Sales on the Outbound

This is the third in a series of posts discussing the role of outbound lead generation in the marketing mix.

In my first post, I described five buyer types that are best reached through outbound sales and marketing.

Then I reviewed the benefits that accrue to marketing from outbound marketing: ROI, market insight and a robust database.

With marketing contributing at most 40% of sales' leads, outbound lead generation is critical for most organizations.

It is rare to find a sales team that achieves its goals only based on inbound inquiries and referrals.

Despite the noise in the marketplace, most B2B marketers are looking to develop an optimal mix of outbound and inbound marketing, where each type of marketing works together to enhance results.

But let's face it...outbound sales is a thorny activity saddled with negative connotations.     

Inbound is simple in its elegance: build relevant content and they will come.

However, it's not that straightforward.

The reality is that most inbound marketers conduct outbound marketing.    Yes, even HubSpot has a large, outbound calling telesales team.

It's important to differentiate between responders and inquiries.   Responders have indicated interest in an offer while an inquiry is requesting a sales call.  A responder is probably more interested in your offer than your solution.

Inbound marketing will engage many prospects but only a small fraction will 'raise their hand' to speak to the sales team.

Sales is then engaged to call responders to identify the buyers vs. the information gatherers amongst highly scored prospects.  

This is outbound, unsolicited calling.  The responders did not request a call nor did the responders expect to receive a call from your sales team.

Sales organizations are always cold calling.     Sales people cold call every day.   To expand business in an existing account, a sales person asks for a referral to another division.    A sales person calls a new account that shares key pain points with a current customer.   

Some would call these efforts 'warm calling'.   Not so.  This is a vendor-centric view that recognizes that the sales person is 'warmed-up'.   From a prospect or customer-centric perspective, there is no direct relationship.    Rather, the prospect recognizes that the sales person is an 'informed stranger' who is conducting a cold call.

Account-Based Marketing is rifle-shot outbound marketing.   If your organization sells gear to telcos, the global target market is approximately 40 accounts.    Account-based marketing or marketing to accounts as a single market favors precise sales and marketing outbound strategies.

Alignment to sales territories favors outbound marketing.  Similar to account-based marketing, the definition of a finite list of named accounts will yield a market that can be communicated to with outbound, customized messaging to unique segments.   For example, an organization could target five verticals with 1,000 accounts in each vertical with vertical-specific messaging.    Email, direct mail and outbound calling are often successfully deployed here.



Outbound sales and marketing play a vital role in complementing inbound and filling gaps that inbound cannot address.      With optimization of the mix between inbound and outbound, B2B organizations will enhance the alignment between sales and marketing and build better demand generation programs that meet buyer needs.


Related Posts:
Marketing on the Outbound
Use Outbound Marketing to Target these 5 Buyer Types

Photo Credit:  Robert Lesser

Don't let inside sales break the law

Are you aware that your inside sales team could be wiretapping?

A few weeks ago, my firm was invited by a large California-based tech organization to respond to a telesales RFP.

Given the terms & conditions that were included, the client's legal counsel was involved in the creation of the RFP.

Yet, this organization requested that each bidder record all calls.

The irony for this tech company in California calling Californians, is that their request could create a legal liability.

If your telesales team is making calls from the USA to California, it is illegal under California law to call record and call monitor without the consent of all parties on the call. See an excerpt below from the California Penal Code (Note: for appropriate interpretation of the law, please seek legal counsel as this blog post does not constitute legal advice. Sorry my one college course in business law doesn't cut it.)

632. (a) Every person who, intentionally and without the consent of all parties to a confidential communication, by means of any electronic amplifying or recording device, eavesdrops upon or records the confidential communication, whether the communication is carried on among the parties in the presence of one another or by means of a telegraph, telephone, or other device, except a radio, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding two thousand five hundred dollars ($2,500), or imprisonment in the county jail not exceeding one year, or in the state prison, or by both that fine and imprisonment.

There are eleven other states that require this consent from all parties on a call: Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Washington. (For an overview by state and by country, see Wikipedia's coverage of telephone recording laws).

Beyond the legal implications, there are nagging questions about the business case for call recording and whether viable alternatives have been adequately considered.

I sense that many executives believe that all front office contact center functions should record calls. However the nature of the beast is very different for inside sales versus technical support and customer service.

Certainly those customers with a strong relationship could be judiciously targeted by inside sales. A customer would be more receptive when notified of a call recording.

Here are a few reasons why I believe that recording calls is a poor practice for inside sales when calling prospects (rather than customers).

Announcing the intent to record the call will address telephone recording laws but will leave prospects cold. When a customer calls tech support or customer service, most customers are willing to be recorded as common practice and as a reasonable exchange for having their issue addressed. Imagine outbound calls to prospects from inside sales that would be prefaced by: "This call may be recorded for the purpose of quality assurance and quota attainment" . Prospects will have no patience or inclination to cooperate with inside sales by agreeing to record the call, especially when their relationship is marginal at best.

Listening to call recordings is drudgery and unproductive. Any manager with a team quota and a sense of priority will minimize the time spent on listening to recordings.

Prospect satisfaction is not on the corporate radar screen. Technical support and customer service are critical to customer retention. Call recording is standard procedure for these two departments. But for inside sales, is prospect satisfaction a priority? Win/loss analysis is common but I have yet to find an organization that survey's its prospects early in the buying cycle to gauge the impact of inside sales.

Let's take a closer look at some alternatives to call recording:

Call Monitor, don't Call Record - for the states where this is permissible, monitor the calls of inside sales but do not record the conversation.

Role Play - if the goal is to train and coach inside sales, role playing is preferable to recording calls. It is very beneficial for inside sales reps to role play with internal staff who have customer insight. An even better approach is for inside sales reps to role play with cooperative customers. We have found this to be invaluable given the rich feedback provided instantaneously by the customer.

Exception-based Assessments - rather than measuring the activity (i.e. conversations), focus on measuring the results (qualified, sales-ready leads, pipeline impact, closed sales). Leakages from the pipeline should be tracked to determine trends. Interviews can be conducted with prospects who 'leaked from the funnel' to see if buyer needs were addressed and if the telesales rep was successful in meeting those needs.

For example, the field sales team at one our clients complained about the quality of the leads that we generated. According to sales, the prospects were not evaluating.

An audit of those leads by my firm indicated that not only were those prospects evaluating but the leads purchased a solution from a competitor to our client.

When presented with this information, the sales team sheepishly admitted that those leads were never contacted.

The moral of the story is that a call recording of our initial conversation would not have addressed the issue raised by our client's sales team. Only by conducting a post-mortem lead audit, could we uncover the truth.

