look like?o What KPIs do we measure?

o How often do we send the dashboard to key stakeholders?

o What gaps are we working on?

y How is the data dashboard used by sales and marketing to make adjustments in their programs and tactics?


CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE (CX/UX)

You’ve got to start with the customer experience and work back toward the technology, not the other way around.

Steve Jobs

Customer experience is the new competitive battleground. It’s where business is going to be won or lost.

Tom Knighton

The buying journey includes everything that happens before, during and after the customer actually buys and uses your solution. The journey stretches across many channels and touchpoints over weeks or months. The consequences of both good or bad experiences are serious, impacting customer satisfaction, support calls, delivery cost, customer retention and employee morale. And beyond the benefits I just covered, the ultimate value is in differentiating yourself in a crowded market and propelling your brand into a sustained leadership position. So, given that fact, why do many B2B companies still not focus on their customer experience?

The problem is articulated well in this article by McKinsey, “Companies need to recognize and address the fact that—at least, in most cases—they are simply not wired to naturally think about the journeys their customers take. They are wired to maximize productivity and scale economies through functional units. They are wired for transactions, not journeys.” Hence many companies measure customer satisfaction at operational touch points like after they order or place a support call. And they think they’ve done a great job of taking care of the customer, but miss the bigger picture that despite the customer rating the support call highly they were totally underwhelmed by the entire end-to-end buying journey. So, the key is to design and track the customer’s cumulative experience across the whole journey not just one or two touchpoints.

And taking it a step further, how you deliver for customers is as important as what you deliver. This is especially true given the sky-high expectations people have developed as a result of great consumer experiences they’ve had. They’ve been “Amazonified” [my term] and expect every company they deal with [including B2B vendors] to provide great marketing, wide selection, deep information, low prices, easy ordering, same-day delivery, no-hassle free returns and instant live service 24/7. Consumers are “always-on” and share their experiences online in an instant – both good and bad -- across their entire social networks and beyond. For example, as I write this United Airlines is dealing with the fall-out from videos showing them forcibly removing of a doctor from their plane. The resulting media firestorm is taking its toll on their reputation not to mention impacting their stock.

http://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/marketing-and-sales/our-insights/from-touchpoints-to-journeys-seeing-the-world-as-customers-do?cid=other-eml-ttn-mip-mck-oth-1612


So, given the importance of this, here are some questions you can use to understand your company’s commitment to delivering a great customer experience.

y What is the customer experience vision and strategy for the company?o Is there a shared conviction and aspiration from the C-Suite to deliver a

great experience? Is it one of the major corporate goals?o What is the company’s appetite for change in the near term? I.e.

are we looking for improvements or a major transformation of the experience?

o What is our overarching aspiration for customer experience? E.g. are we aiming for best-in-class Ritz Carlton experience or something less intensive?

o How are the CX goals mapped to strategy and business goals?o How can we use customer experience to gain an advantage over

competitors? o Who owns customer experience for the company? And, who are all the

people/functions involved in shaping it? [cross-functional team]o What are the specific goals this year and projects to achieve them?o Are all functions and leaders unified trying to achieve the plan?o Do we have the resources and staff capabilities to deliver the

experience that everyone envisions?

Map The Customer Experience Journey


y How do we as a company step back and understand the journey from their point of view not ours? What primary research do we do with customers to understand their fundamental needs/wants? o How do we determine customers’ motivations, needs, desires and

expectations as they buy products from us or our competitors?

o How do those needs and expectations change at each stage of their buying journey?

o How do we determine customers’ feelings about us and their experience with us [satisfaction] relative to their needs/wants in order to identify issues and gaps?

o How do we measure the mind-set of the front-line employees who are the ones delivering the experience?

� How do we learn about their challenges and roadblocks to delivering on the CX vision?

� How do we get their ideas and help in solving problems that they identify?

� How do we measure their active engagement with the plan and the customers?

y How do we gather, store, integrate and share data to ensure a single accurate and unified view of the customer?

� Data gathered from surveys - NPS, CSAT, exit surveys, etc.

� Data gathered from focus groups

� Data gathered from ongoing interactions with the product [web, mobile app, reports, etc.]

� Data in marketing, sales and service systems

� Data gathered from interactions with sales and service people

y Have we mapped each and every touch-point that the customer has with us over the entire buying journey from initial research through onboarding and ongoing use of the product? Which points along the experience are the most important to concentrate on for maximum impact? At the same time, how do we ensure we improve the customer’s overall end-to-end experience since fixing a touchpoint or two could still leave them unsatisfied overall?o What do they experience when researching us and seeing our web

presence, marketing materials, emails, social posts, webinars and other content?

o What do they experience when registering for one of our offers/CTAs or evaluating a free trial of our product?

o What is their experience when interacting with a lead development rep, during sales pitches, when receiving proposals and negotiating pricing/contract terms?


o What is the experience during solution delivery, on-boarding, attending training [web and in person]?

o What is their experience when calling the service or support team to ask questions and get help with a problem?

o What is their experience with the product/service interfaces such as mobile apps, customer portals and emailed reports?

o What is their experience with finance for billing and invoicing?

o What is their continuing experience with our loyalty program and with their account manager or sales person for upgrades, renewals and additional purchases?

y What are the elements at each touchpoint of our experience map [per above] that we have consciously planned/executed to improve their experience? o What analytics do we study to understand customer actions at each

stage?

y What is our customer complaint process?

o Who owns it?

o How do we know when someone lodges a complaint? [beyond directly calling you…e.g. posts comment on social media, writes negative review, files BBB complaint, etc.?

o What other teams are involved in the process?

o What are the escalation procedures when resolution becomes contentious?

y Do we have a customer advocacy and reference program?o How many do we have of reviews, testimonials and case studies? On

which sites?

o Who owns the process for getting more?

o What is the monthly goal?

o Could you share the questionnaire you use with customers during testimonial video shoots and case study interviews?

o What do we do with new ones when we get them? E.g. our website, 3rd party review sites, YouTube, social media, sales portal, etc.

o Do we have a formal program for customers to do referrals? Who owns it?

o Do we have a process for customers to become advocates and share our content? Who owns it? What software do we use to power that program?


80% of B2B buyers found the vendor, not the other way around.

iii iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii

WEB PRESENCE

Just like consumers, when B2B buyers need something they start their journey by searching the web for information on the issue/problem they are trying to solve. And further, they complete 70% of the buying journey via self-directed research online before engaging a few vendors to talk with their sales reps.

We live in a Match.com world; many buyers and sellers “meet” for the first time online. In fact, the entire purchase process may start and end without a single face-to-face interaction.

Unaware[Passive]

Exploring[Interest]

Researching[Consideration

Evaluating[Intent]

Validating

Purchasing

Marketing

Marketing

Sales

Sales

SalesandMarketing.com

Lisa Carr

You Must Be Present To Win


So, given these facts, your company’s web presence is the critical make or break first exposure to your brand. [that’s why I put this section here right after the brand questions] Mind you, it’s not just your website that conveys your brand but anything and everything that people find when they search for your types of solutions including product review sites, analyst sites, social media sites, articles in the press, blog posts, white paper sites, YouTube videos, and sadly the reviews on awful sites like RipOffReport. My former product marketing director said, it’s pretty simple… “You must be present to win!” This means that you need to publish a lot of really good content all over the web so that when potential customers do their research they find you. If you’re not there then you can be that your competitors are. And you need to make sure that your content addresses the needs that customers have at each stage of their buying journey as depicted below.

Be unaware of problemIdentify problem

Research causes & solutions

Assess value & cost of solving

Install solutionReceive onboarding

Use soluitionAsk for service &

support Assess results

Research potential solutions

Develop business case Define needs & requirements

Research vendors Contact vendors for

information Narrow list for RFP Evaluate proposals

Negotiate & purchase

EXPLORE DISCOVER

ENGAGE PURCHASE

Things get even more hairy when buyers become interested in your solutions and start researching your company and product by name. What they find on the first page or two of the search engine results page [SERP] can mean a big boost or big dent in your brand reputation. So, you need to actively manage and optimize your online reputation by publishing customer reviews pages on your website, employee reviews on GlassDoor, testimonial videos on YouTube, product reviews on Google, G2Crowd and TrustRadius, and by working with a PR agency to get covered in leading business and industry sites. I’ll cover reputation optimization later in the brand/reputation building section of this document so here are some questions to get you started in understanding the health of your web presence.

Buyer Needs Vary Across The Journey


y What do people [prospects, media, analysts, customers, potential employees] find when they search the web for information on our types of products and services? o What keywords do they search?

o Do they find content about us or our competitors?

