Seamless Nurturing & Innovative Growth in B2B Marketing
We recently brought together growth marketers from various industries to discuss challenges and best practices around lead nurturing and marketing funnel visibility.
Hosts
Joaquin Dominguez and Tom Gatten, were joined by three growth marketing experts to discuss the perpetual challenges of lead nurturing and optimizing marketing funnel visibility.
Guests
Tejal Tailor Growth Marketing Manager at MHR, an HR and payroll software company
Ali Fakhar Marketing Manager at Geeks, a technology services firm
Cory Johnson, Growth Marketing Manager at Synthesia, an AI video generation platform
Key themes that emerged include:
Tailoring nurture strategies to audience demographics and preferences. Successful nurturing requires understanding nuances in how different audiences consume content across channels.
Driving nurture through “messy” nonlinear journeys. Nurturing works best when prospects can engage in nonlinear ways over time, rather than receiving rigid sequenced drip campaigns.
Leveraging diverse platforms and communities. Prospects can be nurtured through both owned (e.g. Sidecar products, Slack communities) and external platforms (e.g. LinkedIn, Reddit).
Partnering for increased credibility and reach. Strategic partnerships with NGOs, industry professionals etc. can bolster the credibility of branded content and expand its reach.
Continuous experimentation and optimization. There are no one-size-fits-all solutions, so testing and iterating based on data is crucial. Small optimisations like email send times can have a big impact.
Aligning sales and marketing through customer insights. Product marketers who deeply understand customers through research and community engagement help sales teams identify and convert qualified leads.
Introduction
Each guest brought a diverse set of experiences and perspectives around nurturing leads and mapping their journeys through the marketing funnel. While their specific challenges differed based on industry nuances, several universal themes and best practices emerged during the discussion.
The Importance of Tailored Nurturing
A key insight emphasised by all three guests was that effective lead nurturing requires understanding the unique profiles, motivations and journeys of different audience segments. As Tejal explained, “One of the challenges I’m finding at the moment is how do we make the nurture broad enough that it appeals to everyone but also have the tailored content so that banking and finance feel included because private sector feels very different to public sector.” She gave examples of how tactics that work for some groups, like webinars, don’t resonate as well with others, like teachers and administrators who prefer in-person events. Ali from Geeks also highlighted the need to build trust over an extended period when selling services versus SaaS products. He noted that for services, even a highly qualified lead may take 6 months to reach a contract.
Similarly, Cory from Synthesia found that customizing messaging for different regions yielded major improvements. He emphasized the importance of constant experimentation to identify what motivates different segments.
“One of the challenges I’m finding at the moment is how do we make the nurture broad enough that it appeals to everyone but also have the tailored content so that banking and finance feel included because private sector feels very different to public sector.” Tejal Tailor
The Power of “Messy” Nurturing
When discussing hot to continually engage prospects throughout an extended nurture journey, the guests advocated for designing nonlinear “messy” experiences. As Tom Gatten of Adzact explained, “Nurture works really well when there’s mess - when people can interact with you in a non-linear way where they're not getting six structured emails in a boring way.” Tactics discussed included creating diverse content assets like blogs, videos and tools that allow prospects to self-navigate, as well as building online communities where they can organically discuss and interact with the brand. Tejal emphasized the value of joining existing third-party communities as well.
"You don’t even need to worry about the CTA. It’s literally just we exist, we do cool things, we’re here when you need us.” Cory Johnson
Leveraging Diverse Platforms and Partners
In terms of specific nurturing tactics and channels, the guests described success across a diverse mix of owned platforms, external communities, and strategic partnerships. For example, Corey explained how Synthesia drove quality leads through its popular “Sidecar” product - a free mini video generator that served as a lead capture tool. He then re-targeted Sidecar users through channels like LinkedIn, Google and YouTube ads.
Meanwhile Tejal discussed leveraging platforms like Reddit to promote content. As she put it, “We did promotion on some Reddit. We got into some of the subreddits and started talking about our events specifically.” Partnerships also came up frequently as a way to expand reach and credibility. As Corey noted, “We partnered with a big sort of framework book provider called Jisc. We partnered with the National Library Association... and that was like, ‘Oh, they're talking to an institution they respect with a company which was a little bit plucky startup.”
"When selling services versus SaaS products, building trust is critical and could take a long time” Ali Fakhar
The Critical Role of Customer Insights
While experimenting with diverse nurturing strategies, the guests also emphasized the importance of continuously gathering customer insights to optimize efforts. As Corey explained, Synthesia’s product marketing team regularly jumps on calls with clients to understand how they use and perceive the platform. These insights feed into buyer personas, content strategy and sales enablement. As Corey put it, “It’s really good info, and it’s publicly available to the whole company.” Tejal similarly noted that their product marketers “will find all the information. You ask them a question; they will dig to the very ends of the earth to find the answer for you.”
Key Takeaways
Some best practices that growth marketers can derive from the discussion include:
“Taking a scalpel versus a sword” to divide audiences into segments based on demographics, attitudes and use cases. Tailor messaging and experiences accordingly.
Designing nurturing as a “messy” nonlinear journey versus a rigid drip sequence. Let prospects engage on their own terms.
Diversifying beyond email for nurturing. Leverage Sidecar products, communities, and partnerships to increase reach and engagement.
Continuously gathering customer insights through surveys, win/loss analysis and community engagement. Let these insights guide optimization.
Testing and iterating nurturing elements such as email send times, content formats and headlines. Small tweaks can have an outsized impact.
Conclusion
While there is no one “silver bullet” nurturing solution, growth marketers can drive greater funnel visibility and conversion by taking a sophisticated, tailored and agile approach across channels. The key is deeply understanding both broad audiences and individual prospects in order to engage them in authentic ways over time.
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These Virtual Round Table Events bring the community together so these people can share ideas and best practices. We would be honoured if you joined us.
Tom Gatten - CEO and Founder, Adzact
