Offers They Can’t Refuse: Experts Say New Content Focus Needed for Lead Gen

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Written by John Gaffney

Wednesday, 21 January 2009 12:15

Marketers may be overlooking a basic and crucial component of their lead generation initiatives: The offer. Amid all the focus on having the right list, the right scoring system, and the right frequency many experts say the current economy demands the right offer.

“The offer determines to a large extent whether you can maintain a dialogue with a prospect rather than a series of episodes,” says Marketo CEO Phil Fernandez. “It shows you the window through which you can conduct a campaign. Do you want the prospect to pay more attention? Are you requesting them to take action? Are you looking to engage them in other activities? The offer communicates your intention.”

That intention in a tight economy needs to focus on a compressed consideration and sales cycle. The offer contained within emails, direct mailings or even through websites, needs to be clear about what the company will provide in terms of value, in return for the prospect’s business. Time for testing and retesting may not available. “Companies need to rely on the fundamental and proven program and reduce investments in ‘experimental’ programs and media,” says Russell Kern, president of The Kern Organization. “They need to change up their offer strategies to speak about how a solution or a product will provide an immediate ROI. They also need to use ‘free’ incentives and offers.”

Kern’s suggestion of “free” attached to information or product is controversial. As many B2B marketers know, once something is offered for free it’s hard to put a price tag on it later. In the tech industry for example, this philosophy has been applied to everything from free iPods for lead program participants to free software upgrades if a prospect But Kern is adamant. “Yes. Its time to bring out the good old fashion free, bonus, early bird, sweepstakes entry, offers,” he says. “Everyone wants something more than they have ever gotten before. Everyone is scared and in their pillboxes, so marketers have to pry them out with strong, unique highly valuable offers that have high desire and low risk. Further, marketers are going to need to show faster returns on investments or how a given investment can get sales moving in slow times. Everyone is looking for salvation and it’s the marketer’s job to create offer of hope and promise.”

As mentioned, other marketing measurement and lead generation specialists disagree. Among them is PointClear president DanMcDade. He believes there are no guarantees in marketing.

“There is a lot of ‘100% guaranteed’ and ‘save money’ marketing going on now,” he says. “In fact, this is happening at the expense of identifying business issues, compelling events, a vision of a solution and navigating through the process of approval. In other words, it isn’t as easy as it looks. I believe that the economies impact on offers (an offer being comprised of a product, a price and a delivery mechanism) is felt more in negotiation than marketing.”

McCade has developed a lead gen methodology called M2O. It stands for market, media, and offer. For the first “m” he says target selection is critical, as is lead segmentation and matrix testing. For media he recommends a mix of media including outbound calls, emails and some direct mail. The key to M2O is the offer.

“Timeframes and budget can be impacted by offer and message,” he says. “If a company focuses too much on the ‘budget authority needs timeline (BANT)’, deals will be lost to the competition. Marketers should use demand creation as the tip of the arrow rather than the by-product of a shotgun.”

The PointClear M2O program documents the client offer, including problems solved, features/benefits, and competitive differentiators. The plan also includes testing recommendations within a market sub-section as a powerful and inexpensive way to fine-tune performance and increase results.

Regardless of how the offer is structured, experts suggest a few elements are common to communicating them to maintain lead gen programs. Here’s three of those best practices:

Personalize: As Eric Bower, co-founder of Marketbright says, personalization of any communication make lead generation a positive customer experience. “It should feel like you have exclusive membership in a club,” he says. The most effective offer should center around helping the prospect move toward purchasing the right product from your company. Because each prospect is at a different stage, a personalized approach is essential.

Focus on clarity: Evan Adlman, Vice President, Strategic Development, Pontiflex urges B2B marketers to clearly state what the prospect has signed up for. “If possible, specify where they saw your offer,” he says. “Include a clear call-to-action. Remember that in an information-deluged age, a few minutes can be a lifetime and a few days could very well be an eternity: one where your message is condemned to the depths of oblivion.”

Measure & Optimize: Some offers work; some don’t. Some offers work for a short period of time and some seem to attract consistently high conversion rates. Adlman urges marketers to include track able links in the auto responder to track performance post-transmission. “This will enable you to better design more relevant future marketing communications to your prospects , so that you close out a sale or acquisition more easily,” he says.

All lead gen experts agree that companies need to begin with the end in mind. If you’re after engagement, offer a reward for consistent engagement. If you’re pushing to close a sale, make sure the offer reflects the magnitude of that stage of the business. A free iPod by get better engagement, in other words, but don’t expect it to reward a $5 million deal.

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