How do you create a demand generation strategy that is customer-centric and empathetic?

Everybody knows that if you plan to run demand generation campaigns you will need to have a clear understanding of your ICP personas but the question sits on the best way of doing it. I would start by running customer interviews and analysing the analyse their digital behaviour of your buyers to understand: - What channels do your buyers use for education and research - What questions and topics are they interested in? - What are their KPIs, "jobs to be done" and their challenges? - Whom do they follow and trust? - What communities/associations do they engage with? The next stage is to categorize the demand topics and put them into different buckets (point 3).

Customer-centric demand generation is just that, it's putting your (soon-to-be) customers at the center of your marketing. Speaking their language, not yours. Highlighting the features most beneficial to solving their problems, rather than what may be the features your internal teams are most excited about.

For a customer-focused demand generation strategy, think #sharingiscaring. Share what your prospects need, not just what you want to sell. Understand their concerns and address them with your content. Be empathetic – show you care about solving their problems. Engage on social media, respond to comments, and create a community where sharing knowledge benefits everyone. When you genuinely care about your customers, it's not just a strategy; it's a connection that fosters trust and loyalty.

To measure and improve demand generation alignment, track KPIs like lead quality, conversion rates, and ROI. Regularly review these metrics, involve cross-functional teams for insights, and adjust strategies to ensure alignment with organizational goals.

Clearly, a non-negotiable. How do you understand customer challnges? -Through primary & secondary research. Spend decent time in researching across internet and talking to your target audience. Some questions to ask - 1.What's your North-Star Matrix? 2.What's your biggest challenge at the moment? 3. How does the decision making process look?

A more updated way of thinking about a buyer's path to purchase, that's much easier to align your marketing efforts to, is: - Brand Recognition: They know who you are - Brand Understanding: They understand what it is you do - Brand Recall: Clear recall of your brand as a solution to pain points, when those pain points arise - Brand Preference: Your brand is the preferred solution to their problem

Incorporating empathy into your messaging requires shifting the focus from product features to how your solution addresses the specific pain points of your customers and makes their lives easier. Instead of simply presenting facts, use storytelling to emotionally connect with your audience by sharing real-life examples, case studies, and testimonials that reflect their challenges and demonstrate how your solution provides relief. Additionally, communicate clearly and in a relatable way, avoiding jargon or technical language so your message resonates with your audience at their level of understanding and experience.

The B2B demand generation should be seen as a demand waterfall reaching far beyond the customer journey. I develop an effective demand generation based on 3 essential pillars: 1. Demand activities: Awareness and demand generation activities such as case studies, newsletters, micro-events, in-depth guides 2. Distribution: content distribution across Own Audience, Borrowed Audience, social communities 3. Demand Capture: demand capturing through retargeting, intent data, content hubs, high-intent channels and social selling.

Conduct interviews, surveys, and use social listening to gather insights. Visualize the path your customers take from discovery to purchase and beyond. Understand their goals and pain points at each stage, allowing you to create targeted strategies that guide them through the funnel effectively.

With a clear picture of your buyer personas, the next step is mapping out the customer journey. This involves detailing each phase of the journey, from initial awareness to post-purchase advocacy. Understanding the journey allows you to identify key touchpoints where you can engage customers with relevant content and experiences. Consider the questions they have at each stage, the barriers they face, and the emotions driving their decisions. This empathy-driven approach ensures your demand generation strategy resonates deeply with potential customers.

After conducting customer research, I categorize my demand topics and put them into four different buckets so I can work on my demand generation content plan: 1. Business Triggers: What pushes buyers to start looking for solutions like mine? 2. Demand Triggers: Elements that pique interest and motivate learning about opportunities or problems. 3. Discovery and Evaluation: How customers find and assess potential solutions. 4. Decision-Making: Influences shaping their final choices, such as features and benefits. This structure will guide the development of targeted content that addresses each stage of the customer's journey.

What's "valuable" and "relevant" to a given prospect depends greatly on what type of buyer they are, and knowing where your product sits on a product maturity curve can help guide you here. Are you trying to reach Early Adopters, who are often very pragmatic when making decisions? Or are you trying reach to Innovators who don't mind (and often enjoy) being the first to try something new? What's valuable and relevant to an Early Adopter is very different than what's valuable and relevant to an Innovator. And that's not to say one is better than the other. They're just different, with different motivations.

This is the most pivotal step in this process. Speak the language of your buyer. Ensure that the webinars, ebooks, and campaigns you are running will be useful to your audience.

By crafting content that aligns with their specific needs and journey stages, you can foster stronger connections and drive meaningful engagement.

The key to demand gen content is to remember you need to create the content your prospects want, not the content you want. Do your research, or check with your product marketing team, and find out what issues resonate with your prospects every day. Create content around those. Generating demand is not closing a sale. Ensure the content is relevant to your brand, yes. But go at it with the goal of earning engagement with your prospects. Make them smile with a good experience. Make them slap their head with a good insight. Make them remember your brand. Down the road, that will make closing all those sales so much easier.

