The Essential Guide to Building the Lead-to-Revenue (L2R)

Machine

Eight Components that Drive B2B Marketing and Sales Results

By Christopher Ryan
CEO, Fusion Marketing Partners

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The Essential Guide to Building Your Lead-toRevenue (L2R) Machine

Eight Components that Drive B2B Marketing and Sales Results
By Christopher Ryan
@Copyright 2015 Christopher Ryan
Published by Fusion Marketing Press, Colorado Springs, CO.
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ISBN:978-0-9825397-6-7

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Contents
Introduction to the Lead-to-Revenue Machine ........................................ 4
Component 1: A Powerful Brand Strategy................................................ 6
Component 2: An Effective Sales Model ................................................ 11
Component 3: Efficient L2R Processes ................................................... 19
Component 4: Strong Offers .................................................................. 26
Component 5: Appropriate Content ...................................................... 32
Component 6: Total Alignment .............................................................. 38
Component 7: Solid Technology Infrastructure ...................................... 42
Component 8: Critical KPIs .................................................................... 48
Conclusion Why You Need to Implement Your L2R Machine Now ....... 54

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Introduction to the Lead-to-Revenue Machine

f your goal is to massively grow your B2B companys

revenue and profit, no single tool or tactic is going to get
you there by itself. The L2R (Lead-to-Revenue)
Machine positions you for success by aligning your
marketing and sales models so that all your activities are
more effective. This game-changing framework eliminates
wasted motion and drives revenue and profits sooner by
focusing you on the core structural and strategic components
you need to succeed.
Distilling more than 30 years of experience in B2B marketing
during which I worked with dozens of leading companies

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 I will share with you the eight essential components of an

effective L2R Machine. Diligently executed, these strategies
bring in more leads, more revenue and build greater value in
your company every time. If you build this framework
successfully, you will create a marketing and sales juggernaut
that is predictable, high-performing and constantly
improving.
In the pages that follow, you will learn how each of the eight
components work to support the overall L2R Machine as
well as some attributes that separate effective L2R initiatives
from inferior ones. Well share mini case studies that show
you how each component works and set you on the road to
strategic B2B marketing clarity and gains you can measure.

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Component 1: A Powerful Brand Strategy

chose brand strategy as the first key component of the

framework because of its extreme importance to L2R
success. Building the rest of your marketing and sales
initiatives on top of a weak brand is akin to building a house
on a bed of sand. It may work for a while, but will have no
chance of sustainable success. This is why it is so essential to
define your brand promise as a guidepost against which you
can gauge all of your tactical activities.
Despite the compelling importance of the brand promise in
creating a powerful L2R Framework, it is still one of the most
misunderstood, unappreciated, and neglected parts of the
marketing and sales process. Advertising visionary David
Ogilvy was right when he said that positioning (his term for
creating the brand promise) is the most important decision

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made in promoting a service or product. Ogilvy was also

correct when he said that successful positioning has more
impact on the results of a promotion than how ads are
created.
Finding the right branding strategy balance is critical. On the
too broad end, lots of B2B companies, desperate for
recognition and revenue, try to be everything to everyone.
However, aiming too narrowly is equally fatal when you find
yourself locked into a market with shrinking revenue.
As an example of poor branding, one of my partners worked
for a company whose small C-level and business development
team had dozens of potential deals cooking, not one of them
anywhere near the one-yard line. The companys core
branding changed with every potential new partner. In the
excitement of infancy, they were saying Yes to anyone who
would pay attention to them, rolling out pilot programs
whose execution was burning cash and frustrating the staff.
This company would have benefited from a clear and
compelling branding message, delivered consistently. Why?
Because branding clarity brings strategic clarity. It means less
wasted internal motion and a clear, direct line of attraction to
the audience you need.
Keep in mind that in addition to articulating the key benefits
of your product or service, the brand strategy must be based
on the specific attributes, desires and requirements of your
target audience. We often use a persona-based approach
to segmenting our target prospect universe and do online
research to make sure that our messaging lines up with what
prospects are looking for and talking about.

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Whats Your Big Idea?

At Fusion Marketing Partners, we often
refer to the brand promise as The Big
Idea. The best way to think about your
own Big Idea is to consider how you would
answer if a prospect asked you the
question, Whats the big idea about your
company? Your answer to this question is, in essence, your
brand promise. Prospects ask themselves this question every
time they consider your offer. And the reason many of them
dont buy from you is they dont think your offer is a Big Idea.
Why? Because you dont tell them why this is true.
Of course, it is hard to be all things to all people, so I suggest
that you get rid of the me-too approach that is, entering
the market echoing the same value propositions as your
competitors. Being a me-too company may appear to be
safer, but just repeating what your competitors are saying
can position you as a commodity, and companies that act like
a commodity will not be successful in a time when buyers
have myriad choices. Commodity companies almost never
command premium prices.
There is a simple lesson here: Be different, unique and
provocative. It is fundamental to your marketing success to
find the Big Idea in your company and communicate it
succinctly. When you do, it will help your team craft the best
and most effective marketing strategy for any medium. And
doing so will also help your customers find your products and
services more easily in a landscape cluttered with competing
messages.
Have you seen the bumper sticker that says Why Be
Normal? (with Normal spelled upside down). This is a good

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approach to take when it comes to selling. If you have the

same pitch as everyone else in your industry, delivered in the
same way, you are bound to get the same result: mediocrity.
Geoffrey Moore, who taught a generation of marketers with
his books, Crossing the Chasm and Inside the Tornado, now
teaches a methodology called Provocation-Based Selling.
Instead of playing nice, you should poke where it hurts,
challenge the prevailing view, and address the
unacknowledged critical issues. This will get you past the
typical limitations of budget, sales cycle, access to the
decision maker, and so forth.

