The hand-off in a relay is a critical point in the race. Valuable time can be lost if the baton hand-off is not precise or even worse, the race can be lost if the baton is dropped.
The hand-off of leads from marketing to sales is like the relay race hand-off. Not only can time be lost, but revenue can be lost.
Ways marketing can help with the hand-off of leads to help sales and sales management (while also helping marketing in its efforts):
1. Gather information to help qualify the lead. For example, with a web form, design the submittal form to gather important information that will help ‘qualify’ the lead. Work with sales to identify desired fields and then balance what is reasonable to ask while keeping the form short. Example: For a B to B client, we designed the web form to enable the individual to indicate if budget is approved, timeframe a decision will be made (having pre-defined timeframes set) and enabling files to be attached to the lead to provide further specifications. Forms can be designed to test layout and number of fields required and option to determine what will work best for your industry.
Know your audience (marketing 101) – give your prospect flexibility; while for one client we would like to gather phone and email, the reality is our target audience is more likely to prefer email over phone. Knowing that, we do not require a phone number at the risk of receiving no leads vs. leads with less information than is ideal.
Benefit to sales: marketing is handing off leads that have quality indicators that assist them in further qualifying the lead: budget approved (yes or no), timeframe of need, specification files attached. Level of detail in the form submitted assist sales in acting on this lead quickly with a focused list of questions.
2. Too many batons…Any other marketers out there frustrated that leads generated are not being followed up on? Uggh!
Years ago when initially getting started with a particular client, the client acknowledged they lacked leads. There was NO inbound activity. The company was solely reliant on its existing customer base with little to no new business being generated. The sales function was largely an order taking function. Fast forward, we get the marketing foundation in place, start executing an integrated marketing plan and the tables turn. Leads are coming in the door and guess what? Sales is now having a tough time prioritizing and keeping up! Now leads are not being followed up on and sales is complaining that the volume of inbound leads is too much.
How can marketing help with this challenge? Stay in the race after handing off the baton. What I mean by this is, marketing run alongside sales as they work the leads to learn more about what is happening to the leads. Gather the facts (not hearsay) as to how leads are being assigned, what leads are not good and why, and help contribute to solutions vs. walking away and categorizing the issue as a sales problem. Gathering facts will help you determine if there is an opportunity to refine the lead generation activities and reduce overall volume while maintaining or improving overall quality. Running alongside sales will also shed insight into raising the important issue of leads not being worked at all. As part of the relay team, do your leg of the race well and then support your team members in getting to the finish line strong.
3. Offer insight into Prioritizing Leads
Not all leads are created equal.
Many would argue that prioritizing leads is squarely in the court of sales management and not marketing. I would agree, except For Marketing Matters’ clients are small and mid-sized businesses. Organizational structure and responsibilities are not always as defined as we have seen in our corporate experiences. So while staying in our lane, marketers can provide great insight into working with sales to help prioritize leads. Specifically, marketing as keeper of the brand has developed the ideal target profile, is aware of and well-versed in entry-level products/services and those that help build a loyal and committed customer. Marketing offers great insight into what should affect prioritizing a lead.
If there are not parameters in place for prioritizing leads and you as the marketing team are generating leads, develop a straw man to work with sales management to finalize and agree to. If sales is not working all leads or loses sight of past leads that were important, but are no longer on the radar screen, get a simple yet clear prioritization process in place. This helps get some leads to “NO” quicker and helps sales and sales management clearly understand what leads deserve attention and what ones take a backseat. Not all leads are created equal. Don’t allocate time equally across leads.
How to get started: Use a simple prioritization indicator such as A, B, C, D or use 4 star, 3 start, 2 star and 1 star or 1,2,3 or 4.
If prioritizing is an issue and sales is losing sight of where to spend their time, marketing can get this prioritization underway, agreed to and incorporated into pipeline reporting. This helps marketing show the quality of leads that they are generating and it helps sales learn how to allocate their time and sales management can mange the pipeline and coach to this prioritization. With an agreed to prioritization, you can also address head with facts the quality of the leads being generated by marketing and by sales as all leads should be prioritized in the same manner no matter the source.
The revenue generating engine in any company includes marketing and sales. Instead of throwing leads over the fence, handoff the leads and then stay in the race to monitor, learn, and refine. Marketers should be an active participant in generating revenue. Then when the baton comes back to marketing for lead generation, you are in better shape to run your leg well and greatly contribute to overall success.