In that spirit…MARKETING AND SALES FREAKS UNITE. What’s on your mind? How are you? Who are you? Where are you?

Can you take a few minutes to respond to our B-to-B Sales and Marketing Snapshot: 2010?

Take the survey here: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/7NZMPVX

Macon Raine, in concert (no pun intended) with ZoomInfo, has created this survey to get a better handle on the alignment of sales and marketing.

We’re hopeful the responses will give us a sharper sense of the kind content we can provide that will help b-to-b sales and marketing pros perform their jobs better, grease the sales funnel, and, like, the Grateful Dead realized a long time ago, create life-time value with their customers.  We’ll share the results in a few weeks.

To respond to the survey, please click http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/7NZMPVX

Data, like unrefrigerated milk, goes bad fast. In fact, some pundits estimate that 25% of the database will sour within a year. Add poor import practices and other minor mistakes and bad things quickly snowball. It isn’t until senior management realizes they are making strategic decisions on the back of sub-par data that heads begin to roll.

Blame is a complicated thing. Do you yell at the person responsible for cleaning the data in use, the person responsible for preventing low quality data from getting into the system, the sales people for not updating contact info or the marketing department for not scrubbing the unworkable email addresses? Or should the executive team look in the mirror because clean data was not a strategic priority?

Some organizations try to fix the problem by assigning an intern to scrubbing the data instead of committing to a permanent process change. Others will look longingly for new gadgets, tools, hosted software, widgets, mobile apps or various marketing automation tools to fix the problem. These things can provide a wonderful shiny distraction and maybe an incredible technology advantage…but they are no substitute for permanent process change.

Need to rationalize it to upper management? The ROI for clean data is simple. All things being equal, a company with a larger database of clean prospects will close more business than a company with a smaller database of clean prospects.

Data quality is not a one-time event. Cleaning your data will cost money and so will the process improvements needed to support ongoing data quality.

But in the end it is worth it. Although the option to continue working harder not smarter is always appealing, a fast way to improve sales and marketing success is to fix things that can be fixed. Data quality is one of those things that can be fixed fast.

Every reptilian instinct in my body wanted to find a way to bad mouth the agency’s work. But their creative, positioning and the execution was brilliant. We couldn’t find fault in the agency’s work.

We dug deeper and asked to look at their new CRM – the foundation for the entire product launch and the basis for all of their prospecting efforts. It fueled their direct mail, email newsletters, catalog mailings and sales outreach.

The problem was immediately obvious. The turd in the proverbial punchbowl was data quality. The client had spared no expense building world class creative and but left the task of data hygiene to a group of marketing interns who would rather mop the floors than scrub data.

In the post mortem, we learned the interns received various Excel files containing old data, questionable lists, incomplete lists and exports from a variety of personal contact management applications. Then, with bubble gum and bailing wire, the master list was normalized, checked for obvious data format requirements and imported verbatim into the million dollar CRM.

In hindsight, the client was incredibly candid. No one wanted to own the data hygiene. It wasn’t sexy and it cost a lot of money to do right.  So, in the hopes of prevent future CRM data quality disasters, here are few tips you can use to get the biggest bang from your CRM dollar:

1)    Data quality is not a one-time event. Your data will get dirty and cleaning it is an ongoing set of activities so it helps to design processes that keep data clean. For example, after an email blast, a single individual should be responsible for removing or updating undeliverables. In addition, sales people should also be responsible for keeping data clean. They own the accounts and it is in their best interest to champion the data. Additional quality checks such automation of duplicate record checks also stops problems before they get out of hand.

2)    Duplicates cost you. A single company record should be tied to a set of addresses and contacts. Failure to tie together information about an account to a single company record dilutes the effectiveness of the data – especially in key account selling.

3)    Humans matter. While automation of data clean-up is useful, humans are essential to the process. Computers miss things that are usually obvious to a human such as a division’s relationship to a corporate entity.

4)    Protect your data from good intentions. With CRM, it is far too easy for individuals without an understanding of data hygiene practices to import data from external sources. An equal opportunity automated and a manual review process should always be applied to external data before it is imported.

5)    Find a balance. It is easy to be compulsive about data quality but it is not practical. Your data changes every day, making sure it is always accurate is not financially feasible. That is why it is important to strive for “good enough.”

Good data is the foundation for effective CRM. In B2B it is impossible to build strong marketing unless you know the names of the people most likely to buy from you. Maintaining a clean CRM punchbowl requires more than a summer intern.

NOTE: This article originally appeared on the ZoomInfo blog: http://zoominfoblogger.wordpress.com/tag/ben-bradley/

The study compares the responses of the general population to World-Class Sales Organizations, a group that excels in five key performance metrics that correlate to increased revenue. The study also reveals perception gaps among sales representatives, their managers, and C-level executives related to the sales process.

“It’s so critical in this economy to focus on the activities that can produce results now,” said Sam Reese, president and CEO of Miller Heiman. “The results from this study help sales leaders focus their efforts on the best practices that are working for top-performing sales organizations.”