Are the penalties and enforcement of call recording laws inconsequential to you?

Or have you implemented alternatives to call recording?

Photo Credit: Matti Mattila

An Identity Crisis for the Sales Lead

Do you find it startling that many sales and marketing teams still cannot agree on the definition of a sales lead?

The irony of course, is that the deliverable for sales is crystal clear - the sale. The contract is signed and the PO received. The heavy lifting from sales is finished and that of accounts receivable begins.

But for marketing, whose key deliverable is often the qualified lead, the picture is confusing: the definition of a sales lead can be all over the map. Is a lead an appointment or a qualified lead (or both)? Is a lead an inquiry, a trade show visitor, a webinar registrant, a downloader of a white paper or a referral?

To some, a lead is defined as an interested responder. To others, a fully qualified BANT lead (Budget, Authority, Need, Timeframe).

A poorly defined lead is one symptom of a crippling disease: sales & marketing mis-aligment (see my post on ten signs that sales and marketing are mis-aligned).

In the simplest possible terms: a lead is a prospect that sales agrees to accept, engage and close. Best-in-class sales & marketing organizations will add richer criteria to the definition, but the willingness of sales to accept a lead from marketing is elegant in its simplicity.

It also takes into account an important distinction: the definition of a lead may vary by the sales rep. For example, a new sales rep with no sales funnel may accept 'loosely' defined leads versus a sales rep who has a full funnel who will only accept 'strictly' defined, fully-qualified leads.

Unfortunately, the term 'lead' is frequently taken out of context by the vendors that sell to B2B marketers. This may artificially enhance the perceived value of the vendor's solution but adds to the malaise and confusion in the market.

Ask yourself after reading the examples below and apply the simple acceptance rule: can you fathom a field salesperson accepting these 'leads'?

1. Data Vendors - A significant number of data vendors continue to merchandise their lists as 'leads'. Nothing could be further from the truth. These are lists of 'Accounts and Contacts'.
   
2. CRM Vendors - Most CRM solutions have separate buckets for accounts/contacts and leads. Although I agree that leads need a home in the CRM system, the lead bucket seems to be a dumping ground for all flavors of inquiries and marketing responders. A more applicable label would be 'Prospects'
   
3. Marketing Automation Vendors - A popular and vital process in the demand generation process is 'lead nurture'. I agree that this is an easy to understand term for describing the cultivation of prospects until the prospect is sales-ready. However, these contacts are not leads but are prospects that are not yet ready to speak to sales. At one time, some of these prospect may have spoken to sales and subsequently disqualified. A better term would be 'Prospect Nurture'.

It is important for marketing to under-promise and over-deliver to sales. It makes sense to ask their vendors to do the same.

Call me a stickler if you want, but until we see greater success in sales and marketing alignment and in particular, lead definitions, we need to be a lot more careful in the way that we throw around a pivotal term like 'lead'.

Otherwise, it becomes one of those four letter words.

Your thoughts?

Related Posts
Sales Leads vs. Appointments?
10 Signs that Sales & Marketing are Mis-Aligned
Should marketing be compensated like sales?
Comparing B2B Online Data Sources - New Research

Photo Credit: Ash-rly

Sales 2.0 Chicago - What next?

The Sales 2.0 Conference was held last week in Chicago (where I tweeted and published photos).

The day long event featured provocative presentations and success stories on innovative approaches for sales to better meet the advanced needs of buyers and lower the cost of lead generation and selling.

Geoffrey James, blogger of the Sales Machine, proved his mettle as the 'Blogging Machine' by publishing a 'running update' of the conference. Check out this unbelievable recap of the Sales 2.0 Conference.

In the afternoon, I sat at the blogging table (distinguished by having its own power supply) with Ardath Albee who authored these two posts on the conference: here and here.

By the end of the day, the bar was open and David Thompson, co-founder/CEO Genius was doing stand-up Sales 2.0 comedy (read David's post on the success of this Conference series).

As we were packing up, Ardath and I reflected on the challenges that attendees will face in implementing many of the compelling ideas.

It's with this in mind, that I thought I would share a perspective on making the most from this thought-provoking conference:

Make sure the basics are covered - Sales & marketing alignment continues to be a thorn in the side of Sales 2.0. Ensure that sales and marketing agree on target marketing, messaging, lead definitions, SLAs, key metrics and demand generation workflow.

Fit to Strategy - How do these tools and practices fit to your organization's strategy? Increase sales conversion? Lower costs? Given that many of the Sales 2.0 tools are SaaS based and easy to deploy, there are few obstacles to get up & running. Fit to strategy will be the one of key considerations.

The best ideas can be mapped on a grid with High Impact on one axis and Ease of Deployment on another. This will help prioritize what might be a lengthy list and plan for a rollout of your ideas over a longer term.

Customer Insight - It all starts with the customer and now the customer is in the driver's seat. Without customer insight, we substitute our personal opinion as a proxy for that of the customer leading to inappropriate conclusions and costly mistakes.

Culture - This may be the most substantial obstacle. With this economy, many organizations may be unwilling to experiment or innovate or do anything that will take away from lead generation and closing deals.

Or perhaps senior management will not buy into Sales 2.0 and refrain from providing the top down momentum to drive Sales 2.0 realignment.

Scott Santucci, Senior Analyst Forrester and speaker at Sales 2.0 San Francisco, wrote this recent post on the significant issues that sales leaders face in instituting change. As a follow-up to the Sales 2.0 Conference, don't forget to register for Scott's complimentary teleconference “Are you Mounting a Value-Selling Engine on a Product Selling Chassis?”

The best of success to you in rolling out your Sales 2.0 initiatives!

Photo Credits: Robert Lesser

Top Photo: Chicago skyline from Millennium Park
Middle Photo: Dave Fitzgerald, VP Sales, Brainshark & Dan Demko, President, SBTV.com
Bottom Photo: Kevin Hooper, VP, Technology Solutions Group, Hewlett-Packard Company

Robert Lesser on Twitter
Acquiring Minds Blog

Buyer centricity on a shoestring lead generation budget

If you are in telesales, how can you be both buyer-centric AND productive?

For telesales groups that target the SMB segment (Small, Medium Business), the dynamics are very different than in pursuing large mid-market or enterprise accounts.

In targeting the vast SMB market through lead generation, the challenge for telesales is to break into large numbers of accounts without the luxury of referrals or deep account insight.

The issue of minimal customer insight is problematic for both outbound cold calling and the telequalification of responders where limited profiling information exists. The issue is exacerbated by the demanding metrics set for telesales.