In case you are under the impression that branding is a

qualitative exercise only, consider that when people talk
about a company brand, it is often expressed as sort of an
abstract concept e.g. we feel good about our brand or
perhaps not so good. Actually, a strong brand has monetary
value. For instance, it can be a boon to the stock price,
making the entire company more valuable. It can be a sales

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and profit accelerator by helping you sell more products and

services at a greater profit margin. As David Reibstein,
Professor of Marketing at the Wharton School of Business,
stated, A valuable brand delivers return for the company on
two dimensions. Either it allows the company to charge a
premium price, or it adds more volume or market share.
Forbes Magazine recently published an article that
showcased a survey from McKinsey & Company, which found
that B-to-B purchasing decision makers consider the brand
as a central rather than a marginal component of a suppliers
value proposition. Our survey found that decision makers say
that brand is almost as important as the efforts of sales teams
in encouraging them to make out a purchase order. In the US,
for example, brands are seen as having an 18% share in the
purchasing decision, compared to the 17% tied up in the sales
effort. Having a strong brand strategy gives you a good
foundation for success with the rest of the L2R framework
components.

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Component 2: An Effective Sales Model

nce you have your brand strategy complete, it is time

to decide on your go-to-market strategy, otherwise
known as your sales model. And regardless of your
product or service, sales price and target audience, there will
be four major steps necessary to go from Who is this
company? to closing the deal: awareness, education,
engagement and sale.

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As an example of why this is important, imagine two very

different sales models: In the first example, awareness is
created and inbound inquiries are fed to a business
development function. In this scenario, direct sales reps will
only see leads that have been pre-qualified, usually by a
business development rep (BDR) who has personally qualified
inquirers by asking a series of questions about budget,
authority, timing and so forth. To best support this type of
sales model, we want to drive as much activity into the top of
the funnel as possible, creating the critical mass of inquiries
needed to achieve the target number of qualified leads that
have passed through the qualification process.
Lets now look at the second sales model and how we align it
with the marketing plan. If an organization utilizes a direct
sales force, but provides no pre-qualification function (e.g. no
BDRs), our focus in the marketing plan will be more on quality
than quantity. This is true because we know that in most B2B
scenarios, somewhere between 10 and 15 percent of all
inquiries will pass the qualification filter. This means that
sales reps will talk to 8.5 to 9 suspects before reaching one
qualified prospect. This imbalance leads to two negative
consequences. First, the reps fail to call all the suspects,
finding reasons to disqualify them before making the calls.
Second, reps get busy chasing their hot prospects and neglect
to make the qualification calls in a timely manner. At some
point, slow follow-up is almost as bad as no follow-up.
In this type of sales model, we purposefully back off the
quantity goal and align our marketing plan to deliver leads
that are more qualified. When sales reps discover that one
out of every two suspects are qualified and have potential
to enter the sales pipeline they are more likely to be
diligent with their own follow-up. Another way to tweak this
type of model is to require suspects to provide more data

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about themselves on the web form, thus pre-qualifying or

disqualifying themselves. Each additional piece of data you
ask for will reduce the number of responses, but will also
drive up average lead quality.

These are just two sales model examples. When you include
hybrids, there are dozens of possibilities. The following
graphic shows the major sales models and how they relate on
two important criteria: the cost per transaction and the
amount of personal interaction required.
The goal when deciding on your sales and marketing model is
to drive the highest average transaction amount with the
lowest possible transaction cost. And if you already have a
well-developed sales model, it is good to challenge it
occasionally by asking these types of questions:

Have I identified our best target segments and is our

sales model the best way to reach them?
Is our cost of sales higher than it needs to be?

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Can we create a two- or three-tier model to add

additional revenue?
Can we add a recurring revenue model to my existing
sales strategy?
Should we replace all or part of our direct sales model
with a channel strategy?
Are there low-cost ways of reaching a larger
audience?
Is our pricing strategy leaving revenue on the table?
Is our marketing and sales model fully optimized at
every stage?

Instead of simply following an established path, it may be

time to look at a new sales model, perhaps incorporating
channel, phone sales or the web. And even if you are
convinced that you have the best sales model, it can probably
be streamlined. Better to address the sales model now,
instead of waiting until you are under pressure to produce
better results next quarter.
One important factor to keep in mind: Unless you are in a
rare monopoly situation, customers have the control, not
you. In fact, their buying funnel may look very different
from your selling funnel. When you are overly rigid in your
approach, it creates conflict between seller and potential
purchaser. The trick is to accept this, figure out your
organizational strengths and align these strengths with the
way customers desire to do business. There are three steps in
the alignment process:
1. Survey how your customers buy today and how they
want to buy in the future: sales rep, distributor, retail,
online, mail order, telephone, etc.
2. Align the key buying criteria with the ability of each
selling model to fulfill on those specific criteria.

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3. Offer flexibility as your customers change their needs

and wants.

Using a New Sales Model to Shrink the Sales Cycle

One of the common complaints I hear from B2B companies is
the length of the sales cycle how long it takes from initial
sales contact with a prospect to closing the business. Usually,
excessively long sales cycles are caused when sales reps take
a lot of time educating prospects in the early part of their
discovery phase. Below is a model that reflects this type of
approach, showing a total sales cycle of four months to go
through seven steps, starting with qualification and ending
with product implementation.

The graphic below shows how you can align your sales model
to shrink the sales cycle and ensure better overall results. By
creating great online content and giving prospects a way to
qualify (or disqualify) themselves, your effective sales cycle
shrinks from four to two months. While the prospect still
spends four months in the decision process, your sales reps

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are only engaged for two months, leading to a much larger

return on your time investment and greater overall sales
productivity.

Following is an example of several different flavors of online

sales scenarios, ranging from pure e-commerce to hybrid
models that involve both web lead capture and contact from
a telephone or direct sales rep.

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Be careful not to be overly rigid in regard to where you

believe you will get your future revenue. We encountered
one software company who based their revenue success on
scoring massive deals with partners. If it worked, the
company would have been awash in cash. But it didnt, and

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there was no Plan B. Another marketing CMO focused all of

his efforts on winning plaudits from big-time analysts like
Gartner and Forrester, but there was no effective strategy in
place for generating leads and revenue when this analyst-only
strategy didnt gain traction.
Regardless of the sales model you choose, keep asking the
questions mentioned above and continue to tweak the model
to achieve the lowest customer acquisition cost and the
highest average transaction size.

