In this episode, we’re breaking down our own approach when it comes to inbound marketing and sales enablement as a company that specializes in...inbound marketing and sales enablement!
Here, we ask questions like: How do we approach developing content that resonates with our target audience? How do we empower our sales team with the tools, resources, and information needed to effectively engage and convert inbound leads? And how do we ensure sales and marketing alignment to facilitate a seamless transition from lead generation to the sales pipeline?
Joining Dani to answer those questions and so many more is Shaye Smith, Director of Marketing here at LeadG2!
Shaye shares some great pieces of insight, like:
LINKS:
Shaye Smith
Dani Buckley
LeadG2
In this episode, we’re breaking down our own approach when it comes to inbound marketing and sales enablement as a company that specializes in...inbound marketing and sales enablement!
Here, we ask questions like: How do we approach developing content that resonates with our target audience? How do we empower our sales team with the tools, resources, and information needed to effectively engage and convert inbound leads? And how do we ensure sales and marketing alignment to facilitate a seamless transition from lead generation to the sales pipeline?
Joining Dani to answer those questions and so many more is Shaye Smith, Director of Marketing here at LeadG2!
Shaye shares some great pieces of insight, like:
LINKS:
Shaye Smith
Dani Buckley
LeadG2
Welcome to the LeadG2 podcast, the show dedicated to helping sales organizations grow. Each week, host Dani Buckley discusses proven B2B marketing and sales strategies and real-life examples for experts and thought leaders from across industries. In this episode, we're breaking down our own approach when it comes to inbound marketing and sales enablement as a company that specializes in inbound marketing and sales enablement. Here we ask questions like how do we approach developing content that resonates with our target audience, how do we empower our sales team with the tools, resources and information needed to effectively engage and convert inbound leads, and how do we ensure sales and marketing alignment that facilitate a seamless transition through regeneration of the sales pipeline?
Intro/Outro:Joining Dani to answer those questions and so many more is Shaye Smith, director of marketing here at LeadG2. Shaye shares some great pieces of insight like why utilizing owned content is key to not only educating prospects but also helping them through the buyer's journey. How tapping into the thought, leadership and expertise of your own team can be a major boon to your current content strategy. And, lastly, how creating smaller pieces of content from a larger piece of premium content can be an affordable and efficient way to deliver helpful solutions to our ideal customer.
Dani Buckley:Hi Shaye, Welcome. Thanks for joining today.
Shaye Smith:Hi Dani, Thank you for having me. I'm excited.
Dani Buckley:Yeah, as always, it's such a pleasure to get to talk with you. We've worked together for years, but this is always a special way that we get to kind of get the chance to pick your brain and everyone can listen in. So, yeah, thanks for being here, excited to share. Yeah, so the reason we really wanted to do this episode with you is that we are an inbound marketing agency and we often get asked what do you do, what have you seen work, what is your strategy? And so we thought this would be a chance to really kind of dive in and share the secret sauce of what we do, which you know.
Dani Buckley:Of course, every organization, every business needs to have their own strategy, their own approach. We are also. We have marketing which you oversee for three different businesses and like divisions. So there's some things that change that, and so there's lots of different stuff that ties into why we have our strategy the way it is. But I think that you're going to be able to highlight some really cool stuff that people are going to be excited to hear what you've learned over the years and what works and how we've done really well with our marketing. I think.
Shaye Smith:Yeah, for sure, because I came in on the client and the strategy content strategy side and have, you know, just seen so many different angles of it. So I'm excited to share what I have learned.
Dani Buckley:Awesome and remind me how long have you worked?
Shaye Smith:with here With us, I seven and a half years. Yeah, okay, I thought I knew it's been a while.
Dani Buckley:Awesome, I know I'm going to hop right in. So you've seen a thing or two.
Shaye Smith:A thing or two yeah.
Dani Buckley:Great, okay, so we'll jump in. So just to start, can you just provide an overview of Leagy 2's, like current inbound marketing strategy? Just what do we do? Kind of how does it align with our business objectives? What does that look like?
