BY MICHAEL MCCLELLAN – www.PlexusMarketing.com 

A heartfelt ‘thank you’ to all of the attendees to my ‘Meet the Expert” presentation of 9/17/08 on B2B Demand Generation.  As a follow-up to that session, I’d like to address two questions from Laura Hollenstein of Premier Marketing Resources, who attended my presentation:

1. What have you found to be the most effective approach in reaching the decision makers when selling your services?  Sometimes that “firewall” can be pretty difficult to break through. 

This is an excellent question, since marketing professional services (which includes ‘marketing services’) is typically more challenging than other B2B products and services.  While there is no one approach that fits all professional services companies, here are a few suggestions (that Plexus Marketing Group, Inc. also uses) which might make the challenge easier: 

(a)    Enlist the Help of Gatekeepers –  the “firewall” can indeed be difficult to break through, but most ‘gatekeepers’ (e.g. personal assistants and marketing coordinators/analysts) are reasonably informed about the overall direction and ‘pain points’ of a company.  Invest a few minutes of time talking with them and share your ‘elevator speech’, paying particular attention to specifically how your services have benefited companies like theirs.  Next, indicate how answers to 2 or 3 key questions (that you intend to ask the decision maker who you’re trying to reach) could help determine if there is a potential match between your firm and theirs, and enlist their help in getting the answers to those questions.  Finally, offer to send a Capabilities PDF or whitepaper to them that explains your company’s benefits and ask them to share it with the decision maker.  Indicate that you would like their help in determining how best to proceed and that you are interested in starting a relationship building process with their company, then arrange a time to follow-up – remembering to thank the gatekeeper for their assistance.  My marketing team has used this approach successfully, and I believe it will work for you (at least in a significant number of cases where it is used). 

(b)  Cultivate a Business Development ‘Apprentice’ Skilled in Consultative Selling of Your Firm’s Services —   while I spent the first 7 years of my career at a Fortune 100 company (including experience as an outside sales representative), it was not until I started a consulting practice that I felt that I really learned the art of the complex sale and how to be truly consultative when selling.  I am convinced that my day-to-day participation in consulting service delivery was one of the key reasons for my improved lead generation and close rates during that part of my career.  Since those early days of Plexus Marketing Group, Inc., I have been committed to the ‘apprentice approach’ to developing business development talent within my firm.  For example, I am strongly committed to a ‘team selling’ approach, where other members of our marketing and business development team can acquire consultative selling skills and be exposed to ‘best practices’ first-hand.  There are certain parts of the business development process – such as lead generation and marketing event support – where less experienced team members can be a part of the process and gain early successes without having to do the actual consultative selling.  Also, by involving these business development ‘apprentices’ in portions of your company’s service delivery (even if just for one or two projects), they will more quickly become experts on your company’s professional service delivery processes and will be able to speak with more authority during their business development calls. 

(c ) Consider Leveraging Your Key Business Development Executives’ Time and Expertise through Web Videos —   my firm is a TechLINKS sponsor (see www.techlinks.net) and we recently attended one of their special events where they gave participants the opportunity to make a 4 minute presentation on their services to a group of C-level executives, which was then digitally recorded and posted on our company listing at the TechLINKS site.  This marketing tool not only allowed me to leverage my time and expertise in a way that my business development team could then use on its prospecting calls, but it also has generated new business leads from prospects using TechLINKS to locate potential service providers.  Web videos are especially effective tools for professional services companies because they allow the consultants, doctors, attorneys, or other professional service providers to showcase their expertise and let prospects evaluate the potential fit with the provider companies prior to talking with one of the company’s representatives (who then, because of the video, does not have to be one of the key professionals or executives).  Roger Stix of Atlanta Business Video (www.atlantabusinessvideo.com) – who is a client and friend of mine – has related case studies of how professionals such as doctors, attorneys, and B2B professionals have significantly improved their business acquisition metrics through the use of website videos for a modest investment of less than $3000. 

2. How effective or is it ever effective to leave a voice mail for the decision maker regarding the products and services you are selling? I’m referring to a cold call voice mail. 

I think that voice mail messages can be effective in building awareness for your company’s products and services, providing that you have targeted your market segment and audience well and adhere to a few key guidelines:  (a) keep it brief (30 seconds or less is preferred); (b) describe your services and include an attention-grabbing ‘factoid’ that highlights one of the benefits your firm offers companies like theirs; and (c ) include your web address and contact number.  Then, follow up with a key gatekeeper at their company (using the techniques described above) to build upon the ‘beachhead’ that your voice message has established.  And, of course, keep at it … it may take a number of attempts and a variety of approaches to finally reach a particularly busy executive. 

Close this WindowBookmark and Share This Page

Save to Browser Favorites

Ask backflip blinklist BlogBookmark Bloglines BlogMarks Blogsvine BUMPzee! CiteULike co.mments Connotea del.icio.us

DotNetKicks Digg diigo dropjack.com dzone Facebook Fark Faves Feed Me Links Friendsite folkd.com Furl

Google Hugg Jeqq Kaboodle linkaGoGo LinksMarker Ma.gnolia Mister Wong Mixx MySpace MyWeb Netvouz

Newsvine PlugIM popcurrent Propeller Reddit Rojo Segnalo Shoutwire Simpy sk*rt Slashdot Sphere

Sphinn Spurl.net Squidoo StumbleUpon Technorati ThisNext Webride Windows Live Yahoo!

Email This to a Friend

Copy HTML: 

If you like this then please subscribe to the RSS Feed.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

More »