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Secrets to Becoming a Modern Marketer

THE STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE

What’s Inside

Executive Summary................................................................................................................................3

Step 1 – Technology: Modern Marketers Use Technology to Simplify Their Approach.......................4

Step 2 – Engagement Planning: Modern Marketers Plan Before They Execute...................................5

Step 3 – Data Intelligence: Modern Marketers Ensure Data Is Clean, Accurate, and Complete.......11

Step 4 – Demand Generation: Modern Marketers Drive Revenue – And Prove It.............................15

Step 5 – Inside Sales: Modern Marketers Understand the Value of Human Interaction...................18

Bottom Line..........................................................................................................................................19

Executive Summary

This Solution Guide is written for marketing leaders. In it you’ll learn how to get your company on the path to

becoming a modern marketer. You’ll get actionable takeaways, insights from your peers, thought leadership from

the likes of Forrester and SiriusDecisions, and best practices from Televerde’s own experience.

What does it mean to be a “modern marketer”?

Modern marketers are ones who excel at harnessing technology and strategy for targeting, engagement, conversion, and

analysis, according to Forrester. In a recent survey of marketing decision makers across the U.S. and Europe, just 11% of

companies qualified as modern marketers. 33% qualified as experienced, 41% as developing, and 15% as novice.1

The benefits of being a modern marketer are significant:

• 44% of modern marketers said their companies exceeded revenue goals by 10% or more last year, compared

with just 23% of peers

• When asked to describe the results of upgrading to modern marketing practices, over 55% pointed to

increased sales and 37% to higher profitability

• 94% of modern marketers told Forrester that they have attained a significant market share, and 49% enjoy

the market-leading position2

This Solution Guide is organized into five sections that follow the principles of modern marketing:

1. Technology – modern marketers use technology to simplify their approach

2. Engagement planning – modern marketers plan before they execute

3. Data intelligence – modern marketers ensure their data is clean, accurate, and complete

4. Demand generation – modern marketers drive revenue, and prove it

5. Inside sales – modern marketers understand the value of human interaction

Most of the work that a modern marketer does is strategy in preparation for execution. And certainly, it goes far beyond

technology.

Getting sales and marketing aligned. Defining leads at various stages of the buying cycle. Developing a framework for

scoring leads based on explicit prospect identity and implicit prospect interest. Building buyer personas and mapping

the buyer journey. Aligning your marketing processes to utilize and take advantage of the insights from the new

technology. Ensuring your data is clean, accurate, and complete.

All that has to happen before demand generation can begin.

1 Forrester. “Why You Need to Be a Modern Marketer: The Business Impact of Marketing Maturity in the Age of the Customer.” Oct 2014.2 ibid

3 Secrets to Becoming a Modern Marketer

Then modern marketers drive revenue—and prove it. The end result of the journey to becoming a modern marketer is

the ability to answer the questions “How many [insert your product/service here] are we going to sell?” and “How do we

sell more [product/service]?” and “What is going to drive the most sales?” Being able to answer those questions earns

marketing a seat, as Forrester puts it, at the grownup’s table.3

Step 1 – Technology: Modern Marketers Use Technology to Simplify Their Approach

57% of respondents to the Forrester modern marketer survey admitted their marketing infrastructure is not well integrated.

In contrast, modern marketers have a standard, fully integrated cross-channel marketing automation platform.4

People and Process Excellence

Of course, it is not having a marketing automation technology tool that benefits modern marketers—it is having

implemented it properly and using it to its fullest potential. So whether a company is implementing marketing

automation technology for the first time or revisiting their utilization of a platform, the people and the process are as

important as the technology itself.

Too often, companies buy a marketing automation tool but don’t end up getting the return on investment (ROI) they

expected because they didn’t anticipate the processes they’d have to change for the tool to reach its potential. Often,

marketers get overwhelmed with the potential capabilities of the tool and fail to learn how to interpret the insights the

tool is generating.

