In today’s increasingly noisy marketing environment, the idea of trying to personalize demand generation strategies is everywhere. Every marketer, at one point or another in the course of their busy day, is actively engaged in testing and constructing ideas to increase awareness and interest in their company’s products and services.
But just like with all things marketing, it is data that’s at the center of any successful demand gen strategy. It’s almost that simple. Still, too often, marketers rely on a mix of the same old practices – generating the opposite of what’s intended: a lack of demand.
So, what’s to blame? For many, the culprits are erroneous data, too little data, or simply overused data.
Not surprisingly, problematic data can cost you, big time: Organizations estimated that poor-quality data is costing them an average of $14.2 million annually (source). To make matters worse, within a year, more than 70 percent of B2B data will have one or more changes. The ability to consistently generate demand with so much obsolete data isn’t easy, but it is attainable with a new and improved approach to data.
To the point, your demand generation strategy is only as good as the data that powers it. Read on to explore three tactics for tackling demand gen the tried and tested way; by using only the freshest, most up-to-date data to ensure your company’s solution and service is top of mind, at the right time.
Dynamic and Intelligent Data
Pursuing an effective demand gen strategy requires access to intelligent and real-time contact and account data. Otherwise, you risk reaching the almighty unknown.
While lead generation is an essential component of the demand generation process, to have your pick of quality leads, you need to ensure the entirety of your marketing database is as up-to-date as humanly possible.
And we humans, we’re a fickle species. We change jobs and companies more frequently than ever before. According to Marketing Shepra’s research, marketing databases naturally degrade by about 22.5% each year. As a result, B2B databases are often cluttered with inaccurate, outdated or incomplete records (source).
Targeted Outreach with Segmentation
The effort to personalize demand generation consists of an amalgam of marketing campaigns, each designed to address various pain points and each replete with different end goals. So where do you start?
Try segmentation through account targeting, or account-based marketing (ABM). With quality data, you can alleviate the pain of dispersed account information syndrome by:
- Targeting key accounts
- Developing lookalike personas to match your buyers
- Connecting and engaging with the right prospects
By enlisting the help of a B2B market intelligence provider, you can get even more granular with the data at your disposal, leveraging micro-level and technographic account information to sharpen your prospect-savvy and better the customer experience.
By analyzing your database and working with your sales team, you can more easily develop a set of defined buyer profiles, providing your organization with a strong understanding of your audience. With access to the right data found in your new, refreshed database, you can establish a framework for enhanced account and contact targeting, scale your marketing campaigns, and increase ROI.
Personalized Content
Today, content marketing is one of the leading drivers of all things marketing – and for a good reason; content initiatives cost 62 percent less than traditional marketing and generate about three times as many leads (source). But not all content is created equal. To achieve the greatest demand gen results, it is imperative that your message is on point and exceptionally targeted, or you run the risk of losing your prospect along the content journey.
For content to resonate with its recipients and drive engagement, marketers must go beyond including a name. To gain traction, marketers must have a strong understanding of who their audience is, the questions they have, and the answers they need.
In a nutshell, if the content you’re sending out is truly personalized and relevant, the likelihood that it will resonate with your ideal prospect is significantly higher. Breaking all of this down further, the basic formula to personalize demand gen success reads: Quality Leads + Personalized and Relevant Content = Prospect Engagement.
What now?
Use the three tips in this article to impress your colleagues with your B2B data IQ and increase the effectiveness of how you personalize demand generation initiatives – fast. And for the pro tip? Evaluate a B2B data vendor that specializes in serving up accurate contact and account intelligence that’s always at the fingertips of your marketing team, enabling even better and more personalized messaging.