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Component 3: Efficient L2R Processes

y team and I are always preaching the doctrine of

the consistent and predictable lead generation
engine as a key part of the Lead-to-Revenue
Machine. The fact is this: Even the most creative branding
and awareness-building program wont produce the desired
results unless you can efficiently work prospects through the
system and produce revenue at the other end. But like
everything else in marketing, you cant improve what you
dont measure, and you need to continually evaluate your
lead generation program to ensure that it meets seven
important criteria:

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1. You use conversion ratios to monitor results at every

step of the process and you utilize this data to
consistently produce greater results.
2. The system produces a high percentage of qualified
leads relative to raw inquires (this is a key conversion
metric).
3. You follow up all leads in a timely manner (within 1224 hours), except those that are obviously unqualified.
4. The inbound lead flow is balanced by territory, sales
reps, and product line.
5. You produce inquiries/leads at a reasonable average
cost per lead.
6. You capture all information generated from inquiries
and follow-up efforts immediately (and preferably
automatically) in a database system.
7. You have a systemized nurturing (remarketing)
process that converts a high percentage of todays
leads to future customers.
One of the great benefits of creating an efficient lead engine
is that it will allow you to precisely measure your cost of new
customer acquisition. When you know what it costs to bring
in a new customer, you can then focus on lowering this cost
while simultaneously increasing the average sale amount. By
manipulating these two levers, you can vastly increase your
companys success.
Whatever your product or service, never underestimate the
importance of a well-tuned lead generating engine. This is an
area that can separate market leaders from the also-rans.
Since three out of every four business-to-business marketing
communications are for lead generation purposes, you
should put focused and professional attention in an area that
is so vital to your success.

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Optimizing Each Part of Your

Marketing and Sales Processes
As mentioned above, the goal of component 3 is to create a
well-oiled, end-to-end marketing and sales engine as a key
component of the Lead-to-Revenue Machine. At its most
basic, building your engine consists of creating the
infrastructure comprised of processes, people and
technology that will enable you to best implement your
specific sales model component 2 of the L2R Machine.

Here are some important keys to creating and optimizing

your marketing and sales processes:
1. Concentrate your efforts on finding the companies
and individuals that have a genuine need for what
you offer. Isnt this a much easier and less stressful
way of doing thingsfor both you and your
prospects? Response rates will be higher, close rates
will be higher, and you will not have to manipulate
anyone.
2. Keep things simple and focused on as few priorities
as possible. A good way to kill the productivity of a
sales force is to throw too much at them. Too many
products, too many offers, and too many messages
equate to too many chances for the sales team to
mess things up and lose sales.

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3. Treat sales leads with care and respect. It really

offends me when sales departments mishandle the
leads/inquiries given to them by the marketing
department. I have seen sales reps ignore leads,
denigrate leads, and follow them up in a half-hearted
manner. Often this occurs because the VP of Sales
speaks poorly about what marketing is doing, creating
a culture where reps feel it is okay not to work the
leads they are given. Leads cost money, and few of us
have extra money to flush down the toilet. If the lead
quality is not where it needs to be, please review my
post about creating a service level agreement (SLA)
between marketing and sales.
4. Build effective sales lead management into the
process. One of the best ways to follow the advice
from the previous point is to first carefully qualify the
inbound inquiries and then create an ongoing dripmarketing program to nurture these leads until they
are ready to engage in the buying process. Quality
sales lead management can boost sales performance
by 100 percent or more.
5. Have a highly flexible sales process. While flexible
process may sound like an oxymoron, sales is both an
art and a science. If you over-engineer the process,
you can end up with a group of sales reps that will do
anything you tell them, except the most important
thing close business. Sales is a game of technique,
but also one of instinct and intuition. Thinking and
acting outside of the box is okay as long as it falls
within reasonable limits.

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6. Never lose a deal alone. Selling at its best is a team

effort and it is a serious error to lose a possible deal
because the sales rep neglected to bring in the rest of
his or her teammates. You need to be very aggressive
about letting your reps know about all the resources
they have available to help them at every stage of the
sales process. And one of the most important
resources you can provide is a fresh perspective.
7. Create a culture of accountability and support. Many
sales managers are good at telling their people what
to do, but not so good at supporting them. However,
the more you try to direct someones actions, the
more the ownership is retained by you, instead of by
the rep, where it belongs. The sales reps job is to
produce his or her revenue targets. Your job is not to
tell your staff how to make their numbers; it is to
support them in every way in achieving their goals.
8. Remain consistent. One of my clients had great
technology, but also had a very bad habit of changing
its product offerings and value proposition every six
months or so. The sales team was encouraged to
spend their time on the newest offerings instead of
what had worked for them in the past. This required
extensive retraining of the team, and they never
found their rhythm. In a tough selling world,
consistency can be the attribute that keeps your team
on top.

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The Role of Social Media in

Generating Leads and Revenue
There is a lot of industry talk around the question of whether
social media is a good vehicle to generate leads and
revenue. Some people say it is worthless as a lead generation
tool and others say it works great. Some of these
prognosticators are highly biased (e.g. social media agencies)
and others have actual experience.
The correct answer is that while it depends on the company,
target audience, and product or service, most of the time you
can generate leads and revenue through social media. I know
this because my company, Fusion Marketing Partners, has
generated very good clients entirely through pull marketing
strategies like social media and also because our B2B clients
have had similar results. The companies who make a
commitment to blogging, tweeting, content creation and
LinkedIn updating are rewarded quite well for their efforts.
Several months ago, I was visiting with a prospective client
who is CEO of a medium-sized software company. When I
asked whether he had considered pull marketing and social
media to raise his companys market awareness and generate
leads, he answered, Of course not, that crap doesnt
work. I tend to be blunt about such things, so I asked him
how he knew it didnt work if he had never tried it? His
answer: I dont use it myself and dont believe in it. My
reply was: Who cares what you like or dont like isnt it
your prospects and customers who count?
Social media should be considered a marathon, not a
sprint. You have to put the time in to get the results. When
someone tells me they tried social media for a month or two

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and didnt get results, I want to ask them if they took up

jogging for a month or two and then tried to complete the
Boston Marathon. Of course the answer is no and the same is
true if you expect instant results from social networking.
There are times when social media should be a part of your
pull marketing strategy and times when it should not be. My
blog post, Should You Say YES or NO to Social Media, talks
about some of the pros and cons. But more often than not,
social networking can drive awareness, leads and revenue,
and sometimes in a big way. If you are in doubt, jump on the
social media bandwagon. You can always jump off later, but
make sure you give it a thorough evaluation keeping in
mind that you are running a marathon, and not a sprint.

