How to Blend Sales Enablement with Demand Generation

WEBVTT 1 00:00:02.540 --> 00:00:02.740 Yeah. 2 00:00:05.240 --> 00:00:09.050 Welcome back to be to be growth. I'm Leslie Cruise with Sweet Fish Media And 3 00:00:09.050 --> 00:00:13.790 today we will be continuing our deep dive into demand generation. Joining me 4 00:00:13.790 --> 00:00:17.630 today is Tabatha Atoms, the senior demand marketing manager over it. 5 00:00:17.640 --> 00:00:21.260 Integrate Tabatha. Thank you so much for joining me today. Yeah, Thank you 6 00:00:21.260 --> 00:00:25.440 for having me. Absolutely. And for those listening, integrate is the 7 00:00:25.440 --> 00:00:29.930 leader in precision demand marketing, which is a new emerging category. To 8 00:00:29.930 --> 00:00:35.230 help B two B marketers develop and deliver an Omni Channel demand strategy 9 00:00:35.240 --> 00:00:39.790 Convert leads to revenue and drive marketing R o I Tabatha, do you mind 10 00:00:39.790 --> 00:00:43.170 sharing just a little bit about your role at integrate and kind of what your 11 00:00:43.170 --> 00:00:48.530 day to day looks like? And also how your role has evolved over time? Yeah, 12 00:00:48.530 --> 00:00:53.350 sure, I'll start more with the history. I think especially with the more demand 13 00:00:53.350 --> 00:00:57.850 context, What is happening in demand generation? It's an interesting seeing 14 00:00:57.850 --> 00:01:02.220 how my role is kind of evolved over time. When I first started, um, coming 15 00:01:02.220 --> 00:01:05.570 out of college, it was more focused on demand generation in terms of lead 16 00:01:05.570 --> 00:01:10.070 generation. Um, what are you doing to bring in more volume? How are you 17 00:01:10.070 --> 00:01:13.870 increasing your company's awareness as a marketer, then how are you finding 18 00:01:13.870 --> 00:01:18.670 more leads? Leads being the key word there for your sales team today. 19 00:01:18.670 --> 00:01:21.680 Integrate. I think it's really evolved more into how do we connect with their 20 00:01:21.680 --> 00:01:26.410 buyers. So as a senior manager for demand, it's more focused on how do I 21 00:01:26.420 --> 00:01:30.420 create new conversations with the prospects were targeting. And how do I 22 00:01:30.420 --> 00:01:33.010 make sure that our marketing efforts are across the channels that matter 23 00:01:33.010 --> 00:01:36.530 most to buyers? Um, which has been really interesting, especially with our 24 00:01:36.530 --> 00:01:39.440 precision demand marketing launch, because we're thinking more about how 25 00:01:39.440 --> 00:01:43.380 do we align that buyers process? I'm sure you've seen a lot of other 26 00:01:43.380 --> 00:01:46.400 articles or research, but I think there's there's this bigger idea that 27 00:01:46.400 --> 00:01:50.510 buyers are more and more digitally focused. Um, making sure that our 28 00:01:50.510 --> 00:01:53.660 efforts are around the channels they want to engage with us in we're giving 29 00:01:53.660 --> 00:01:56.900 them the right content has really been key to how my role has evolved here to 30 00:01:56.900 --> 00:02:02.400 integrate, too. How does demand generation change with your view of 31 00:02:02.410 --> 00:02:06.070 precision demand marketing? Are they one and the same? Do you feel like 32 00:02:06.080 --> 00:02:10.600 demanding as a subset of that? I think demand generation is more of our 33 00:02:10.610 --> 00:02:15.370 internal kind of engine to support precision demand marketing. Um, so one 34 00:02:15.370 --> 00:02:18.720 thing I'm thinking about more is my role evolves, and I support this 35 00:02:18.720 --> 00:02:22.440 messaging for our company. It's more about how do I engage with not only 36 00:02:22.440 --> 00:02:27.340 individual buyers or again that volume piece of demand