3 Lori Wizdo. “Shift Focus to the Customer Life Cycle to Take L2RM to the Next Level.” Forrester. 30 Jan 2015.4 Forrester. “Why You Need to Be a Modern Marketer: The Business Impact of Marketing Maturity in the Age of the Customer.” Oct 2014.

Marketing Automation Benefits for Modern Marketers

14%Just 14% of companies

have a standard, fully integrated cross-channel

marketing automation platform, according

to Forrester.

Clear Benefits: Companies that automate

lead management see a 20% or greater increase in

revenue in 6 months, according to Gartner.

20%@


That failure is often (at least in part) because the skills necessary to implement and run a marketing automation tool

are quite different than the skills necessary to manage marketing operations. In response, some companies outsource

the strategic setup and implementation of the marketing automation tool or contract for utilization of the platform

through an agency. An in-house platform specialist can be difficult to find… and to keep. Many times, utilizing a partner

for the ongoing administration of your tool can enable you to stay focused on the strategy while the tool administration

expert runs the execution.

Another common source of failure in leveraging marketing technology is the difficulty integrating disparate technology

tools to tell a single story. Modern marketers recognize the importance of having integrated technology tools—including

the customer relationship management tool and the marketing automation tool as the foundation of the modern

marketers’ technology stack, not to mention the wide range of other marketing technologies available. The goal is to

surface the right story.

Aligning reports from different systems to surface that right story is no easy feat, though. Challenges range

from field and character alignment to connecting and syncing the tools. Despite the challenge, it is essential

for success, and another reason why utilizing a partner with expertise in the integration of these tools can be

tremendously valuable.

Marketing Technology Services from Televerde

Marketing Automation Implementation & Optimization

Automation Platform Configuration/Lead Management Setup/Cloud Connector Services

• Reduce time to implement marketingtechnology

• Define and set up an accurate leadmanagement program

• Streamline CRM integration with cloud- connector setup

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Certified Marketing Automation Resourcing/ Automation System Support

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Marketing Automation Managed Services


Step 2 – Engagement Planning: Modern Marketers Plan Before They Execute Modern marketers use not just technology, but technology and process excellence—which extends beyond

implementation and administration of the marketing automation tool. So after modern marketers implement their

CRM and marketing automation technology platform as the foundation of their marketing stack, they examine their

processes and build a strategic engagement strategy that stretches across the buying cycle, from inquiry to close.

That strategy serves as the foundation for all marketing and sales activities. Building it involves:

• Defining the buying cycle and, within it, the lead qualification definitions

• Developing a framework for scoring leads and routing them through the buying cycle with the right digital and

human touch elements

• Building buyer personas and mapping buyer journeys

• Ensuring prospect data is clean, accurate, and complete

• Creating strong, relevant content that aligns with personas and journeys—and automating delivery to scale

Aligning Sales and Marketing

Sales and marketing alignment is a critical element of success in modern marketing organizations. Forrester explains

why: “In the digital era, customer engagement is a lot more complicated. Marketing execs need to rethink marketing/

sales alignment to better engage today’s buyer and: let the buyer journey define a sales-ready lead; focus more on

shared stewardship than a smooth handoff; and recognize sales as a vehicle in attribution analysis.”5

5 Lori Wizdo. “Shift Focus to the Customer Life Cycle to Take L2RM to the Next Level.” Forrester. 30 Jan 2015.

“Organizations with tightly aligned sales and marketing functions see 36% higher customer retention

rates and 38% higher sales win rates.”

-SiriusDecisions


Alignment isn’t a specific activity, but rather an ongoing initiative that is planned, periodic collaboration between

marketing and sales leaders to gain consensus on joint accountabilities. Aligned sales and marketing organizations:

1. Agree to a common language

2. Jointly define inquiry and lead definitions/criteria, and pipeline stages

3. Establish pipeline and conversion metric goals and agree to ‘one source of truth’ for measurement

4. Develop measurable Service Level Agreements (SLAs) on client, pipeline, and lead engagement

An SLA is a living document, written jointly by marketing and sales, that defines expectations and accountability. Only

22% of respondents to a 2016 HubSpot survey have a formal SLA between marketing and sales, yet organizations

with an SLA are more than 5 times as likely to be effective. For example, in an SLA marketing might provide clear stage

definitions for advancing leads to sales-readiness and sales might provide defined follow-up time for leads received by

marketing.

