5 Second Summary
Marketing leads (and your marketing efforts) are worthless until those leads convert to happy clients and profitable revenue. Own your leads and control their destiny.
2 Minute Version
A marketing agency owner was complaining about how his firm got fired by a client after delivering what he felt were great results. When I asked about measurement (no surprise), he bragged about all the calls and web forms his efforts were delivering each month. How about clients and revenue? “That’s not my job,” was his response. And now we know why he was fired.
Whether you’re part of a marketing agency or corporate marketing team, your job can’t end when the phone rings. Marketing programs, generated leads, and your related efforts are worth nothing until those prospective clients become profitable clients. Rather than trying to point fingers at other teams like sales or service, you should own, or at least monitor your leads until new clients are implemented, invoiced, and satisfied.
Let’s assume we’re all great at generating awareness, interest, and leads. Here are four key business areas where marketing needs to have some influence after the lead handoff:
- Lead qualification and presale – “These leads are sh-t!” Buyers must be interested in your company, need your products/services, and be in the right position (budget, authority) to buy. If not, adjust your marketing approach and efforts to attract more relevant buyers.
- Sales pipeline management – Salespeople gravitate to the opportunities that make the most money. Closely monitor the sales pipeline to ensure that no lead lags behind, and provide the sales team support needed to make it easier for clients to buy – from collateral to contracts.
- Client management – the effort and communication through signed contract and onboarding sets the stage for the client’s long-term relationship. Marketing can help improve this experience while measuring ongoing satisfaction (think NPS®) to identify risks, reduce churn, and increase referrals.
- Results reporting – I like to own this process and be the one to report good and bad news. If you don’t own it, coordinate with sales, implementation, and support teams to report on the complete revenue continuum. Identify opportunities where marketing can help improve results.
Whether your goals are altruistic or selfish (like me), marketers must think beyond clicks and calls to ensure your marketing efforts generate profitable revenue from long-term client relationships. You don’t have to take over other people’s jobs, but you do need to participate in this team effort. If downstream processes or systems are causing issues that impact marketing results, speak up and drive improvement.