The recognition that the internet has enabled buyers to be in control of the buying process creates formidable challenges to telesales: how to be knowledgeable, consultative and bring value to the discussion.

For many organizations, the resources for telesales enablement may limited adding to the woes of telesales.

So what to do? How can you trade-off between efficiency and effectiveness?

Let's start with an example of what not to do:

Hi Mr. Lesser, I am calling today after reviewing your website. Our solution is well-suited to your company. It will help you save at least 10% in costs...

The problem with this approach is that the sales rep is calling under false pretenses - hardly a way to build a rapport with a prospect. By their generic value proposition it becomes clear that the only thing customized about their pitch is the use of your name.

For fun, try this out: ask the telesales rep why he/she believes that their solution is a good fit to your company based on their review of your website.


In contrast, my suggested approach digs deeper but still allows you to work on a shoestring lead generation budget.

Segment your List & Segment your Messages
By segmenting your list based on criteria such as size of organization or preferably, industry/vertical market, you will be able to use the power of mass customization.

A message using industry vernacular to articulate how your solution addresses industry pain points can be an effective door opener.

Although not as effective, as communicating to account-specific pain points, it can build credibility and give you the 'right' to ask more detailed, account questions.


Fact-Find Low, Call High
A year ago, Paul McCord, sales trainer, consultant and author, blogged about how he prospected. Paul's approach to sell his firm's services was to call 'low' into an account to discover pain points and potentially generate an internal referral to a senior decision-maker.

Then, armed with account insight, Paul calls to the decision-maker with stellar results.

To economize, this approach can be well-adapted to high volume telesales by interviewing only one low level contact prior to approaching the senior decision-maker and limiting the number of call attempts.


Use Trigger Marketing
Just as consumers who move through life stages, the buying cycle for businesses can be triggered by milestone events such as changes in the executive suite, mergers & acquisitions, office relocations, the bankruptcy of the vendor of an installed solution etc.

Lists that track these triggers are broadly available and also with such tools such as InsideView.

Overlaying this data onto your database can flag accounts that then can be batched and targeted by telesales.


Telesales faces very different pressures than field sales. Some of the above approaches are used by field sales in a similar fashion but the approaches described here reflect the unique requirements of the world of telesales.

Photo credit: Balancing act by theDQT

Sales Leads vs. Appointments?

Which to consider: lead generation or appointment setting?

Answer: both.

Both approaches are highly effective for building sales pipelines.

Appointment Setting gets you in the door, while Lead Generation not only gets you in the door but gives you the right hot buttons to press with prospects that are actively evaluating solutions.

In other words, with Lead Generation you only get appointments with accounts that are pre-qualified when the appointment is being set according to a robust list of qualification questions.

There are eight criteria that you can use to determine which teleprospecting method will be most appropriate but let's start by contrasting the two methods.

Appointment Setting is best deployed against Named Accounts or accounts that you are very sure are a good fit to your value proposition. Appointment Setting is also great for early stage solutions where active projects cannot be found because the early adopters are not aware of a solution in the marketplace. Another scenario is where sales reps need all the appointments they can get to fill their pipeline.

Lead Generation is best used when highly paid sales reps are selective on the opportunities they pursue and do not wish to waste time on unqualified accounts. For these reasons, most B2B organizations are focused on generating more quality leads and less quantity.

Further, when the sales reps do engage a lead, they want to be able sell a solution based on pain points and decision criteria identified during the lead generation process. Solution selling on complex solutions requires this type of insight on the prospect.

When a face-to-face sales meeting is required as part of the buying cycle, field sales reps will prefer leads to be fully qualified to ensure that the travel expense is warranted.

Should a B2B organization target a market segment where the solution may beyond the reach of many prospects, it becomes crucial to confirm that a budget is committed or obtainable. Lead Generation would be favored in this case. However, with the popularity of affordable, SaaS applications, this may become less of an issue for software vendors.

Finally, the marketing team may value market intelligence that is gathered during the course of Lead Generation for market assessment and segementation: competitive landscape, use of custom solutions, engagement of third parties such as consultants, systems integrators or service bureaus etc.

Eight Criteria
To recap: the below seven factors can be used as criteria to select the best method for your team. (Lead Generation = L.G., Appointment Setting = A.S.).

For example, should you wish to pursue SMB accounts with a mainstream, complex solution, Lead Generation (L.G.) would be your best choice.

1. Type of Accounts - Named Accounts (A.S) vs. General Business (L.G.)
   
2. Size of Accounts - Enterprise (A.S.) vs. SMB (L.G.)
   
3. Stage of Solution Adoption - Early Stage (A.S.) vs. Mainstream (L.G.)
4. Size of your Sales Pipeline - Small Pipeline (A.S.) vs. Large Pipeline (L.G.)
5. Type of Solution - Volume Sale (A.S.) vs. Complex Sale (L.G.)
6. Distance from Prospect - Easy Commute (A.S.) vs. Long Commute (L.G.)
7. Solution Affordability - Within reach of most prospects (A.S.) vs. out-of-reach of many prospects (L.G.)
8. Market Insight - No need (A.S.) vs. High Need (L.G.)
   

Connect with me: Twitter, LinkedIn, Company Website

Photo Credit: pawpaw67

Marketing on the Outbound

In my last post on outbound marketing, I discussed the use of outbound marketing in targeting five types of buyers - buyers who can only be reached and persuaded to consider your solution through outbound marketing.

Outbound marketing or lead generation is used to directly contact 'cold' prospects through tactics such as direct mail, email, events and teleprospecting.

Depending on the size of your target audience, the spectrum of programs could vary from either a mass direct marketing program targeting small businesses with a volume sale type of solution or a high touch, account-based marketing program targeting enterprise accounts with a complex sale solution.

Despite the noise in the marketplace, most B2B marketers are looking to develop an optimal mix of outbound and inbound marketing, where each type of marketing works together to enhance results.

Today I want to highlight (not hype) some of the key benefits uniquely associated with outbound marketing. The first benefit, marketing ROI, provides an immediate payoff on outbound marketing while the remaining benefits pave the way to success for future marketing programs.

Marketing ROI - For most B2B organizations, especially those selling complex solutions, outbound marketing can deliver a sizable return on marketing investment (ROMI).

The higher costs of outbound marketing are affordable for organizations selling complex solutions that often start at $10,000 (or much more). By focusing on well-defined, high potential segments with large deal potential, just one close will pay for the outbound marketing program many times over.