� If they find our content, is it from our website or a non-owned site like LinkedIn or YouTube, etc.?

o What is our page rank for the top relevant keywords prospects search?

o Do we do a good job of publishing our content on relevant sites all over the web? i.e. How would you rate the breadth of our web presence compared to everyone else in the industry?

y Could you share the list of ALL our “owned” external-facing web properties:o websites

o blogs

o microsites

o landing pages

o customer-portals

o partner portals

Your Web Presence Is So Much More Than Your Website


y Could you share the list of ALL our “claimed” pages on the web:o social media sites

o video sites

o directory sites

o industry association sites

o review sites

o product reviews sites

o employee review sites

y How many shares, mentions, questions and complaints did we get on social media last month? o Who monitors those and responds?

y For our non-owned web properties:o When was the last time each was updated with our brand content?

o How often do you post/update each?

o Who has the list of all the passwords?

o Who is in charge of posting on them?

o Who is in charge of monitoring them and responding to comments?

y For our primary company website:o How old is it? Last refresh?

o What CMS is it built on? E.g. WordPress, Drupal, etc.

o Is the site mobile optimized?

o Who “owns” the website and ensuring its success?

o What is the monthly traffic in unique visitors and page views? How is that trending?

o What are the primary sources of traffic to the site?

o What are the most popular pages?

o What are the most popular pieces of content? E.g. ebook, whitepaper, etc.

o What is the average time on site and how has that changed over time?

o Are happy with the performance of the website? Why?

o How does it compare to competitor sites?

o How do we test everything on site and continuously optimize it?


y Is the blog part of the main website or separate? Why?o What traffic does the blog get in unique visitors and page views? How is

that trending?

o Is the blog mobile optimized?

o What are the primary sources of traffic to the blog?

o How many people subscribe to get new blog posts by email?

o What are the most popular blog posts in terms of traffic and engagement?

o How many leads do we get from the blog each month?

o How many shares of blog stories do we get each month?

o Who “owns” the blog for the company? i.e. responsible for its success

o What is his/her content strategy for the blog?

o Who are all the various subject matter experts we leverage to write posts?

o How often do we publish new blog posts?

o How do we optimize the blog/posts for search engines?

o How do we use the blog to feed marketing and sales emails?

o How do we leverage the blog for lead gen campaigns?

o How do we measure effectiveness?

y How does our website quickly and easily convey that we solve the target audience’s problem?o Is it written about the customer and their needs -- not about us and

what we do?

o Does it have a video commercial with an overview of our vision, value prop and differentiation?

o Does it have video explainers for our solutions -- features and benefits customer receive?

o Does it have graphics with proof points of differentiated results we’ve delivered to customers?

o Does it have lots of customer case studies testimonial videos talking about the results they got?

o Does it have visual stimulating collateral packed with customer benefits?

y How does the sales team use the website and blog to aid their selling? y How are we optimizing everything on the site and blog to improve

discovery in search and the resultant traffic?


o SEO for pages and content pieces?

o Publishing new content types?

o Getting offsite links?

y Does the website have clearly defined lead conversion flows and compelling offers [CTAs] for pulling leads? [I cover the various types of offers in depth in the Demand Generation section] o Do we have multiple contact methods including tracking phone

numbers and web forms on every page?

o Do we use Live Chat? Who monitors/manages it? What hours? How much do they qualify the lead?

o What are our incredible offers [CTAs] that a prospect can’t resist [lead magnets]? Are they prominent on every page of the site?

� “You have to give value to get value” – in other words, no one wants to fill out our form unless we give them something awesome

� One test of our offer is whether or not it is something people might actually pay for versus just another collateral piece.

� Are the offers super easy to get without hassle? i.e. people click away in 2 seconds so make it super easy – fewer form fields the better

y How do we A/B test all our content and offers on the site and blog in order to improve our conversion rates?

y What is our process for handling inbound leads from the website? o Who owns it? Are their incentives tied to KPIs for lead quantity, quality,

conversion?

o How many inbound leads [calls, emails, forms] do we get per month?

o Have we defined every step in the process for handling the leads – e.g. who answers the phone and asks qualification questions, who checks the inbox and how fast do they call the lead back, how do they get the lead to the sales person or to the marketing team for nurturing, what is the SLA for sales to respond?

y How do we track each lead by channel and program? y What measures do we have in place to track sales progress with each

lead and deliver marketing content to help accelerate down the funnel? y How do we track and report on the conversion of leads into revenue and

attribute to the marketing spend in order to determine ROI? y How do we nurture the leads once they become a lead? [I dive into

deeper questions about lead nurturing and lead management in the Demand Generation section]

y Do we have a marketing automation SaaS? o If yes, who runs it and what is their level of certification?

o Is it integrated into our CRM?

o How many workflows and emails are we leveraging?

y How do sales reps know when a contact has engaged with the content and increased in lead score?


CONTENT

Content brands build relationships. Relationships build trust. Trust drives revenue.

Andrew Davis

Give value to get value.

Todd Ebert

Relevancy magically creates time and attention [by the audience]!

Jay Baer

Content is the very nucleus of literally everything we do in marketing: website, ad campaigns, social media, email, lead nurturing, organic search, webinars and trade shows. Not to mention it’s the essential ingredient Sales reps use in their emails to prospects and their social selling activities on LinkedIn and Twitter.

But let’s be super clear on the key to success --- it’s got to be great content that’s all about helping the customer, not telling them about your company. They don’t care about you [yet] and too many marketers miss that basic truth. My teams get tired of me saying “you have to give value to get value,” meaning that our content needs to be so good that the reader wants more. It may sound corny but we want to create a relationship with the customer through our content, and then hopefully if we do our job right they want to learn about one of our solutions.

Over time if we continue to provide great content and are careful to not overpromise we will gain their trust. Once analyst at Aberdeen Consulting created a formula for building trust where: [ Credibility + Reliability + Transparency ] / Self-Interest = Trust The first parts are self-explanatory but I thought the self-interest part was an interesting twist since clearly the audience is judging whether you are truly trying to help them or if you’re only doing it to get the sale. If they judge your self-interest as high then the trust is eroded.


There are many examples of consumer brands that have figured this out, like the Lauren Luke makeup videos my daughters watch where a young woman started doing unscripted YouTube make-up tutorials and turned it into a $100 million business. Of course, HubSpot practically invented the concept and has done a super job of providing content to help marketers regardless of whether you use their software or not. What do those two very different businesses have in common? They’re both providing valuable [non-salesy] help to people. Consider the stats below showing how pervasive the online buying journey is. And it’s as true for a manufacturing VP looking for a $500,000 industrial laser cutting machine as it is for your daughter shopping for make-up.

y 93% of B2B purchases start with an Internet search

y 84% of buyers engage in online information consumption and self-education

y By a factor of 3 to 1, B2B buyers say that gathering information on their own is superior to interacting with sales rep

y 74% of sales go to the first company that was helpful

So, ask yourself, how helpful are we? Do we provide a lot of truly helpful and valuable content that makes our customers’ lives easier, teaches them a valuable skill or helps them solve their business problems? Because, as the stat shows, that is exactly what customers want and they will reward the company that gives it to them. In addition to creating great, helpful content you’ve got to make sure you provide the right pieces at the right stage of the customer’s buying journey. There is a lot of overlap across stages but here is a directionally correct idea for where each content piece fits best.

• Educational videos• Infographics -

interactive• Blog posts - industry

issues• Industry news / POV• Tools/apps - interactive• Product trials [free]• Ebooks – provocative

research• Assessments - interactive• Industry survey results• Webinars• Tips & Tricks articles• Curated lists

• Industry analyst reports• Whitepapers - technical

leadership• Executive briefing

papers - thought leadership

• Solution “tour” on website

• Recorded demo / video

• Best practice guide• How to videos• Use case examples• Customer testimonials• Expert webinar• About Us video

• Solution finder tool• Custom proposal• Live solution demo via

webinar• Product collateral• Product “explainer”

videos• Competitive

comparisons• Total cost of ownership

calculator• ROI case study• User group insights• FAQs document

• Industry analyst competitive comparisons

• Customer referrals• Customer reviews• Product manager

discussion• Product roadmap• Detailed case studies• Pricing / ROI tool• Deck & business case for

champion to provide to bosses

• What to expect next document

• Onboarding introductions and processes

• How to videos [e.g. understanding your reports]

• Product guides• Customer webinars• User groups• Customer newsletters• Resource centers• Blog posts on key issues• Ebooks – advanced

topics

Marketing must capture attention and make a great first impression that you are a market leader & can solve their problem

Marketing must create wow moments that get them to think highly of your brand and take the next step

Marketing must keep you top-of-mind & show the value prop that differentiates you from the other choices

Marketing must provide validation that you are best option and enable the champion to convince senior decision-makers [justification

Marketing must build trust through great onboarding experience, and showcase the great value you are providing

Exploring Researching Evaluating Validating Purchasing

https://www.youtube.com/user/panacea81

https://www.hubspot.com/resources


Here are some good questions to get you started on determining the health of your content creation and marketing strategy.

y Do we treat our content like an investment in an asset [customer benefit] or an expense [sales tool]?

y Of all our content pieces how many [what percent] are aimed at helping the customer versus selling our company/products?

y How does our content help customers? List all the ways. Here are some examples of helpful content. Do we offer anything like this?o Educational material on an important industry issue - e.g. detailed

explanation of the HIPAA regulation and its impact on our industry

o “How-to” guide or video on an aspect of their function - e.g. 7 tips for making the world’s best customer testimonial video

o Best-practice template or spreadsheet for a function they need to perform - e.g. Excel template for creating a monthly demand generation dashboard report to management

o Compilation of interviews with industry experts on a relevant subject – e.g. ebook with tips on how to grow your blog by 5 leading business bloggers

o Free training lessons on a relevant topic - e.g. the first 2 training videos on how to optimize your website for search engines

o Free industry analyst report relevant to their function – e.g. Forrester report on the future of digital marketing

o Lists. Either a list of great tools for a certain function or a checklist of things to look for when tackling a specific role or problem – e.g. 10 best tools for monitoring and repairing your online reputation

y How many people subscribe to get our content updates via email? y How many of those subscribers eventually become customers? [what

percent] y What research have we done with Sales and Service to determine the

questions that customers have at each stage of their buying journey? o Have we done a gap analysis to make sure we have great content

assets for those most frequently asked questions? That way we can be the helpful company that enables them to move to the next step of the journey.