Defining the Prospect Buying Cycle and, Within it, What Constitutes a Sales Accepted Lead (SAL)

All of the behaviors of aligned sales and marketing organizations hinge on a mutually-agreed, consistent definition

of what marketing is delivering to sales. The SiriusDecisions demand waterfall is the industry standard for defining the

buying cycle, delineating roles, measuring results, and optimizing demand creation efforts.

We TargetTarget Demand

Active Demand

Engaged Demand

Prioritized Demand

Qualified Demand

Pipeline

We Suspect

We Connect

We Know

We Expect

We Won!

We Evaluate

SiriusDecisions 2017 Demand Unit Waterfall™

Closed


Developing a Framework for Scoring Leads and Routing Them Through the Buying Cycle

Not all leads are created equal, so successfully bringing each lead to close requires different marketing and sales

activities at different times. How does the modern marketer know when to send an email, and when to pick up the

phone? By the lead score.

While each organization’s framework for scoring leads is unique, the framework can be broadly defined according to

the SiriusDecisions lead spectrum:

Commitment to engage. Level 5, plus agreement to meet at a specific date/time.

Initial inquiry. The prospect has demonstrated an initial level of interest in an offering.

Profile fit. The prospect matches both the company and individual characteristics of the target profile.

Activity qualified. Level 2, plus activity (for an individual lead or cumulatively across multiple contacts in an account) has reached a threshold that demonstrates a level of significant interest and engagement.

Unverified propensity to buy. Relevant information indicating propensity to buy (one or more elements of budget-authority-need-timeframe) has been obtained (e.g. through Web registration) but has not been verified.

Verified propensity to buy. Relevant information indicating propensity to buy (one or more elements of BANT) has been verified through direct interactions with the prospect or prospects.

Unqualified contact. Contact information for a prospect (or an anonymous visitor record) exists in the marketing database.

Level 0

Level 1

Level 2

Level 3

Level 3

Level 4

Level 5

Companies that get lead scoring right have a 192% higher average lead qualification rate than those that do not.

-Aberdeen Group, Lead Scoring and Prioritization


After modern marketers define what is a marketing qualified lead and what is a sales accepted lead, they develop

a framework for those leads to be scored within their marketing automation tool and routed through the marketing

funnel. Automated marketing is delivered according to the lead’s place in the funnel, implied preferences, and lead

score. Reaching certain lead score thresholds triggers additional marketing activity; once a lead reaches a particular

threshold score, the sales team takes over.

What criteria are included in a lead score? The standard BANT (budget, authority, need, and timeline), and much more.

The power of a marketing automation platform is its ability to track a lead and learn not just explicit information like

name or age or income but also implied or behavioral information, based on the prospect’s engagement.

Two of the most commonly used scoring dimensions are prospect identity and prospect interest:

• Prospect identity – explicit data such as title, industry, and company revenue. This determines the prospect’s fit.

• Prospect interest – implicit data such as frequent visits to website, responsiveness to marketing communications or

intent data. This determines the prospect’s level of engagement.6

The first step to building a framework with that level of detail is often to get visibility into all the ways that a lead

could engage with the company—web pages, emails, videos, phone calls, downloads, etc. Modern marketers

then build a custom lead scoring model within which each lead is automatically assigned a score based on a

combination of factors, including interaction with emails and on the website, and responses to marketing and sales

communications.

Because leads are tracked across the buying cycle, lead scores are dynamic. As the prospect engages (or not) with

marketing or sales over time his or her score improves or declines. That provides an incentive to marketing and to

sales to ensure that high-scoring leads don’t go cold.

