Take The Marketing Success Test
Are Your Marketing Investments Diversified?

• Do you discount the pricing of your products or services more after the 15th of the month and at the end your fiscal quarter?

• Are you creating leads or forging for sales?

• Are your marketing investments paying for themselves or are they wasted investment?

• Does 50% of your current revenue come from existing customers only?

Marketing is not a staff position supporting revenue . . . it is a line position deigned to create revenue. If your marketing investments are not creating qualified inbound lead generation, then you are wasting your time and money.

There are only three ways to generate leads -- and only three -- and they are cold calling, networking and marketing. We call this the three legged stool of lead generation. Each leg has its own contributing value and cannot be ignored. When there is an imbalance in which sales teams are required to cold call or network only, or your marketing department only sends out direct mail, your company's growth potential diminishes.

Yet today, many marketing programs primarily focus on brochures, pretty web site development, or pens with their company name on it.

Like a good stock portfolio, marketing diversification with investments into the right vehicles is the key to lower lead costs and increased lead qualification. Focusing only on cold calling, tradeshows or channel partners as your primary source of leads ultimately fails because you are held hostage to the source's ability or lack of ability to create lead volume.

Often companies generate leads through a single approach based on their marketing experience. Your cost per lead increases when you limit your approach to lead generation. Like a stock portfolio, you want to average down your cost per lead by spreading across multiple options.

When lead sources are weak, there is a direct correlation to product or service price discounting.

To reduce sales team discounting,
increase qualified lead traffic.

Provided to Paul DiModica by eMarketer.com under contract.

So the question remains -- how successful is your marketing?

Take The Marketing Diversification Test?

• 1.     Does your marketing create at least 3 qualified leads a month for each salesperson?
  
  ___Yes            ___ No
• 2.     Are tradeshows your primary lead generation tool?
  
  ___Yes            ___ No
• 3.     Do you generate at least 10 qualified leads a month from your web site for each salesperson?
  
  ___Yes            ___ No
• 4.     Do you hold free thought leadership events (monthly or quarterly seminars, webinars, teleseminars, etc.) for your prospects?
  
  ___Yes            ___ No
• 5.     Does each sales team member cold call at least 20 new prospects each week.
  
  ___Yes            ___ No
• 6.     Do you publish a newsletter at least monthly to your existing customers and new prospects?
  
  ___Yes            ___ No
• 7.     Do you publish at least one new press release each month?
  
  ___Yes            ___ No
• 8.     Do you contact trade publications and local business publications in your industry and the geography you sell into once a month to educate them on your company and its offerings?
  
  ___Yes            ___ No
• 9.     Have you mailed at least three times during the last 12 months any marketing material to your entire customer base who has bought from you during the last 24 months?
  
  ___Yes            ___ No
• 10.  Do you calculate marketing return on investment for each program you implement?
  
  ___Yes            ___ No

Answers
Each correct answer is worth 10%

Scoring Overview:

70% and Above
Your marketing investments appear diversified and should produce a broad range of qualified leads from multiple sources.

50% to 70%
Your current marketing program may be functional but your marketing program has additional potential to increase its marketing return on investment through lead generation diversification.

Below 50%
Your marketing is ineffective and you need to review your investments in your current programs. More than likely they are unbalanced in their focus and/or are not generating enough qualified enough leads for your firm from a variety of sources and your current lead costs in funding or time management allocation is probably high.

It's not just marketing; it's how many leads and at what cost.

Writers Resource Box