Shaye Smith:Right. So our inbound marketing strategy really exists of a mix of content strategy, search engine optimization and our digital communications channels like social media, podcast, email, our newsletters, things like that and it expands outside of that into thought leadership, branding and awareness and also sales enablement efforts. So we want to attract those qualified leads to our own media, which is our website, where we house our expertise, where we share the problems we solve, but also where we offer resources for the people and meet them where they are in the buyer's journey. So is our inbound marketing getting those people to our own media when they need it and delivering the content they need when they need it. And so, through those channels, we drive them there and then when we convert them, are we nurturing them?
Shaye Smith:Are we, as part of that inbound strategy, it's not just getting them there. If they just get there and convert them fall flat. What are we doing to nurture them and get them closer to a place where our sales team can then intercept them if they're a sales qualified lead, and engage with them and communicate them with them as a prospect? So are we driving qualified visitors through these channels to our own media? And that's really an overview, without any examples.
Dani Buckley:Yeah. So to boil it down, I mean the way I kind of hear it is, our biggest kind of strategic pieces are lead generation using content, marketing and thought leadership. And what would the third one be?
Shaye Smith:Oh, sales enablement, oh yeah, oh yeah, sales enablement, yeah. So lead generation, the content strategy to deliver those search results and get people there, and then the sales enablement piece so we can enable them, through the funnel, to get closer to a self.
Dani Buckley:Perfect, got it. So you touched on a bunch of different tactics, right, different channels, everything from SEO to podcasts like this one, to a big list of things that we've done over the years and continue to do. If you were to just name one or two that you think are the most effective in driving, specifically in driving leads for Leagy 2 on the marketing side, what would you say stands out and how have you kind of optimized those strategies over time?
Shaye Smith:Right. So our own content, our blog, is one of the key Tactics channels. I mean it could be both, no matter how you look at it. To our end, on marketing strategy, we spend a lot of time researching our target persona, their buyer's journey. What questions are they asking? We just recently hosted a buyer's journey workshop amongst the committee of people in our company to hone in on that and see where they are. So are we getting content out there? Is it available to them through our own channels our blog, our emails, but also through search and delivering that.
Shaye Smith:So our content and there's so much that goes into that the blog, right, it's not just writing a piece of content, it's keyword research, our target persona research, the buyer's journey research. So delivering content through the blog is a heavy, heavy piece of our strategy that we spend a lot of time on. And then also what I call our hub content, or the premium content, as a lot of people call it, are we creating educational pieces that people would want to convert for. Will they give us their email address or will they download a piece of content in exchange for the value that they're getting in that content? So those two pieces are key. There are so many other things that go into it. But if you don't have good content in those two areas, then really you're lacking a lot.
Dani Buckley:So I would say that's true, that makes sense. So we know and we're hearing content is a big piece of everything we do, so people always love to ask how do we handle content creation? So who creates our content? How do you manage, kind of facilitate and support that Like just what is the overall process of developing content for us?
Shaye Smith:Right. So we really value the I would say the thought leadership and the expertise we have on our team and we rely on our team as the driver and the subject matter expert behind our content, because we want our content to deliver value and our people are what delivers the value on strategy and things that we do and you know, at Leagey too. So what does that look like? Well, we just went through our target persona and buyer's journey workshop. So we do research, just like we ask and tell people to do like research or target persona, know your target persona From there, how do we manage and facilitate it?
Shaye Smith:Well, we look at the content we have. We look at what we've done, what's work. We assess it. Does it work? Does it not? Do we need to do it, do we not? And then we have a team. So amongst the marketing team or our content team, there is someone looking at keyword research and the topics that we deem important for our end on marketing, for our strategy, for our campaigns, to create that content. So we map out strategies and then the blog topics. That looks like the keyword research and the topics we want to talk on, creating a list and then looking at who can write on this topic or do we need to find someone to write on this topic that we need for our audience?
Dani Buckley:So I don't know if that was really a clear map, but in a nutshell, that's how we do it and we do have people to oversee that process and really focus on that to make sure it's the best for our audience and our business objectives and our goals and really yeah, one thing I want to point out is that because a lot of people ask this as well we work with a lot of clients and we're hired to be that marketing team right from any of our clients at Leading 2 and and there's sometimes that time in the partnership, you know, sometimes it's a few years in or whenever where it's like oh, could, could, we, should we start taking this over? Like, do we need to work with Leading 2 forever? And that's a fair question and some clients our whole plan is to transition them to Do these things on their own, and sometimes people just want to work with us forever and we love that too.