o Have we used that information to guide our content creation schedule?

y What good, helpful, interesting content do our top competitors have on their websites? o What are the keywords for those content pieces [using a tool like

SpyFu]?

o How do we match up against them in providing content for the top keywords customers are searching online?


o How do they use those content pieces in their marketing programs and across the web to drive awareness, traffic and engagement?

y How have we tailored our content strategy to each customer persona and their buying journey [and our equivalent sales cycles]?

y What is our quality control process for checking all content to make sure it is written specifically to one of our customer personas, addresses one of their needs/pain points, provides valuable/helpful information, etc. See the Content Checklist in the Appendix.

y What research have we done with our prospects and customers to find out what they think about our content? i.e. do they know about it, care about it, like it, etc.

y Who owns developing content assets for the company?

o How does he/she determine which content pieces to create?

o What research is done with Customers and Prospects to know what content they would like?

o What research is done with Sales and Service to know what content pieces they need?

y Who are the key people on our list of subject matter experts and thought leaders?o Are they active contributors?

o If not, how can we recruit them and make it easy for them to create more?

y What is your aspiration for the value of the content we create?o How can we make it super cool/interesting/useful stuff that people look

forward to getting?

o How does our content create moments of inspiration/action for the reader?

o How do we tailor the content to our different customer personas?

o How do we develop appropriate content pieces for each buying stage?

o How do we know whether the readers like our content pieces? i.e. how do we measure if they are successful or not?

y Can I review the list of all our content assets?

o When is the last time we did a content audit?

o What are all the content types we create? Ebooks, Infographics, Buyers Guides, Presentations, Explainer Videos, Whiteboard Videos, Meme Images, etc.

o How can I tell the age of each of the pieces to determine current relevance?

o How do we know if each content piece was successful or not?


o How many interactive content pieces have we created?

o How do we use video as part of our content strategy?

y How many content pieces do we create per month?

o What is the content roadmap and editorial calendar?

o How do we prioritize all the ideas and requests?

o Who decides which of all the pieces goes on the calendar?

o How far out does the calendar go?

y What is our strategy for videos and interactive content? [proven to have 3X the impact on visitor engagement]o Engaging company overview video -- our powerful brand commercial

that makes people take notice

o Product and technology explainer videos [see article] that make it super easy to understand how it works and the value it provides

o Expert videos in interview format or whiteboard format that provide education and insight while building our brand as innovators and thought leaders

o Customer videos that provide proof points for our value prop

o Interactive tools and calculators that provide valuable help to the customer

y What is our strategy for user-generated content?o Would our customers shoot quick videos on their mobile phones about

how they use the product and/or what they like about it?

o Would they write an article about their lessons learned during installation/use that we could post on the blog and/or turn into a collateral piece?

o What other easy but relevant content would they be willing to create?

y How do we sync the content roadmap to the marketing plan and product launches?

o How do we create major content themes that support the plan?

o What tools and systems do we use to create and manage all the content? [see MarTech section]

y How do we merchandize our content assets on our website?o Do we feature key content pieces on the homepage and other

relevant pages?

o Do we have a content hub or resources page where we host all content and make it easy to find? Are their filters to make it easier for users to find the topic they are looking for?

y How do we spread or “atomize” our content assets across the web where people are more likely to find it?

http://marketingland.com/explainer-video-matters-b2b-customers-212599


o For example, do we put our presentations and whitepapers on SlideShare?

o Do we put our infographics on Pinterest?

o Do we put all our product explainer videos and expert interview videos on YouTube or Vimeo?

o Do we post product graphics / infographics to Instagram or Flickr?

o Do we put our whitepapers on a key industry association website or technology website? [often free to do but sometimes requires a paid sponsorship]

y How do we gain awareness for our content assets? i.e. How do we market our content?o What is our strategy for putting our content on-domain versus off-

domain?

� For example, for every major onsite piece how do we use several bite sized pieces to drive awareness and interest for that major piece?

o Do we have an internal employee advocacy program that prompts them to share our best content pieces every week?

o What external influencers do we work with to promote our content?

� Influential customers?

� Industry analysts?

� Reporters?

� Key partners?

o What is our social media strategy for getting the word out about each piece?

o How do we use advertising and sponsored posts to amplify our reach?

y What is standing in the way of having the best-in-class content in our industry?

y What else should I know about our content marketing efforts?


MARTECH

Instead of using technology to automate processes, think about using technology to enhance human interaction.

Tony Zambito

Marketing technology is essential in order to create a high-performing team that builds brand awareness, captures and nurtures leads and drives revenue. But the proliferation of tools has often resulted in a patchwork approach where nothing ties together and results/ROI are far less than promised. According to Chiefmartec.com there are over 4,000 marketing technology companies today. The odds are that your team uses dozens of different systems, software and services every day. Hence you need to get your arms around all of them to see what is working and where you have gaps. The best way to do this is to create a map of the stack like these examples and the ones below from the “Stackies” awards at chiefmartec.com. You can start by asking your team to list which vendors they use for each major category and then to diagram the flow of how they all fit together.

https://www.slideshare.net/sjbrinker/2016-stackies-awards-41-marketing-technology-stacks?ref=http://chiefmartec.com/2016/03/41-marketing-technology-stacks-2016-stackies-awards/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ChiefMarke


y What is included in our mar-tech stack…all the technologies, systems and vendors? [I’ve listed some vendors in each category but there are many more]

y When is the last time we did an audit of all the various systems used across the company?

y How do all the systems fit together? What does our “stack” map look like? y Who owns mar-tech for the organization/company? Is it a formal position? y How does it support our team and business objectives? y What are our objectives for leveraging the stack? o Business objectives?

o Customer experience objectives?

y How did we choose each of the vendors? How do you rate the effectiveness of each?

y How do you continue to learn about new technologies and innovate the stack?

y What martech obstacles or issues are getting in the way of success? y What else am I missing about our martech?


Engagio, Terminus, LeanData, Kapta, KickFire

Google Adsense, Adroll, DemandBase, RocketFuel, MadisonLogic, TradeDesk, MultiView, LinkedIn, Facebook

Google Adwords, YouTube, Bing, Marin, WordStream

Google, Adobe, Omniture, Bizible, BrightFunnel, Tableau

LiveChat, FreshDesk, LiveAgent, Intercom

SalesForce, Microsoft Dynamics, ACT, ZoHo

Chatter, Yammer, Slack, Trello, RedBooth, Basecamp, Evernote

Drupal, Wordpress, Pantheon, BlueHost

Sprinklr/GetSatisfaction, SalesForce, ZenDesk, Lithium

Scripted, Asana, BuzzSumo, CopyBlogger, Kapost, Acrolinx, Curata, LookbookHQ // Copy Testing - Wistia, Buffer, MadMimi

UberFlip, TinderBox, HubSpot, HootSuite, GrowSumo

G2 Crowd, Gainsight, TechValidate, TrustRadius, Captera, GrowSumo, Influitive, Ambassador

Dunn & Bradstreet, Hoovers, SalesLoft, LinkedIn Navigator, RingLead, Infer, Informatica, LeanData, InsideView, KickFire, Bombora, Lead411, ZoomInfo, Datanyze, Avention, VisiStat

Camtasia, home grown via login to your platform

SocialChorus, Bambu, Smarp, LinkedIn Elevate

MailChimp, SilverPop, SendMail / Rep focused systems – YesWare, Reply.io

Account Based Marketing

Ad Platforms for Display

Ad Platforms for Search

Analytics / Tracking / Attribution

Chat

CRM

Collaboration / Project Mgt.

CMS / Hosting

Community Management

Content Creation

Content Distribution

Customer Advocacy / Reviews / Product

Ratings

Data / Enrichment

Demos

Employee Advocacy

Email

MarTech Categories

Potential Vendors


Cvent, Bizzabo, EventBrite, EventPro

Box, DropBox, GoogleDocs, Microsoft Sharepoint

GrowSumo, SocialChorus, BuzzSumo

LeadPages, InstaPage, Unbounce, GetResponse

Marketo, Eloqua, Pardot [SFDC], Act-On, InfusionSoft, Hubspot, SilverPop

Webex, Go-to-Meeting, Join.me

SiteCore, Vidyard, Marketo, Evergage, Tribilio, Captora

Cision, Prezly, Presspage

HighSpot, Clearslide, Savo, Docurated, BuzzBoard and your own home grown sales intranet portal

Google Webmaster, MOZ, SEMRush, RankingCoach, SpyFu

Hootsuite, Radian6, TweetDeck, Sprinklr, SproutSocial

Stock, Adobe, Shutterstock, Getty Images

SurveyMonkey, SnapSurveys, TypeForm, SurveyGizmo

Optimizely, CrazyEgg, Zarget, Kissmetrics, VWO, TrackMaven

YouTube, Vimeo, Vidyard, Wistia, Viddyoze

VisualVisitor, LeadForensics, Loopfuse, MultiView

ON24, ReadyTalk, WebEx, GoToWebinar

Event Management

File Sharing / Asset Mgt.

