This is a synopsis of what I shared with my friend:
- The b2b sales and marketing landscape is experiencing an era of unprecedented change. If you are a b2b CEO you need to be in student mode right now. You should be careful not to rely on old ideas and thinking because you can fail to achieve the competitive edge it takes to be successful.
- More b2b sales organizations are moving to a Sales 2.0 model: i.e. Prospecting and completing the sales are being turned into two distinct business functions. Prospecting and appointment setting need to be continuous.
- Tools are critical
- Content is critical
- There is no thought of trying to “make the prospect doing anything” it’s accepted that prospects are in control. Your mission is to make it easy for the prospect to learn more and to determine the best time to engage with the prospect.
The thing that I stressed the most is that Content is more important than ever before and that he would need to get his content strategy figured out and key content elements created as soon as possible.
The first content element to establish is the Value Proposition. “The unique reason that a company should do business with you.” My friend is very lucky in that his new company has a very unique product that is indeed substantially better than other players in his market…that’s why he took the job.
We also discussed tools. I let him know that there are a lot of tools to choose from and that he will need to have some of these tools.
- A Salesforce Automation tool like Salesforce.com (for his company Salesforce.com is good fit.
- Lead Nurturing tools. Fortunately there is a good Lead Nurturing solution in the Salesforce.com AppExchange.
- Blogging or Content Management. I mentioned Hubspot and WordPress as two options.
Basically he will need to arrive at position wherein he can effectively coordinate People, Systems and Content to go after his target audience and get the appointments he needs to begin growing the business….a never ending task to be sure, but one that can be done with the right knowledge and perspective.
Reservation
If you would like to learn more about implementing a Sales 2.0 regimen, attend a PPS Webinar on E-Telemarketing & Lead Nurturing. We show you a good example of how to coordinate People, Systems and Content for a Sales 2.0 System.
