Enterprise companies routinely build highly effective, robust inside sales teams.  These inside sales teams are extremely effective at what they do because of their focus.  But, this focus tends to restrict their flexibility.  This is a problem because directors of revenue creation and marketing continually have new sales initiatives.  They must manage sales of additional products …

The “Oz Curtain” is a term that we use to describe the way most lead generation firms operate.  All of the activity takes place behind a curtain and the customer is asked to pay attention only to the results.  The customer has no idea what is going on.  Who is calling on the account?  Who is …

What are the common telemarketing and pre-sales gaps and how does an emerging technology company close them? Ideally, it would be impossible to differentiate a telemarketer from a sales professional.  The reality of the situation is that it requires an investment in both product knowledge and process to really be able to understand and sell …

The four key revenue building blocks related to demand generation within the emerging technology market are suspect, prospect, opportunity and customer.  More often than not, a company will hire a specialized marketing team charged with taking suspects to prospects and hire a professional team of enterprise sales representatives dedicated to taking opportunities to customers.  So what …

Transparency is critical to the demand generation process, and many companies will say that they have transparency.  But, there are two decidedly different views of exactly what transparency means. One view is held by a group that we callthe wishful thinkers.  These people lack a formal process and meaningful documentation.  These people know they’ve had …

Typical telemarketers make cold calls and use scripts when they reach potential customers.  These scripts sound rehearsed and the calls are impersonal and rigid.  The prospect voices objections, and each objection is met with another canned speech.  The prospect simply wants to get off the phone.

The technology space is complex.  Businesses are selling big-ticket items …

There are always risks involved in handing the task of demand generation over to a call center.  The risks can be reduced or increased by the complexity of the product being sold.  For companies selling widgets, transactional items or business-to-consumer items, the risks usually are small.  However, companies selling products that are complex, like technology products, …

There are three main sources of revenue for companies.  The first for most companies is also the easiest. When a company is in its early stages, growth typically comes from referrals and customers the company already knows.  These relationship-based sales can often get a company to revenue mark around one or two million dollars.

To grow beyond …

The technology market today is a constantly changing, competitive landscape.  Organizations need to make sixty to seventy cold calls per day, have intelligent conversations with prospects, be persistent in nurturing leads, and be able to constantly adjust to the market in order to be successful.

There are several critical questions related to demand generation that should be …

Lead generation mistakes are difficult to avoid, especially for a technology company.  Lead generation must be a competency to be successful at it, and lead generation simply is not a competency for most technology companies.  Technology companies are proficient in the services and products they offer.  That is what they focus on and that is why …