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Component 4: Strong Offers

2B marketing is always challenging, but even more so

when you are in a crowded market space filled with
tough competitors. There are ways to stand out from
the crowd, such as having a strong and differentiated product
and precise targeting of the potential audience. But one of
the most neglected weapons in the B2B marketing arsenal is
an offer that gains attention and drives action.
In simple terms, an offer is what you propose to give to the
prospect, and what you are asking for in return. The offer is
the Whats in it for me? part of the marketing equation.
The offer wraps the product or service in with the delivery
method, terms and pricing. It may be a one-step offer, where
the purpose is to directly sell the product or service; a two-

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step process, where the purpose is to connect the prospect

with a sales rep; or a 3+ step process, where the purpose is to
put the prospect on a drip marketing list for later conversion.
Offers can range from soft to hard. A soft B2B offer
requires little from the prospectfor example, a free
information download without requiring any contact
information. By contrast, a hard B2B offer requires much
more from the prospect, for example, a credit card payment
for a direct sale or filling out a multi-question web form for a
two-step lead generation campaign. Typically, soft offers will
produce many more responses, but the average lead quality
will be lower.
These are the criteria we look for in an effective B2B offer:
1. It compels action. Regardless of what you are asking
the prospect to do, the offer fails if it does not achieve
the intended results.
2. It reinforces your brand promise. Offers that are
incompatible with the companys values and
positioning can sometimes generate short-term
results, but are counterproductive in the long term.
Resist the urge to go for the quick fix that damages
your reputation.
3. It is interesting enough to cut through the
marketplace clutter and your prospects
preoccupation. Businesspeople are exposed to a huge
number of promotional messages and you will need
offers that are strong enough to overcome this
barrage.

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4. It attracts the right audience. The point of the offer is

to drive quality, not just quantity. Downstream
conversion metrics can tell you whether your offer is
targeted correctly.
5. It is timed correctly in the sales cycle. For example,
information offers are used for prospects that are in
the data-gathering stage, and pricing/discount offers
are used when prospects are in the purchasing phase.
6. It is powerful enough to compel immediate attention
from the prospect. If possible, the offer should be tied
to a strong call to action that shouts, Take advantage
of this offer right now!
Keeping these criteria in mind, lets talk about the differences
between good and poor marketing offers. Lets start with the
poor offers:

Straight sale with no special inducement.

Contact me great for those deep in the
buying cycle, but otherwise not effective.
Product-centric better to have something
focused on the solution or pain points.
Brochures and fact sheets.

Replace these types of B2B offers with

something stronger, like:
Special Pricing This offer works well
with later-stage prospects who already
know about your product or service.

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The special pricing offer could be a discount for prompt

action or an urge to buy now before the price goes up.
Introductory Offer An introductory offer is used to
introduce new prospects to your company. It will have the
greatest effect when the discount is significant. You have to
be careful, however, not to offend existing customers who
just purchased the same product for more money than you
charge new buyers.
Multiple Product With this offer, buyers get the second or
subsequent products at no charge, or at a large discount.
Premium Something extra is given away to spur the
prospect to purchase now. Premiums range from advertising
specialties such as desk calendars and pens, to expensive
items such as trips and electronic equipment.
Free Information Similar to the premium offer, but you give
away information instead of a product. This is especially
effective with a business audience, since people are always
interested in ways to save money and perform their jobs
better. Plus, this type of offer can often be fulfilled
immediately via a computer download.
Trade-in or Trade-up The prospect trades in an old item and
gets a discount on the new item. For example, a computer
manufacturer can give businesses that trade in a competitors
equipment a $500 credit toward the purchase of a new
computer. This way you meet two objectives: sell a product
and displace the competitor.
Free Trial If you have confidence in your product, let
potential customers try it out in their office for fifteen to
thirty days. This has been a strong offer for software
companies, equipment manufacturers, and publishers.

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Satisfaction Guarantee While a guarantee should be part of

every offer, an extra-strong guarantee can serve as its own
offer. An example would be Double your money back if not
completely satisfied.
Cash Discount A special price can be given to help force the
purchase decision. This offer works well in combination with
free trial offers. The prospect has the option to try the
product and pay full price if he decides to keep it, or pay for
the product now and receive a substantial discount.
Special Terms This can work as well as a cash discount. For
instance, Receive the item now and take up to six months to
pay with no interest. In some cases, purchasers will be more
interested in the monthly payment terms than the total cash
amount.
Demo/Trial A smaller, trial version of the product is sent
(sometimes for a fee, sometimes for free). If the prospect
likes the demo, he orders the full product. This offer works
well for computer software products and publications.
Free Samples Free samples are an effective way to highlight
your product. For instance, an office product manufacturer
can offer day planners or desk lamps as a bonus for
purchasing a desk set.
Performance Guarantee The customer gets to use the
product for a period of time. If it does not live up to the
specified criteria, she can return it for a full refund. This offer
works well if your product is clearly superior to its
competition.

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Special Inducement Something extra is given to the

prospect if he acts immediately. The inducement could be
extra product, better terms, free training, or extended
maintenance.
The type of B2B offer you use should be based on the
objectives of your program. If you are selling a high-ticket or
complex product, or if you need to make a personal sales call
to finalize a transaction, you should choose a marketing offer
geared to generating leads. Conversely, if you are promoting
a low-ticket, non-complex item via online, phone, or mail, you
will use a different type of offer.