generation, but also 37 00:02:27.340 --> 00:02:30.630 attract the right accounts and meet with the right demand units within each 38 00:02:30.630 --> 00:02:35.050 account. A lot of this has been driven by our marketing leadership. I love the 39 00:02:35.050 --> 00:02:38.500 idea. We talk a lot about the buyer's journey, and it's not just this 40 00:02:38.500 --> 00:02:42.750 methodical framework or a theory, but it's more put into our practice with 41 00:02:42.750 --> 00:02:46.840 our demand team, as we think about what are we doing from awareness all the way 42 00:02:46.840 --> 00:02:50.300 through to deal acceleration. And how do we use that? Buyers trying to make 43 00:02:50.300 --> 00:02:54.560 sure we're staying focused on the buyer again and not thinking about demand in 44 00:02:54.560 --> 00:02:58.090 terms of volume or just a number of leads or engagement we're having at the 45 00:02:58.090 --> 00:03:01.740 top of the funnel? That's really interesting, And that kind of brings me 46 00:03:01.740 --> 00:03:06.050 to my next question, actually, because a few years ago you presented something 47 00:03:06.060 --> 00:03:10.520 called marketing beyond marketers blending sales enablement with demand 48 00:03:10.520 --> 00:03:14.140 generation. To anyone listening, this is a really insightful presentation you 49 00:03:14.140 --> 00:03:18.450 can find over on Tabitha's LinkedIn. But I would love for you to share more 50 00:03:18.450 --> 00:03:21.450 about this presentation and more specifically, where you talked about 51 00:03:21.450 --> 00:03:26.140 that people first outcome second, um, and also solution based marketing. So 52 00:03:26.140 --> 00:03:30.380 do you mind diving into that? Yes. Let me start more where that presentation 53 00:03:30.380 --> 00:03:33.990 came from. I think, um, that really come out of the fact that I was 54 00:03:33.990 --> 00:03:37.610 starting with more of a startup organization within the length the 55 00:03:37.610 --> 00:03:40.730 company I worked with at the time. And one thing we were trying to figure out 56 00:03:40.730 --> 00:03:43.960 is, how do we ramp up our marketing efforts with a really small team? So I 57 00:03:43.960 --> 00:03:48.120 was one of two or three people on the marketing side. We had myself leading 58 00:03:48.120 --> 00:03:52.310 demand content marketer and partner marketing, and then we had about four 59 00:03:52.310 --> 00:03:56.710 or five SDR, so it was really more to How do we equip the sales team to help 60 00:03:56.710 --> 00:04:00.170 us with our marketing efforts and then this realization that it's not really 61 00:04:00.170 --> 00:04:03.440 about our marketing goals or sales school, but really, we're trying to 62 00:04:03.440 --> 00:04:06.880 reach the same people engage more interest from the same buyers. So how 63 00:04:06.880 --> 00:04:11.000 do we work together and kind of equip each other for that conversation? So 64 00:04:11.000 --> 00:04:14.830 one thing that really came out of that was more thinking beyond marketing 65 00:04:14.830 --> 00:04:19.339 goals, marketing objectives and putting the buyer first, which is where more of 66 00:04:19.339 --> 00:04:24.860 that people first outcome second came from. So starting more internally, how 67 00:04:24.860 --> 00:04:29.230 do I equipped the sales team with the right tools and processes to generate 68 00:04:29.230 --> 00:04:33.830 interest with their buyers and making sure they can see what topics are most 69 00:04:33.830 --> 00:04:37.280 interesting to their buyers, what channels they need to kind of focus on 70 00:04:37.280 --> 00:04:41.030 to engage with them. And then how do they measure that? Based off the people 71 00:04:41.030 --> 00:04:45.650 they're talking to? Not just a number of activities. Our number of form fills. 