Primary Market Research - What if you could define a vertical market segment comprised of 1,000 accounts in a region and be provided with a detailed report on that market? Unfortunately most technology analysts are unable to drill down to small-sized market segments in their research efforts.

By conducting an outbound marketing effort, you can profile segments in a precise way and use criteria that are meaningful to you. This insight gained is a bonus spin off from the core goal of generating qualified leads.


Market Segmentation - An outbound marketing program can provide very actionable information for B2B marketers to segment their markets and generate higher yield programs.

This information can be leveraged for trigger marketing and solution selling.

Accounts that are not converted to leads can be used for segmentation and are often profiled using the following criteria:

• pain points or needs
  
• buying criteria
• future date for evaluation
  
• satisfaction with competitive solutions
• date of installation of competitive solution
• use of in-house or custom solutions
  

The challenge with inbound marketing is that you are profiling accounts that are not within your target market (as defined by size, industry and geography) and who maybe responding to an offer, rather than to your value proposition. This skews the results of the profiling.


Robust Database - A clean, well-profiled database provides the foundation for future marketing programs. Given that 20% of a list decays over a year, marketers are well-served if data can be cleaned as a by-product of outbound marketing efforts.

Less wastage on marketing to poor data and the cumulative impact of relevant messaging creates a compelling case for frequently touching key prospects through outbound marketing.

This database provides intelligence should a prospect respond through inbound or outbound marketing efforts.


What unique benefits do you associate with outbound marketing?


Photo Credit: jot.punkt

10 Signs that Sales & Marketing are Mis-Aligned

Office Fight by trawin

Poor quality leads and a broken lead process are warning signs that sales and marketing are not aligned.

As a provider of lead generation services, we are afforded a unique position at the intersection point between sales and marketing to observe many of these 'canaries'.

Today, I have tallied our top ten signs that sales and marketing are mis-aligned:

1. Wrestling in the Office - Sales and marketing settle their differences like cro-magnon men (see photo).
   
   
2. Rental Lists as Leads. - Marketing refers to accounts and contacts on rental lists as 'leads'. Any marketer who indiscriminately parrots this term from list vendors should be sent back to B2B marketing school.
   
   
3. Inquiries as Leads - Marketing categorizes an inquiry as a 'lead'. A responder is just that: someone who is interested in your offer and may not be evaluating solutions.
   
   
4. Multiple Definitions for a Lead - Marketing and sales can't agree on a single definition of a qualified, sales-ready lead.
   
   
5. Recycling Marketing Messaging for Sales - Dragging-and-dropping a message from a marketing brochure or website does not satisfy the needs of inside and outside sales for precise, distinct and succinct messaging.
   
   
6. No commitment from Sales on Lead Handling - Once marketing hands off a lead to sales there is no agreed upon course of action for lead engagement, lead reporting or lead recycling.
   
   
7. Fuzzy Sales Lead Feedback - The reports from sales are full of emotion but not facts. Leads are tossed aside with little detailed feedback as to why the lead did not meet the lead criteria.
   
   
8. A Qualified Prospect Calls Back - A lead who is expecting a call from sales, never receives contact. The lead re-contacts your organization to find out when someone will call.
   
   
9. Leads Generated by Marketing are Not Factored into Quota - Sales does not count on marketing-sourced leads to achieve their quota.
   
   
10. Marketing is Measured on Inquiries or Responses - Marketing is measured on activity metrics, rather than results metrics.

What signs do you see that cause you concern about sales and marketing alignment? What would you add to the list?

Use Outbound Marketing to target these 5 Buyer Types

Given the popularity of social media and inbound marketing, when should outbound marketing be used?

For some types of buyers, outbound marketing is the only way to engage (e.g. direct mail, email, events, teleprospecting).

These buyers require intervention through outbound marketing:

The Unaware Buyer - this buyer is evaluating but is unaware of your solution despite your high level of marketing activity (including inbound marketing). Outbound marketing may be your only option to reach these buyers.

The Puzzled Buyer - this buyer has some misconceptions that have precluded consideration of your solution. By persuading the buyer through direct, interactive, phone or web-based communication, these buyer's misconceptions can be corrected through dialog.

The Buyer with Unmet Needs - in this case, the buyer may have underlying needs that have not been openly discussed with a third party. Or perhaps, the buyer was unaware of a solution that would address her needs so had not initiated an evaluation. Early stage solutions that are new-to-market often target buyers with latent needs.

The Tuned-out Buyer - not all buyers participate in social media or conduct online searches. Some buyers expect that some vendors must reach out to them as a precondition to considering their solution.

The Buyer at the Tipping Point - B2B marketing is part art & part science. Given the length of the marketing and sales cycle, we can often identify many of the touches that led to a closed sale but we are unable to pinpoint the catalyst that converted the buyer. Perhaps those accounts that closed through online marketing were prompted by the cumulative impact of both online and offline touches through both inbound and outbound marketing.


Through our outbound marketing efforts we have converted these types of buyers into opportunities. Depending on the stage of their evaluation, these buyers can vary in terms of their potential to close.

What results have you seen with these types of buyers?

Photo Credit: henrybloomfield

Having a blast with B2B email?

When you think email, do you think email blasts?

You know - a humongous email broadcast - the digital equivalent of a large mail drop.

Otherwise known as Batch & Blast email, B2B marketers have viewed this type of email as best for retention marketing, rather than acquiring customers.

In the early days of email marketing, two powerful types of email were unavailable to B2B marketers:

• 1to1 Sales emails that allow sales reps to automate, personalize and track emails.
  
• and Trigger emails that are sent in response to online & offline behavior and segmentation criteria such as the stage in the buying cycle.

But all that is changing as...

1. Multi-Function Email Suites dominate B2B email marketing.
2. Retention email marketing takes a back seat to acquisition marketing.
   
3. Marketing automation vendors are extending their applications.
4. The marketing automation and email vendors consolidate.
   

Multi-Function Email Suites dominate B2B email marketing
Although no one (except me, ahem) labels these applications 'multi-function email suites', I am using the term to describe multi-faceted marketing applications that include the functionality of the three types of email marketing that I have noted above: Batch & Blast, 1to1 Sales emails and Trigger emails. Of course, the functionality of these applications goes well beyond email marketing to include content management, web analytics, CRM integration etc.

When we surveyed 249 B2B marketers last year, we were surprised to find that marketing automation suites (or multi-function email suites) dominated the rankings of email applications.

Upshot: if you are not yet using or at least looking at these multi-function suites, you may be lagging the market.


Retention email marketing takes a back seat to acquisition marketing
With the widespread use of email filters and the need for recipients to opt-in to email communications, retention marketing has been the primary goal for email marketing.

