The only way it works is having sales and prospect development working together. Are you geared up for either?
I have worked with many lead generation businesses. It’s their business model I always struggled with it. The laziness of it all. Who sets up a business with blind faith that their clients can close what they send them? Who thinks that the setting of a meeting three weeks in advance with some marketing manager who responded to a vague LinkedIn message – or a three line sales call – is job done? And for the paying clients, who is arrogant enough to believe they can go in blindly to a meeting and that the marketing manager has a memory for why they are there? Or cares? It’s so robotic.
I think there is a place for intermediaries, I really do. But the £4k per month ‘generate me meetings, that’s your KPI’ model is so broken it’s embarrassing. It must be so tough for those businesses to keep getting repeat business. Their clients can’t be bought in for the long term. They also need to push back on working with the right clients; asking questions like; can you close, what other commercial channels do you have working for you, what are your processes and operational set up for working the data once we hand it over?
Set both parties up for success.
You identify your ideal customer – job one is done. They all should buy from you. But ask yourself, does it matter if they all buy right now? That’s what you’re asking of lead gen, find me the ones that need to buy right now. Because you won’t put a proper client (prospect) development process in – I’ve rarely met a business that does this well in tandem with the lead gen relationship – and all that effort in getting the meeting will be wasted because you were promised (and expected) 4 leads a month.
We have two clients who we have put our own special lead generation spin on, but that’s so multi-channeled and inclusive that it isn’t really lead generation. We call it pipeline generation. And it’s a partnership.
When you aren’t focused on leads, but commercial growth and speed isn’t the requirement (you have bigger problems if you need a client in the next three months), but a process to repeatable and considered business development you will have less churn with intermediary partners. With the current lead generation companies on the market, you’d need several of them to have the full effect, in your suite you’d need;
- A personal branding agency
- A LinkedIn lead gen agency
- An email lead gen agency
- A cold calling lead gen agency
On top of that you’ll need a rocket, experienced sales leader.
Only when you have all the commercial model working together, and that lead generation engine is a string in your bow, will you stop the churn of intermediaries and sales people in your business.