The Next Chapter in Demand Generation

Despite not having the luxury of meeting face-to-face for the past year, B2B marketers are still pressured to move buyers through the funnel and produce more leads. Marketing’s job is NOT just to give more leads to sales.  Marketing’s job is to move buyers all the way through the buyer’s journey. It’s about mapping content to the right buyers and capturing the demand. So, the question is: how do you engage buyers? And more importantly, how do you build your pipeline?

The way people buy has changed. So what does that look like in the way you market?  Ten years ago, marketers were solely focused on delivering thousands of leads to sales, but many of those leads never converted to qualified pipelines. It’s not just about building an engaging campaign and handing over “MQL leads” to sales. You need to build a solid funnel-based content marketing strategy that gives you the intelligence you need to generate better leads and move buyers through your system.  Publishing more content and producing more webinars isn’t going to get the job done.

Think Outside the Box

The real shift has been in the way people want to buy—people now have access to a lot of options, and there are more ways a demand marketer can reach them. Consider the type of content experience you are creating for your customer. If you blast out content without knowing what your audience wants, it’s just pure noise.  It’s time to think outside the box about where buyers are going and how they make purchases.

Generate High Propensity to Buy Leads

The game has changed from high volume lead generation to generating leads that want to buy. Everyone talks about the top of the funnel, and many marketers are measured on this but the real magic is engaging with buyers no matter where they are on their journey. Use content to connect and educate with in-market buyers and invest in a content-led nurturing methodology that engages prospects and see what happens.

Change Your Mindset

Many marketers relied on events for demand generation, but the pandemic has forced B2B tech marketers to change their mindset. Although events areslowly returning, companies are still leaning on digital marketing with 90% agreeing (or saying) that digital marketing will continue to grow in share of marketing budgets, according to Activate’s 2021 State of Demand Gen report.Shift your focus to get a deep understanding of what buyers really want and engage them with content that moves them through the funnel. Understand the digital body language that reveals true buying signals. Think about changing your channels and tactics to account-based marketing (ABM) and high-quality lead (late-funnel, HQL/SRL) programs.