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Component 5: Appropriate Content

usinesses that need to increase their brand

awareness, credibility, and preference with their
target audiences are turning to content marketing in
greater numbers as a proven pull marketing strategy that
aligns well with important business metrics. Whether your
goals are to increase market awareness, drive website traffic,
build lead generation or improve sales funnel conversion,
understanding how to create copy that delivers results is
fundamental to achieving success.
From strategy to execution, you need to accomplish this in a
consistent and on-target manner. You must leverage your
brands core promise while turning your differentiators into
compelling content that systematically engages your critical

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audiences during every stage of the process, causing them to

take action. In an L2R Machine, we are not creating content
for contents sake, but rather to drive very specific business
objectives.

The Payoff Earned from Effective B2B Content

Effective B2B content attracts visitors to your website,
provides value for your social media outreach, converts
website visitors to leads, and much more. High-quality B2B
content can have a big payoff in five major areas:
1. Large increases in brand awareness. People buy from
companies they know and quality content can help
you get known.
2. Make it easier for prospects to find you. Quality
content helps web searchers find you quickly. This is
true for both non-paid organic search traffic as well as
paid methods such as pay-per-click that depend on a
quality score.
3. Credibility boost. Visitors to your website will judge
you by the quality and quantity of the content that is
relevant to their needs. Good content can reinforce
your brand promise and educate your prospects.
4. Lower cost per lead. Content marketing is a pull
marketing strategy that produces leads at a fraction of
the cost of push marketing leads. Quality content can
help convert lookers into readers and readers into
leads.

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5. Shorter sales cycle. Good content helps prospects

learn about your products and services, thus selfqualifying themselves. This enables prospects to make
a much faster purchase decision, especially if you are
targeting content based on where they are in the
buying cycle.

How Much New Content Do You Need?

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This is one of those it depends questions. If your company

is in a well-defined market where the competition isnt
strong, you might require a relatively small amount of new
content. By contrast, if your company is in a complex and
highly competitive space, you may need quite a bit of new
content.
What types of digital content shorten the B2B sales
cycle? Here are a few ideas:
1. Product Brochures and Data Sheets
Prospects will want to review your product or service
literature before making the purchase decision. Perhaps
they have made the emotional decision to purchase and
are looking to confirm this by matching features and
functions against their needs. They may also be
comparing your benefits and features against competitive
offerings. Either way, it behooves you to have wellorganized and complete product and services
information.
2. Company and Product Reviews
Your offer may sound viable and the features and
functions match the prospect requirements. But the
impact of all the other information you provide will be
magnified if you have lots of testimonials and
independent reviews available. In fact, anything you offer
the prospect to alleviate the fear of making a bad decision
can help shorten the sales cycle.
3. Case Studies
We love to produce case studies for clients because they
are excellent tools for showing how a product or service

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works in their specific vertical or horizontal domain. This

specialized content can have a much greater impact on
prospects than a generic product pitch.
4. How To Guides
Potential purchasers have a great interest in how they will
install your product and use it on an ongoing basis.
Assuming your product is not overly complicated,
providing this information will help motivate prospects to
act more quickly.
5. Price Lists
We often have lively discussions with clients about
posting their prices online. Companies hesitate to do this
because they are afraid it will chase away prospects and
because competitors will have access to this information.
Both concerns are valid, but should be balanced against
the benefits.
6. Order Forms.
The order form is the ultimate way to shorten the sales
cycle since it compels the prospect to take action now.
Even if your product or service is high ticket (expensive)
or complex, the order form can be used to generate a
minor close. A good example of this is the free trial offer,
where you are asking for a small commitment now, to be
followed by a larger commitment later. We have used this
approach successfully for equipment, software, and
service offerings.
7. Website Information

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All of the content categories mentioned above, plus

others, should be available on your website. We like to
think of the website as Command Central when it comes
to educating, motivating, and converting prospects into
customers.
Keep in mind that some of the above digital content items
can be offered in non-text formats like graphics, audio, or
video. When it comes to shortening the B2B sales cycle, there
is no right or wrong when it comes to content length. The
point is to get the information to the prospect in the most
easily and quickly digestible manner possible. Brevity is often
better than comprehensive content, but do make sure that
you have links from the summary to detailed information.
Many companies suffer from paralysis by analysis when it
comes to content. The key to success is to get started. You
cant procrastinate and hope that positive results will
miraculously happen. Make the effort today and begin
creating good-quality B2B content that will help you meet
your marketing and sales goals. And make sure your content
fully supports the first three components: a powerful brand,
an effective sales model and efficient processes.

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Component 6: Total Alignment

isalignment between sales and marketing can cause

companies to miss their revenue targets even if
both the marketing and sales departments are
good at their individual functions. A revenue-killing gap can
occur if your sales leader and marketing leader dont see eye
to eye on objectives, branding, sales support needs,
etc. Because the sales department is closer to revenue, this
gap will usually work against the interests of the marketing
department. Marketing VPs have been fired because of the
failure to achieve alignment.
One major issue we see a lot is lack of accountability. As you
will read more about in the discussion on component 8,
metrics drive the modern B2B marketing organization.