72 00:04:45.650 --> 00:04:50.650 We were seeing on the back end. Yeah, switching gears a little bit here. Why 73 00:04:50.650 --> 00:04:55.760 do you think that demand generation is so widely criticized? You know, I see a 74 00:04:55.760 --> 00:05:00.860 lot of people who are talking about oh, demand Gen is just just marketing. It's 75 00:05:00.860 --> 00:05:05.790 not anything, and I think that's you know, it's always criticized by people 76 00:05:05.790 --> 00:05:09.210 who follow the A B M approach specifically, So why do you think that 77 00:05:09.210 --> 00:05:13.810 is? Yeah, I think there's two things happening here first is that demand has 78 00:05:13.820 --> 00:05:18.400 become synonymous with lead generation instead of thinking of demand 79 00:05:18.400 --> 00:05:22.250 generation more holistically. And I think the second part is because of the 80 00:05:22.250 --> 00:05:26.090 account based marketing approach. We see that there are marketers that think 81 00:05:26.090 --> 00:05:30.620 of a B M is the way to connect more with their sales team and generate more 82 00:05:30.620 --> 00:05:34.970 of those conversion programs versus demand being more of this top level 83 00:05:34.970 --> 00:05:40.530 acquisition focus when really demand should include both awareness, 84 00:05:40.530 --> 00:05:43.870 conversion and even the expansion pieces. And that's where I feel like 85 00:05:43.870 --> 00:05:48.340 you see more of a B M becoming a tactic within your demand tool belt. Um, 86 00:05:48.340 --> 00:05:52.200 instead of them being contrasted or like you're saying these debates that 87 00:05:52.200 --> 00:05:56.670 are happening where A. B M is, um, kind of put head to head with demand and 88 00:05:56.670 --> 00:06:00.030 they're being separated. Um, really, they should be both used together to 89 00:06:00.030 --> 00:06:03.590 create more of that personalized experience and again focusing more on 90 00:06:03.590 --> 00:06:07.300 the buyer instead of this. An account based marketing approach, Or is this a 91 00:06:07.300 --> 00:06:13.460 demand approach? Hey, everybody, Logan with sweet fish here, if you're a 92 00:06:13.460 --> 00:06:17.190 regular listener of BTB growth. You know that I'm one of the co hosts of 93 00:06:17.190 --> 00:06:21.080 the show, but you may not know that I also head up the sales team here at 94 00:06:21.080 --> 00:06:25.390 Sweet Fish. So for those of you in sales or sales ops, I wanted to take a 95 00:06:25.390 --> 00:06:29.540 second to share something that's made us insanely more efficient. Lately, our 96 00:06:29.540 --> 00:06:33.640 team has been using lead I Q for the past few months and what used to take 97 00:06:33.640 --> 00:06:39.370 us four hours gathering contact data now takes us only one where 75% more 98 00:06:39.370 --> 00:06:43.700 efficient were able to move faster with outbound prospecting. And organizing 99 00:06:43.700 --> 00:06:48.180 our campaigns is so much easier than before. I'd highly suggest you guys 100 00:06:48.180 --> 00:06:52.860 check out lead I Q as well. You can check them out at lead. I q dot com 101 00:06:52.870 --> 00:07:01.570 That's L e a D i q dot com. All right, let's get back to the show. So do you 102 00:07:01.570 --> 00:07:07.540 think that the reason it is so widely criticized is because it's kind of tied 103 00:07:07.540 --> 00:07:13.810 to how demand and a B M are presented in the overall funnel? Yeah, I think 104 00:07:13.820 --> 00:07:17.400 going back to what kind of what I was saying before. Sometimes demand gets 105 00:07:17.400 --> 00:07:20.260 acquainted with just that top level awareness when you're thinking of your 106 00:07:20.260 --> 00:07:25.130 funnel, it's that first entry point of, um, are we targeting our ideal customer 107 00:07:25.130 --> 00:07:29.020 profile? And are we getting enough volume in terms of engagement versus A 108 00:07:29.020 --> 00:07:33.150 B M has often been equated to How are we further supporting sales or that 109 00:07:33.150 --> 00:07:37.110 more conversion part of the funnel? Um, when really What I think is happening 110 00:07:37.110 --> 00:07:40.950 now is that the two things shouldn't be siloed. Both of them are used to create 111 00:07:40.950 --> 00:07:45.120 more of that personalized experience. Um, and demand now is more about 112 00:07:45.120 --> 00:07:49.060 solving that pain point of reaching buyers based off their role or based 113 00:07:49.060 --> 00:07:52.930 off the channels they're engaging across. It's not that volume play, so I 114 00:07:52.930 --> 00:07:57.340 think if we can kind of move past demand being synonymous with awareness, 115 00:07:57.350 --> 00:08:00.950 um, we'd see more of the similarities between account based marketing and 116 00:08:00.950 --> 00:08:05.360 demand, and it being more one focused on the buyer versus once focused on 117 00:08:05.360 --> 00:08:11.190 your accounts or your demand unit. What do you see? Changing in how people are 118 00:08:11.190 --> 00:08:15.350 modernizing their demand approach? I think the big one. I think we've seen 119 00:08:15.350 --> 00:08:18.100 this a few different ways, but it's been more about that funnel. I feel 120 00:08:18.100 --> 00:08:22.740 like we're seeing less of the standard. Oh, gosh. I wish we had, like, a slide 121 00:08:22.740 --> 00:08:27.340 for this, but your wider the top narrow at the bottom funnel. And then with a B 122 00:08:27.340 --> 00:08:31.430 m, we had reversing it, being more focused on a very small amount of 123 00:08:31.430 --> 00:08:35.030 target accounts. Um, well, now I feel like we're moving more to what I was 124 00:08:35.030 --> 00:08:39.020 saying about integrate this journey framework being less about volume, 125 00:08:39.020 --> 00:08:43.840 converting to your ideal prospects at the bottom to Hey, let's think about 126 00:08:43.840 --> 00:08:47.900 what we're doing across the journey. Volume aside, are we seeing engagements 127 00:08:47.900 --> 00:08:51.600 from the people that we want to talk to from those that are interested in our 128 00:08:51.600 --> 00:08:55.610 product and or re surrounding our complete addressable market? By using 129 00:08:55.610 --> 00:09:00.810 things like intent? We're having more of that multi channel to the golden 130 00:09:00.810 --> 00:09:05.950 buzzword Omni Channel experience for our buyers. Yeah, and going off of that, 131 00:09:05.950 --> 00:09:11.430 Do you have any best or maybe favorite demand in practice is that you want to 132 00:09:11.430 --> 00:09:14.400 share and, you know, feel free to share some examples that you've worked on in 133 00:09:14.400 --> 00:09:18.670 the past as well. Um, I think one of them has been this idea again of 134 00:09:18.670 --> 00:09:21.790 blending account based marketing with demand. So when you're building out 135 00:09:21.790 --> 00:09:25.780 your program instead of thinking about segmentation first, think more about 136 00:09:25.780 --> 00:09:30.110 the goal of the outcome you want your buyer to take. This has been more, I 137 00:09:30.110 --> 00:09:35.420 guess, a mindset change versus they programmatic change. But it has allowed 138 00:09:35.420 --> 00:09:39.750 myself and I know some of my teammates to also think through, um, what are we 139 00:09:39.750 --> 00:09:44.350 doing that's very focused on R I C P Anarchy personas? And then how does 140 00:09:44.350 --> 00:09:49.240 that lead to an A B M strategy or a strategy by channel? Um, that way you 141 00:09:49.240 --> 00:09:53.990 make sure you don't have siloed efforts for email versus social or even versus 142 00:09:53.990 --> 00:09:57.360 some of your content pieces like Webinars. But instead, each of those 143 00:09:57.370 --> 00:10:02.060 are holistically thought about based off one goal or outcome for your buyers. 