Effective Marketing Strategies in demand management will increase and expedite the conversion of Marketing Qualified Leads (MQLs) to Qualified Sales Opportunities (QSOs). An organization that enjoys consistent double-digit growth typically has a healthy and sustained marketing and sales pipeline of qualified sales opportunities. Qualified sales opportunities are those with a high probability of converting to closed won/deals. They are not leads. Best-in-class organizations separate, but integrate, the process of creating MQLs (demand creation) and the conversion of marketing qualified leads to QSOs (demand management). These functions must not only be aligned and integrated for lead follow-up, but must also be united when building the demand generation plan. Because sales resources are among the most expensive resources for any organization, it is critical that tasks assigned to salespeople are high value and are directly correlated to advancing and closing opportunities. In general, steps in the sales process that reside at the top of the sales funnel are most often assigned to marketing, as they can be highly segmented and automated. However, these assignments have to be well-defined steps in the sales process and proactively managed by both sales and marketing. Below is an example of effective marketing strategies which increase the conversion of marketing qualified leads to qualified sales opportunities.

1. Effective Marketing Strategies
increase and expedite the conversion of MQLs
Effective Marketing Strategies
Fourquadrant.com/Marketing-Resource-Blog

2. Effective Marketing Strategies!

3. Effective Marketing
Strategies in demand
management will
increase and expedite
the conversion of
Marketing Qualified
Leads (MQLs) to
Qualified Sales
Opportunities (QSOs).
An organization that enjoys consistent
double-digit growth typically has a healthy
and sustained marketing and sales pipeline
of qualified sales opportunities. Qualified
sales opportunities are those with a high
probability of converting to closed won/
deals. They are not leads.
Best-in-class organizations separate, but
integrate, the process of creating MQLs
(demand creation) and the conversion of
marketing qualified leads to QSOs (demand
management). These functions must not
only be aligned and integrated for lead
follow-up, but must also be united when
building the demand generation plan.
Effective Marketing Strategies
Overview

4. Effective Marketing Strategies
Key Benefits
Only opportunities worthy of a sales person’s time are passed to sales people1
Institute a 10 – 30 touch lead follow-up model which is aligned with the buying
process.
2
The ROI of marketing campaigns increases as more leads convert to customers3
An outcome-based approach to investing in holistic and integrated marketing
campaigns is promoted
4
The buying process must be well-understood and documented for sales and
marketing processes to be effectively aligned
5

5. Effective Marketing Strategies
Strategies
Develop a qualification matrix of the specific criteria used by the sales team to
define a qualified sales opportunity.
1
Institute a 10 – 30 touch lead follow-up model which is aligned with the buying
process.
2
Leverage automation to exhaust each opportunity with meaningful, relevant and
timely content.
3
Define the actionable metrics and manage the conversion ratios.4

6. Effective Marketing Strategies!
Tactics!
ü Assess the demand management function
ü Standardize the terminology, roles and responsibilities and processes
ü Create a Target Account Profile
ü Create the qualification model
ü Establish a lead scoring model
ü Establish a lead routing and escalation process
ü Institute a 10-touch lead follow-up model
ü Build specific nurture paths
ü Conform to a demand management timeline
ü Document the SDR prioritization process
ü Document meaningful metrics, dashboards and KPIs

7. Effective Marketing Strategies
Questions to Ask
ü Who owns lead management – sales or marketing?
ü Have clear goals been set for the lead management function?
ü Has an assessment of the lead management function been performed?
ü Is lead management tightly integrated with lead generation?
ü Are there automated systems in place?
ü Are there managed, repeatable processes in place?
ü Have roles and responsibilities been clearly communicated?
ü Is the data clean?
ü Are there a set of metrics, dashboards, reports and KPIs in place that are
monitored and actively managed?
ü Is feedback incorporated into the process and if so, how?

8. Effective Marketing Strategies!

9. Effective Marketing Strategies
increase and expedite the conversion of MQLs
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Effective Marketing Strategies
Fourquadrant.com/Marketing-Resource-Blog