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Ideally, you have a service level agreement (SLA) that

specifies what your department is expected to directly
produce in terms of awareness, inquiries (raw leads) and
marketing qualified leads (MQL) and also how you will
influence metrics like the number of opportunities and
revenue.
A related problem
is setting your
department up for
unachievable
objectives. Market
ers (me included)
tend to be
optimistic by nature, but too much optimism can get us in
trouble, especially when it comes to making promises. The
sales VP says, We need 150 qualified leads a month to hit
our numbers. Instead of a thoughtful response like Let me
run the numbers and get back to you, you blurt out, Of
course. No problem. Well get your 150 qualified leads per
month. Although well-intentioned, your promise can come
back to haunt you, so it is usually best to slightly underpromise and over-deliver.
The following steps are essential in establishing a productive
working relationship and tight alignment between marketing
and sales departments:
1. Sales managers and reps should be brought into the
design phase of the L2R program. They must feel that
their input receives full consideration and they must
buy into the program before it is implemented.
2. Salespeople should feel that the system rewards them
for cooperation. The best reward is for them to be

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able to make more sales with less effort. Show them

how the system rewards them for working smarter,
not harder. Never institute a new system at the same
time you take any negative action (such as cutting
sales territories), or you will permanently link the two
events in the minds of the sales department. You
must keep everything positive.
3. Feedback loops should be put in place. Sales reps
need to be kept abreast of changes and upgrades in
the end-to-end L2R process. Likewise, you should
regularly solicit their input on how the process is
working.
4. You must get agreement on the technical aspects of
L2R. The ideal structure will combine a great deal of
flexibility for field sales reps with maximum control by
the marketing department (not the other way
around), and ensure that relevant information about
all prospects is captured all prospect and customer
data belongs to the company, and not to the
individual sales rep.
5. Sales and marketing must agree on what constitutes a
good lead, because this definition will drive much of
the marketing departments efforts. The criteria for
what constitutes a hot lead or qualified lead forms
part of the basis for a service level agreement (SLA)
between the marketing and sales departments.

How to Quantify the Marketing Contribution

One additional way to create a mutually respectful and
appreciative relationship is to have a written understanding

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of what the sales department expects and what it will require

to make its revenue targets. Always start with the revenue
numbers and work backward. However, do not just take the
entire revenue number and assume that you need to supply
all the inquiries, leads, and qualified leads that are necessary
to hit that target.
To illustrate, an
established company
with a quarterly
revenue target of $10
million may find that
fifty percent of more of
this number is run-rate
business that will come
in regardless of what
marketing does. Cross-sales, add-on sales, maintenance sales,
and some channel revenues are examples of this type of runrate business. I have seen situations where marketings
contribution to revenue is as little as ten percent and as high
as ninety percent. Regardless, this is the number you should
focus on. In Chapter 8 (KPIs) you can view a chart that shows
how this marketing contribution formula works with other
L2R metrics.
Once marketing and sales leaders have established each of
these crucial metrics, they then come to agreement as to who
is responsible for which part of the process. In most
scenarios, the marketing VP is responsible for every part of
the process through qualified leads, and the sales VP is
responsible for opportunities and revenue. Therefore, if the
handoff from marketing to sales is at the qualified lead stage,
then you must gain agreement as to what exactly constitutes
a qualified lead. Agreement is critical for both parties because
it will be used as a basis for evaluating future performance.

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Component 7: Solid Technology Infrastructure

dont blame you for being confused about the subject of

marketing and sales technologies. There are tons of
options available from many different vendors, including
products that handle a very narrow range of functionality.
Generally, you will need three major systems to have a great
end-to-end solution: website, customer resource
management (CRM) and marketing automation (MA). Within
these three systems are dozens of features, but Ive included
just the necessary base functionality below.
Contact and Data Management: Clean and fresh data is
essential, so every effective L2R system will require a place to
store and manage both your sales and marketing contacts.

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Your solution should allow for real-time list segmentation and

data enhancement.
Sales Activity and Account Management: Tracks every
activity related to the sales process, from initial contact
through close of the sales (and beyond). Includes the ability
to link each activity to an account and/or opportunity. Sales
activity is tightly integrated with sales forecasting, contact
management and the asset library.
Sales Forecasting/Pipeline Management: As a chief sales
officer (CSO), you need to report to the CEO or board exactly
where you stand in terms of your sales pipeline at any point
in time. This feature allows you to measure the activity of
your sales team, forecast revenue, pipeline coverage, lostbusiness analysis, and goals vs. actual revenue.
Campaign Management: Ability to create and execute
marketing campaigns across multiple delivery methods,
including: online, channel, events, direct marketing, social
media, pay-per-click and content syndication. Campaign
budgeting (estimated and actual), target prospect
segmentation and results tracking are important features of
Campaign Management.
Lead Scoring and Lead Nurturing: Generating inquiries is just
the first step. You want to first score them on criteria such as
location, company size, title of respondent, and specific
activities taken. If possible, you will want to further qualify
inquiries (via telephone or web form) based on interest,
budget, and timeframe of expected purchase. Those leads
that score high are immediately passed to the sales
department. Those that score in the low to medium range are
put into the lead nurturing (drip marketing) process to
receive relevant messages on a periodic basis.

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Behavior Tracking: This feature tells you exactly how your

prospects are interacting with your company, including the
pages they visit on your website, which emails they open and
which landing pages and marketing campaigns they respond
to. You can also find out what keywords they use to find you
and what social media they utilize and respond to.
Landing Pages: This is an important feature mostly found in
MA systems. You will need the ability to customize your
pages for specific offers and campaigns. Landing pages are
tightly integrated with both website and campaign
management functionality.
Email Marketing: Your system should be able to send out
either single emails, triggered emails or batch emails. Batchand triggered email functionality is commonly found in MA
systems and personalized, individual email capabilities are
found in CRM systems. Your email technology should also
include functionality that helps you achieve good
deliverability and track factors like open rate, bounce rate,
etc.
Analytics/KPIs: Each of these three systems contains its own
set of analytics. On the website, you want to measure things
like how many visitors you have, what they do after visiting,
what actions they take, and so forth. In the MA system, you
measure inbound leads by campaign and time period,
conversion ratios of inquiries to qualified leads, cost per lead,
etc. In the CRM system, you monitor critical sales metrics like
touches, pipeline coverage, sales cycle time, and conversion
ratio of qualified leads to sales.
Document/Asset Library: An asset library is an essential part
of sales enablement functionality. It basically gives every
marketing and sales person on your team access to the latest

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versions of every printed and electronic asset that is available

to help them to attract and convert prospects. Good asset
libraries have version control and the ability to set
permissions based on user role and asset type.
There are many other necessary administrative and
infrastructure functions that we didnt discuss including
calendars, budgeting, user-role assignments, and security.
Perhaps the most important is integration. Unless the
website, marketing automation and CRM systems are
seamlessly integrated, you will spend a lot of time and money
creating patches and workarounds. To be effective, the L2R
Machine should always be built on a set of seamless end-toend processes.