144 00:10:02.740 --> 00:10:07.220 How do you measure that success? How do you know if those campaigns are 145 00:10:07.230 --> 00:10:11.660 actually successful? So I know I mentioned at the beginning that leads 146 00:10:11.660 --> 00:10:15.680 shouldn't matter as much. And demand is less about volume. Um, but leads are 147 00:10:15.680 --> 00:10:18.870 still a great indicator for your program's success. I just wouldn't say 148 00:10:18.870 --> 00:10:22.530 that should be your ultimate goal or kpi. When you're thinking about this 149 00:10:22.530 --> 00:10:26.980 bio centric program. Um, what I have found, especially as you're leaning 150 00:10:26.980 --> 00:10:31.260 into a new role or a new company. As a demand marketer, make sure you 151 00:10:31.260 --> 00:10:34.990 emphasize that you want to be aligned with business outcomes. So how are you 152 00:10:34.990 --> 00:10:39.050 driving pipeline, or how are you driving revenue through your programs? 153 00:10:39.540 --> 00:10:42.310 This does involve some kind of partnership or work with your marketing 154 00:10:42.310 --> 00:10:45.790 ops team or sales ops team to understand. How are you attributing 155 00:10:45.790 --> 00:10:49.660 that information for marketing? But aligning their also allows you to have 156 00:10:49.660 --> 00:10:53.260 a better partnership with sales, which I think is really the key indicator for 157 00:10:53.260 --> 00:10:57.460 success for demand marketers. Um, if you can go to your sales team and they 158 00:10:57.460 --> 00:11:01.030 can tell you what programs are working well for them to connect with their 159 00:11:01.030 --> 00:11:04.320 prospects or to expand with their customers, and you know the 160 00:11:04.320 --> 00:11:07.840 partnerships there so you can take that information, use it for new programs. 161 00:11:07.840 --> 00:11:11.090 Then you know that you're driving more success because sales sees the benefit 162 00:11:11.090 --> 00:11:14.330 of it not only from a volume perspective, but they see the kind of 163 00:11:14.330 --> 00:11:17.150 activity you're driving for the accounts or contacts they care about. 164 00:11:17.740 --> 00:11:21.950 Yeah, one thing that I love about this conversation I've been having with 165 00:11:21.950 --> 00:11:26.610 several people is the sales and marketing connection. And, you know, I 166 00:11:26.610 --> 00:11:30.790 think that a lot of times they're two completely separate areas. It's like 167 00:11:30.790 --> 00:11:35.050 sales is way over here in left field and the marketing is way over here and 168 00:11:35.240 --> 00:11:37.930 they kind of butt heads a little bit. But I think what's really interesting 169 00:11:37.930 --> 00:11:42.650 about Demand Generation is that it involves that collaboration across both 170 00:11:42.650 --> 00:11:47.520 teams. Yes, definitely. I think that's where a lot of this a BM verse demand 171 00:11:47.520 --> 00:11:50.550 debate has come from. Two is account based. Marketing has always been 172 00:11:50.550 --> 00:11:55.050 synonymous with a conversion based program where you're supporting sales 173 00:11:55.140 --> 00:11:59.470 and you're really prioritizing their sales target list. Um, but that doesn't 174 00:11:59.470 --> 00:12:03.000 have to be isolated to account based marketing efforts. You can take the 175 00:12:03.000 --> 00:12:07.120 sales target list and incorporated into your general programs that you have 176 00:12:07.120 --> 00:12:10.640 that kind of surrounding the buyer experience in terms of what is sales 177 00:12:10.640 --> 00:12:15.600 care