Don’t fall into the lead generation pain cave
Lead generation is vital. An insufficient volume of leads at the top of the sales funnel translates to an insufficient volume of closed opportunities at the bottom of the sales funnel, and missed revenue targets. Missed revenue targets translate to misery for pretty much everyone in the organization.
Old school lead generation
There’s no reason to stay stuck in the lead generation pain cave. Lead generation has come a long way in the last few years. That said, we see a lot of businesses who do lead generation today like they would have a decade ago. First, Marketing originates leads via one or more channels (Paid Search, Content, Social, Webinars, Trade shows, etc.). Next, these leads are qualified, and the better ones are handed over to Sales Development Representatives. Finally, SDRs follow up on inbound leads and schedule meetings with decision makers who have BANT (Budget, Authority, Need, Timing). SDRs are also tasked with cold calling prospective clients.
Lead Generation at Scale
Today, it’s no longer which prospects are out of reach because you lack resources. You no longer need to have the resources of a Fortune 500 Marketing department to reach the entire universe of potential buyers.
Even a company with limited resources can build personalized lead generation at scale, using technology as a force multiplier.
The blueprint for personalized lead generation at scale
- Build your lead generation at scale processes. You need to be able to execute processes that deliver leads of a quality that you want, supported by a governance that picks apart the good from the bad leads. Cost per lead does not matter at this stage, nor does volume of leads. That comes later.
- Build a lead generation at scale technology stack: Your technology stack will act as the force multiplier, drive volume of leads up and cost per lead down. Building a technology stack is simple but not easy.
What your technology stack should do for you
1. Identify potential prospects – Use tools like LinkedIn Sales Navigator, CBInsight or Apollo to identify potential prospects, using extensive filtering criteria.
2. Build your market Intelligence: Utilize tools like SourceScrub to gather comprehensive market intelligence and insights, helping to refine your prospects list.
3. Identify decision makers: Use tools like LinkedIn Sales Navigator to identify the decision makers of prospect companies.
4. Enrich contact data: Use tools like Apollo or Clay to enrich the data in your possession on decision makers e.g. their email address and mobile phone number. Equally, information on the founders, their age, how far they are from retiring, etc.
5. Develop icebreakers: Use large language models like ChatGPT or Claude to craft personalized messages that resonate with potential prospects’ decision makers.
6. Connect to decision makers: Use tools like PhantomBuster to automate connection with decision makers on LinkedIn.
7. Engage with decision makers: Use tools like Lemlist or Outreach.io to develop multi-channel campaigns with complex if / then rules, to engage with decision makers. Create a drip-feed campaign of personalised messages. You’re trying to engage with decision makers and get a first meeting. At that point, the SDRs take over.
8. Automate the campaign: Use tools like Zapier or Make to daisy chain the steps into a streamlined process.
Companies who build this capability can easily handle 30,000 to 50,000 highly targeted multi-channel touch points, generating a consistent flow of new meetings with prospects.
If you don’t want to build it yourself, there are companies that can do this for you. We partner with an excellent one. Some of these companies operate on a performance basis. Which means that you only pay them for meetings booked.
Leveraging AI and automation can free up scarce SDR and Sales time for what really matters: building your top of funnel, nurturing the relationships, converting prospects into clients.
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