How to Choose the Right L2R Technology

The major vendors
in the Lead to
Revenue space are:
Act-On, Adobe,
CallidusCloud, IBM,
Marketo, Oracle,
salesforce.com/Par
dot, Salesfusion,
and Silverpop. This is not a complete list and new companies
are being added periodically, but it should give you a good
starting place. One of the most critical aspects of evaluating a
new technology is to make sure it is a good fit with the size of
your organization and the complexity of your marketing and
sales processes. Here are a few more guidelines to help you
make the right selection.
1. Processes should lead, not technology. By this, I mean
that you need to thoroughly understand your business

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2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

objectives and develop the processes that best drive

the objectives. Only then should you look at
technology.
Pay attention to two important acronyms: Time-toValue (TtV) and return on investment (ROI). In short,
you want quick TtV and large ROI.
Match your requirements to the solution. Make sure
you know exactly what type of features you will need
before you start the vendor evaluation process.
Ease of use is a crucial factor. Any product you
consider should not come with a steep learning curve.
I have seen many expensive systems neglected or
underutilized because they were too complex for the
average user. Back when software was actually
delivered in boxes, we referred to this as shelfware
because you would find the software sitting on
someones shelf, not being used.
Flexibility is critical. Even if your software fits your
needs today, it may not do so if your business
processes change. Make sure you have systems that
are configurable which means they can be changed
without software coding and expensive outside
resources.
Make sure the solution is scalable. By this I mean that
you will not have to purchase a new solution as your
company, data and number of users grows. At the
most, you should only be required to add new
licenses.
Pick the right deployment model. For most
companies, a Cloud/SaaS solution is the right option.
Cloud software is much easier to implement, requires
no hardware purchases and can be operated
anywhere the user can get to an online connection. It

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also tends to be much easier to customize/configure

than on-premise solutions.
8. Find the right balance between a proven solution and
new technology. The solution with the most
customers may be appealing, but it could be based on
an older architecture that gives you less flexibility at a
higher price.
9. Dont forget integration. If you already have a CRM or
marketing automation (MA) application, it is best to
choose a new technology that works well with your
existing solution. Systems that dont play well
together cause lots of headaches.
Forrester Research does a great job in covering the strengths
and weaknesses of marketing and sales automation suppliers
in its annual Forrester Wave: Lead-To-Revenue
Management Platform Vendors report. You can buy this
directly from Forrester or get it for free from one of the
companies mentioned in the report. One other option is to
check out the excellent content and product reviews at
www.sellmorenow.com. Rich Bohn, who founded
SellMoreNow, calls himself The Worlds Oldest Living CRM
Analyst but he has his pulse on the newest and most
efficient solutions for marketing and sales.
One important note: Companies sometimes make the
mistake of first buying (or renting in the case of Cloud or SaaS
apps) a sophisticated software tool to manage the L2R leads.
However, if possible, apply your go-to-market model in a
manual fashion, before you buy and implement new
technology. Failure to do this can lead to unpleasant surprises
later.

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Component 8: Critical KPIs

his component ties all the other pieces together. Get

a bunch of B2B marketing and sales professionals
together and ask them, What are your most
important criteria for benchmarking performance and how do
you define success? Youll probably get some blank stares
and muddled answers like, Well, we find that in this world of
Web 2.0, commitment to advertising synergy blah, blah,
blah. But the fact is that good marketing is both an art and a
science. And the KPIs are where the science part comes in.
The fact is, unless you can explain how your marketing and
sales departments measure and report on work output, you
will not be recognized as a professional, let alone be viewed
as indispensable in a tough economic climate. Start the

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thinking-through process by asking yourself these six

questions. Note that some of these refer to soft/qualitative
measurements while others are hard/quantitative
measurements both are important.
1. Do you have a well-defined value proposition that is
communicated in all your marketing messages and
promotions? Can your entire team express this
message in a concise and compelling elevator pitch?
2. Are you targeting the right individuals at the right
companies? Do you know who these people are and
have you captured them in a system (CRM or
database) that allows for ongoing targeted
communications?
3. Is your brand/image being accepted by the
marketplace? Are you seen by your prospects and
customers in a way that is consistent with the way you
see yourself?
4. Does every part of your end-to-end marketing and
sales model work? Are you both effective and efficient
at every phase of the process or are there gaps that
keep you from achieving your goals?
5. Do you have a service level agreement (SLA) with the
sales department that specifies the quantity and
quality of leads you will be delivering? Is this a
sufficient quantity for the company to achieve its
revenue objectives? If you need more information on
how to determine lead requirements, read my article
How Many Sales Leads Do You Need?
6. How many of the leads that you deliver to sales are
truly qualified do they meet the agreed-to criteria
and have the potential of actually buying something
from you?

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B2B marketing and sales is tough, but it is even tougher if you

dont know how to evaluate your success. Each of the above
questions forces you to reflect on a different part of the value
youre providing to your organization. Im not saying that
these specifically should be your success benchmark
questions but I am saying that you need to determine and
release your own performance indicators. Remember: You
cant improve what you cant measure, so start measuring
and keep improving.

What You Need to Measure

The prioritization of marketing
and sales metrics should
always be based on your sales
model. For example, an
enterprise software company
with a 12-month sales cycle
would operate differently than
a SaaS provider that uses a
free-trial offer or a consulting services provider that has a
four- or six-week sales cycle. Every one of these scenarios
requires a different set of marketing activities, as well as
different ways to measure and improve marketing analytics.
But, while they utilize different marketing metrics, these
scenarios all have two important characteristics in common.
First, the need to spend the least amount of money to attract
the maximum number of customers in other words,
achieving a low cost per new customer acquisition. Second, to
achieve marketing metrics that are both consistent and
repeatable. If you do these two things correctly, you will
create a powerful L2R Machine.