Influencer Marketing

Landing Pages

Marketing Automation

Online Meetings / Presentations

Personalization

PR

Sales Enablement

SEM / SEO Tools

Social Media Monitoring/Posting

Stock Photography

Surveys

Testing / Optimization

Video

Web Visitor Reverse IP Lookup

Webinars


PRODUCT MARKETING

The product is the marketing and the marketing is the product.

Todd Ebert

Focus on the core problem your business solves and put out lots of content and enthusiasm and ideas about how to solve that problem.

Laura Fitton

The term product marketing can mean different things in different organizations. Often there is no formal product marketing function and the responsibilities fall to the product manager. But in my experience product managers typically have a technical or engineering background and are light on formal marketing education or training. Hence, I believe it is best to have a separate and dedicated product marketing function tasked with the commercialization of new products and market success of a product portfolio from cradle to grave.

At the highest level, Product Marketing deals with outward / customer-facing tasks; marketing the product to analysts, media, partners, prospects, and customers leveraging a multi-channel approach. Often the product marketer leads the go-to-market team coordinating the launch across all teams including, training, sales, service and marcom.

Build deep knowledge of the market & customers

that guides positioning and marketing strategy

Communicate market position in a way that

is differentiated & monetizable

Equip Training & Sales with the knowledge & tools they need to be successful

Ensure the market success of the product portfolio from cradle to grave

The Charter of Product Marketing


y How do product managers / product marketers understand the customer’s world? o How often do they get out with reps on sales calls?

o How often do they meet with industry analysts?

o How often do they work at conferences and trade shows?

o How often do they do primary customer research?

y How is product marketing handled at the company? o Is there a formal/official product marketing function?

o If yes, what is included in the scope of the role?

o If there is no official function then who is responsible for the market success of the product?

o How are the following responsibilities accomplished?

Product Management & Marketing Framework

Product Management

Product Management

Product Marketing

Field Marketing / Marcom

The market-drivenmodel for managing & marketing technology products

EXECUTIO

NSTRA

TEGY


� Positioning and messaging

� Branding and naming

� Marketing strategy

� Pricing and bundling

� Launch strategy, timing and execution

� Sales enablement and tool kit

� Customer win/loss analysis

� Customer testimonials and case studies

� Thought leadership content

� Analyst and media briefings

� Internal and external evangelism

y What is the product development process? o Who owns it?

o What are the stages/gates?

o Are there regularly scheduled meetings with all functions involved?

o How are all the concepts/products vetted and prioritized?

o How and when is marketing involved in those decisions? What stage?

y How are detailed customer personas developed including the following? What approach is used [outsider or customer input?]? How are they validated? See example in the appendix. o Demographics and psychographics

o Responsibilities

o Challenges

o Business problems / pain points

o Need states

o How they personally benefit from solving problems

y Who owns completing the product/market situation analysis? See example template in the appendix? What is included in the doc?o market and target customer description

o product description

o competitive landscape

o pricing

o beta test analysis

o launch schedule

o impact on internal systems and process


y Who owns completing the product positioning and messaging doc [PMD]? See example template in the appendix. What is included in the doc?o customer pain points/needs we solve [based on customer research

and data not just gut feel]

o features / benefits

o differentiation from competitors [again need real data proof points to support any claims]

o value proposition / unique selling proposition [USP]

o proof points – stats & facts, customer research, analyst research

y How is the PMD vetted and agreed on by the key stakeholders in Sales and Product? And then by senior management?

y How is the initial draft of the sales story created?o What is the form of the output document? [story boards, slide deck,

etc.]

o Who all is involved in building the story, getting input and polishing it?

o How is it validated? Is it actually tested in the field?

o What other items do you build as part of the sales kit?

y How are new products launched when ready? Is there a formal/official Go-To-Market [GTM] process as part of the product development process? What is covered?o Steering committee and executive sponsor

o Market situation and competitive landscape – provide the detailed competitive analysis of technologies, features, benefits, price, etc.

o Buyer personas – create detailed descriptions of who we are selling to, insights from “voice of customer” research, etc.

o Positioning and messaging document [PMD] – complete the document for vetting across the team [see template in appendix]

o Naming and branding – provide concepts for the name and logo design, work with legal to vet names and get trademark protection, etc.

o Pricing strategy – define the prices, volume discounts, bundles, trial offers, special promotions, etc.

o Test strategy – provide the detailed plan with dates for Alpha/Beta/UAT tests to gather feedback and initial testimonials

o Channel strategy – define the channels we will sell through: online, field sales, inside sales, distributors, etc. and the detailed training/roll-out schedule

o Customer strategy – define how the launch will impact current customers including considerations for: early purchase option, ability to upgrade, price discounts, trade-ins, etc.


o Launch timeline – lay out the detailed launch schedule with dates for testing [alpha, beta, UAT] and completion of the PMD, demo, screen shots and sales story, along with dates for sale training, general availability, launch event, launch communications, etc.

o Customer experience plan – define the experience we want customers to have from initial sales engagement, through onboarding and ongoing touches by sales and service, etc.

o Goals and objectives – define the goals for success:

� Marketing – market awareness, offer uptake, leads, etc.

� Sales - base penetration, new customer acquisition, average deal size, revenue, retention, etc.

� Service goals – volume and frequency of customer issues, support load, average resolution time, etc.

o International plan – define which regions will sell the product and the training/roll-out schedule

o Services plan – define how we will service the product including: SMEs, front-line team, tech/tools required, training, onboarding process, differences between current and new customers, anticipated questions [FAQ doc], anticipated support issues, ticket process, etc.

o Marketing plan – layout the integrated plan for creating the: website, content assets, sales presentation & tools, advertising, demand generation programs, PR & social media, email campaigns, reviews/testimonials/case studies, employee advocacy, etc.

o Sales training plan – layout the plan for getting the team up to speed and ready to sell: target customer definition and personas, product technology, features/benefits, pitch/demo, sales tools/collateral, objection handling, pricing, order entry processes, differences between current and new customers, compensation, incentives/spiffs, sales contests, etc.

o IT / Operations plan – define the systems required, systems changes needed, process flows and integration with other systems, etc.

o Buzz / excitement plan – set the dates and tactics for the both the internal and external launch events and associated communications to employees, partners, press, analysts and customers

o Risks and mitigations – define the potential obstacles and risks to a successful launch and what steps are being taken to avoid them

o Win/loss analysis – define who and how you will track all sales won and lost during the initial launch period along with the rapid feedback loop to the team

y How is pricing and merchandising handled at the company?o Who “owns” pricing – product, marketing, finance, other?

o How do we tier pricing – by volume / strategic national accounts / etc.


o What market research and modelling do we do to support and validate pricing decisions? i.e. How do we predict the impact on demand, revenue, profit?

o What is our discounting strategy?

o How do we bundle and package products together?

o How do we come up with introductory offers and promotional pricing?

o How much discretion does Sales have in discounting or changing the price?

o What is the management review and approval process for price changes/exceptions?

o Who is responsible for the ongoing marketing of the product portfolio to ensure success and achievement of revenue goals?

o Conducting market and competitive analysis in order to recommend changes to features, positioning, marketing and pricing

o Evaluating and recommending changes to merchandising strategy including price changes, bundles, offers, promotions

o Monitoring the customer experience and recommending improvements

o Soliciting customer feedback and feeding it to the product management team, while also creating testimonials and case studies

o Getting feedback from Sales and channel partners and working with them to modify selling stories and create new tools

o Determining if the pricing and bundling are appropriate and making changes as needed

o Working with field marketing and marketing communications on demand generation campaigns

o Evangelizing the product internally and externally through webinars, thought leadership content, analyst briefings, press pitches and speaking opportunities

o Partnering with product management to launch new versions of the product and line extensions

y How do you manage the product marketing roadmap with all the projects for version updates, new features and major new product launches? o Could I get a copy of your roadmap so I can see all the projects and

dates?

o What tool do you use to track and manage everything? E.g. Google spreadsheet or project management software?


SALES ENABLEMENT

As marketers, we should be changing the mantra from always be closing to always be helping.

Jonathan Lister

Many people think of sales enablement as including three things: 1. content-based enablement, 2. technology-based enablement, 3. training-based enablement. I definitely agree that all three of those are needed, but I’ve seen many instances where the tools or training were ignored and not used by the Sales reps. Why? Because they were created in a vacuum by marketing or sales operations and there was no skin in the game by the reps. There’s a much better way to do it. Several years ago I went to our Chief Revenue Officer and proposed that we create a joint “smarketing” team with dedicated members from Marketing, Sales Operations and Sales [you could add training too if that makes sense]. This integrated team was tasked with [and rewarded for] identifying and executing high impact projects that would increase lead flow, boost sales productivity and improve close rates….and therefore lift revenue.

Build A “Smarketing” Team

The “smarketing” team helped us break the typical us versus them mentality and set the standard and example for the rest of the marketing and sales professionals. It wasn’t just a loose partnership, but a truly integrated team that:


y reworked our customer personas y mapped the customer need states along the buying journey y positioned our products based on real world customer experiences y identified the ideal prospects in our database and created ranked lists y enriched the customer data records with unique insights that fueled sales

conversations y developed the campaigns to influence, engage and nurture prospects y built the content customers wanted and sales tools reps needed to have

high-value selling conversations

The “smarketing” team changed what was a disjointed and often uninformed process into an integrated series of touches on the customer that included the appropriate advertising, content pieces and sales tools for each stage of the journey.

