What are other companies offering their prospects?

Software Advice, a research consultancy, recently released the results of a new survey called “B2B Demand Generation Benchmark Report: 2013 Marketing Priorities.” The report has some interesting points. One which I’d like to pick up on is a question which attempts to find out what offers companies are making to their prospects.

If I asked you that question, I’m sure almost everyone would say that their primary offer to prospects is “contact us”. And that’s fine. But can you think of anything else you’re offering? There were no fewer than ten items in the survey which scored more than 60% (of companies using them), which means that most companies must be offering several of these items. They are, in order of popularity:

1. Learn more/Contact us
2. Videos
3. White papers
4. Case studies
5. Live demos with reps
6. Price quotes
7. Webinars
8. Surveys
9. Video demos
10. Free trials

I’m more than a little surprised at the popularity of one or two of the items in the list, and I wonder if it’s a result of the survey responders being primarily in the “technology” sector, which in the USA at least tends to mean software. So I’d like to repeat that question here, with a bit of help from you. Before we do so, if you can add any “offers” (actions which you’re currently suggesting prospects take) to the list above, I’d be interested to hear what you’ve got; you can add them in the comments. Then I’ll run our own version of the survey, and let’s see what we come up with.

In the meantime, it’s worth looking at the list above and asking if there are more things you should be offering your prospects. You may have many of them available, but are you forgetting to offer them?