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So how do you decide what to measure and how to present

the data? Here are my five top rules for marketing and sales
analytics:
1. Make sure that what you are measuring has value to
both the executive suite and sales department. All the
charts and data analysis wont mean a thing unless the
CEO and other executives agree that what you are
doing contributes to revenue.
2. Create a dashboard to showcase your analytics. Very
few people (especially executives) prefer to look at
spreadsheets when they can instead look at nice,
graphic illustrations of how you are performing in a
few key areas.
3. Dont measure anything you cant act upon. Every one
of your metrics should lead to specific actions you can
take to improve performance in marketing and/or
sales.
4. Make sure the marketing analytics you use are the
back-end of a well-defined process. For example,
research from our friends at MarketingSherpa shows
that only about one quarter of B2B companies have a
lead generation and follow-up process that is
routinely followed. All the analytics in the world
wont help you if you dont have your act together
from a process standpoint.
5. Make sure everyone measures their part of the
process. If you are a marketer and have promised
specific performance in terms of generating
awareness, inquiries and qualified leads, then make

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sure the sales department acknowledges what they

will achieve in terms of closing deals.
6. Focus on no more than five or six key metrics. Here
are six that we typically focus on for our B2B clients:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

Number of new website visitors

Number of new inbound inquiries
Cost per inquiry
Conversion ratio of inquiries to qualified leads
Conversion ratio of qualified leads to sales
Cost per new customer acquisition

The following chart illustrates how some of these metrics

come together in the L2R Machine. Its important to note
that you can vastly improve your total results by focusing on
improving any one the conversion ratios for example,
improving the ratio of opportunities to qualified leads from 1in-4 to 1-in-3 can have very large impact.

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One additional KPI that may be useful to you is something we

call the Connected Audience. By this, I mean the number of
people/companies you have connected with in some fashion
(e.g. inbound inquiries) and have permission to market to. If
the total potential universe of purchasers is 1 million and you
have 100,000 in your database, you have achieved a
Connected Audience percentage of 10 percent. A few other
items worth measuring are number of repeat visitors, growth
in average deal size and conversion of website visitors. But as
mentioned above, a few KPIs, carefully monitored and
optimized, are better than measuring too many things
haphazardly.

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Conclusion Why You Need to Implement Your

L2R Machine Now

hile every B2B company will end up with a

different version of the Lead-to-Revenue
Machine, all eight components are important in
every scenario. Even if you believe that you are already doing
well with a particular component, please review that section
anyway. Its not just the individual parts of the process that
are vital, but rather the way they come together to form a
powerful and synergistic solution that keeps your marketing
and sales functions syncopated and producing measurable
gains.
And while it can be tough to quantify what each component
contributes to the bottom line, companies that embrace the
entire L2R methodology can see their marketing
effectiveness, sales revenues and profits increase by 50 to
100 percent or more in a way that is much more effective
than the singular focus now practiced by many companies.
The faster you get started, the faster you will start reaping
the benefits. L2R is not a magic formula there will always
be a fair amount of elbow grease and creative thought
required. But if you plan diligently and execute crisply (dont
forget to test in small increments) you will find the rewards
far exceed the costs. To sum up the impact of the eight
components, you will have an organization that:
1.
2.
3.
4.

Has a powerful and differentiated brand

Is based on an effective and consistent sales model
Utilizes highly efficient processes
Presents strong and compelling offers to the target
audience

Page 54

5. Has appropriate content to influence every part of the

marketing and sales process
6. Has marketing and sales teams and processes that are
in total alignment
7. Is built on a solid technology infrastructure that
supports your people and processes
8. Utilizes critical KPIs that lead to constant
improvement

I hope you have received great value from reading and

practicing the strategies contained in this book. I would
appreciate hearing from you. Please feel free to contact me
at info@FusionMarketingPartners.com.
Chris Ryan

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About the Author

hristopher Ryan is CEO and

founder of Fusion Marketing
Partners. Chris has more
than 25 years of marketing,
technology, and senior
management experience, and is a
widely known expert in business-to-business (B2B) marketing,
sales strategy, systems, and processes. As both a services
provider and in-house marketing executive, Chris has played
a transformative role in driving marketing and sales programs
that achieved outstanding results and created alignment and
synergy between the sales and marketing operations.
Prior to founding Fusion Marketing Partners, Chris served as
Vice President of Marketing of SpringCM, the worlds leading
provider of on-demand content management solutions.
Before that, he was Vice President of Marketing at Stellent,
Inc., a $125 million supplier of enterprise content
management (ECM) software and services, as well as Vice
President of Worldwide Product Marketing for FrontRange
Solutions, Inc., a $100 million supplier of customer
relationship management (CRM) software. Chris was also cofounder and Chief Marketing Officer of Saligent Software,
Inc., a marketing automation software and services company.
Earlier, he held senior management positions at noted
technology firms PeopleSoft, Sybase, and Group 1 Software.
Chris is known as an outstanding communicator and has
presented keynote addresses and breakout sessions at
numerous conferences on marketing and technology. For
three years, Target Marketing magazine named Chris as one
of the Top 100 U.S. Marketers. He has written four other
books on marketing (most recently Winning B2B Marketing)

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and information technology and has been an instructor and

lecturer at SBA, SCORE, College of Notre Dame, University of
Colorado, and Montgomery College.

About Fusion Marketing Partners

usion
Marketing
Partners
(FMP) is a B2B marketing agency that specializes in helping
companies turn around their stalled or underperforming
marketing and sales operations and build value in their
business. FMPs strategic expertise and vigorous execution of
proven tactics has quickly driven measurable improvements
in awareness, leads and revenue for B2B clients across the
U.S. and internationally. The company was founded by
principals with deep experience in B2B marketing, sales,
business development, web marketing, and public relations
from successful startups to Silicon Valley giants. To find out
more, visit: http://www.fusionmarketingpartners.com.

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