6 Oracle. “Grande Guide: Lead Scoring.”

“To keep pace with the changing buying process, advanced lead-scoring systems use a wide range of data points to determine lead quality. Although explicit criteria

such as job title, company revenue, and industry may suggest a good fit, implicit—or behavioral—information

is the key to determining true buying interest.”

-Oracle, Grande Guide: Lead Scoring


The goal of building a process and implementing technology to automate the process and measure its effectiveness

is to have visibility into what’s working well and what could be made better. So modern marketers see the latter not

as failures but as new sources of insight and new opportunities to improve. All to achieve the ultimate goal – to

generate more revenue.

Building Buyer Personas and Mapping Buyer Journeys

Alignment between the marketing and sales organizations is essential, as is agreeing on a definition of what is a

sales accepted lead, and developing a framework for scoring leads and routing them through the marketing funnel.

But all that work is for naught if the prospective buyer doesn’t feel compelled to buy.

To create messages that will compel prospects to buy, modern marketers get to know their buyers. That means

building buyer personas.

Once modern marketers know their buyers, they map the buyers’ journeys. The buyer journey is different

than the buying cycle, because it includes all the activities that a buyer does before ever engaging with

the company—activities that, when marketing knows about them, offer up great marketing (or, at least,

influence) opportunities.

“Built from the real words of real buyers, a buyer persona tells you what prospective customers are thinking and doing as they weigh their options to

address a problem that your company resolves. Much more than a one-dimensional profile of the people you need to influence, or a map of their journey, actionable

buyer personas reveal insights about your buyers’ decisions – the specific attitudes, concerns and

criteria that drive prospective customers to choose you, your competitor or the status quo.”

-Buyer Personas Institute


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Segmentation and Targeting

Customer & Market Research / Persona Development / Buyer's Journey Mapping

• Execute campaigns targeting specific buyerpersonas

• Engage with relevance by conducting primaryresearch

• Increase response rates through highlyrelevant offers

• Build clarity on decision criteria across thebuyer journey

Campaign Design & Development / Lead Scoring & Nurture Strategy /

Content Marketing Plan / Sales & Marketing Alignment Processes

• Develop credible content to educate andconvey insight

• Prioritize content marketing assets bybusiness impact

• Define required Inside Sales capabilities andprocess

• Align to specific industry, functional, andchannel needs

Demand Generation Strategy

An effective buyer journey map explains:

• Why does the buyer buy? Answering this question helps marketing understand the buyer’s perception of value.

• Who is involved in the decision and what is that person’s role? Stakeholders include influencers as well as decision-

makers. (The average B2B buyer group consists of 5.4 people, according to CEB.)

• When? After all, buyers have different needs at different stages of their buyer journeys.

• What are the buyer’s challenges, what does the buyer need to know and in what format does he want that

information?

• Where is the buyer getting that information?

The purpose of developing buyer personas and mapping their journeys is about relevancy—delivering the right

message, to the right person, at the right time. According to a survey by The Economist, 75% of global CMOs expect

to be fully responsible for the end-to-end customer experience and therefore need to segment in ways that respect

audience interests and preferences. Marketers who are effective at gaining this level of insight combine engaging

content with company and contact level data points for maximum impact.


Step 3 – Data Intelligence: Modern Marketers Ensure Data Is Clean, Accurate, and Complete

Modern marketers know that the results they get out of any marketing activity are only as good as the data going

into it. And data strategy goes way beyond “having a good list.” Modern marketers follow a six-step approach to

data intelligence.

54% of companies say their biggest challenge to data-driven marketing success is the lack of data

quality and completeness.