After the survey closes Oct. 30, Miller Heiman analysts will compile the results into a number of reports specific to industries, regions and countries. An executive summary will be available to provide an overall analysis of the most significant results.

To take part in this year’s study, visit www.millerheiman.com/2010research. All participants gain immediate access to the executive summary of the 2009 Miller Heiman Sales Best Practices Study. Everyone who completes the survey by Friday, October 16 will receive an early preview of some of the preliminary results of this year’s study.

Enjoy.

TWITTER FOR LEADS? Personally, no. We have seen zero new business from Twitter but like the rest of the world, I’m holding out because it looks promising. On the other hand, a number of people that I follow have subscribed to my newsletter and RSS feed. I’ve connected offline with three prospects via Twitter but right now they are only in the early stages of the sales pipeline. The problem I have with Twitter is that most of the activity could be considered “preaching to the converted.”

LINKEDIN FOR LEADS? Personally, yes. Without a doubt, LinkedIn is a great tool for developing and cultivating new leads and new business. It is even more valuable for researching prospects. If forced, I would say that spending time mastering LinkedIn is by far the best investment we have made in our social media activity.

FACEBOOK FOR LEADS? Personally, no and yes. So far, no new business generated from Facebook. However, I’m connected to a few prospects on both LinkedIn and Facebook. Probably more important, I’m connected to quite a few clients on Facebook. Connecting with clients on Facebook makes it easier to share stories and photos of babies and puppies. We also use Facebook to research and monitor the weekend debauchery of prospective employees. So is Facebook a good use of time? Yes. It is a good nurturing tool.

I’ve received calls from clients that want to outsource their “twittering.” I’ve warned them that outsoucing this part of your social media persona is a little bit like trying to outsource your social life.

Just an observation but I think the people that are using these tools most effectively are the ones that can walk the tightrope between sales and marketing with relative ease. The people that function as true advocates, that are empowered to say things online that maybe slightly left of appropriate and the people who are good at building relationships are the best users of social media and the ones that generate the most leads using social media.

You’d think these old school morons would somehow find a clue. Probably too much to hope for.

The rolodex is irrelevant. Certainly, who you know matters. But the thing that matters more is what you do with your rolodex.

There is a fantastic article on this topic over at MyVenturePad. Check it out.

Macon Raine clients have the opportunity to participate as part of the  Sales Leadership Advisory Board (SLAB) –  a peer network of accomplished sales and marketing executives.  Business owners rarely have the opportunity to consult or collaborate with peers about the challenges of B2B sales and marketing.  SLAB is an organically grown community and forum for peer learning and promoting best practices.

To participate, take the survey here. All survey participants receive a copy of the whitepaper and summary survey result.

The real benefit of the Sales Leadership Advisory Board is access to a team and network that cooperates to assist, nurture and challenge thinking while providing valuable networking, interaction, coaching and mentorship. 

Additional benefits of the Sales Leadership Advisory Board include:

• Benchmarking opportunities
• Peer evaluation
• Lead referrals
• Community and best practices sharing

SLAB helps companies enhance performance and become more successful in all aspects of the B2B sales and marketing cycle.  To learn more about SLAB, please contact ben@maconraine.com.

What is SharePoint? For those of you living in a cave, SharePoint allows individuals within an organization to quickly and easily create and manage their own collaboration websites. Once SharePoint is part of your organization, there is no need to ever call IT for support or to set up permissions. Individuals are empowered to define and manage access to specific information. SharePoint is pretty slick and it is often overlooked as a project management tool.

I read the book because I believe most marketing failures can be traced back to failures of project management. I wanted to see how SharePoint could be used to quickly manage marketing projects and help my clients avoid marketing project failure.

Don’t get me wrong. There is no shortage of great project management tools. ProjectCompanion. Microsoft Project Server. Primavera. Basecamp. ProjectTurf.  But many people don’t know that they probably already have SharePoint running somewhere within their organization. When budgets are tight, leveraging technology that you already have can help stretch a strained budget.

I emailed Dux to get a better understanding of some of the essential capabilities marketing managers should look for when evaluating project management tools. His response was succinct:

·         Supports the generation of a project charter, schedule and budget

·         Facilitates communication and feedback

·         Monitors project activities

·         Controls project changes

·         Analyzes and forecasts project performance

·         Disseminates project status to relevant stakeholders

·         Provides real time information essential for initiating, planning, executing, controlling and closing a project

In response to my question: “When should a marketing manager start thinking about using a project management tool,” he responded:

1)      No standardized systems for integrating project goals: project schedule, cost and quality objectives are individual silos. For example, financial information in Excel is not automatically recalculated anytime the project schedule is adjusted. Making manual updates takes time away from other project activities.

2)      Inefficient document management: project documents are not stored in a central location. Tracking, undoing changes, and the ability to roll-back to prior versions are limited. Additionally, varying levels of access permissions are unavailable. IT/IS can only do so much in supporting information access requirements.

