Is lead nurturing still relevant in a world of intent data, artificial intelligence (AI) everywhere and highly personalized ABM campaigns? The simple answer is “yes.” But it’s undeniably becoming more challenging. Budget pressures, longer sales cycles and more complex customer journeys are turning up the heat on B2B marketing teams everywhere.
Yet some are still excelling. Our research reveals that while 10% of low performing teams claim to be “very good or exceptional” at lead nurturing, the figure surged to 69% of their high-performing peers. To close the gap, they’ll need more effective ways to nurture leads through longer and more unpredictable buyer journeys.
B2B marketing teams are used to spinning metaphorical plates. But they have several challenges all requiring urgent attention today. The first is sales and marketing misalignment. A third of U.S. companies told us they’re concerned about the bottom-of-the-funnel friction this can cause. It’s compounded by the growing disconnect between how B2B buyers actually purchase today, and the linear handoffs that take place between most marketing and sales teams.
The Chaos of the Buying Journey
The truth is that most modern buyers conduct the majority of their research independently online, and may not engage with sales until most of this journey is complete. They jump between vendor research, internal meetings, demos, vendor comparisons and so on, in a chaotic, non-linear fashion.
And they’re likely to do so for far longer than they used to. Three quarters of organizations told us they’re experiencing longer sales cycles, and many are seeing buying groups expand to 10 or 20 individuals. Only 41% are confident in identifying all of the new personas in these groups. As finance stakeholders get involved, there’s more likelihood that sales cycles will stretch even further— up to six months is not uncommon. That decisions will be driven by short-term cost pressures.
Where We Need to Get To
As challenging as these conditions are, they needn’t be existentially threatening for B2B marketers. First, they should tackle the content conundrum— something a third (32%) of U.S. teams admit they have problems with. Data-driven personalization for nurture sequences, especially emails, is essential to cut through the noise, improve relevance and align with those non-linear buyer journeys. It will help organizations continue to build credibility and stay top of mind for their leads, even as sales cycles drag on.
AI tools are increasingly popular for both segmentation and personalizing content at scale. They’re especially useful at enabling smaller teams to overcome skills shortages and potential budget cuts— although they must be used with care when creating content. It’s always advisable to have a human in the loop to make sure what is being produced is in line with brand voice and tone, free from hallucinations, and meets other key requirements.
Teams must ensure they track engagement with these programs— capturing every signal, from email opens to website visits, in order to drive true personalization and relevance. Lead qualification and scoring should be integrated into these efforts to help prioritize leads and guide them through the buying journey as effectively as possible.
Introducing Branded Demand
Another way of improving the performance of nurture programs is to combine syndication of high-quality, relevant content with targeted display advertising. This new Branded Demand approach drives engagement through the former while at the same time building brand awareness and recall through the latter.
The idea is to ensure prospects are already familiar with and trust the brand, and are therefore more likely to engage, convert and become customers. It’s an antidote to the short-termism that has eroded much of the value from demand generation efforts. And it aligns neatly with the longer sales cycles and erratic buying behavior that are increasingly the norm today.
A Continuous Cycle
Our research reveals that U.S. marketers feel significantly more confident in lead nurturing and management than their global peers. Yet only 15% rate their efforts “excellent.” There’s still clearly plenty of room for improvement.
B2B marketers wanting to join the elite group of high performers should start by assessing current nurture performance by stage, identifying drop-off points, and redesigning sequences with the help of AI. Perhaps most important, though, is to run those nurture programs indefinitely. Your prospects might buy in two months, or two years’ time. In the meantime, you need to keep educating, building credibility and trust, and reinforcing the brand.
Given the extra costs associated with generating net new sales-ready leads, this makes infinitely more business sense than a short-term focus on rapid conversions. There’s likely to be a large cohort of potential customers not ready to engage yet. But they will one day, and you need to be ready.
Matt Hummel serves as the Chief Marketing Officer at Pipeline360, where he leads the development and execution of strategic marketing initiatives to enhance the customer experience, accelerate growth, foster cultural evolution, and deliver on the company vision. Drawing from his extensive experience as a multi-time customer of Pipeline360, Matt brings a unique perspective and a deep passion for delivering exceptional business and customer value. After starting his career in advertising and public relations, Matt found his passion for B2B marketing, spending more than a decade at leading global financial services organizations including Deloitte. Most recently, Matt led Digital Marketing at Demandbase, and prior to that had senior leadership roles at leading SaaS companies including RealPage, Social Solutions, and Thomson Reuters, where he built and led teams that consistently drove profitable growth. Matt is a graduate from the University of North Texas where he holds a degree in Marketing.
