Q & A With B2B companies

Q & A With B2B companies

This month at Litmus Live in Boston, I hosted an “Ask the Expert” table for email questions.

One of the most common scenarios posed by B2B companies went something like this:

I need to collect data about my contacts to personalize emails.  I rely on my sales or customer service team to collect that information. Either I’m not receiving the information, or I’m not confident in the quality of the information I’m receiving. How do I get my team on board to get better data?

Here’s the answer:

If other departments aren’t supporting the email marketing goals, then they probably aren’t seeing the value in prioritizing this task.

What can you do?

  1. Find out what creates value for the other department. Is it recognition? Meeting a sales goal?  Filling a quota? Something else?

  2. Create a common vision for how you can achieve your goals together.  A team motivated by recognition might value a contest for gathering quality data, while a team motivated by sales goals might not understand how email is a key factor in achieving those goals.

  3. Understand the challenges and goals of the other team. Are they pressed for time? Challenged by a new computer program? What can you do to make collecting marketing data an easier part of their day, and how can you help them achieve their goals?

Email marketing is a complex and data-driven process that, with good data, can drive great results at low investment. Yet many people don’t understand what’s involved or what potential it presents.  Creating a common understanding and working together to achieve goals and remove roadblocks helps everyone in the company win.