Dani Buckley:But what I want to point out is that we have three full-time Marketing people that run our marketing, and I think that's just always important to know, because some people are like, oh, we'll just hire this like marketing assistant that can do everything. And so, yeah, we have three full-time people you and and two other folks and then, yeah, and we also, like you said, our entire team writes and creates content.
Shaye Smith:It is a team effort, for sure.
Shaye Smith:Like there's a lot of people involved in this right, my whole team touches almost every blog post in some way, whether it's Research or the creation or the curation of the content or the delivering of the content. So between the three of us, we're all touching almost every piece of content At some point, and then we are relying on an outside person to often be that subject matter expert, you know, and to deliver that expertise. Yeah, really, you could look at four people on almost every piece of content at minimum To make sure it's quality and delivered in the best channels. So, yeah, yeah, it's a big process but cool.
Dani Buckley:So in my marketing content. Marketing really big piece of what we do. We do it well. You and your team do an amazing job.
Dani Buckley:I love seeing the leads come in every day, but let's shift the conversation and talk about sales enablement, because that's a huge piece of what we do Right at Leigh G2 and as well as what you do on the marketing team and in you Oversee a lot of that process. So we know sales enablement is not just for converting leads into customers, because we also, when we think of leads, we're thinking of like Prospects that marketing maybe has generated. But sales enablement is for our entire sales process. It supports our sales people with any type of prospect. So I know this is a big question, so I'm gonna Let me just gonna give it to you. But how do we, how do you and how do we empower our sales team with, like, the tools, the resources and information to Effectively engage and convert inbound leads? So I'm thinking about that on the sales enablement side, those leads coming in. What are you doing on the marketing side to support sales enablement, turning leads into customers?
Shaye Smith:right. So first of all, I'm going to Scream without screaming. Sales and marketing and alignment and any type of organization, whether you have a sales team of 8,000 or a sales team of 0.8, however many people you have on your sales team, it is really important that the marketing team, whoever's overseeing that strategy, has communication and in alignment with Whoever's leading the sales, because you're not gonna be able to tell every salesperson every time, every content whatever, but if you have that relationship with your sales team, that alignment is so important. And so then it trickles down from there. So you know, what are we doing to support the sales enablement piece?
Shaye Smith:Well, I meet with our director of sales, elisa, and we talk about, like, where are the holes in the sales process, that they need Content to support those conversations. So that is a little difference, not necessarily the end bound lead, but when we're looking at the buyer's journey workshop that we just did, I look at the full funnel, like top, middle, bottom, where what are questions that Prospects are asking at any point. So that bottom of the funnel piece of the content really exists more for the more for the sales enablement piece, that bottom of the funnel content that delivers. You know, maybe examples of what we might do for them. Maybe it's a case study that shows. You know, case studies can be used throughout, depending on how you know you really verbalize them and visualize them. But you know, maybe it's a case study that shows how we helped a very similar company do something that we can help them with. So Enabling them with that content to sell once the lead is converted is just as important as that lead conversion content to start.
Dani Buckley:So did I answer a question? Yeah, perfect, yes, I.
Shaye Smith:Don't expect the communication piece and sharing where you're saving it what new contents coming so they can plan their sales process around. That is something that has to be done too. You can't just like create the content and then not tell anybody, yeah, because then they don't plan to use it, or you know they might have a prospect that it'd be really good for, and if they know it's coming, they can tell them you know. So, yeah, that communication piece and saving it somewhere that's accessible so they can find it easily or link to it easily from their emails is really important to you.
Dani Buckley:Well, you're perfectly segue into my next question, which is about technology and in particular In in sales enablement. But but we know that that is integrated with marketing right, and so we use HubSpot, we use hubs out for our CRM, we use hubs out for our marketing automation. We are, we love HubSpot. Are there any specific tools that you've seen like just from the marketing perspective, that have seemed to been particularly valuable in Helping with the sales process, helping with lead nurturing or helping with you know different types of sales enablement?