While you may not be ready to create a single “smarketing” team at the very least you need to deeply understand every aspect of the sales function and align resources from the marketing team to help them drive more revenue. After all, that is the ultimate goal of both teams. Here are some of the key questions to start learning about your Sales organization.

Sales Goals y What are the specific goals for the next 12 months? And why?o Number of high-value selling conversations [meetings]?

o Total revenue? By region? Segment? Product?

o New acquisition and retention?

o Cross-sell / upsell?

o Net promoter score [NPS]?

Sales Structure y How is the sales team structured? o Self-service online/ecommerce sales

o Inside sales

o Channel/partner sales

o Field sales

y What percent of revenue comes from each of those? y How many reps are allocated to serve each of those? y How are reps allocated by geographic regions? y How reps allocated by industry segments? y How are reps allocated by account segments [small vs. large national

accounts]


Customer Buying Journey & Sales Flow y Who are all the people involved in the buying process at a typical target

customer?

o Define and map the typical decision-making unit of main point of contact, users, influencers, functional approvers, economic approvers, etc.

y What does their buying journey look like? What are the common customer expectations, questions and objections at each stage of their journey? Have we mapped all the sales and marketing touches at each stage in order to proactively educate and address the common questions/issues/objections in order to help them choose our solution? What are the differences by segment and persona? o Exploring – identifying potential solutions to their issue/pain

o Researching – checking out potential vendors

o Evaluating - comparing a select group of vendors

o Validating – vetting the chosen vendor and gaining internal approval

o Purchasing – negotiating the contract and lining up payment

o Onboarding – learning and implementing the solution

o Using – using the solution, troubleshooting and seeking service

o Renewing – going through all the stages all again

y Which sales methodology do the reps use? E.g. Challenger, Miller Heiman SPIN, etc.o How is the methodology trained and reinforced?

o How is it audited?

o Is it working? Are there any changes planned?

y Describe the elements of the Sales playbook and the various types of sales plays you use throughout the sales cycle.

y What is the typical [average] sales cycle from initial prospecting call or lead to meeting[s] to proposal to close?o How does it stack up to the recent past?

o How does it stack up to the competition?

o What are the key levers to accelerating the cycle?

y What are the differences between how you sell to low dollar customers from high dollar customers?o Do we practice Account Based Marketing with personalized

communications to our top prospects?

y How does a typical sales person spend their time?o How do they develop their pipeline and get appointments?


o How does a typical prospecting call unfold?

o What does a typical email look like? [see some strong templates here]

o How does a typical meeting unfold?

o How many meetings does it take to get to a close?

o What goals are set for them in terms of productivity?

y What does a typical “pitch” look like? o Is there a standard PowerPoint deck or does each rep create their

own?

o Or does the rep pitch from the website and online demos?

o How is the pitch tailored to the sales methodology?

o Is it customized to the prospect’s unique needs?

o How often do you listen to live or recorded calls and provide input to the rep?

y How do reps win deals?

o What are the keys to success?

o What is the opportunity to close ratio?

o What would make a significant impact on close rates?

y What is the win/loss evaluation process?o Who is involved?

o How often is it performed and reported?

y What is the process for Sales, Account Management or Service to renew customers?

o How is marketing involved in that process?

y How do you approach upselling and cross-selling to current customers?o How is marketing involved in that process?

Collateral and Tools y How do reps learn about new tools and content created by marketing? y Where do they go to get the tools? E.g. sales intranet or a SaaS portal like

HighSpot y What is the consensus opinion about the tools? Which ones are most

effective? Least effective? y What tools do the reps ask for that would truly make an impact if they had

them? y Please share how you’ve mapped all the tools at your disposal to each of

the stage of the sales cycle.

http://www.artofemails.com/


o website & blog content

o infographics & newsletters

o solution videos & how-to videos

o presentations & collateral

o whitepapers & ebooks

o online product tours & online demos

o customer case studies & testimonial videos

o assessment tools & price calculators

Training y Who leads training and what training does a rep get each year in:o customer pain points solved with our products?

o product features/benefits/technology versus competitors?

o selling skills? [aka prospecting and the pitch]

o time management?

o personal brand building?

Lead Management y How clean and accurate is the data in the CRM? [minor vs. major issue?] y What data is missing from a typical account record that would help the

reps be more effective in their prospecting and selling? y What are the key factors that go into the lead scoring methodology?o How accurate/predictive is the lead scoring methodology?

o What changes are needed to make it better?

y How do you measure the quality of leads reps receive?o What are the feedback loops to marketing for both good and bad

leads?

y How do you measure the responsiveness and effectiveness of how reps handle the leads they receive?o What is the average time it takes reps to call new lead they receive?

o What percent of MQLs are not able to be contacted?

o What is the average number of attempts they make to reach a lead before recycling it back into the CRM as not able to be contacted?

o What SLAs are in place to measure these and other lead metrics, and how often do you track them?


o What are the ramifications of not meeting the SLAs?

Dashboard y What does the Sales dashboard look like and how is it accessed?o What productivity measures do you track?

o What are the SLAs for lead follow-up in terms of speed of response and number of attempts?

Contests y What contests and spiffs do we use to incentivize reps to hit goals? y How often do we run contests? Spiffs? y Is there a “presidents” club? How do reps make the cut? y What role does marketing have [if any] in any of these?

Tradeshows & Events y Which shows/events are the most effective in generating qualified leads

and ultimately customers, revenue and ROI? y How do you decide which shows go on the annual plan? y Who staffs the shows? y How are leads handled at the show? y What is the strategy and plan for company hosted events like seminars

and customer workshops?

Personal Brand Building & Social Selling y How do reps build their personal brand and reputation as trusted advisors

in the industry? y What are the primary social channels that customers visit to get

information? [e.g. LinkedIn, Twitter, industry blogs, etc.]o What types of company content or industry content do reps they share

on those channels?

o How often?

y Do they practice social selling? i.e. mine information on prospects and reach out to them via social with great content pieces.


DEMAND GENERATION

Demand generation means different things to different people. I could easily argue that all marketing is demand generation. After all, isn’t the point of marketing to influence people into buying your products and services? But for the purpose of this document, I’m defining demand generation as the marketing activities specifically undertaken to capture leads, qualify them, nurture them, score them and help the Sales team close them. I’m also including customer marketing in this section. It’s a much-overlooked way to generate demand by increasing customer retention and selling them more products more often.

Making your prospects feel like they have an exclusive membership in a club makes lead generation a positive customer experience.

Eric Bower

Approach demand gen as a game of inches. Todd Ebert

DISPLA Y

EV ENTS

Align sales and marketing to create a consistent, high performance, continuously optimized, predictable, lead-to-revenue [L2R] engine. Measure the cost of acquisition in order to focus on reducing it over time and simultaneously increasing retention and lifetime value.

Build A Demand Gen Engine


The ultimate goal is to create a consistent, high performance, continuously optimized, predictable, lead-to-revenue [L2R] engine that fuels the growth of the company. Moreover, by measuring the cost of acquisition you can focus on reducing it over time and simultaneously increasing customer retention and lifetime value.

But, it’s easier said than done. The harsh reality is that it is extremely hard to generate leads that turn into customers. According to research by Sirius Decisions only 7 in 1,000 marketing inquiries become customers…that’s less than 1%. The absolute, number one, most essential thing for success is to have a truly great, authentic brand that separates you from everyone else in your market. The entire lead to revenue engine starts with your prospects being not only aware of your brand but also having a favorable impression of it. This is known as the “know-like-trust” cycle. Not only does your brand [products, services, employees] have to have a great reputation, but your marketing has got to be so useful, educational, entertaining and helpful that people actually look forward to receiving it. You want prospects to think of you in human terms as someone they like and count on to help them, not just another corporate vendor out to sell them stuff and disappear until renewal time. I’ve reviewed the essentials of a great brand foundation previously in this document and the next section covers the tactical aspects of brand building through paid, earned and owned media.

Check out my presentation, The 10 Musts For Demand Gen Success Download

Offers / Calls-to-Action y How do we come up with compelling offers to use in advertising, emails,

content marketing and the website? y Would you say that our offers:o are unique?

o provoke curiosity?

o are valuable / desired?

o cut through clutter?

o drive action?

y How well have they performed? Would you call them lead magnets? y What are the best performing offers that we’ve used? [i.e. lead magnets] y What are some of our worst performing offers? Why? y How do we assess the effectiveness of our offers?o How do we test and optimize offers to drive greater lead flow?

y How have we mapped offers to each stage of the buying journey?o Blog content upgrades – checklists, resource guides, worksheets, etc.

https://www.slideshare.net/ToddEbert/building-a-demand-gen-engine-dashboard


� For example, on a post about landing pages offer a one page guide with the 5 proven best practice landing page designs that will boost your conversion rate overnight

o Educational content like analyst reports, ebooks, whitepapers and webinars?

o Self-assessments, apps and diagnostic tools?

o Expert consultations and assessments?

o Product/technical demos?

o Product configurators and price calculators?

o Free product trials?

o Discounted pricing or free add-on products?

Lead Gen Plan y What is our profile of an ideal customer?o What firmographic, technographic, and psychographic criteria do we

use to describe that ideal customer?

o Who are the key people we need to reach in the decision-making unit at that ideal customer?

y What is our definition of an ideal qualified lead?

o How do we define a lead at each stage as it progresses through to a closed sale?

� Are our definitions of an ideal lead the same or different than the sales team definitions?

