Organizations have traditionally treated clients and accounts like oil and vinegar – John Russo, director of marketing at Fusion, a B2B sales and marketing firm, explained that many practices have lead traffic and account traffic and that they exist as two separate entities. But that's no longer acceptable in today's sales environment, where professionals need a unified view of the buying process while prospects and customers demand more personalization.
"It's hard for marketers to think. "Well, how do I get ABM and data into my systems and measure everything?" - Rusa explained. "People just don't know how to think about the individual channel because they're so focused on leads and accounts."
To further explore the power of a single funnel (and discuss key components missing from industry history), the General Demand Report team, along with Russo, explored the components needed to bring these disparate movements together. .
Demand Generation Report. the unified funnel is the ideal result for professionals to track all purchasing activities. Why is it important for professionals to join their pipes?
John Russo. Typically, you have a lead funnel, an account funnel, and a sales funnel, but the CEO or CFO isn't trying to juggle all these different funnels; they consider it to be marketed (GTM). But traders often don't consider leads as part of an account.
DGR. Combining contacts and accounts into one system is complex and requires a lot of manpower and technology. What advice do you have for companies looking to combine the two?
Russian. Start with change management. First you need to define your lead process, then you need to define your account process, and finally you need to build the right architecture to support your separate lead and account processes. If you have affiliates, referrals, or even "contact us" as inbound channels, you should be able to use them as volume and rate filters for your unique funnel.A database architecture is needed to handle traffic based on connections and accounts. This type of architecture is common in Salesforce and marketers don't spend much time on it. But they often have to refer to it. it is very important to take the next step.
DGR: What will the technology stack look like to implement these steps?
Russian. The premium technology suite will include account-based technology, a marketing automation platform and a customer relationship management system. These are the three main components, but you can enhance them by implementing nice solutions like a lead generation platform, a sales engagement platform, and a sales fulfillment platform.
DGR: What challenges do organizations often face when working to implement a single funnel? Are there key areas that are often overlooked?
Russian. Often practitioners and thought leaders overlook the SDR performance side of the funnel. And that's where the rubber meets the road. you can have the best machine in the world, but if your SDRs are not up to par, it won't be effective.
SDR performance is often overlooked by marketers, and in today's environment, sales effectiveness and productivity are top priorities for everyone. You don't want to implement the technology without thinking about the SDR workflow, because that workflow in turn needs to feed a funnel.
DGR. What steps can organizations take to best meet SDR requirements?
Russian. The first tip is to measure all data visualization platforms because account information resides on a different platform than SDR workflows. These technologies do not contribute to sales efficiency; they are good for beautiful panels. You must be in the SDR workflow.
You also need the right technology to track and attribute transactions across your platforms. You should be able to say "This intent moved this transaction through the pipeline". And behind that is the data architecture we talked about earlier.
DGR: Do you have statistics or examples of how a funnel benefits organizations?
Russian. I recently worked with digital platform Amplience to help them gather account data from multiple metrics for multiple global customers and prospects and improve the productivity of their sales force. By implementing a unified view, the company discovered:
- 6.5 times higher calling rate on a qualified 6sense account than traditional outbound cold calling;
- 83% of its opportunities come from accounts in the decision-making and buying stages, compared to 55% previously; In:
- 36% increase in the average annual value of the first year contract in ongoing negotiations.
DGR: Why do you think SDRs are not considered in the single funnel discussion?
Russian. In my operational role, I managed the SDR function as well as my team members. So we are probably biased in how the seller thinks about the change. Marketers want tools, while salespeople want a simple, scalable and repeatable process. I have SDR experience so I take it more seriously, but I've also researched hundreds of clients and seen their entire sales and marketing pipeline. I think about profitable sales and marketing more holistically than just marketing.
