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Email Won't Supplant Your B2B Sales, But It Will Make It More Profitable

by Tom Ruwitch

I spoke recently with the president of a company that sells robotic machinery to manufacturers. He told me email marketing doesn’t work.

“We tried email marketing,” he said. “And it didn’t generate a single sale.”

I hear this sort of thing occasionally from business-to-business marketers. They imagine email to be a silver bullet that will miraculously generate sales. Email is not a magic bullet, but – when deployed properly – it can help B2B companies nurture leads and close more sales.

I asked the robotics company president to describe life before email marketing: “How did the sales process work before you tried email?”

He described a typical business-to-business sales process – sales reps conducting phone conversations and meetings with prospects. Lots of nurturing. Lots of direct contact. Most sales grossed more than $25,000.

Email won’t supplant that process. If yours is a business-to-business company that sells high-priced products or services, your prospects rarely receive emails, pick up the phone and say, “I’ll buy one of those.”

But email can complement the process and help it run more profitably. Your email may not turn a reader into an instant buyer. But email can turn a cold prospect into a warm one. Email can help your sales reps identify your best prospects. And email can help your sales reps close sales with less cold-calling and wheel-spinning.

The robotics company sent emails to more than 1,000 prospects. When email marketing “didn’t work,” the company never tracked who opened the emails or clicked the links.

I recommended a simple adjustment: Include in the emails links to the products and services you describe; use your email marketing software to track who opens the emails and clicks the links; share the list of those people with your sales reps; and have the sales reps follow up with those people.

The people who open your emails and click your links are warmer prospects than those who don’t. You have nurtured them with your email content. They are more likely to welcome a phone call from your sales reps. They are more likely to buy.

With a mailing list of 1,000 people, you might get 200 to 300 to open your email. You might get 15 to 30 to click on a link.

In this scenario, you might schedule 10 or 15 sales meetings with 30 or fewer phone calls (calling just those who click). Without the email, you might have to make 300 or more phone calls to get 10 to 15 sales meetings.

That translates to more sales with less cost and effort – a profitable formula for any business.

To attend a free webinar with five tips in just 25 minutes on “Five Ways B2B Businesses Use Email to Engage and Drive More Sales,” go to MarketVolt.com/B2B-webinar.

Tom Ruwitch is founder and president of MarketVolt, a St. Louis-based interactive marketing firm and email service provider. For additional tips on how to use interactive surveys to grow your

Submitted 9 years 63 days ago
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