Working Together: Five Marketing and Sales Strategies for Improving your Close Rate 

Two Teams, Same Goals 

Creating content that brings people to your website (inbound marketing) achieves higher ROI (return on investment) than direct techniques (outbound marketing) regardless of company size, geography, or budget. Sales and Marketing Teams must work together on strategies to generate new leads and get them over the finish line. In this blog, we look at five strategies that help achieve this and improve your close rate. 

Strategy 1: Understanding and Leveraging External Factors 

External factors, or things outside our control, that rattle the economy and cause industry caution are constantly in flux. Think of the hot-button topics of the past few years, including the pandemic and the resulting supply chain issues. Regardless of the size of the economic challenge, you can tackle external factors with careful planning by asking yourself: 

• Which markets are active? (Either new or existing) 
• How do I market to recruits?​ 
• Which channels provide the highest quality leads? 
• How can I budget wisely? 

Answer these questions by knowing that people are optimistic, even with today’s concerns of a possible recession and the skilled labor shortage in the industrial space. This means investment in your business through marketing can make an impact as people start to look past current external factors. 

Strategy 2: Aligning your Sales and Marketing Teams

Alignment between sales and marketing Teams is key to defining and generating a qualified lead. Marketing Qualified Leads (MQL) and Sales Qualified Leads (SQL) may not be identical given their approach but do work toward the same end goal. Not all leads are created equal, so deciding disqualifiers is a big part of this process. To do this, can your Teams answer: 

• Who is your ideal Customer?​ 
• What channels do our Prospects use to source vendors?​ 
• What is our proven process? 
• What are our goals, and how do we measure them? 

Once you’ve established MQLs and SQLs, it’s time to focus on ROI. Businesses that calculate ROI are 72% more likely to have an effective marketing strategy. This metric evaluates how well an investment performs and needs analytics in place to measure—lead measurement platforms like CallRail, LOOP Analytics, and Google Analytics inform strategies and reveal the buyer’s journey. Prospects still have 43% of their journey remaining after they contact you, and before making a final decision, these platforms can help you close that final half. 

For example, a steel supplier was generating qualified traffic to their website, yet leads were low. We validated the traffic through tools like our User Behavior Report and search query data. ​The upfront part of the buyer’s journey worked, but there was a hurdle near the finish line. After listening to call analytics and reviewing form submissions, our Client identified that callers request standard sizes of steel sheets. At that time, these sizes were not featured on their website, so charts were added to the steel landing pages. These charts also included a request for a quote, which routed users to a form.

There’s a feedback loop between marketing and lead data that ensures quality over quantity. This data can help you invest in the right channels, create the right messaging, and confirm the right information is in your forms. 

Strategy 3: Studying your Buyer’s Journey

The typical buying group for a complex B2B solution involves six to ten decision makers‚ each armed with four or five pieces of information they’ve gathered independently. Putting this puzzle together takes time and requires a look at multiple vendors. In a survey of TopSpot Clients, 65% reach out to three-plus vendors when looking for a new supplier.​  

To add to the complication, over half of the leads we’ve studied utilize more than one channel​ and 22% of that group utilize over twelve channels. Where lead tracking follows all the pieces, user behavior tells us where those pieces go. Looking at user activity across your site, including page views, downloads, or video views, provides data on what behavior drives sales and allows you to capitalize on this knowledge. LOOP Analytics has this functionality, showing companies visiting your website and giving you an understanding of their behavior once there.

Strategy 4: Building a Tracking Infrastructure for your Digital Strategy

Once a strategy informed by data is in place, tracking success is simple:

The search defines your Customers and the B-SMART Method® has this in mind. It’s a way to listen to the market and respond, using what’s already being searched and creating target keywords and content to populate those searches.

In theory, the more places you show up, the better. However, quantity versus quality comes into play with digital strategies. While you want to show up across the search landscape with varying content such as images and videos, The B-SMART Method ensures the right Customers see these efforts, securing ROI.

Strategy 5: Keeping Prospects and Customers Engaged with Exceptional Customer Services

There isn’t a finish line in sales and marketing—referrals and return Customers are important sources of recurring revenue. Keeping Customers engaged with exceptional Customer service is just as important as drawing them in. It can start from the moment a prospect reaches out receives a thank you page from your website, and then extends to:

• Links to your social media​
• Resources​ like case studies
• Information on value-added services
• Newsletter signup​
• Upcoming event information​

Beyond content, response time is critical to this stage of the journey. Customer service must include little-to-no hold times, call trees properly mapped to connect callers quickly to the right representative, and same-day return calls. These steps create positive Customer experiences and a higher chance of sales and referrals.

You’ve Got the Knowledge, Now What’s Next?

It all comes down to effective communication internally, don’t assume all Team members understand your organization’s goals​. Keeping a Team mentality and regular training can help to understand and tackle external factors, establish lead qualifiers, create feedback loops between marketing and lead data, track progress, and create positive Customer experiences. Need help? Contact TopSpot and get help with all five strategies to achieve better close rates.