-Ascend2

1. Data Sourcing,AggregationCapuring, organizing, integrating all possible sources of valuable information

6. Data Quality ControlKeeping data upgraded, clean, complete and accurate, standardization normalization, rules to merge or purge duplicate, managing enrichments

2. Insights & TargetingTranslating data into actionable insights about addressable audiences

5. MeasurementMeasuring for continuousimprovement across the steps and communicating performance

3. Stategy & PlanningEstablishing segment strategy; personas; needed fields for modes; interactive types

4. ExecutionMatching records to tailored individual content across channels and interaction types

Six-Step Approach to Data Intelligence


1 - Data sourcing and aggregation

Data sourcing and aggregation is about capturing, organizing, and integrating all possible sources of valuable

information. After all, data is the heart of the marketing machine that drives interest, engagement, and ultimately

revenue. To ensure the completeness of their data and in order to personalize engagement, modern marketers

dynamically append existing records with this additional source data. They employ a data aggregation model that puts

prospect touch points at the intersection of insights into the prospect (social data), the company (D&B data), and

the technology landscape (market data).

2 - Insights and targeting

Insights and targeting is about translating data into actionable insights about addressable audiences. Modern

marketers create targeting criteria with specific combinations of desired characteristics. In addition to firmographics,

these criteria might include:

• Title

• Job function

• School

• Groups

• Skills

• Location

• Keywords

3 - Strategy and planning

Data strategy and planning is about establishing segmentation strategy, defining required fields to capture personas,

modes, and interaction types. The goal of segmentation is to separate the market into categories that are measurable,

addressable, and relevant. A typical market segmentation includes geographic, demographic, psychographic, and

behavioral data.

When creating a segmentation strategy, modern marketers keep three goals in mind:

• Measurability – The degree to which size and purchasing power of segments can be assessed; metrics include

number of organizations and typical expenditure

• Accessibility – The degree to which the marketer can reach the intended target segments efficiently through

unique communications and distribution strategies

• Profitability – The degree to which identified target segments are large enough or have sufficient sales and profit

potential to warrant unique or separate marketing programs

4 - Execution

Execution is about matching records to tailored individual content across channels and interaction types. While

modern marketers leverage a multi-channel approach, they focus their resources on prospects that have opted in to


communications and the channels through which they prefer to communicate. Across all channels, modern marketers

pay close attention to the data privacy laws in the countries and states where they’re marketing.

5 - Measurement

Measurement is about continuous improvement across the steps and communicating performance within the

organization. While data performance is best benchmarked within one organization, there are a few key data

benchmarks that modern marketers keep in mind:

• 95% postal mail deliverability rate using local post office standards

• No more than 15% of emails should hard bounce

• 95% of records should have a valid business activity code and valid number of employees

• Valid contact names – 0 invalid strings or descriptions

• 70% of named contacts should be selectable by function

6 - Data quality control

Data quality control is about keeping data updated, clean, complete, and accurate. Data quality degradation is a con-

stant issue that must be addressed. There are a number of causes, including lack of control over inbound lead forms;

inaccurate data entry by CRM users; and non-standardized, low-quality record imports. Furthermore, people and com-

panies change situations, rendering their data obsolete.

As a result, 5-7% of the records in a marketers’ database go bad every month. Without ongoing contact data mainte-

nance and appending, all that bad data becomes very costly. In one example calculated by SiriusDecisions, reducing a

B2B marketers’ bad data rate from 25% to 10% resulted in:

• A 25% rise in inquiry-to-marketing qualified lead (MQL) conversions

• A 12.5% rise in MQL-to-sales accepted lead (SAL) conversions

• A 66% increase in revenue

Data quality control isn’t so much about preventing data degradation as it is about knowing what data is degraded and

cleaning it up. Even the most sophisticated modern marketers face data quality degradation. But they manage through

it. Modern marketers:

• Improve lead volume with buyer and company information

• Increase lead conversions with targeting and cleaner data

• Dynamically append missing form data to improve quality

Pre-campaign assessments for data cleanliness, accuracy, and completeness are essential of course, but it’s not a

one-and-done deal. In an environment in which 5-7% of a database goes bad every month, ongoing contact data

maintenance and appending is essential.