Shaye Smith:Yeah, so I think the communication between HubSpot's different hub sales marketing, crm is. I mean, I I know that's so much and there's actually so many different pieces of technology into that one thing. But what I get from that from the marketing side that supports the sales enablement is so say, we created a new ebook or a new case study and we upload that in HubSpot because it's going to be on our public-facing website right Like it's available. We are using it for lead generation, also in a campaign. But I know that the sales team could use that tool, that resource also. So in because all the tools are connected through HubSpot, the sales team can then grab that piece of that file and link it in an email and then they get straight from the HubSpot tool. They can link to it, they see data on it when they're working with prospects. So, having those files accessible in one place, you can organize them in there.
Shaye Smith:And from the sales side, I'm not exactly sure of the process, so correct me if that process is incorrect, but by what I know in the communication of them is it makes it really easy for them to access those files and I'm also using for marketing.
Shaye Smith:And then also one thing I like from the marketing side is when we get a new lead, I can see on the contact record that it's been assigned to a salesperson. So the follow up and again, I don't follow up with every lead and that's not really my job, but I can see if we get a lead and I feel like it's qualified, I can go in, I can look at where the lead came from, I can communicate with the sales team to say, hey, that lead came from this website. We won't do that for everyone, but if there is something I find valuable on that contact record also that sales enablement piece and looking at the sales process on the contact record from the CRM, it helps me to look at how people are getting there so we can create more content that might speak to these things and enhance and make those things better that work.
Dani Buckley:So yeah, I love that.
Shaye Smith:It really works. It's so good. There's so much.
Dani Buckley:I can't even. We're able to see the sales process for marketing leads and do attribution and reporting and all those things, and then sales is able to see all the ways that marketing has maybe touched this lead or prospect and use that to have smarter conversations and do next steps. So yeah, well said, it's like all that integration and alignment of the two it matters for sure it's so, so valuable.
Shaye Smith:I mean, I can't even like say I love looking at a contact record when a lead comes in and seeing everything it's touched, but then also how the sales team is using the content in their sales process. It's all right there on that record and it's really valuable.
Dani Buckley:So I feel like we're already kind of actually touched on this a lot. My next question, which is the what we call lead flow, which is essentially what happens when a lead comes in to, when it, like, everything happens after that, and I feel like we've actually kind of covered that a lot. Is there anything else that you want to add, that you just think any specific point to hone in on or tip around lead flow that maybe we want to leave with, to make that people should make sure they're doing, to just make sure that process is seamless and effective.
Shaye Smith:Yeah. So one thing is I get every lead notification form. It comes, every form notification that comes in and this is really important and we have one person on the sales side in the same way, maybe not every blog subscriber notification, but every form fill. That is a lead generation form. Again, a blog subscriber is a generation form, but it's different for the sales process. It's not necessarily like a lead they might explore.
Shaye Smith:So having people on those notifications that are important to that, I would say, is a big part of that, because then if you have someone out of the office like we recently had someone on vacation for a week and a half I was able to step in and say, hey, you make sure you go check out this lead that comes in and we are able to really look at that handoff from marketing to sales, because that's our process. Like we, you know people qualify them differently, but for our process, having people on those forms I think is really important and you know, using that tool in that way or signing, you know different leads at different qualification points. You can do that all in there too. So I would say, just make sure that you communicate and that is set, so nothing gets lost.
Dani Buckley:Yeah, got it. That makes sense, very helpful. So let's talk about reporting, measurement, analytics. We know that that's all really valuable and you know I'll be fair, I think we're, I think our approach is often like we're not so heavy on the analytics here. We like to keep it simple and we often recommend that to our clients. Obviously, there's exceptions to where that needs to be the case, but I know that there's some key or, I guess, key performance indicators that we focus on. So tell us a little bit about what are some of the top ones that you look at and how do you use that data?
Shaye Smith:Yeah, so from the end, on marketing side, I do look at things like traffic, traffic to our blog, what blogs are driving traffic, what pages are driving traffic. I also do look at leads, so new contacts, but then also total conversions, because I think that's really important too on the nurturing side, that total conversions and the new contacts, because while we're not like founding analytics, it's important still, no matter what to see. And then looking at those amongst different campaigns and different efforts that we're doing, so to see what works over time.
