{"id":7852,"date":"2011-11-16T13:53:33","date_gmt":"2011-11-16T13:53:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.matthew-j-smith.com\/?p=7852"},"modified":"2023-09-05T02:04:10","modified_gmt":"2023-09-05T02:04:10","slug":"has-b2b-marketing-embraced-lead-generation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.matthew-j-smith.com\/?p=7852","title":{"rendered":"Has B2B Marketing Embraced Lead Generation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>MarketingSherpa LLC, a MECLABS Group Company, has released their 2012 edition of the <em>B2B Marketing Benchmark Report. <\/em>They surveyed more than 1,700 B2B marketers in what they call one of the most extensive studies in the industry.\u00a0 The full report looks at top challenges B2B marketers are facing, barriers preventing success and best practices to attract and convert the B2B buyer.<\/p>\n<p>Based on survey responses, MarketingSherpa claims <em>\u201cMarketers now prioritize lead conversion over branding, reputation and awareness, despite its traditional connotation as a \u2018Sales responsibility.\u2019\u201d<\/em> They also state that,<em>\u201cMarketers are realizing the importance of supporting conversion as a marketing function by incorporating funnel optimization strategies to accelerate sales pipeline performance.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>I wonder how many Chief Sales Officers agree with these two findings?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Our conversations are far more anecdotal than Sherpa\u2019s 1,700 person survey but the majority of CEOs andCSOs we talk to still claim far less than necessary support from marketing in the area of lead generation. \u00a0\u00a0Sure, that could be because CSOs talking to 3FORWARD are the ones <em>looking for help<\/em> in some aspect of their sales process \u2013 and leads is on the top of nearly every CSOs list.\u00a0 But other internal data we do track very closely tell us marketing may be <strong><em>talking<\/em><\/strong> lead gen but is not ready to <strong><em>own<\/em><\/strong> lead gen.<\/p>\n<p>Back to the Sherpa study.\u00a0 Here\u2019s one set of findings from the survey showing what B2B marketers indicate are their top priorities.\u00a0 How does this compare to your organization?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Top B2B marketing priorities (vs. challenges)<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Lead generation\n<ul>\n<li>60% \u2013 Priority<\/li>\n<li>48% \u2013 Challenge<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Converting qualified leads\n<ul>\n<li>57% \u2013 Priority<\/li>\n<li>52% \u2013 Challenge<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Branding, reputation and awareness\n<ul>\n<li>45% \u2013 Priority<\/li>\n<li>38% \u2013 Challenge<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Do you run sales or marketing for your company?\u00a0 Tell us how this compares to your priorities, challenges and realities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MarketingSherpa LLC, a MECLABS Group Company, has released their 2012 edition of the B2B Marketing Benchmark Report. They surveyed more [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.matthew-j-smith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7852"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.matthew-j-smith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.matthew-j-smith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.matthew-j-smith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.matthew-j-smith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7852"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.matthew-j-smith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7852\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8176,"href":"https:\/\/www.matthew-j-smith.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7852\/revisions\/8176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.matthew-j-smith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7852"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.matthew-j-smith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7852"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.matthew-j-smith.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7852"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}