7 Lori Wizdo. “Shift Focus to the Customer Life Cycle to Take L2RM to the Next Level.” Forrester. 30 Jan 2015.

Data Intelligence Services from Televerde

Campaign Data Readiness

Data Quality Health Check / Contact Record Remediation / Contact Record Provisioning

• Insight to data quality issues with a full plan toclose gaps

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Data Enrichment & Append / Engagement Data Insight

• Enhance contact record quality with socialprofile info

• Append social data to personalize engagement

Account and Buyer Intelligence

Technology

Engagement Planning

Data Intelligence

Demand Gen

InsideSales

Lead

Attract

Nurture

Sell

Revenue

Discover

Explore

Buy

Marketing Activities Buying Cycle Lead to Revenue

Step 4 – Demand Generation: Modern Marketers Drive Revenue – And Prove It

Clearly, there is a whole lot of work that goes into building the foundation for a successful demand generation program.

Technology implementation. Engagement planning. Data intelligence. While demand generation is often the most visible

face of marketing, without that foundation, the best demand gen program in the world is hard-pressed to succeed.

Driving Leads to Revenue – Show Me the Money!

Ten years ago, says Forrester analyst Lori Wizdo, the idea of measuring B2B marketing effectiveness by revenue

performance was radical.7 Today, it is standard.

Driving Leads to Revenue


Modern Marketers Create Strong, Relevant Content That Aligns With Personas and Journeys – And

Automate Delivery to Scale

Combining content strategy with marketing automation technology to both personalize and scale message delivery is

at the heart of becoming a modern marketer.

Simplified Campaign Blueprint

Proving It

Another of the key recommendations Forrester makes in its modern marketer’s survey report is that marketers

“sharpen their attribution acumen.” In other words, if marketing is driving revenue, prove it—and then shout it from the

rooftops.

The specific metrics that modern marketers use to prove success depend on the goals established during the

engagement planning phase—and agreed upon between sales and marketing. The specific metrics also depend on

eNewsletter nurturefor non-responders,

unqualifie leads,and non-buyers

Fast track(based on “talkto a sales rep”

response) Sales Handoff (Stage 5)

• Insight

Sales Qualification (Stage 4)

• Email #4 & Email #5

Sales Qualification Lead (Stage 3)

• Objection handling &budget

• Email #3

Inbound Funnel Feeders

• Social media channels• Paid search ads• Nuture lists (3+ months of

engagement but not sale)

Stage 0

• Email capture & persona ID• Email #0

Respondent (Stage 1)

• Track & problem ID• Email #1

Qualified Respondent (Stage 2)

• Objectives & persona engagement

• Email #2

Sales Contact


how the campaign itself is architected. These metrics go beyond typical marketing or channel engagement metrics

(email, PPC, clickthrough, etc.). Generally, modern marketers measure and report on the progress to closing a sale:

• Number of marketing qualified leads (MQL)

• Number of sales accepted leads (SAL)

• MQL-to-SAL conversion rate (%)

• SAL pipeline value ($)

• Number of sales qualified leads (SQL)

• SAL-to-SQL conversion rate (%)

• SQL pipeline value ($)

• Number of closed/won deals

• SQL-to-closed/won conversion rate (%)

• Closed/won value ($)

• Average sales price ($)

• Average sales cycle (days)

Modern marketers typically break out those metrics by source—e.g., digital, outbound calling, and inbound calls.

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Lead Generation (LDR)/ Event Recruitment /

Appointment Setting / Proactive Online Chat /

Account Based Marketing

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• Warm handoff to salesreduces droppedopportunities

Multi-Channel Lead Generation

• Effective demand genwithout risk of brandcompromise

• Incremental capability todrive multi-channeldemand

• Boost number of qualifiedcustomer leads throughscoring

Campaign Channel Execution

Campaign Analysis & Reporting / Predictive

Analytics

• Execute campaignstargeting specific buyerpersonas

• Engage with relevance byconducting primaryresearch

• Increase response ratesthrough highlyrelevant offers

• Build clarity on decisioncriteria across thebuyer journey


Step 5 – Inside Sales: Modern Marketers Understand the Value of Human Interaction

With all the growth in the digital marketing landscape, it became popular to believe that the human touch is irrelevant

in most of the buying cycle. While SiriusDecisions has found that 67% of the buyer’s journey is now done digitally, “The

67% statistic in no way says that no one talks to a salesperson before getting halfway through the buying cycle. Just

because buyers spend time online doesn’t mean sales is not involved at all stages of the buyer’s journey, including the

early and late stages.”8

In fact, as Forrester analyst Lori Wizdo puts it, “The human channel is the most potentially effective channel. Use it well.”