1to1 Sales email and Trigger emails provide a level of personalization, immediacy and relevance that Batch & Blast emails cannot deliver allowing B2B marketers to target prospects, rather than just customers, with compelling emails.

The broad market acceptance of lead management and sales enablement applications is paving the way for the widespread use of 1to1 Sales emails and Trigger emails for lead generation, lead nurture and conversion.

Upshot: Marketers and sales reps now have robust email marketing tools available for lead generation.


Marketing automation vendors are extending their applications
As vendors push to increase their scale, the competition is intensifying.

Recently, Genius launched a lead management application to complement their leading sales enablement solution. While Eloqua and Marketo have launched a broadside to Genius by moving into the sales enablement space from lead management.

For a terrific overview of this standoff, read Laura Ramos' recent post on her blog. Laura is VP / Principal Analyst, Forrester Research.

Upshot: enhanced competition should provide more attractive options for buyers to buy full application suites.


The marketing automation and email vendors will consolidate
I asked Jon Miller, VP of Marketing, Marketo about how buyers will look at evaluating marketing applications:

Q: Will B2B sales or marketing teams stop buying one-dimensional email applications? i.e. Batch & Blast applications only

A: I definitely think this is true; people don’t have time or energy to cobble together piece part solutions.

As marketing automation vendors scramble to extend their applications into other types of email marketing, two analysts see the market consolidating.

In a webinar earlier this year, Alexander Drobik, Managing VP Gartner Research simply states:

In the current era of economic uncertainty and increasing IT productivity, users will congregate their IT software spend in megavendors and their ecosystems.

(For free access to the Gartner webinar slides, click here.)

David Raab, a consultant specializing in marketing technology and analysis, noted in a well-written review of Marketo Sales Insight, that the revenue opportunity on sales enablement tools will be very attractive to sales automation vendors (i.e. CRM vendors) and those vendors will 'take the business for themselves'.

Upshot: B2B marketers may find standalone, Batch & Blast vendors to be a dying breed as robust sales & marketing automation suites dominate the market. Our research shows that of the Batch & Blast vendors, it was mostly the budget-friendly vendors, who held significant market share.


(Image copyright - Fox Media. The resemblance to the author is purely accidental.)

Should marketing be compensated like sales?

Should marketing carry a quota on revenue?



The answer is yes according to Joe Payne, CEO of Eloqua, a marketing automation software vendor (far left of above photo). 30% of the Eloqua marketing team's pay is contingent on Eloqua achieving its revenue objectives.

I recently spoke with Joe Payne at a panel discussion on sales and marketing alignment.

But Joe, shouldn't marketing be compensated based on sales qualified leads (SQLs) or sales accepted leads (SALs)? I asked after the panel.

Joe noted that he wants marketing to be aligned with the corporate goals. SQLs or SALs are not money in the bank. Joe's concern is that marketing is savvy and can game the system by persuading sales to accept leads.

Joe should know. Unlike most CEOs, Joe's background is in marketing with stints at MicroStrategy, Coca-Cola and Procter & Gamble.

But how can marketing influence the sale after the lead has been passed? Joe believes that marketing can play a strong role by creating tools such as ROI calculators.

Personally, I would be reluctant to adopt Joe's framework especially given the high 30% rate:

• If marketing was gaming the system, a high rate of disqualification of accepted leads by sales would quickly set off alarm bells for sales management and senior management.
• Once a lead is passed to sales, marketing loses control of the lead. Lead leakage beyond marketing's control can take its toll: leads either contacted too slowly or not all, leads who suffer from a poor sales experience, or falsified documentation in the system indicating lead follow-up that didn't transpire. Unfortunately marketing is unable to plug these leakages that may occur in the sales department.
  
• Marketing's role in demand creation and nurture marketing dwarfs its role in helping to close leads. Yes - marketing can influence closed sales through tools and collateral but its role is much diminished. Put it this way, if tools and collateral were that important, why do few (if any) organizations gauge their influence on the sale or ROI?
• The telequalification team is not significantly bonused on revenue and is closer to the sale than marketing. According to a recent survey by Phone Works, the inside sales team responsible for telequalfication is most often bonused on the quality of leads (58%), appointments (54%), number of leads (50%) and pipeline contribution (42%). Only 35% of organizations used revenue as a factor in determining bonuses (down from 65% in 2007).

Let's be fair, especially during this recession. Give marketing a quota but on metrics within their realm such as sales qualified or sales accepted leads.

If a B2B marketer is to be measured on revenue, then call it a bonus and make it a smaller proportion of pay such as 10%.

PS. For a recent article in the Economist discussing agency compensation in the B2C world, click here.

Photo Credit: Robert Lesser's photo of (l to r) Joe Payne, CEO Eloqua Corp.; Frank Falcone, Senior Product Lead, Microsoft Dynamics CRM, Microsoft Canada; Ajay Sirsi, PhD, Associate Professor, Marketing, Schulich School of Business; (missing) Rick McCutheon, President, FullContactSelling (April 27, 2009).

Sales 2.0 fuels PTC's SMB Expansion

As a former paratrooper, Dan Maier’s background has prepared him well for his current assignment: managing a global inside sales team of 75 reps selling a $9,000 solution to hard-hit manufacturers.

Dan Maier’s title is as long as it is deep: VP Worldwide Inside Sales & North America Mathcad Sales, PTC (see Dan's photo on the left that I snapped at the Sales 2.0 Conference in Boston).

Like many enterprise software developers, PTC has moved downmarket to sell to SMB accounts (Small & Medium size Businesses). The creation of a strong inside sales team structure complemented by sales through the channel, reflects the economics of selling profitably to this market segment. According to ChannelWeb, 21% of PTC's revenue is driven through 400 global PTC partners.

At the Sales 2.0 Conference, Dan discussed how PTC has successfully targeted the SMB space by leveraging inside sales. With $1 billion in revenue and 62,082 customers, PTC's average yearly revenue per customer, including services, is just over $17,000 (from SMB to Enterprise accounts).

PTC's Siebel CRM system covers the universe of manufacturing accounts. According to Dan, PTC is only adding a couple of thousand net new accounts per year. However, PTC needed to broaden the list of contacts at each existing account. By choosing Jigsaw, PTC significantly improved their prospect conversion rate.

The PTC inside sales team's objectives are to conduct 250 to 275 calls per week with talk time of 12.5+ hours.

After Dan's presentation at the Sales 2.0 Conference in Boston, I asked: is Sales 2.0 an evolution or a revolution?

