As enterprise adoption of demand generation marketing soars, marketing teams are starting to realize that choosing the right marketing technology (MarTech) is imperative to reach qualified audiences and implement a data-driven marketing strategy. Technology can enable marketers to more efficiently identify qualified leads and fill the sales pipeline with the right opportunities.
74 percent of companies that don’t exceed revenue goals are unable to measure how many visitors, leads, marketing-qualified leads (MQLs) or sales opportunities were generated. To meet the demands of modern B2B marketing organizations, 2017 marketers need tools for data capture, analysis and visualization, as well as automation platforms for operational efficiency. The vast majority of programs also need tech to track oportunities, manage projects, execute account-based marketing (ABM), and orchestrate demand generation efforts.
Why Demand Generation Tech Matters in 2017
When marketing teams’ goals shift from the volume of leads generated to the quality of leads and opportunities created, they need new ways to measure success. MarTech can enable marketers to close the loop and achieve an end-to-end understanding of marketing performance, the lead lifecycle, account engagement scores and a host of other real-time insights. These insights can then be used to further refine lead targeting, top-of-funnel content, lead scoring criteria and other aspects of demand generation programs.
Marketing automation, sophisticated CRM tools and collaboration platforms are just a few types of tech that power B2B marketing organizations. To help shape your demand generation strategy in the months to come, read on for real customer reviews of seven of the best demand generation tools of 2017, as identifed by game-changing B2B marketing pros.
To see a more complete list of essential marketing tools, grab the Secrets and Strategies of Marketing Ops Game Changers eBook. Get your copy here.
Real Customer Reviews of 7 Top Demand Generation Tools for 2017
1. Marketo: Marketing Automation Platform
As a top marketing automation platform (MAP), Marketo has been a leading choice for B2B marketing, consumer engagement and real-time web personalization for more than a decade. In addition to a broad feature set for targeted lead generation, the platform offers native integrations with hundreds of other services including Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics, SugarCRM and SAP Cloud.
Among other options for B2B enterprise marketing automation, Marketo is pinpointed by many B2B marketers as the most essential piece of technology in their marketing organization.
Colin Day of FIS Global credits it as the foundation “for building, deploying and managing all of [FIS’s] marketing campaigns and tactics.”
2. Unbounce: Landing Page Builder
Unbounce provides customers with landing page templates, landing page builders, lead generation tools and data-driven design optimization features to enhance the conversion rates of lead generation pages. It’s designed for ease-of-use among marketers without an extensive background in web design or marketing experiments.
According to Demand Marketing Game Changer Jenna Keegan, “Unbounce makes it easy to design and optimize really great landing pages that actually convert.”
3. DemandBase: ABM Platform
DemandBase is designed as an all-in-one tool for account-based marketing – including targeting, retargeting, account-based advertising, lead engagement and conversion optimization. Driven by artificial intelligence, DemandBase enables marketers to take a data-driven approach to refining their ABM strategy.
Jenifer Metz of Oracle says Demandbase enables B2B marketing teams to “execute ABM at scale, [by enabling] effective and efficient ad spend to target the customers you care about most.”
4. Salesforce: CRM
With nearly one-quarter (22 percent) market share, Salesforce is the best-known and most widely-adopted CRM software. Salesforce offers end-to-end tools for managing relationships with prospects as they move through the buyer’s journey, including lead qualification, event-based notifications and pipeline reporting. It’s highly customizable, allowing organizations to integrate it with other core marketing systems and adjust features to meet internal requirements.
Dave Rigotti of Bizible says it’s their “centralized hub of marketing and sales data across prospects and customers.”
5. Trello: Project Management
Achieving sales-marketing alignment requires transparency. While many of the leading end-to-end solutions for demand generation offer project management and task-tracking functionality, some marketing teams prefer a lightweight, dedicated app to enable project visibility at a high level.
Trello is one of the simplest and most intuitive project management tools. With a goal of enabling a “shared perspective,” Trello can be set up in minutes.
According to Travis Taylor, Trello “has helped [Veritas] manage our projects in a logical fashion with little to no overhead.”
6. Tableau: Data Visualization
Data can be confusing, especially when organizations are combining disparate data sources to enable total visibility into an account’s qualification and readiness to buy. Tableau enables business intelligence, with built-in capabilities that allow customers to quickly integrate, visualize and share data for intelligent oversight. While Tableau has the analytics strength to stand up to complex applications, it’s also easy enough for users without extensive experience in business intelligence to adopt.
Tim West at Box states, “Nothing drives business intelligence like Tableau. Tableau allows us to spot trends quickly and adds a layer of data to every aspect of our operations. We’ve also built out a self-serve reporting dashboard which enables Marketing Ops to focus on moving the business forward.”
7. Integrate: Demand Orchestration Software
Integrate is designed to solve many of the most common challenges facing B2B marketing organizations in their demand generation journeys – including difficulty scaling pipeline contributions, challenges managing top-of-funnel campaigns and data sources, poor quality leads and low conversion rates. Integrate provides marketers with all of the tools, data and integrations needed to bring together top-of-funnel marketing activities into a holistic demand marketing strategy.
Ashleigh Davis at Trend Micro says “Integrate gives us the edge we need to scale quickly and hit our pipeline goals.”
Improving Internal Alignment with the Right Demand Gen Tools
Creating strong alignment between sales and marketing, and throughout the organization as a whole, is key to developing a higher-value funnel filled with quality leads and the right opportunities. Organizations with tight alignment achieve, on average, a 208% increase in marketing-driven revenue, 36% better customer retention and 38% higher sales win rates.
Technology enables marketers to generate the right leads, automate lead nurturing, and improve communications between sales and marketing to better move prospects through the funnel. Regardless of where your organization stands currently, investing in some of the top demand generation tools of 2017 is one tactic that can accelerate your marketing results.
To assess your current demand generation strategy and identify areas of improvement, download the Demand Marketing Assessment Guide today.
