What Competency Level Is Required For Your Company To Implement Its Marketing Strategy?

Is Your Company A Marketing Novice?

The primary KPI for a marketing novice company is related to the number of leads generated by each marketing program, campaign and resource in which the company invests.

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By John Bernardi

Marketing-Assisted-Selling For B2B Companies

Apply Marketing Assisted Selling To Boost Your Sales Process To The Next Level

To me, a B2B sales professional is a high value company asset who leads and executes a tailored selling process while also being an adept marketer and customer experience expert.  Their primary accountability includes:

1. Closing profitable sales opportunities
2. Managing a healthy sales funnel enables continuous goal attainment
3. Creating golden spike sales opportunities
4. Converting customers to clients
5. Facilitating company-to-company and peer-to-peer relationships
6. Feedback to company leaders contributes to effective decision making

Marketing Assisted Selling Enables Optimal ROI From Your Sales Assets

1. Help customers determine if they have a problem worth solving.
2. Success stories about challenges, solutions and results are a wonderful resource for situations where risk reduction is more important than price reduction.
3. Pricing tools show the value of each trade-off during negotiations.
4. Complementary vendors who have relationships with people that can benefit from your company's solutions are a great lead source.  These relationships enable "whole product" solutions.
5. Self-service content and assessments for each stage of the buying process must be intuitive for general awareness and more in-depth for educated buyers.
6. The field marketing (FM) process is involved in each stage of the buying cycle:

• Awareness Stage: approach suspects to gain permission to send relevant, timely and expected information.  For each account that appears in the CRM database, FM reps search for additional contacts where cross-selling makes sense.  FM reps schedule sales interviews for sales reps and are a consistent backup when sales reps are unavailable.

• Pre-Purchase Stage: Nurture early stage leads. FM reps assign sales ready leads and work with sales reps to ensure that leads are reviewed and acted upon in a timely manner.  FM Associates stay in touch by distributing relevant articles, company information and videos and conducting theme webinars.
• Purchase Stage: FM reps assist in presentations, proposals, site visits, etc.
• Post-Purchase Stage: Sales reps and FM reps co-author programs to retain, cross-sell and up-sell second-tier customers (STCs) and develop STCs into key accounts. A welcome package for new customers teaches them how to do business with your company and creates a positive first impression.

Complementary Partners Are Essential To Your Business

It's important to understand if yours is a real partner program or just an affiliate program in search of leads and transactions.

An important first step is to develop a partner rating process that enables consistent terminology for your staff and also enables your business development team to prioritize how it spends its time and resources.

Most Growable Partners (MGPs) are the core of your business.  The strategy is to nurture them and convert them to MVPs.  Their characteristics include:

• They opt-in to receive your communications and meet with you periodically [online and in person]
• They allow you to speak with others in their firm
• They consistently refer and/or close a minimum number of sales opportunities for your products and services
• They make you visibile in their facilities [online and offline]

Most Valuable Partners (MVPs) are elite members of your partner community.  The goal should be for 20% of your partners to be MVPs. The strategy is high level partnering through recognition, customized solutions, programs and learning relationships. They possess all of the MGP characteristics plus:

• They tell you what you need to do to be successful – no guesswork
• They provide suggestions for improving your business
• They consistently refer or close a high number of sales opportunities for your products and services
• They refer you to new potential MGPs

Second Tier Partners (STPs) are partners whose commitment level and results would not be affected by your 1to1 time investment. They do not present the opportunity to become MGPs. You retain them and attract new ones through your BizD process.  Their characteristics include:

• They opt-in to receive your communications and will speak with you on the phone and online
• They sporadically refer or close new sales opportunities for your products and services

Below Zero Partners (BZs) will never justify the time required to partner with them.  The strategy is to eliminate their misperceptions or to subtly encourage them to become someone else’s partner. Their characteristics include:

1. They are not willing to speak or meet with you and do not opt-in to receive your communications
2. They are not willing to allow you to build rapport with others in their firm
3. They do not dedicate basic resources to refer or close new sales opportunities for your products and services

Targets are those with whom you'd like to establish a 1to1 relationship because they suggest future MGP potential.

Make sure that your partner team is not only oriented towards recruitment and managing STPs, but that you also have the calibre of staff to develop MGPs and MVPs?  Otherwise, top partners will lose interest and leave for a better opportunity.

Before contacting a partner, make sure that you know about their company and the person with whom you'll be speaking relative to their history with your firm.  Don't make the conversation only about what they're doing to help your company.  Why not send an email asking to set up a convenient time and agenda rather than expecting them to be ready to talk with you at that moment you call.

Complementary Partners Required For "Whole Product" Solutions

Except for early adopters and true innovators, most people are pragmatic when it comes to making their buying decisions.  They don't want to spend time or money finding or creating the ancillary components associated with the product or service that they buy from you.  Instead, they prefer buying from a company who not only provides an excellent product or service, but who also connects them with the right complementary partners who can fill in the gaps necessary for a "whole product solution". Most likely a partner has chosen you because your products and services fit into the total solution that they offer to their customers.

If you are a "market maker", you create an umbrella under which some of your partners will develop their total business.  In other situations, partners who have a mainstream business can differentiate themselves by offering their customers your products and services as a complement to theirs.  In either situation, a win/win bi-directional relationship is essential for success.  Discover and apply the keys to success unique to your partner program.