Dan quickly answered that Sales 2.0 is an evolution. However, he is concerned that his sales team will be inundated with technology. Dan maintains that there has to be a balance between the new facets of Sales 2.0 with standard best practices and core selling skills.

When asked about whether Sales 2.0 was helping to close the gap between empowered buyers and his telesales team, Dan responded that SMB buyers are more agile and conduct more online research than Enterprise buyers. Sales 2.0 has helped PTC to close the gap with SMB buyers. However, there is not as much a gap to close with Enterprise buyers.

With half of his team of 75 outside of the US, Dan is challenged in rolling out Sales 2.0 practices in countries that are well behind the US.

Dan mentioned that there are constant challenges in aligning sales and marketing. Dan is looking for a better framework for sales and marketing to evaluate the effectiveness of Sales 2.0

Finally, Dan talked to me about the biggest impact of Sales 2.0: the metric to evaluate his telesales team has moved from tracking the number of calls to talk time. For Dan, Sales 2.0 has enabled this transition.

To view more pictures of Dan and all of the other speakers in Boston, check out my 27 photos on Flickr.

Joining Dan on his panel at the Sales 2.0 Conference was Travis Fore of Network Solutions. For my interview of Travis, please see my blog post interview of Travis Fore.

Sales 2.0 Boston Conference Links

Sales 2.0 Conference website by Selling Power

Social Networking in Sales: Show Me the Money by Anneke Seley, The Sales 2.0 Advocate blog

The Sales 2.0 Conference Post by Geoffrey James, BNET blog

"Loose Talk" at the Sales 2.0 Conference, Boston, MA by Marci Reynolds, Sales Operations blog

Sales 2.0 Lessons from the Twitteratti by Parker Trewin, B2B Marketing for Faster Sales blog

Photos of Speakers and Attendees at the Sales 2.0 Conference by Robert Lesser

Network Solutions Levers Sales 2.0 for a 360 degree customer view by Robert Lesser, Acquiring Minds blog

Network Solutions levers Sales 2.0 for a 360 degree customer view

Travis Fore is in a unique position to profit from Sales 2.0. As SVP of Sales, Service and Product Delivery, Travis is responsible for the breadth of customer experience at Network Solutions.

I spoke with Travis prior to his appearance on a panel discussing 'Sales Lead Management 2.0' at the Sales 2.0 Conference in Boston.

Network Solutions has expanded its offering beyond domain registration to online services in such areas as search marketing (SEM), ecommerce, website design and hosting with customers spending from $500 to $50,000 per month. Approximately 300 direct sales reps target small businesses across the US.

One of my questions to Travis concerned buyer dissatisfaction. According to a recent survey, a large issue for buyers are sales reps who make promises that are then broken when the prospect becomes a customer.

Travis admitted that Network Solutions is still working on aligning sales and service. Travis believes that buyer dissatisfaction with broken promises is a problem with most sales channels, especially those selling complex products.

At Network Solutions, a significant amount of training is conducted with sales reps on how to set customer expectations.

A wiki has been created with Salesforce.com, Network Solutions' sales CRM system, that helps reps find answers to their questions. All collateral and training materials are posted to Salesforce.com including a one page cheat sheet with FAQ.

With Travis sitting in the middle of sales and service, he has found that he can cut through the 'BS' (note to reader: Travis is not referring to the balance sheet).

Network Solutions tracks all cancellations by reason and by solution. Travis' team can quickly determine if training is the root cause of an issue.

Travis discussed with me some of the Sales 2.0 tools that have improved his team's decision-making, lowered costs, enhanced customer value and allowed Travis to manage a widely-dispersed and mobile workforce:

• Salesgenie.com has been instrumental in enabling segmentation by vertical and on-the-fly geographical proximity. A key data point provided by Salesgenie is the spend on local advertising.

• CallEffect is a click-to-call and call logger that is integrated with Salesforce.com

• An internally developed tool that generates a proposal based on an evaluation of the prospect's website - SEM, ecommerce, security etc.
  

• Online contract management software
  

For more on Travis' panel at the Sales 2.0 Conference, tune in to this blog or my tweets at www.twitter.com/RobertLesser.

Sales 2.0 Techniques for the Job Search

Usually I write for the B2B professional who is conducting lead generation programs.

Today's post is for the professional who is the program.

As an out-of-work B2B practioner, you may be looking for innovative ways to search for your next position. If you are the proverbial cobbler, you may have neglected the marketing of you.

The next generation of web applications (aka 2.0) should be very appealing to you (as it is to the resource-constrained B2B marketer): free or nearly free applications, easy and fast to get up and running and rich with interactivity and online tracking information.

Let's step through a plan to get you that job:

Goal Setting
To help you manage the roller-coaster ride of a job search, it's much easier if you can objectively look at the job search like a sales pipeline. For example, the more activity at the top of the funnel (e.g. applications and interviews with appropriate target companies) should lead to more offers.

By setting top of funnel goals it can help keep you focused even if the offers are not forthcoming. Talk to your peers and set reasonable goals for yourself. Celebrate the achievement of positive metrics.


CRM System
You will need a system to manage your job search metrics and to keep track of your progression with contacts.

A CRM or customer relationship management system will keep you organized and disciplined. An added bonus is that the use and configuration of a CRM system will give you the insight and experience of being a sales rep (where you are the product).

FREE CRM - Yes that's right - the entry level version of Salesforce.com (Personal Edition) is free.


Email Marketing
Some email marketing systems allow 1to1 emails, where an individual can send a trackable email to a prospect.

In Job Search 2.0, a trackable email will allow you to find out how many times the email has been opened.

This intelligence is invaluable as it indicates that your recipient has forwarded your email or resume to colleagues.

$99 per year - The Salesforce.com Group Edition provides trackable email.


SEO
Search engine optimization is ranked #1 by B2B marketers for generating quality leads.

Your application of SEO to your job search is similarly important.

For example, should you upload your resume to a job board or directly to an employer, keywords in your resume will drive traffic to you and in turn, will help rank your resume higher (Shall we call this JB - SEO or Job Board - Search Engine Optimization?)

For a B2B marketer, it can be challenging to determine what keywords the target audience is using to search.

Not so on job boards - you can easily tap into current job postings by employers to assess keywords.

FREE Keyword Tool - Interested in visualizing the keywords in multiple job ads? I used a free tag cloud tool Wordle to create the tag cloud (to the left) by combining the copy from three job ads on Monster.


List Procurement
The next generation of online lists favors the job searcher. No longer do you need to pay a hefty premium for minimum order sizes.

