Know-How Exchange : Strategy

There is no rule of thumb. It's different in every industry, for every company, in every situation. And it can change over time.

For example, we consulted with a large industrial chemical company that sold what most people think of as commodities -- bulk chemicals, fiber and film. In some of their product ategories we were able to define a meaningful difference (i.e., a unique benefit for their customers) and brand the product. That let them charge a premium price for the product over many years. So the contribution of branding was small in the beginning, but large after we established the branding program. Same industry, same company. Just a different product positioning and a different contribution from marketing.

It comes down to finding the optimal marketing mix. Sales is only a sliver of the mix. Like M Goodman says above - it differs from industry to industry. If I was dealing with a big ticket item like a semi-conductor that cost 100k - I would opt for a heavy sales team. Mobile Phones? You will need advertising and a sales support team.

Hi

I believe ‘every person working in an organization is a sales person’; technically you can’t formulate any rules on success coming from sales and marketing.

If you are planning for budget allotment to B2B activity, I recommend you to understand your ‘lead to cash’ ratio (Still not advisable) and marketing efforts to generate those quality leads.

Yes, it’s true that marketing only create interest but sales activity actually generate revenue.

I will advise you to understand your product and services, business competitors, market, current positioning, and target audience; certainly you will be able to find the right ways of investing money to brand your business.

Why don’t you use cost effective branding activity to market your product and service?

If you have any questions please email me...

Mansing

B2B sales are often more carefully researched and considered than comparable B2C sales. As an example, when doing searches it's common for B2B searchers to go to the 2nd or 3rd page of Google Results, but uncommon for B2C searchers.

With that in mind, and with the criticality of communications for an organization it is imperative that your brand be considered as reliable and a good investment. Otherwise, well no one ever got fired for hiring AT&T...

With this as a premise your branding efforts should be centered upon creating a "digital trail" for your prospects to follow which will create that impression. This is done with Landing Pages on your site designed for this effort. These "branding" efforts then become lead generation efforts that are designed to move prospects further along the pipeline.

When presented to the sales team in this light 100% of your branding efforts are supporting Lead Gen.

Chris Kieff
CEO 1 Good Reason.com
Social Marketing
Follow me on Twitter: www.Twitter.com/ckieff

Dear djp55,

If you've put together a reasonable target for the trackable leads
WHY are you spending your budget on brand activity, sales tools,
and other activity that aren't lead-generation specific?

Forget about branding. Branding isn't what's important. The only thing that CREATES a notion of branding is getting your goods and services into the lives and hands of the people that will be using them.

And to do THIS you must create the desire to buy.

So, to answer your question: "What percentage of sales is marketing responsible for?" the logical answer is all of it.

Every point of light in your marketing galaxy must focus back
onto the ability of the goods or services you're offering to meet and exceed people's expectations. It's THAT that builds brand awareness
and brand loyalty.

But until your marketing has generated a sale nothing else happens.

The role of marketing is to generate sales. Any part of the marketing mix that does NOT help reinforce the notion of value and the good sense involved in buying that particular thing because it solves a specific problem has no business in your marketing plan.

I hope this helps.

Gary Bloomer
Wilmington, DE, USA