Anyone in a smaller organisation needs to consider the ‘right type of lead’ as diligently as larger organisations do – possibly more so.
Much is written about the relationship between marketing and sales, and whether marketing is delivering what the sales department needs. This makes for a good discussion, of course. However, at smaller businesses, marketing and sales are the same people – or even the same person. Is there a similar issue? Surprisingly, there often is.
When the salesperson is also responsible for generating their own leads, it’s still quite possible that they’re generating the wrong type of leads. For example, take a business whose strength is in developing a relationship with the prospect and convincing them that they need to be buying a completely new system and approach. That requires leads from the earliest stage prospects, who will still be open to new ways of doing things. I’d hope that a separate marketing department would identify this. However, a hard-pressed combined sales and marketing person might find themselves inadvertently targeting the purchase-ready prospect, with offers too far along the ‘purchasing journey’.
I’ve been asked in the past to write some advertising and corresponding website copy aimed at getting people to consider red widgets as an alternative to traditional blue ones. But it turned out the client didn’t want leads from prospects willing to take a meeting and hear the case for red widgets – they wanted direct sales from their new red widgets online store. Steady on. The right type of lead here would have been prospects already buying (or convinced of the need to buy) red widgets. That’s a whole different sales story.
Anyone in a smaller organisation needs to consider the ‘right type of lead’ as diligently as larger organisations do – possibly more so.