Sunday, September 12, 2010

B2B Marketing Through Lead Generation

Every business needs sales to survive and one of the business to business marketing strategies that are often used to make this happen is lead generation. In order to have steady flow of qualified prospects down the pipeline that a business can sell its products and services to, an effective sales lead generation campaign is an absolute necessity. The business to business marketing strategy of lead generation is the process that consistently keeps qualified prospects flowing steadily through this pipeline. In order to accomplish this, any lead generation strategies implemented must be well targeted and appropriate to your business and budget. It is therefore essential that any strategy that is chosen be done after a careful assessment of the existing situation and the future needs in order to provide measurable benefits.

To many businesses, a business to business marketing strategy that involves lead generation is simply having an expensive brochure or a flashy website. While corporate websites are an invaluable tool, they are only effective they are integrated with other sales tools and marketing materials. The goal of any lead generation strategy should be to initiate contact and develop that relationship to become a business one. Thus, an effective marketing strategy is more than brochures and websites. Since lead generation is the heart of business sales, it can be said that you cannot survive without actively seeking new clients. Unless you are a monopoly, you primary goal should be to target clients with an immediate need and fill that need. Even where a need does not exist, establishing and maintaining prospects should be a consideration for any business to business marketing strategy so that your products and services will take precedence when the need arises.

If you are actively visible to your prospects, their immediate need will move them to request a quote or ask for further discussions and this happens more often that you think. With no budget in mind most prospects will ask for additional information and if they clearly the eventual return on investment, they will ask for a quote. Since most prospects already have vendors, your goal should be to ensure that you are on the top of the ‘vendors to consider’ list when the current vendor fails to satisfy their future needs. In order to maintain top-of-mind awareness it is thus essential that you build and maintain an ongoing relationship with your qualified prospects in this highly competitive market. Any business to business marketing lead generation strategy undertaken should clearly have this as its main goal.

Marketing Consultant in Kansas City