about, Um, what accounts do we know are engaging based off intent or 178 00:12:15.600 --> 00:12:18.530 even your internal reporting? And then who do we know? We need to target based 179 00:12:18.530 --> 00:12:23.520 off our personas or I C. P. So I think there's a lot marketers can do on that 180 00:12:23.520 --> 00:12:26.900 front without immediately thinking I need to integrate a new strategy like a 181 00:12:26.900 --> 00:12:31.430 B M or solely focus. My dollars are my effort on an account based marketing 182 00:12:31.430 --> 00:12:35.600 strategy. Yeah, I completely agree. And would you Do you have any examples of 183 00:12:35.610 --> 00:12:39.960 of those? Like, what could marketers be doing there? You know, um, Leslie, I 184 00:12:39.960 --> 00:12:43.030 think that's a good question. I think one thing marketers can do to start 185 00:12:43.030 --> 00:12:47.960 that is really understanding. Do we have enough program support across the 186 00:12:47.960 --> 00:12:52.690 buyer's journey? I think when you look at your programs today and you see, um, 187 00:12:52.700 --> 00:12:56.640 that your emails are generating a lot of engagement or mq Els or You had a 188 00:12:56.640 --> 00:12:59.790 webinar and it generated 500 new registrants, but none of them are 189 00:12:59.790 --> 00:13:03.320 converting. Then you can start to map out. Maybe I'm focusing too much on 190 00:13:03.320 --> 00:13:06.880 awareness, or I have a lot up there in the front of the buyer's journey. But 191 00:13:06.880 --> 00:13:12.730 nothing is converting to a pipeline or two conversations down funnel Um, so if 192 00:13:12.730 --> 00:13:15.960 you can start to map your programs across those fire journey stages and 193 00:13:15.960 --> 00:13:20.250 understand, do I have enough here to surround the buyer? Um then you might 194 00:13:20.250 --> 00:13:24.100 have a better idea of how you're partnering with sales. And what efforts 195 00:13:24.100 --> 00:13:28.200 can sales use beyond that initial engagement as new leads or new 196 00:13:28.200 --> 00:13:32.460 respondents come in from your campaigns? This has been so insightful. Tabatha, 197 00:13:32.460 --> 00:13:36.860 Thank you so much for joining me. And where can people find you online if 198 00:13:36.860 --> 00:13:41.010 they're interested in learning more? Yeah, definitely. Leslie, um, I love 199 00:13:41.010 --> 00:13:43.830 talking about this conversation, debating more about account based 200 00:13:43.830 --> 00:13:48.360 marketing versus demand. Um, I'd love to connect with any of you via LinkedIn. 201 00:13:48.360 --> 00:13:51.670 I'm also somewhat active on my Twitter profile. But if you want to have this 202 00:13:51.670 --> 00:13:55.100 conversation further, reach out on LinkedIn first, and you can always 203 00:13:55.100 --> 00:13:59.330 connect. Fantastic. Well, again. Thank you so much for joining me here on GDP 204 00:13:59.330 --> 00:14:00.560 growth. Thank you. 205 00:14:02.540 --> 00:14:07.770 Mm. It's sweet fish. We're on a mission to create the most helpful content on 206 00:14:07.770 --> 00:14:12.290 the Internet for every job, function and industry on the planet. For the B 207 00:14:12.290 --> 00:14:16.330 two B marketing industry, this show is how we're executing on that mission. If 208 00:14:16.330 --> 00:14:20.040 you know a marketing leader, that would be an awesome guest for this podcast. 209 00:14:20.050 --> 00:14:23.560 Shoot me a text message. Don't call me because I don't answer unknown numbers, 210 00:14:23.570 --> 00:14:30.040 but text me at 4074 and I know 33 to 8. Just shoot me. Their name may be a link 211 00:14:30.040 --> 00:14:33.990 to their LinkedIn profile, and I'd love to check them out to see if we can get 212 00:14:33.990 --> 00:14:35.660 them on the show. Thanks a lot.