If possible don’t route TOF leads straight to your BDRs. But if there is not other way make sure they don’t get hit with the good old "Hello, you downloaded a whitepaper." Get personal and show you're genuinely interested in their journey. Mix it up with emails, social media, and engaging content tailored to their interests. Use insights from their interactions to create a connection that feels personal. Educate and intrigue, nurture them with valuable information that resonate with their current needs.

Engaging leads is more than just pushing for immediate sales. Many require time, information, and trust before committing. Nurturing leads involves establishing relationships over time through personalized communication.

Not all prospects are ready to make a purchase immediately. Lead nurturing is about building relationships over time, guiding leads through the funnel with targeted, personalized communication. Use email marketing, social media, and retargeting campaigns to stay top of mind, always providing value. Segment your leads to deliver more personalized messages, and employ lead scoring to identify when they're sales-ready. This approach fosters a sense of understanding and care, moving leads closer to a decision at their own pace.

Marketing's demand gen efforts require strategic alignment, coordination and tight collaboration with sales to yield their full potential of delivering business results (revenue). As a best practice, establish a recurring cadence with sales leadership/front line managers to cover: + In-flight marketing campaigns: Ensure there's an understanding of key messaging for seamless handoff and follow up + What's ahead: sales can leverage upcoming campaigns/initiatives as an addition touchpoint for open opportunities and engage net new prospects for outbound programs + Feedback: What's working/not working - which campaigns result in meetings booked, and where there are gaps/misalignment in ICP, pain points, messaging to increase conversion

In my opinion, this is the most important step. Ensure your marketing and sales teams work together seamlessly. Align them around shared goals and strategies, ensuring a cohesive approach to lead nurturing and conversion.

The marketing and the sales teams should work together and on the same account list and should be aligned on?ICP, goals, and metrics.

Alignment between marketing and sales is essential for a seamless, customer-centric demand generation strategy. Both teams should work closely to ensure a consistent message and smooth transition for leads moving from marketing to sales. Establish clear definitions for lead qualification, set joint goals, and share insights and feedback regularly. This collaboration enhances the overall customer experience, ensuring that marketing attracts and nurtures leads effectively while sales closes them with empathy and understanding.

One thing I've found helpful is to ditch the rearview mirror and focus on the road ahead. Traditional KPIs show us where we've been, like gazing through a rearview mirror. But in today's dynamic landscape, a different map is needed. That's where Leading Indicators (LIs) come in. Think of them as your compass, pointing toward future possibilities. Forget lagging indicators that simply tell you what's already happened. Instead, track early conversion signals. These real-time insights empower you to adjust course, seize opportunities & steer towards its brightest horizon. No more frantic scrambling based on past regrets. With LIs, we can navigate w/ foresight and confidence, making every decision a step towards your brand's ultimate ascent.

Utilize email marketing, social media campaigns, and automation tools to nurture leads effectively. Employing lead scoring allows for prioritization and segmentation based on lead interactions and interests, ensuring efficient resource allocation and tailored communication.

Demand generation is an ongoing process that requires continuous optimization. Set key performance indicators (KPIs) that reflect your customer-centric goals, such as engagement rates, conversion rates, and customer satisfaction. Regularly analyze your data to understand what's working and where there's room for improvement. A/B testing, customer feedback, and market trends can inform adjustments to your strategy, ensuring it remains aligned with customer needs and expectations.

What does customer-centric and empathetic demand-gen look like? It enters your prospects lives in a way that attracts attention but doesn't seem intrusive. It acts like a little voice telling you something you feel you should have already known. You have to be subtle and clever to achieve this. Most B2B ain't.

Experimenting with diverse content forms and channels enables you to reach and captivate broader segments, enhancing your demand generation efforts' overall effectiveness.

In developing a customer-centric and empathetic demand generation strategy, consider the evolving landscape of digital engagement and the increasing desire for genuine brand interactions. Recognize the importance of emotional intelligence in marketing—understanding not just the data but the human stories behind the numbers. This approach not only respects the customer's journey but also builds a foundation of trust and loyalty that transcends transactional relationships, fostering a community of advocates for your brand.

In addition to the primary strategies for demand generation, consider the broader impacts of your tactics. This includes understanding the ethical implications of your marketing efforts, ensuring that your strategies respect customer privacy, and aligning with broader business objectives. It's also vital to stay updated on the latest marketing technologies and trends to continuously refine and adapt your approach to meet evolving customer expectations and market conditions.

1. Conoce a tu audiencia: Realiza investigaciones profundas sobre tu ICP. 2. Contenido relevante: Desarrolla contenido que resuene con tu audiencia, abordando sus puntos de dolor y ofreciendo soluciones prácticas. videos, webinars y estudios de caso para ofrecer valor real. 3. Personalización: Adapta tus mensajes para cada segmento de audiencia. La personalización demuestra que entiendes sus necesidades específicas y construye una conexión más fuerte. 4. Interacción continua: Fomenta el diálogo y la interacción constante en redes sociales y otras plataformas. 5. Optimización constante: Mide los resultados y ajusta tu estrategia basándote en los datos y el feedback recibido.