3)      Lack of appropriate tools to facilitate team collaboration: Project information is not accessible anytime, anywhere. In addition, the team is incapable of developing or working with information at the same time.

4)      Inability to report accurate and timely status of the project: project status information is only available whenever the project manager makes it available. How do you deal with project sponsors who want to view real time project status information?

5)      Not achieving organizational strategic goals: lacking a standardized tool to facilitate consistent project management processes throughout an organization can limit the ability to effectively support strategic goals.

Any marketing manager should quickly realize that these five issues alone more than justify the need for investment in reliable project management tools.  Dux’s book gives a deep dive for any marketing manager investigating how to use SharePoint to better manage his or her department. Pick it up at Amazon.

Your goal as an organization is to deliver on your commitments reliably and predictably. By doing so, you build the trust needed to sustain a healthy relationship with your customer for many years. The sum of these healthy relationships is a strong brand. In professional services, a strong brand is evidenced by happy customers.

At Macon Raine, we put skin in the game and invest in our client’s sales, marketing and business development process. If we are going to put our money where out mouth is with the promise of revenue, and if we are going to bet on the successful outcome and consistently meet client expectations, we can’t sign-up for bad deals. In fact, if we sense that the client can’t deliver on their side of the agreement, we need to back off fast.

Good deals put you and your customer on the same page. They are structured as win/wins. Bad deals cost too much. No matter who is at fault, bad revenue costs everyone dearly in reputation and pain. 

By copying one of our clients, we have implemented our own “No Stupid Deals” policy. It makes a lot of sense.  No one wants to be in a “stupid deal.”   Very quickly, the “No Stupid Deals” policy has yielded immediate benefits for our clients and for our business.

In fact, our quality of life improved because we were no longer spending too much time putting out fires. When we are aligned with the customer, customer satisfaction goes up.  Our ability to manage expectations and deliver on our promises grew rapidly. 

Clients don’t want stupid deals either. Step into the client’s shoes. Imagine you are picking a new vendor. A new vendor is a big time investment. Finding the right vendor is a big deal. Finding a vendor that can help move the needle is a big deal. Your clients want long-term, trusted relationships as much as you do. If they don’t, they are probably not worth the investment.

But it takes a leap of faith to say no. It is hard to walk away from dollars. In this economy, why would anyone turn down a deal? But if you can’t establish a dialogue with the client and modify the project into a win/win, it is probably not worth doing.

Trust is a shared belief that you can depend on one another to achieve an objective. Trust is built through interaction, integrity, success/failure, transparency and consistency.

The business development challenge for most professional services firms is identifying ways to scale the process for demonstrating trustworthiness to prospects.

How do your firm’s current marketing activities strengthen the personal networks of the managing partners or help build trusted relationships?

If you have a vague feeling of marketing malaise, it may be due to the growing recognition that modern marketing-think is steadily transforming itself into sales-think. In sales-think, the conversations, the relationships, the personal network and persuasion have always been the de facto currency.

Your unease may stem from the fact that the marketing function as we know it is changing dramatically. This may be due to audience fragmentation or the shift of power from the seller to the buyer or hundreds of other equally valid reasons.    

For those practice managers and managing directors interested in more efficiently finding new business it begins by aligning marketing with the task of increasing the number of highly-qualified trusted relationships in the portfolio, not closing a deal. For marketing, it is important to recognize that new business development as a disciplined activity is steadily morphing into an exercise in “personal branding.”

If you are uncomfortable with the term “personal branding” because it minimizes the power of the corporate brand, welcome to the club. But if people buy from people and if a brand is really the sum total of a customer’s interaction with a company, then it follows that in professional services, the personal brand is really all that matters.

Traditional marketing-think such as intrusion, hard-sell tactics, product-push, branding and controlling-the-message activities just don’t resonate anymore. Marketing-as-control has been undermined by customer access to information, networks and experience far beyond the marketing department’s ability to control and manage.  The marketing department is being forced to accept that authentic, inclusive, people to people-driven information is becoming the dominant method for inviting prospects into relationship that can be nourished into customer relationships.

This is even more complicated by the fact that the isolated points of encounter between a company representative and a prospect aren’t just sales encounters, but social encounters as well.  These social and network encounters don’t lend themselves the traditional linear progression of a sales pipeline diagram.

There are some stand-out marketing organizations that have embraced this truth. Yet there are others who are just not capable of authenticity because they are so far removed from the customer.  

This is why some professional services organizations are delegating the function of authenticity to the managing partners and practice managers. The managing partners, responsible for thought leadership are now also responsible for promoting and demonstrating that same leadership through their actions.

Today, the cost of content production and distribution has shrunk dramatically, the information freely available  has grown to include not just sellers but buyers eager to share their own needs, challenges and experiences;  and reaching interested people with relevant offerings is a much more fractured challenge. The challenge is aligning personal relationships with the sales funnel in a way that supports meaningful and valuable discussion as well as trust building.