Expertise Professional consultation and

analysis of a key issue e.g. free website and SEO assessment &

recommendations

Content Educational materials with

unique insights about a relevant topic / pain point e.g. marketing

dashboard ebook + template

Products Free trials / ”freemium” products enable the user to try before they buy. E.g. 14-day trial of Constant Contact email marketing software

Apps & UtilitiesDiagnostic tools, assessments & calculators that help identify opportunities & solve problems. e.g. HubSpot Marketing Grader

Create Compelling Offers That Are Lead MagnetsEffort to Acquire

Value


o How do we know when a lead is ready to be passed on to the sales team to work?

y How would you describe our partnership with Sales in terms of demand generation?o Do we have a formal plan and program built with the sales team?

o Do we work closely with the sales team or is it more of a simple lead hand-off and they do the rest?

o If I asked the sales reps how effective would they say the marketing team is at giving them qualified leads?

y How many qualified leads do we need to hit revenue targets? y How many leads do we deliver to Sales in a typical month/quarter?o How many are net new leads sourced from marketing programs

[“marketing sourced leads”]?

o How many are leads already in the database that sales has engaged with [“marketing influenced leads”]?

y What percentage of company revenue does marketing contribute [per quarter or per year] from marketing leads?

y What is the company/division revenue target for the year?o What are the goals for new customer growth, retention, upsells, etc.?

o What is the average sales cycle from lead to close?

o What is the average new customer deal size and lifetime value [LTV]?

o What is the cost to acquire a new customer [CAC]?

o What is the number of closed deals needed to hit the revenue target? How does that number breakdown?

� Deals from current customers? [renewals, upsells]

� Deals from new customers?

� Deals brought in by channel partners?

o Of those numbers how many is marketing responsible to deliver from marketing sourced leads?

y What are the demand gen goals for the quarter/year?o How do we set those goals?

o What are the main barriers to achieving those goals?

o How can I help remove those barriers?

y What is our marketing program plan for the year to deliver leads against the company and team objectives listed above?o What are the major themes we are building your programs around?

e.g. big market/customer issues that you solve, new products you’re launching, etc.


o How do we drive awareness and traffic to our site?

� What is the mix of advertising, email, social media, webinars, events and other tactics?

o What does the detailed marketing schedule/roadmap look like?

o Which channels have we tried as part of previous plans? Which ones are most effective in terms of ROI?

y What does the marketing/sales funnel look like? o Draw it on white board with current numbers at each stage and

conversion rates [i.e. inquiries, MQLs, SALs, SQLs, Closed Deals]

o Which channels perform the best in terms of inquiries, leads and closes?

o Which offers perform the best in terms of bringing in inquiries, leads and closes? i.e. which offers or CTAs are your lead magnets?

y How do we build our opt-in subscriber list?o How many subscribers do we have?

o How many do we add each month? How do we get them?

o How many opt-out each month? Do we ask them why?

o How do we measure the effectiveness of the content we send?

y How are we using lead scoring as part of our demand generation plan?o What are the key components of scores? Company firmographics,

decision-maker authority, web pages visited, content consumed, etc.

o How do we get feedback from sales on the accuracy of the scores?

o How do we measure the effectiveness and predictive ability of our scoring system?

Monthly Revenue Target- repeat “run-rate” base business- up-sells & cross-sells to base- channel partner contribution

= Revenue Target for ”Smarketing” Teamx % agreed from Marketing leads (a)

= Marketing Contributed Revenue Target÷ average deal size

= # Closed Deals from Marketing Leads÷ average lead to customer rate (b)

= # Marketing Leads Requireda) set by “smarketing” team based on historical trend data plus a stretch goal associated with spend on marketing programs. b) takes into account the conversion rates all the way down the funnel

Work Backwards to Set Your Lead Targets


Landing Pages y How many landing pages are we currently using? y How do we build them – internally or through a vendor like LeadPages? y What is included on a typical landing page?o Strong value proposition

o Proof of benefits

o Money back guarantee

o Prominent and specific call to action

o Trust building content like video testimonials

y How are they performing in terms of conversion rate and leads? y How do we test and optimize them? y What do our follow-up campaigns look like when someone downloads a

content piece or registers for a webinar? [3-4 email follow-up campaigns are a smaller version of nurture campaigns – see below]

Lead Nurturing y How many leads are being actively nurtured? y How many different lead nurturing campaigns do we run? y How have we mapped our content assets and offers across the nurture

campaign work flow? i.e. which pieces and offers do we use when? y How effective are our lead nurturing campaigns at creating customers?

o How do we measure the effectiveness of each campaign?

o How do we test and optimize all our nurture emails and content?

y What percentage of leads being nurtured eventually turn into customers?

Lead ManagementThe speed and manner with which you intake, respond and handle leads is critical to success, so even though some of this was addressed under the Sales Enablement topic I will cover it in detail here.


y Can you share the map of our lead flow process from beginning to end?o What is the lead flow for inbound leads [calls, forms, emails] from initial

intake to qualification and nurturing to distribution to sales? Who “owns” this?

o What is the lead flow for outbound leads [events, email, etc.] from the event to qualification and nurturing to distribution to sales? Who “owns” this?

y What service level agreements [SLAs] does marketing have in place for lead handling and responsiveness? o For inbound leads e.g. answer all calls live between 7am and 7pm?

o For webinar leads?

o For trade show and events leads?

o For nurtured leads?

y What service level agreements [SLAs] does sales have in place for lead responsiveness, follow-up and disposition?

y What service level agreements [SLAs] does sales management have in place to ensure all leads are worked and reported on by the sales teams?

NEW LEADSOnline ChannelsSearch - PaidSearch - OrganicDisplay adsEmailSocial posts & adsWebinarsAffiliatesPR

Offline ChannelsTele-prospectingRadioSeminarsTrade ShowsPartnersSponsorshipsReferrals

Hot LeadSend Immediately to Rep

Existing LeadUpdate Record Add to Nurture

Not Sales Ready

Add to NurtureSend Great

Content

Alert Rep When Lead

Reaches Min Score[sales ready]

Rep engages, conducts meetings and recycles to nurture if not ready.

Map All Lead Flows – Simple Version


Customer Marketing y Who on the team is responsible for customer marketing programs? y What goals does the company/division have for customer retention and

lifetime value? y Is there a dedicated email newsletter just for customers? y How often do we plan and execute marketing programs to customers for:o Retention?

o Upsell / cross-sell?

o Winback?

y What have been the most successful customer campaigns we’ve run? Why?

y What marketing programs do we run to drive customer referrals? y What offers have we used to incent referrals? y How do we assess and evaluate the effectiveness of customer marketing?

Dashboard y How are we measuring the effectiveness of our demand generation

engine and improving it over time? y What is your lead attribution model? How do we assess which channels

drove the lead?o Which channels are more effective at converting versus assisting?

o Are certain channels being overvalued [search]? Undervalued [display]?

o What are the top converting channels by first and last interaction?

o Are non-branded campaigns leading to branded conversions later? [e.g. email with ebook or webinar that later results in brand name search when the prospect is looking for information online]

o What is the average number of touchpoints prior to conversion?

y What does our dashboard look like?


Simple Dashboard Example

Detailed Dashboard Example

Lead

s Ad

ded

to N

urtu

re##

##

Month Highlights• Total Marketing reach grew X%• Website visits up X% to #,

primary driver was• # new leads this month, up X% • Marketing sourced leads

brought in # customers, up X% • X% of new customers this month• X% of new revenue this month• Reduced CAC by X% to $#

Reach Through ChannelsImpressions [paid + earned + emails]

Website Visits [owned]

######

######

######

########

###

##

%

%

%

%

%

#

#

Inquiries

Inbound MQLsCalls-Emails-Forms

Outbound MQLsEngagements with Emails

SALsIn Target Segment%

SQLs

Won

Renewed

LTV $______ CAC $______ Ratio_______

To get a true picture of conversion rates requires a full year view so that the leads can make it through the sales cycle.


y What KPIs and metrics do we track on the dashboard? o Leading indicators: Impressions, website visits, inquiries, leads,

opportunities

o Lagging indicators: sales from marketing-sourced leads, total contract value, cost of acquisition, average time to close, etc.?

y How often do we run the dashboard and report to key stakeholders? y How do we measure and report on the effectiveness of:o campaigns?

o channels?

o offers?

o content?

y How do we measure and optimize the conversion rates at each stage of the lead-to-revenue flow?

y How do we measure and report on the effectiveness of our lead management SLAs?

y What are the barriers hindering our ability to track and report on key metrics?


If people like you they'll listen to you, but if they trust you they'll do business with you.

Zig Ziglar

BRAND / REPUTATION BUILDING

Marketing is no longer about the stuff you make, but about the stories you tell.

Seth Godin

In previous sections of this document I covered the fact that you need a great brand in order to be successful. [No duh, right?] So, in this section I’ll cover the key questions about how the marketing team goes about building awareness and affinity for the brand. The goal is to create such excellent, authentic, brand-building marketing that you capture the attention of your potential customers, along with analysts, media, investors, partners, and employees. And then through regular and consistent exposure to the awesomeness of your brand their attention turns into interest, affinity, loyalty and advocacy. Once again, this is called the “know-like-trust” cycle and the key is authenticity. You have to be so genuinely useful, educational, entertaining and helpful over a long period of time that people trust that you are the best choice for their success. A well-used framework for brand building involves a three-pronged approach using owned media, earned media and paid media.

