Conversion Mapping: Building a Call-to-Action Architecture that Speeds Your Sales Pipeline

Bulldog Solutions
Conversion Mapping:
Building a Call-to-Action
Architecture that Speeds
Your Sales PipelineBy Ahmed Taleb, Senior Director of Strategic Planning, Bulldog Solutions
www.bulldogsolutions.comConversion_Mapping v1 (05/2009) © 2009 Bulldog Solutions, Inc.Bulldog Solutions Conversion Mapping: Building a Call-to-Action Architecture that Speeds Your Sales Pipeline
Executive Overview
Potential buyers of your services have a broad set of concerns that must be satisfied before they begin the buying process. If you're simply serving up content about features and benefits, you're ignoring their preferences and illustrating to them your lack of insight into their buying process.Successful BtoB marketing organizations must understand the buying behavior of specific decision makers and build an effective call-to-action architecture that matches prospects' buying behavior with specific value offerings designed to satisfy their objections and help move them through the sales pipeline. This architecture is a critical part of conversion planning and sales readiness: It sets your sales team up for success by identifying and engaging prospects who are ready to buy.In this final of a four-part series on strategic planning, I will outline a strategy designed to help you create a call-to-action architecture that: . Engages your prospects through a fair exchange of information and captures their permission for future marketing efforts . Anticipates your buyers' needs by aligning relevant information with the stages of their buying cycle and satisfying their objections . Creates specific conversion points that lead to sales engagementThese exercises build on the strategic planning framework outlined in my previous white papers about how to create buyer personas, how to develop effective calls to action, and how to maximize your marketing calendar. All three are available on the Bulldog Solutions resource library at www.bulldogsolutions.com/resource-library.

Bulldog Solutions' Strategic Planning Methodology
www.bulldogsolutions.comConversion_Mapping v1 (05/2009) 2© 2009 Bulldog Solutions, Inc.Bulldog Solutions Conversion Mapping: Building a Call-to-Action Architecture that Speeds Your Sales Pipeline
Table of Contents
Executive Overview............................................................................................................................................................2It's About the Buyer............................................................................................................................................................3Review and Categorize Your Call to Action.......................................................................................................................4The Hand Raise: Capture Attention and Gain Permission.......................................................................................4Anticipate Their Needs: Overcome Objections.........................................................................................................5Reading the Signs: Nurture and Convert..................................................................................................................6Building the Call-to-Action Architecture............................................................................................................................6Progressive Disclosure: The IT Burden.............................................................................................................................8One Size Doesn't Fit All: The High-Value CTA...................................................................................................................9Conclusion........................................................................................................................................................................10
It's About the Buyer
Most BtoB sales and marketing organizations have defined sales practices and discrete metrics to support each stage of the sales pipeline. However, a typical buyer has no visibility into these stages and, regardless, doesn't consider them important to their buying process. Simply put, BtoB decision makers have a set of objections they need to overcome before they're ready to make a purchase decision. But marketers often fail to address those objections. A classic example is listing th... [download for more]