Dani Buckley:And then let's see, trying to think some other One thing I know we often are really focused on, too is the different sources for those things. So, where is the traffic coming from? Search social email, where are the leads actually coming from? Because we might be on a bunch of traffic but not leads from there, and so I know that's also something yeah we do look at.
Shaye Smith:In HubSpot I can look at total traffic to this domain in this month and it gives me a breakdown Like is it organic search? Is it organic social? Is it paid social? Is it referrals? So I do look at that and then where those contacts are coming from. We also do a lot of employee advocacy, so providing our employees these resources to share through their communications channels if they want. I look at that and a lot of times we get new contacts from our employees just posting on LinkedIn. They don't think it's a big deal, but it's stuff like that that we track. That is super valuable. And then also the piece, the attribution, for when a company gets into the deal process. Where did that deal come from? Was it a marketing attribution? And then the size of the deal and things like that that we've added later in this process is really just cool to see and I like that. Yeah, we're talking RY, right, we're talking RY.
Dani Buckley:We see it, and I think one thing I want to point out because this comes up a lot with our clients and other business leaders that talk about this is that and this is true from our leadership level down this is how we look at marketing, RY, attribution, things like that is. We are very adamant, I would say, of not having to have things be black and white. Well, I'll give you an example I have as this. So some companies would say, okay, this prospect was already in our system. Most person called on them last year, put them in the CRM and that's already on their account list, Even though nothing's happened.
Dani Buckley:Maybe or maybe they have met with them before, but nothing. They haven't turned into a customer. And then they get marketed to, for whatever reasons, and then they engage with marketing. They come back multiple times. Maybe they click on a consultant's LinkedIn post at some point because they're connected. Whatever it is, there's these different touch points that are happening. So they've been in contact with a salesperson, They've had marketing touch points, all this stuff. Some companies, if that turns into a piece of business, eventually, would say that is not a marketing lead. Marketing gets no credit for that. They were already in the system. We already knew them, or maybe they were a client years ago or something, and we don't do that and we really look at the holistic approach, that every touch point matters and on the other flip side of that if something's a marketing lead and then sales does a great job, sales doesn't get any
Dani Buckley:less credit if they close the deal. That was came from marketing, which some companies do that too. So I just I think it's important to point out because it's something that comes up a lot that like there should be, it should not ever be like one lead source, and that's what we look at it should be. What is the holistic view of how this person was impacted by all of our efforts? Cause all the efforts matter, and that is actually how you generate new business most effectively.
Shaye Smith:And if that's the business goal, new business, right. So if you're looking at an inbound marketing strategy as part of your new business goal driving new business it's so important to have a platform where you can track those things and look at them, because you know we'll have like. That's why I enjoy looking at this through our HubSpot reporting because I can see, or through the contact record and the deals you know, I can see that the salesperson use this case study that my team created or they sent them this blog and, yeah, that blog or that ebook may have been part of an inbound marketing campaign, right, but they're also using it in the sales process. So maybe that campaign didn't drive the lead, but that campaign really attributed to that sell because the seller was using it as sales enablement. So I think it's a bigger picture and if you look at inbound marketing from the full funnel and you do look at that sales enablement piece, that's where you can really use the attribution from a wider perspective, because it's not just like, oh, we got one lead and that's all this campaign did, and that's a small example.
Shaye Smith:But you know, like it is like maybe the lead was three years ago and they've just been getting our you know blogs every day, and then one stood out to them. They downloaded a book because there was a CTA in the bottom and then they asked to set up a call because at that point in their journey they knew they needed help with this at that point. So it really is so much wider and broader and so many companies, like you said, like to just specific on the one thing. But and I think that's why we definitely look at analytics and it's always important to look at analytics but you have to kind of look at the ebb and flow too. There's gray, you know, there's different colors, it's not just black and white.
Dani Buckley:So it really is. Yeah, that's a surefire way to know if a company doesn't have good marketing and sales alignment is if marketing and sales are constantly arguing over who gets credit. That should never be the case, right? It's like like if that's a thing, then we're not working together, like it's not aligned, like it should not be a question of like who gets credit for a piece of whatever you know Well and if a B2B sales team I mean marketing team if a B2B marketing team isn't performing with the end goal of driving business, then like I don't really know what they're doing.
