The Funnelholic

OK, not everything in my life can be about B2B lead generation and sales and marketing. I also live and breathe on the internet so every once in awhile I get something that I think is fun to post on. I am pretty sure this link has gone viral, so you may have seen it…if not, enjoy. Click here to do it.

Written by Craig Rosenberg - The Funnelholic
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Ok, call it a comeback. One thing I will admit is that I have been very inconsistent in updating the funnelholic. That is not good. (considering I claim to be an expert in b2b marketing, )

The long of the short of it is that the funnelholic is making a comeback. The goal for the rest of 2008 will be to update the funnlholic 1-2x a week. As I gear up for some prolific blogging, I finally started to read all the posts and watched all the webcasts I had been putting in my queue over the last couple months. This Saturday, I looked at every blog on Jon Miller’s Big list of b2b marketing blogs. Check out his post, that was a big task///138 blogs. By the way, great linkbait by Jon there but nonetheless a great list of the B2B marketing blogosphere.

In sum, the funnelholic is back.

Written by Craig Rosenberg - The Funnelholic
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Unless you’re in a cave, thanks the credit markets the global economy is on the rocks. I have always marveled at the carefully chosen words of our politicians or economists. BTW, not just in trying times but all the time. Right now, my most uncomfortable laughs are coming from the pundits regarding the current financial mess. I especially enjoyed this, so this pundit Martin Feldman from Harvard is the first one to declare a recession. Here is my favorite though:
Martin Feldman on Bloomberg.com (read article here):

Harvard University economist Martin Feldstein, a member of the group that dates business cycles in the U.S., said the nation has entered a recession that could be the worst since World War II.

I didn’t have perfect grades, but wasn’t the recession during World War II known as the “Great Depression”? Way to go out on a limb there Marty! Of course he prefaces it with “could”.

Even more hilarious is our boy Treasury Secretary, Henry Paulsen.

From Bloomberg.com also:

“We have slowed down very significantly. I’m not getting into’ whether it is a recession.

That’s a good one. Our guy whose job it is to keep our economy safe is going with a “no comment”.

Bottom line, you gotta be an idiot to not see that the sh__ is hitting the fan. Pundits and politicians know full well what is going down, but their job is to couch hysteria so they have to choose their words careful.

Here are the translations:

What Feldman really said was: We are headed into a financial cycle close to or worse than the Great Depression

What Paulsen really said was: We are clearly in recession, I am too dumb to consider the Great Depression, all my buddies work on Wall Street so I gotta keep the markets pumped up, and I am not going to be the one to call this what it is.

Ahh, the beauty of words. So why does the Funnelholic weigh in? Well, I for one while “growing up” professionally in the valley used to laugh at marketing folks worrying about every word, but when I was finally an adult I realized the importance. Now, I notice it all the time. you might say, well, I am not that dumb I am not falling for this, but the truth of the matter is there has not been a massive sell-off yet and people aren’t fully freaking out so their words are likely working against the mass public. (BTW, words can only hold reality for “that long” (imagine me barely holding my two fingers apart). Funnelholic learning: Words do matter.

Written by Craig Rosenberg - The Funnelholic
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CAVEAT: I know equating the most popular piece of news to your blog topic is pretty corny. Nonetheless, I think there is something we can learn from the Giants victory over the Patriots Sunday. (for those of you who don’t know, the New York “football” Giants beat the undefeated and seemingly unconquerable New England Patriots in the Super Bowl.

The point is that anybody can beat anybody on any given day. I am a big fan of unified lead definitions, but I am not a fan of ultra-tight lead definitions that leave no room for “upset”. Ill give you an example, I once did an lead generation implementation where the client wanted only Tier 1 manufacturers with X number of revenue, and x number of products, etc. One day, Yahoo came in. No one would take the call. Finally the Sales Development Rep got a Product Manager on the phone with them and came back with the realization this is a great target. 6 years later the company’s number one vertical is online media.

ESPECIALLY if you are an early company, don’t restrict yourself to too many “psychographic” traits. Your job is to bring in as many people who would be the Patriots (perfect targets) and could be the Giants (not entirely perfect on paper, but worth the Sales team’s time). Dont limit yourself to only Patriots, and find away to get the Giants in there because they may become your biggest customer yet. The one exception could be if the sales team’s pipelines are already and always full with near-term deals (dig deeper, this isn’t likely to be true but could happen at a mature company in a mature market).

The other caveat is that is you are still letting sales limit your lead definition to only deals that they can close tomorrow, you are screwed so I can’t help you. Sales has to be willing to sell and if not, you don’t have a true partnership.

If you can create leeway to find the next big “upset”, victory can be yours.

Written by Craig Rosenberg - The Funnelholic
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Want to connect directly? Email me at craig AT funnelholic.com<