PAIDMEDIA

EARNEDMEDIA

OWNEDMEDIA

Advertising is the best way get your message in front of prospects at every step of their buying journey. If you’re not present you can’t win.

Media stories, customer reviews, analyst coverage and social shares create “word-of-mouth” exposure and independent credibility.

Your website, blog, social media pages and company events create an impression that can win or lose customers so impress them with your content.


y How do we build awareness and affinity for our brand BEFORE potential customers need our solutions Or SO that they need our solutions?

y Who “owns” brand building strategy and execution for the marketing team? i.e. who handles advertising, PR, social media marketing, etc.

y How do we integrate these brand building activities with the overall marketing plan and especially content marketing and demand generation?

y How do we ensure that execs know the critical importance of brand building despite it not being as easily measurable as other tactics like email and pay-per-click ads on search engines?

Paid Media - Advertising y What advertising tactics are we using to create brand awareness

with people before they have a need our solutions? [since customers complete most of the buying journey online we have to build awareness before they need us or risk not making it into their consideration set]

y What advertising are we doing to reinforce our brand and build affinity as prospects progress through their buying journey?o Trade journals – contributed content, print campaigns and display

campaigns

o Persona targeted display campaigns

o Company targeted display campaigns

o Behavioral display campaigns

o LinkedIn display campaigns

o Facebook campaigns

o Search engine ad campaigns

o Retargeting campaigns

y How do we evaluate the results of our advertising campaigns? y Do we create our display ads in-house or through an agency?

o Which agencies do we use for creative?

o How long is the relationship?

o What is their monthly retainer fee?

o Are you happy with their output and results?

o How often do we evaluate the agency? On what criteria?

o How do we ensure the agency stays “on brand” in their creative?

o How often do we test and optimize ad creative?


Owned Media – Email & Social Media y I’ve covered a lot of key questions about the website and blog in the

earlier section on Web Presence so I will not address them here. y What is our strategy for the email newsletter?

o Who “owns” the newsletter?

o What is the content strategy for the newsletter?

o How many subscribers do we have?

o How many subscribers do we add in a typical month?

o How often do we send it?

o How do we measure effectiveness in conveying key brand messages?

y What is our social media strategy?o Who manages the social media accounts?

o Which sites do our target customers use the most? i.e. which ones are most important for us?

o What is the cadence of posting to those sites?

o How do we gather/generate the best content to use socially?

o What content types generate the most engagements?

o How do we monitor and respond to all comments, questions and complaints?


Owned Media - Webinars & Company-hosted Events y What is our webinar strategy?o How often do we hold webinars?

o How do we select the content topics and speakers?

o How do we feed them into our lead gen campaigns?

o How do we measure the effectiveness?

y How often do we do company events or seminar series?o What are the goals for these?

o How are they structured?

o What is the content strategy?



Earned Media – PR & AR y What is the media relations plan for the next 12 months?

o What are the major themes or messages that we want to get coverage on? Why?

y Who is the PR agency?

o How long is the relationship?




y Which publications are most important to us? i.e. Which ones are most impactful on our target audience?o Could I get a copy of our target publication list – ranked for each of

our major press themes?

y Who are our top subject matter experts and spokespeople that can be interviewed for articles?o Have they had formal media training?

y What is our strategy for obtaining speaking opportunities?o Which events/shows are on our list?

o Who are our best speakers by topic area?

o How do we measure their effectiveness?

o What is our strategy for analyst relations?o Who owns AR for the company?

o Which analysts/firms are most important to our target customers?

o What coverage have we obtained in their reports?

o What is the general analyst sentiment on the company/products? Positive? Negative?

o What is the analyst relations budget for the year? How is that broken out between paying for research versus consulting time?

o How often do we conduct analyst briefings?

o How else are we influencing their opinions of the company/products?


y What is our strategy for community relations?o Who owns CR for the company?

o What are the key elements of the CR plan for the next year?



Owned + Earned Media – Employee Advocacy y How many employee shares of our content were there on social networks

[LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, etc.] last month? y How are we leveraging the employees, especially sales reps, to share all

the great content we produce for the website and blog across their social media networks?

y Do we run a formal employee advocacy program with training and tools that makes it easy for them to get on board with spreading the word?o If not, why?

o If yes, what tools do we provide them [e.g. send them a weekly email with new content to share or use an app like SocialChorus]?

o What types of content do we include in the program?

o How do we measure the results?

Owned + Earned Media – Online Reputation y What do people see when they search for you on Google and Bing? What

is the overall sentiment of the page? [i.e. how many positive links versus negative links]o What is the sentiment of the search engine results pages [SERPs] for our:

� Company name

� Company name + reviews

� Company name + complaints

� Product names

� Product names + reviews

� Executive names


y What do people see when they search for us directly on review and directory sites?o What is our average rating on each of the following sites?

� Review sites: Google, Yelp, etc.

� Industry sites: unique to your industry

� Product review sites: unique to your industry

� Employment sites: GlassDoor, Indeed, etc.

� Complaints sites: Complaints Board, RipOff Report, etc.

o Do we have a large enough number of positive reviews to outweigh the negative ones?

o What is our process for getting new reviews from customers?

� On key review websites like Google, Yelp, and industry-specific sites

� On independent product review sites like G2Crowd, TrustRadius, etc.

y Who is the person that owns responsibility for our online reputation and proactively improving it?

y What is the dashboard that he/she uses to track and report the company’s online reputation?

y How many case studies and testimonial videos do we have on our website?


o Is there a dedicated page for them or spread all over the site? How many page views does it get? How is that relative to views of other pages?

o Who owns responsibility for working with the sales and service teams to identify happy customers and solicit cases/testimonials?

o How many of those do we plan to get each month/quarter? Do we achieve that goal?

y Do we have a YouTube page where we post customer testimonial videos? y Do we use an agency for SEO and reputation SEO? o How long is the relationship?




y Who monitors negative [or positive] comments on across all our social media accounts like LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, SlideShare, etc.?

y What is the reporting/escalation/resolution process for upset customers that post negative reviews or comments on those social sites?


About Todd Ebert

I am an unabashed Longhorn fan, annoyingly observant father, technology tethered raspberry Snapple drinker, 51% Philly direct / 49% Texas nice, self-proclaimed chip & salsa connoisseur, fluent in sarcasm, smoked meat aficionado and Paleo eating specialist, dogs vs. cats, underwhelming golfer, never met an IPA I didn’t like, getter of shit done.

I believe the difference between winners and losers in today's hyper-competitive markets is great marketing, and that's something I know a bit about. I’ve spent twenty-five years with my sleeves rolled up leading marketing teams that drive growth and increase enterprise value. I'm a student of both the art and the science of marketing with lots of experience marrying the two for powerful results.

Marketing is too important to be left to the marketing department.

David Packard

Check out my presentation, 17 Memes That Every Leader Needs

https://twitter.com/ToddEbert

https://www.linkedin.com/in/toddebert/

https://www.slideshare.net/ToddEbert

www.toddebert.com

https://www.slideshare.net/ToddEbert/17-memes-every-leader-needs


Appendix 1Brand Discovery and Development Exercises

y Write down the list of what we are and what we are not. This is to make it super clear what type of company we are and what we do not want people to think we do. Then pick the best description of what you do and write the PR strap line ------- e.g. XYZ Corp, a leader in ________ announced today that….

y Write what excites you about working here – why are you here…what great work will you do, what great impact will you have on the world? Here’s an example from Deloitte.

y Write the headlines of the future that you would be proud to see in major publications. For example, at Catapult Sports I’d like to see “17 of the world’s top 20 championship teams rely on this company’s tech to beat the competition” – Sports Illustrated February 2, 2018

y Make a list of all the real people you know who embody the company. Who would you say is the face of the company? This can be employees or outsiders who personify the brand.

y Which of the 12 brand archetypes are we? Why that one? Explain your rationale. See the following appendix for a chart of all the archetypes. The brand archetype will be used to guide the messaging, graphics, website, communications, everything…

y Once you have agreed on a brand archetype, re-write the company About Us page or the product web page in that personality and tone of voice. This should explain the value we provide to world without any “gobbledygook”. In other words, you need to write like you are the person in that archetype [hero, magician, rebel, sage]. For an example, the www.footcardigan.com website has a distinctive tone of voice that is quite different than what you’d expect from a sock company. Here are 5 great B2B examples.

"All the facts and figures that talk to our size and diversity and years of history, as notable and important as they may be, are secondary to the truest measure of Deloitte: The impact we make in the world.

So, when people ask, 'What's different about Deloitte?' the answer resides in the many specific examples of where we have helped Deloitte member firm clients, our people, and sections of society to achieve remarkable goals, solve complex problems, or make meaningful progress. Deeper still, it's in the beliefs, behaviors, and fundamental sense of purpose that underpin all that we do."

http://www.footcardigan.com

https://www.b2bmarketing.net/en/resources/blog/5-examples-awesome-about-us-pages-b2b-brands


y Using a whiteboard storyboard the 90 second company/product marketing video commercial and/or the sales pitch. This should list out the characters, hero, quest the hero is on, emotion you want viewers to feel, and then graphically show the panels [slides] for how the hero gets to the promised land. Check out “the best sales deck ever” approach to show how you will deliver the customer to the promised land.

y Write 3-4 provocative story abstracts about why the company/product is so special for the PR team to use in media pitches. In other words, write the story you’d like to see printed in the WSJ about the company/product.

y Write a short but attention-grabbing and impactful introductory email to new prospect explaining why they need our solutions. i.e. write the world’s best marketing email about your company/products.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/greatest-sales-deck-ive-ever-seen-andy-raskin?trk=hp-feed-article-title-like


Appendix 2Brand Archetypes


Unaware[Passive]

Exploring[Interest]

Researching[Consideration

Evaluating[Intent]

Validating

Purchasing

Appendix 3The B2B Buying Journey

The B2B buying journey is highly complex, not linear as depicted in this graphic. But for the sake of simplicity I am using the funnel to define the typical stages that buyers go through when trying to solve a business problem.

