It's been a busy couple of weeks for SalesGrok. Lots of selling, planning and travelling! We even took a vacation to Riviera Maya, Mexico. Yes, we survived the pandemic! Ironically there were more people in Austin, Texas with the swine flu than in Cancun...go figure.
I've been thinking a lot about Marketinglately. I was wondering how many of you out there are 100% satisfied with your company's marketing efforts... hmm? There is a decades old love-hate relationship between these departments. When you strip away all the intricacies, it comes down to these basic facts: Sales always want more and better leads and Marketing believes all the leads are golden and Sales doesn't manage them well enough. We should talk about how marketing automation technology can eliminate this barrier another time - companies like Eloquaand ExactTargethave absolutely addressed this paradigm.
At the moment, I'm thinking about event marketing (not event-based marketing...this time!) because my company put on a stellar executive summit in Boston last week. I'd like to share some of the details, highlights and lessons learned.
With all of the noise - hundreds of emails, webinars, banner ads, cold calls, etc., etc. we get on a daily basis - the opportunity to get face to face time is invaluable. What better way to strengthen relationships with existing customers while developing relationships with prospective customers than to bring them together? What if you could have your customers tell your prospects about your solutions and how you helped them achieve success? Powerful!
We call the summit Metamorphosisto mark the evolution of technology and our business. This was the 9th installment of a series we kicked of in 2005. Metamorphosis has been an extremely sucessful forum for our people, partners and customers to collaborate, learn, teach, and network in a fast-paced, highly interactive environment. Every year the event has gotten bigger and better...so much so that the return is greater than any other industry event we sponsor.
This year the turnout was fantastic even with the economy still sputtering along - a great indicator for the value of our technology! Our speakers and honored guests included industry titans like Bob Andersonof Gartner, Jeff Kaplanof ThinkStrategies, Dean Robison of Salesforce.com, Sanjay Jainof Microsoft, Chris Broylesof Daptiv and Lonnie Willsof CloudTrigger. OpSourcejoined us as a platinum sponsor, which was very cool since they brought another dozen attendees with them!
THE highlight of the event was our customers and partners! They delivered more than two-thirds of the content for the event with solid, real-world presentations about how they solved business and technical challenges with our technology. Take a look at the agenda to witness the quality and depth of the speakers.
Lesson learned:
-Give back - Make it easy for your customers to get involved. We funded local transportation, lodging and meals for all qualified attendees.
-Lose the spin - Avoid "pitching" your company and/or products. A brief overview is appropriate, but be pithy and focus on customer success, industry trends and business value.
-Keep it real - Encourage your customers to speak frankly about the positives and the negatives associated with their experience.
-Be spontaneous - we organized a bus tour to the Boston Commons for a pub crawl. The fun we had will not soon be forgotten!
-Follow through - The execution of a great event is the first step. It is critical to enroll participants in post-event materials - audio/video, blogs, analyst reviews, PR, etc. - to foster the relationship, keep the momentum going and to facilitate a viral effect as attendees share the event with their colleagues.
Would be interested in your feedback on what your company doing right now to drive demand...please share!
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