Shaye Smith:Like, so the sales and marketing have to work together because I'm not closing the deal, I'm not talking to the prospect on the phone, the sales team is. So we really our team, exists to support that function. Also, it's just as important as the new lead and my you know, opinion and the way we look at things. So it's full funnel, full spectrum importance on that attribution there for sure.
Dani Buckley:Right, I love it. I know we're both getting. We're passionate about this stuff.
Shaye Smith:We're really passionate about that.
Dani Buckley:Yeah, I am. I know you are too Okay, so you know we're into the year now 2024. What trends, or, yeah, innovations or things, what are you just excited about? Anything that's peaking your interest that you're looking at this year or thinking about or diving deeper into?
Shaye Smith:Yeah. So one thing I'm passionate about and excited about and diving into is really looking at ways we can multiply our content, like creating more subcontent from a hub piece of content. I love this so much and I think it's so effective in an inbound marketing strategy because if we're spending all this time on, say, a hub piece of content, an ebook or a checklist or even a podcast, right, that is hub content. From there, you have like almost endless opportunities to create content. From there. You could create multiple blog posts. You could create tons of social media posts. You could create brand social media posts and thought leader social media posts for your team. Like, there's really so much.
Shaye Smith:It could turn into a speaking engagement. We might create an ebook that you might say, hey, this would be a great topic to deliver at this conference and it might become your presentation. So, really looking at ways to multiply our content how can we do that effectively and then efficiently to drive people back to the content that then converts, right? So that's one thing. Also, the ever evolving world of SEO. I mean it is such a mind blower, mind boggler, but it really excites me to dig in and figure out how to win. Does that make?
Dani Buckley:sense. So like, how are you gonna win the game? The goal is always moving, or the target? It's always changing.
Shaye Smith:And you almost just have to embrace that like excitement, because if not, you're gonna get mad about it, because our traffic ebbs and flows based on every Google update they make in the search, so in the search world. So those are two things that I think are really important to focus on. Of course, creating new content will always be focused. I'm creating new campaigns, but really delivering more and multiplied content from what we have that works, or repurposing that content because we know it works and we know where audience works like wants it. So that's really what I'm excited about this year Less time spending the wheels, more time spending a wheel that creates lots of more wheels spinning from there.
Dani Buckley:And I'm glad, and we don't just some people listening. We don't pre-plan these answers together or anything like that. So when I hear Shay's answers, that's for my first time. I'm just glad you didn't say AI, and not because, because I know AI as part. We right you the AI as a company. We've built our own AI models and we I've had episodes on the podcast about AI, so it's not that it's not important, but I'm also just glad because it's I'm a little tired of hearing about it too, so I love that.
Dani Buckley:It's part of it. I know you're deep in it and using it, but when it makes sense. But but I think it's been maybe over focused on by some folks. It's like all like you know, marketers and so forth it's like that's all they're looking to is just like this hyper focus on AI. So I'm glad that that wasn't on your top list.
Shaye Smith:And you really have to be careful. I've been talking to some SEO experts about it. You know and like yes, it is valuable and it can support your marketing strategy and you should be exploring it in some ways, in my opinion. But it is not the end all be all. It is not going to take your job, it is not going to like you should not be letting it write everything for you. You know, like we still have to be human. We're marketing to humans, like even in the B2B space, like we're not marketing to another company. They're still a human that makes a decision at the end of that sales process. So I think that's really important. On the AI note, yes, learn about it, know it, use it, but it's not the end all be all and it shouldn't be the only focus for the year. Yeah, great.
Dani Buckley:Well, thank you, shay. This has been awesome, such a good conversation. I love the different places it went, appreciate your expertise. And, yeah, thanks for joining today, hi to the beer. So thank you for having me. Yeah, and so for those listening, you can connect with Shay. I know she's always up to connect, especially on LinkedIn and things like that, so you can find her in for contact information in the show notes and I look forward to seeing you all on the next episode. Until then, happy selling.
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