Has no need or is unaware of business problem. Possibly unaware of many vendors.

Becomes aware of a business issue or need and starts trying to learn about potential causes and solutions.

Researches requirements and determines cost estimate. Adds and subtracts vendors from consideration set.

Seeks budget approval. Analyzes and compares vendors then narrows down to a short list. Solicits proposals/pricing.

Chooses winner and justifies the choice to the decision-making unit. Gets approval and alerts key stakeholders.

Negotiates final price, Issues purchase order, and signs contract. Implements solution, goes through onboarding, and measures results.


Appendix 4Customer Personas

Responsibilities/Challenges: • Develop brand's strategic marketing plan in

partnership with agencies; then sell ideas to boss

• Maintain integrity of brand (personality, TOW

• Direct and approve program creative

• Manage and allocate budget across all activities

• High-level oversight of tactical execution; coordinating execution with peers in sales

• Campaign must align with brand strategy

What keeps hint up at night: • What's the next big idea?

• Staying ahead/keeping up with competition

• Brand growth —YOY sales, promotion-based lift, brand awareness, brand sentiment (affinity)

• Personal/career growth

• Is the ROl justifying the spend?

• How can I sell this to my boss?

• Maximize value from agencies

General motivations: • Motivated by getting recognition for good

ideas and success

• Everyone is trying to sell them but don't want to be fired for trying something new/unproven

• Don't want added hassle; prefer plug n' play 3. party systems that are easy to scale/execute

Information Sources:

Agency partners

Ad Week

Ad platforms Facebook Twitter, Google)

AMA

ANA

Blogs

Business School Publications

Focus groups

LinkedIn

Personal Peer Network

PR Week

Watching competitors or brands they admire

Brand Marketer Ben (Consumer Packaged Goods)

Associate Brand Manager or Brand Manager Male 30-38


Messaging Element Questions Yes or No?

Buyer Insight Does our message tie to buyer insight we have uncovered or validated?

Yes or No

Target Buyer Audience Does our message map to a target audience and targeted buyer personas?

Yes or No

Message PurposeDo we have a clearly defined purpose for our mes-sage? Does our message aim at informing, affinity, or action?

Yes or No

Unique PositionDoes our message clearly articulate a unique position? Does it help us differentiate from com-petitors?

Yes or No

Brand Promise Does our message uphold the brand promise of our organization?

Yes or No

Tailored Messaging Have we tailored our messaging appropriately to targeted channels, buying stages, and audiences?

Yes or No

Appendix 5Messaging Checklist


Appendix 6Product / Market Situation Analysis

NOTE: This is a greatly shortened version of an analysis document intended to illustrate some of the information you need prior to go-to-market. You will want work with Product Management, Sales, Finance and Service to complete a much deeper analysis for your product launches.

Questions Answers

TARGET MARKET

Why are we launching this product? Busi-ness rationale? Customer need? Competitive defense?

Which market segments have the most need for this product? Why?

Why will we win in that market?

Who is the ideal customer for the product? Describe their unique characteristics.

• Geography• Industry, sub-vertical• Size (revenue, employees, etc.)• Technologies used• Services used• Need states / use cases• Other criteria you define

Firmographics:

Technographics:

Psychographics:

PRODUCT ANALYSIS

What are the primary use cases for when/why a customer uses the product? Provide details on how/when it will be used and key require-ments.

What are the features and benefits for this solution?

Provide detailed features with their associated benefits to customers. Do in rank order from most important to least important.


Provide the feedback from sales reps & indus-try analysts on our solution/offer.

• Likes• Dislikes• Suggestions• Recommendations• Use Cases

What is the timeline starting today though all major milestones until completion.Include dates for items such as:• Dev / Design check-ins• Positioning / Messaging Complete• QA / UAT• Demo Available• GA

COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS

How/why do customers use competitor prod-ucts instead of ours?

Why are customers satisfied and/or dissatisfied with competitor products?

List the following for each key competitor:1. What is their market share?2. What distribution channels?3. What is their pricing structure?4. How do they position themselves?5. Why do people buy from them?

List the following for each key competitor:1. Product features 2. Product benefits3. Product value prop

PRICE ANALYSIS How is the solution priced for all channels? Explain how the pricing was determined for each channel.

Local Sales National Accts Partners Country A Country B Country C Country D

How does our pricing compare to competitors? Insert table comparing major competitor prices.

What are the order requirements for each channel? Are there any specific buying instruc-tions?


FINANCIAL PROJECTIONS Provide an overview of the quarterly / annual financial projections for this solution:

• Number of Accounts • Average Deal Size• Acquisition Cost• Lifetime Value• Total Revenue• Margin • Others TBD

SYSTEMS/PROCESSES

Explain how this solution/offer will impact our existing systems.

System A System B System C System D System E System F

Explain how this solution/offer will impact other departments and processes.

Billing Provisioning Finance Support

Other Other

FAQs

Develop a list of anticipated questions (FAQs). What will our Sales people ask us? And what will Customers ask the Sales and Service peo-ple? What are our answers?

CUSTOMER OBJECTIONS

Develop a list of anticipated objections and how Sales should respond.

BETA TEST ANALYSIS

When was the Beta, how did it work, and how long did it run?

Provide background on what we tested.

Which accounts did we recruit for the beta?

List the customer names who were part of the beta and describe key characteristics of why they were selected. Are the representative of the customers we want to sell to? Why or why not? Did the beta testers get the product for free?


Who led the beta and who else is involved?

Sales, PM, etc. What information did we gather from them on the effectiveness of the beta?

What did we measure to determine the suc-cess/failure of the beta?

Describe the criteria for success – product mea-sures, financial measures, etc..

What was the CUSTOMER feedback?

Did Customers feel the solution/offer lived up to its intended purpose? Why or why not?

What did Customers LIKE about the solution?

What did Customers DISLIKE about the solu-tion?

What new features did Customers ask for?

And which features did they suggest changes to?

Would Customers purchase this solution/offer? Why or why not?

Would Customers recommend this solution/offer to a friend?

Why or why not?

What was the SALES team feedback?

List what the Field LIKE about the solution/offer. (UI/UX, features, etc.)

What did the Field DISLIKE about the solution?

Does the Field think that they can sell this solu-tion? What features did they say need to be added in order for them to be able to sell it?

What challenges does the Field foresee in sell-ing this offer/solution?

What tools would the Field find useful to sell this solution/offer? (I.e. demo, collateral, train-ing, videos, etc.)


Appendix 7Positioning and Messaging Document [PMD]

NOTE: This is a greatly shortened version of a product PMD intended to illustrate some of the information you need in order to go-to-market. You will want to do a much deeper and more thorough messaging doc for your product launch.

Ideal Customer

Define exactly who Marketing should market to and who Sales should sell to. Must be detailed with specific firmographic, tech-nographic and psychographic criteria. Include the key members of the customer decision-making unit.

Firmographics:

Technographics:

Psychographics:

Other Criteria:

Customer Pain Points

What are the top 3 pain points or needs that customers have that beg the need for our product? Assign weights to each by impor-tance of the pain to customer.

Weight Description of Audience Pain

Voice/Tone

Describe the tone we should take in our writing when communicat-ing with this audience. i.e. formal vs. informal, technical vs. busi-ness, etc.

Solution Description

Short description in layman’s terms about how the solution works and what it does for the customer. This should be the ex-planation that a typical customer would understand, not a technical deep dive.


Positioning

Succinct description about how the solution fits into the compa-ny’s portfolio and how it supports the company’s mission/BHAG.

Value Proposition

Describe how the solution solves the customer pain points. Go be-yond features/benefits to explain the financial value -- cost savings, cost avoidance, revenue genera-tion, productivity improvement, etc.

The solution provides value [financial value] to customer in the following ways:1.2.3.4.5.

Competitive Differentiation

What are the top 3 reasons the audience should buy our solution versus alternatives?

Proof Points

What proof do we have that we are the best? They need to be facts – independently sourced and legally defensible.

Product Features & Benefits

Provide a deeper dive on each product/technology feature and the resultant benefit to the customer. Start with the most important feature to the custom-er at 1 and then work down to the least important.

For example:

Feature = radial tire pattern engi-neered to grip wet roads

Benefit = drive safely in bad weather, protect your family

Features– describe what it is and what it does for the customer

Benefits – describe the benefits that fea-ture provides to the customer

1 2 3


Anticipated Questions [FAQs]The purpose of this section is to anticipate the most common questions and objectives by customers and provide our answer. We will use this to write marketing messages in our collateral and website that directly address the questions before they are asked.

Question Answer

501 Questions Every B2B CMO Needs To Ask

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Transcript of 501 Questions Every B2B CMO Needs To Ask