Now many lists do not require either a subscription or a minimum order. Take a look at lists such as: Jigsaw, NetProspex, SalesGenie, Zapdata and ZoomInfo.. For a recent study on online data sources, click here.


Social Networks
And of course, social networks like LinkedIn provide free contacts. However the records do not include contact information and the number of available contacts depends on the size of your network.

One of the key benefits of 2.0 tools is to track online behavior.

Did you know that in LinkedIn you can find out who is viewing your LinkedIn profile?
On the sidebar of your profile, you will find this handy widget.

With LinkedIn, you can inform your network of your job search status, ask questions of your network and the LinkedIn community and ask your network for introductions.


Blogs
As a job seeker, you are severely constrained by the amount of space on a resume.

A personal blog is a much more expressive medium to expand upon your capabilities and in a much more personable tone than a resume.

It's also a great way to demonstrate your written communication skills - essential for the marketing profession.


Video
If you a good public speaker looking to standout from the crowd, a video biography may be the tool for you.

Of all the social media tools available to marketers, blogs and video are ranked most highly by B2B marketers for lead generation.

$299 & up - Create a video biography with Market Yourself Smarter



Further Assistance
If I can be of any assistance in your job search (my focus is B2B marketing), please feel free to contact me at: robert (at) OnDemandInsideSales (dot) com

If you are a marketer that would like to help out your peer group, please leave a comment.


Additional Reading
Job Search 2.0 by Rachel Happe, The Social Organization Blog
Career Toolbox: 100+ Places to Find Jobs by Sean P. Aune, Mashable
30+ Websites to Visit When You're Laid Off by Ben Parr, Mashable
7 Secrets to Getting Your Next Job Using Social Media by Dan Schawbel, Personal Branding Blog
Job Searching 2.0: Looking for Work 'New School' by Monica Hamburg, Me Like the Interweb Blog

Comparing B2B Online Data Sources - New Research

At last year's MarketingProfs B2B Forum, I met Ruth Stevens, consultant, author, columnist, educator and B2B guru. Ruth was planning an analysis of online data providers and was considering some options for structuring the approach.

Just this past week, Ruth and co-author Bernice Grossman, president of DMRS Group, a marketing consultancy, released an interesting study of major online sources of B-to-B data (Thanks to Ruth for acknowledging in the appendix my modest contribution).

As discussed in this comparative analysis of B2B data providers, the Internet has spawned new competitors like Jigsaw and Zoominfo and enabled self-service list procurement and instant download.

Ruth and Bernice asked fifteen compiled list providers to participate in the analysis and ten responded. The list providers were requested to provide counts across a variety of industries and asked to match data to ten real-world contacts that shared their contact information.

The ten providers included: Demandbase, idExec, Jigsaw, Lead411, NetProspex, OneSource, SalesGenie, Selectory, Zapdata and ZoomInfo.

Ruth and Bernice provided some observations and recommendations:

• The data quantity and quality varied widely, even between providers that were subsidiaries of the same parent.
• Run a test by providing a file to a number of vendors for data append.
• Be aware that some vendors may be strong in some industries but weak in others.

We have experienced first-hand the differences between data providers. My organization, Direct Impact Marketing, maintains a strict privacy policy: no lists are shared between clients, so we often rent lists and then conduct lead generation programs.

I would like to share some insight that we have on working with data providers:

• A breakthrough on minimum order sizes - With the advent of online data providers, B2B marketers can now order small quantities without penalty.
• The temptation of batch-and-blast email - Just because you can now order or append email addresses, doesn't imply that you will be well-served by blasting out emails to prospects. Most of our clients are disappointed with this tactic. A more rewarding approach is to call the prospect and then send a 1to1 sales-style email that is personalized to the prospect.
• One size rarely fits all - We have found that it is difficult to find one list provider that meets all of our client needs. Sometimes one data provider can provide very accurate information at the account level but the number of contacts is sparse. This is especially true when we try and target mid-level contacts. We often will merge two lists to get the best of both worlds.
• Centralized vs. decentralized authority - A critical consideration is whether you are targeting centralized locations (i.e. headquarters) versus decentralized locations (i.e. branches). Should you wish to focus on decentralized locations, a response or subscription list may be a better choice, given the demonstrated affinity or interests of the contacts.
• Watch out for list hustlers - If the price sounds too good to be true, then it probably is. Check out the scoop on this data provider.
• Just say no - Rental lists can be highly addictive. I have spoken with many marketers who would rather rent than invest the time in their house file. Once your list is of a reasonable size, you will be best served by focusing on marketing to your house file and growing that list organically.
• Size vs. list criteria - Sometimes larger lists will offer fewer selection criteria. Make sure that you have prioritized your selection criteria to ensure that you get a list that fits your needs. It may make sense to pay for more selection criteria and fewer records if the list is a better match to your target market.
  
• Ask your data provider to stop using the term 'sales leads' - A data provider is in the business of selling suspect records, accounts or contacts but not leads. For a data provider to refer to the data as 'sales leads' is mis-using a key B2B term and over promising on their product. A sales-ready, qualified lead is very different than an unqualified name on a list.

Bizzuka interviews Robert Lesser on Lead Generation on BlogTalkRadio

Paul Chaney, blogger and Internet Marketing Director from Bizzuka read our report on LeadGen Tools and asked me to appear on Bizzuka's internet radio show.

John Muncell, CEO and Co-Founder of Bizzuka held a wide-ranging discussion with me for an hour.

Have a listen to this podcast on BlogTalkRadio and hear my perspective on best practices and tools for lead generation, as exemplified by our recent research on LeadGenTools.

Networking & Photos from the Sales 2.0 Conference

The Sales 2.0 Conference in San Francisco was a great opportunity to chat and catch-up with luminaries from the B2B Sales & Marketing world.

The first day I sat at a table with Garth Moulton, VP of Community /Co-Founder at Jigsaw and blogger. Last fall, I had met Garth in Chicago when I spoke at a Chicago Association of Direct Marketing conference sponsored by Jigsaw. Garth and I spoke for a few minutes on best practices in using Jigsaw.

During the reception it was great to catch-up with two Forrester analysts who I had not spoken to in a while: I last met Laura Ramos, VP, Principal Analyst at Forrester Research and blogger when I presented at the MarketingProfs' B2B Summit 2008 in Boston and Scott Santucci, Senior Analyst at Forrester in San Francisco where I spoke at a MarketingSherpa B2B Summit a few years back (Laura and Scott posed for this photo that I took).