How Modern Marketers Use Inside Sales

Modern marketers understand that, especially in B2B, people buy from people; even though a buyer’s journey begins online, actual self-service is rare. So it takes integrated human touch throughout the process to win the prospect’s business. Indeed, a lot of deals are won on subtlety—e.g., understanding people’s behaviors, needs, and where they may be in the decision making process. It’s very much about the relationship; all else equal people buy from people they like.

Traditionally, businesses employed salespeople to conduct face-to-face meetings with prospects to close deals. These individuals spend the majority of their time traveling to meet with their prospective clients. This method has been highly successful, but has also become quite costly. The alternative—inside sales—costs 40-90% less to bring in new customers, according to the Harvard Business Review.

With inside sales, reps spend their time in the office where they interact with marketing qualified leads. They gather data on prospects to customize their communication with them via telephone and email. A common misconception regarding inside sales is that it is essentially telemarketing; this is not the case. Inside sales reps are not cold-calling or dealing with unqualified leads. Inside sales teams are given leads that are generated through demand gen campaigns, scored and qualified and passed on to them to close.

By eliminating travel time and using online technology, inside sales reps are able to reach more customers in a variety of

locations, which ultimately results in higher sales and ROI.

Modern marketers leverage inside sales at two important stages of the sales cycle:

• Lead qualification – 88% of B2B buyers say they want to feel good about their purchase decision based onthe guidance from and trust they have with their vendor, according to a 2015 SAP study. Of course, deliveringguidance and establishing trust requires human-to-human engagement. For modern marketers, using human leadqualification teams to discover the prospect’s needs, establish a relationship, and build trust increases the quality ofleads, avoiding a pipeline clogged with unqualified leads and an overinflated sales forecast.

• Lead nurturing – 79% of marketing leads never convert into sales, according to MarketingSherpa. The primaryculprit: a failure to nurture those leads. Combining marketing automation and human-to-human interactions,modern marketers create powerful lead nurturing campaigns that effectively guide their prospects through eachstage of the buyer’s journey to close. From personalized emails to perfectly timed sales calls by the inside sales

team, lead nurturing keeps modern marketers top-of-mind and ahead of their competition.

8 Megan Heuer. “Three Myths of the ‘67 Percent’ Statistic.” SiriusDecisions. 3 Jul 2013.


Best Practices in Inside Sales

Respond right away – 5 minutes. That’s how long marketers have to respond when a buyer reaches out online. “The

odds of making a successful contact with a lead are 100 times greater when a contact attempt occurs within 5 min-

utes, compared to 30 minutes after the lead was submitted. Similarly, the odds of the lead entering the sales process,

or becoming qualified, are 21 times greater when contacted within 5 minutes versus 30 minutes after the lead was

submitted.” That’s according to the Lead Response Management Study conducted by MIT business professor James

Oldroyd.

Prepare – Before picking up the phone, effective inside sales reps develop extensive knowledge of the prospective

customer, the problem the prospect is looking to solve, and possible objections. They have a plan for how to best po-

sition the product or service and how to overcome any opposition. They know the prospect’s role and how the pros-

pect has interacted with the company (if at all) in the past.

A CRM platform integrated with a strong industry data source and a marketing automation tool makes that kind of

reconnaissance easier. With data that’s clean and accurate, the inside sales rep is better prepared to have a successful

conversation.

Make the first impression count – You have 7 seconds to make a good first impression, according to Business In-

sider. That can be more challenging over the phone than in person. Inside sales reps are judged based on voice, tone,

phone etiquette, and, obviously, what they have to say. Good inside sales reps speak confidently, stay focused, have a

plan, and make a powerful opening statement.

