Corporate Visions hosted a Marketing & Sales Alignment at Lake Tahoe in October 2010. I delivered this presentation to spur the conversation on how marketing & sales can come together to focus on demand generation.
13. Situation: Company wanted to
target a large market, but 30,000-
and 15,000-feet views were too
broad; they weren’t sure where to
focus
Action: BAO surveyed 10,000
companies regarding IT initiatives
in the next 6 months:
• 91% of the initiatives uncovered
existed in 49% of companies
• 51% had fewer than three initiatives
• 31% had ZERO initiatives
14. Why is this important?
• They needed to know their
market – who was buying their
solutions, who wasn’t
• They could point sales at
accounts that have the highest
probability of buying
• They learned that the right
market roadmap equals an
effective lead-gen strategy
16. At street level, you can
see the segments that
should drive revenue
Segment #1
Already virtualized their desktops
Segment #2
Going to virtualize desktops
Segment #3
No plans to virtualize desktops
17. Let’s put it in street-level terms:
BAO surveyed 500 companies…
• 230 of them have desktop virtualization
initiatives in the next 12 months, including:
– BB&T
– Bausch & Lomb
– Ball Corp.
– Banner Health
• 230 will not be doing desktop virtualization at all
• 40 of them have already “completely completed”
18. Why is this important?
• Sales knew exactly which
companies to target
• Marketing knew exactly
which companies to
nurture
• Both sales and marketing
knew which companies to
avoid wasting time and
money on
19. How do we know this…
Let’s step through the process
• Look at the total addressable market
– For virtualization example, we used enterprises with revenues >$750 million
• Develop business rules to identify a Buying Spectrum – ask:
– What are we trying to get to?
– Whom do we want to go after, and what do we need to know to go after them?
– Which companies have budget / initiatives in place to virtualize their desktops?
– Which companies haven’t virtualized their desktops but plan to?
– Who has already completed desktop virtualization?
– Which companies have no plans for desktop virtualization?
20. Survey your targets
Create a survey based on micro-markets and start
calling targets.
CAUTION: It is critical that this is done by a vendor-
agnostic third party.
21. Create an action plan…
Segment #2
Already virtualized their desktops
ACTION: Active lead generation and nurturing through appointment-setting.
Segment #1
Going to virtualize their desktops
ACTION: ATTACK, ATTACK, ATTACK! Hot opportunities immediately
flagged — high priority on appointment-setting.
Segment #3
No plans to virtualize desktops
ACTION: Low-cost nurturing campaigns
BAO typically sets appointments
with 70% of the green market and
50% of the yellow market within weeks.
22. You can’t find buyers from
30,000 feet alone.
To know who’s buying now,
you also gotta hit the street.
23. A happy sales and
marketing marriage…
• Means taking both perspectives –
30,000 feet and street level – into
account
• Requires that you map your market
the right way
• Gets you to exactly the companies
you want to target
• Drives pipeline – and revenue –
faster than you ever thought
possible