Laura noted to me some of the obstacles that large businesses face in adopting social media. I pointed out that social media were especially well suited to small business. Although small businesses are passionate, Laura has found that resources at small business often become constrained in meeting the demands of content creation.

Jill Konrath, Chief Sales Officer, Selling to Big Companies, author and blogger confided in me some of the challenges that she faces in expanding her sales training organization in this downturn.

Anneke Seley, Founder & CEO of Phone Works, author and blogger was very receptive in discussing with me alternative inside sales models in a Sales 2.0 world. Anneke (see photo on left) was one of the standout speakers on a panel later that day.


Jim Dickie, Partner at CSO Insights gave a stellar presentation at the conference. Although hardly participating at the same level, I offered up to Jim our learning through our LeadGen Tools Research. The photo below



was taken of Jim (left) with Gerhard Gschwandtner, Founder and CEO, Personal Selling Power and host of the conference.

Lead Nurture through Social Networks

Today is the second day of the Sales 2.0 Conference in San Francisco.

On Day One, Mark Wilson, VP Marketing, Sybase presented a unique perspective on social networks. Mark can be seen on the far right of the photo of the panel on Marketing for Sales Success (click on the photo to expand the photo size).

The topic of social networks arose in an unexpected scenario: Mark Wilson advocates using social networks for lead nurture.

This comment was unusual in the context of a sales conference and in that Sybase has traditionally used a marketing automation tool to nurture leads that are not yet sales-ready.

Mark's perspective was that a social network was a great forum for prospects to connect with Sybase customers and fans. Mark favors neutral or third-party networks vs. Sybase sponsored networks.

More posts to follow on the conference.

Follow this link to my photos from the conference.

Lead Generation Takes Precedence in the Downturn

In response to a substantial drop in technology spending, B2B marketers will cut budgets and re-jig their media mix.

This was one of the main conclusions drawn from the recent BtoB webinar: Outlook 2009: Marketing Priorities and Plans.

The webinar featured Kate Maddox, Senior Reporter, BtoB Magazine, Rich Vancil, VP Executive Advisory Group at IDC, Mark Wilson, VP Corporate Marketing at Sybase and Mark Gambill, CMO at CDW

Rich Vancil spoke to some preliminary results compiled from a recent survey of 36 tech marketing vendors.

Tech & Marketing Spend - IDC forecasts that IT Global Revenue Growth will increase marginally by 0.5% in 2009 and Global Marketing Investment Growth will drop by 10%.

Although this is a sombre forecast, it does not compare to the steep drop in spend in 2001 (see my previous blog post on this).

Brand vs. Lead Generation - The IDC survey indicates that B2B marketers have ranked demand generation significantly higher than awareness building for marketing initiatives. In good times, IDC has found that the rankings of demand generation and awareness building are equal.

The further that a marketing activity is distanced from the sales team, the deeper the cuts will be. IDC forecasts deep to moderate cuts in branding, big tent events, marketing strategy and product marketing but moderate increases in lead management and qualification and sales enablement.

Digital Marketing - IDC reports that digital marketing spend is over 9% of total marketing investment in 2008 and predicts that digital marketing will carve out the largest slice of marketing spend by 2010.

Sales Spend - Areas such as sales administration and outside sales will bear the brunt of cuts while sales enablement and insides sales are forecasted to see increased funding.

Sales investment in Lead Qualification and Demand Generation will increase by 20%+ in 2009.

Mark Wilson from Sybase and Mark Gambill from CDW echoed Rich Vancil's remarks.

Sybase is using the recession as an opportunity to assess all marketing programs, even the 'sacred cows'. Integrated programs are prioritized over one-off, standalone programs. Sybase's media mix will favor online media such as SEM, social media and virtual events.

CDW has taken a very analytical approach in strategic target marketing and understanding customer behavior. From this, CDW has aligned the essential programs to the strategy and any outliers are subject to scrutiny and cost-cutting.

As I consider the comments made during the webinar, some further thoughts come to mind as advice for marketers:

1. Be Proactive - 'If we cut marketing budgets by 10%, what will the impact be?' If you can't address this question in a factual way, then your CFO will answer this question for you.
2. Be Focused - Now more than ever, marketing needs to focus on success, minimize the noise and gain organizational buy-in.
3. Don't be Misled by the Law of Averages - Although the overall marketing budget may be cut by a significant percentage, there usually is latitude to double down on the winners and cut out the losers with a more effective media mix.
4. Remember that Change is Opportunity - with your competitors shedding unprofitable product lines, cutting back on marketing spend, tarnishing their customer satisfaction levels and laying off valuable staff, now may be the time to seize the day.
5. Use Levers in the Demand Generation Process - The most prevalent points of leverage are the shift from offline media (e.g. print advertising, face-to-face events) to online media (e.g. virtual events, SEM, social media) and from outside sales to inside sales and telemarketing.

To read more posts, follow this link to The Acquiring Minds Blog

To download the BtoB Magazine webcast, follow this link: Outlook 2009: Marketing Priorities and Plans.

Technology Spend - A Repeat of 2001?

Fasten your seat belts. We will be encountering turbulence.

Like an airplane riding out choppy flying conditions, technology marketers wonder when the outlook will stabilize. Will our stomachs be spared the next gut-wrenching drop?

For those of us with memories of the last downturn, we ask:

Will we see a repeat of the 2001 Tech Meltdown?

In 2000, technology spending in America grew 16% but then dropped 6% in 2001.

According to a recent article in the Economist, we are unlikely to repeat the cataclysmic events of 2001.

A number of reasons are cited:

• The IT market has become more global with China and India spending expected to grow.
• IT Departments today are much leaner and less likely to overspend.
  
• The largest IT vendors are better managed and capitalized
  

The Economist draws heavily from an OECD report and quotes from its author:

More importantly, last time around the IT industry was not the victim of an economic crisis, but its cause, says Graham Vickery, author of the OECD report - Information Technology Outlook.

.....the slowdown and declines so far are not as dramatic as the ICT crash in 2001-02 as the sector is markedly stronger and has not engaged in the excesses of the earlier period.

From a technology marketer's perspective, I believe that today we are in an advantageous position:

• B2B organizations have conservatively managed marketing headcount and marketing spend since the last recession. According to IDC, B2B marketing budgets declined two years before this downturn.
• As the mantra moves from 'Do More with Not Much' to 'Do More with Less', we have a plethora of online tools that are more affordable and measurable than before.
• Open source and SaaS (Cloud Computing) provide price-sensitive buyers with a viable option to minimize upfront expenses and avoid shelfware by recalibrating licenses on a yearly basis.

To sum it up, there is room for optimism despite the doom and gloom.