Listen and ask questions – Talking too much is one of the most common mistakes inside sales reps make. Reps call

a prospect and launch into a description of their product and value propositions, without listening to the prospect or

understanding what the prospect needs or wants.

In contrast, effective inside sales reps find out what the prospect’s wants and needs are, and then (and only then) do

the sales reps explain how they can help. That way, the prospects feels like the inside sales rep (and by extension, the

company), is fulfilling their need, not making a sales pitch.

Follow up (and again × 5) – 80% of sales require five follow-up calls, but 44% of salespeople give up after only one

follow-up, according to Marketing Donut. So effective inside sales reps follow-up, then follow-up again, and follow-up

again…typically until they get a “yes” or a “no.”

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8Reach the

Right PersonOpen the

CallBuild

RapportActive

ListeningBuild Value

Verify Qualifications

Call to Action

Recap and Validate

8 Principles of Call Mastery


Bottom Line

You can be well on your way to becoming a modern marketer.

Let’s recap what’s in it for you:• Boost revenue – 44% of modern marketers said their companies exceeded revenue goals by 10% or more last

year, compared with just 23% of peers

• Boost sales – When asked to describe the results of upgrading to modern marketing practices, over 55% point-

ed to increased sales and 37% to higher profitability

• Boost market share – 94% of modern marketers told Forrester that they have attained a significant market

share, and 49% enjoy the market-leading position9

9 Forrester. “Why You Need to Be a Modern Marketer: The Business Impact of Marketing Maturity in the Age of the Customer.” Oct 2014.

Inside Sales from Televerde

Sales Campaign Planning

Inside Sales Engagement Plan / Inside Sales Operations

• Planning to guide key accounts engagement

• Test new offerings, markets, sources ofrevenue

• Improve management’s focus on sellerdevelopment

• Insight driven engagement with highimpact tools

• Streamline opportunity and account planning

Sales Development / Opportunity Management / Inside Sales Support /

Campaign Reporting & Analytics

• Increase the number of qualified opportunitiesin the pipeline

• Pilot new sales programs to reduce time torevenue

• Immediately respond to inbound inquiries

• Maximize coverage through direct, channeland field sales

• Augment current team for revenue

Inside Sales Outsourcing


To realize those benefits, modern marketers follow five steps:

STEP 1 - Technology: Modern Marketers Use Technology to Simplify Their Approach

• Leverage a fully integrated cross-channel marketing automation platform

• Understand that technology alone doesn’t suffice and commit to people and process excellence

STEP 2 - Engagement Planning: Modern Marketers Plan Before They Execute

• Align sales and marketing

• Define the buying cycle and, within it, the lead qualification definitions

• Develop a framework for scoring leads and routing them through the buying cycle with the right digital and humantouch elements

• Build buyer personas and map buyer journeys

• Embrace lessons learned

STEP 3 - Data Intelligence: Modern Marketers Ensure Data Is Clean, Accurate, and Complete

• Data sourcing and aggregation

• Insights and targeting

• Strategy and planning

• Execution

• Measurement

• Data quality and control

STEP 4 - Demand Generation: Modern Marketers Drive Revenue – And Prove It

• Create strong, relevant content that aligns with personas and journeys—and automate delivery to scale

• Prove success—and shout it from the rooftops

STEP 5 - Inside Sales: Modern Marketers Understand the Value of Human Interaction

• Leverage inside sales at two important stages of the sales cycle: lead qualification and lead nurturing

• Ensure inside sales reps follow best practices, including listening and asking questions and consistent (perhaps

dogged) follow-up

It’s possible, of course, to go it alone and become a modern marketer. But many companies find far more success driving

revenue with a partner. If you’re interested in exploring that route, contact us today at televerde.com or 888-787-2829.

© 2020 Televerde. All rights reserved.

http://televerde.com

http://www.televerde.com/

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