One should never underestimate the depths of cultural context when it comes to a B2B buying decision. You might very well understand the importance of putting the prospect’s perspective first in your lead generation strategy.
However, that’s never complete unless you check the cultural context of their decisions. It forms part of the decision maker’s psychology as well as the business culture of their entire organization.
Normally, it’s always advisable to think the best of your customers. On the other hand, this shouldn’t be a reason to include the so-called ‘village idiots’ in your prospect organization.
Yes, it sounds rather obnoxious to suspect any potential client of being that stupid. But remember, sending the wrong prospect to a sales rep is more likely going to frustrate them. You don’t honestly think the village idiot is going to those qualifications now do you?
It’s not easy finding a short answer to the question. A company could offer general ITs solutions to all of its target industries but claims to ‘specialize them’ for its ‘unique requirements.’ Likewise, a specialist company could in fact be offering a general solution that is just ‘exclusive’ for a particular industry.
But before you start going insane from figuring this out, stay calm. There is a reason why having a variety of IT leads can be a good thing, regardless of how you go about appealing to each different buyer personas.
For the many in the IT industry, there’s not much appreciation for all that coding, testing, and debugging that takes up a professional’s work day. (That and Googling for the answer.) Everyone from the CEO down to the customer is more interested in the bells, whistles, and digital buttons (after which they’ll likely complain about something as if it were on cue).
But you know, there’s really a lot of merit to understanding the non-techie-ness of customers, prospects, as well as your own higher-ups. It gives you a fresh perspective, one that could really be useful in your IT lead generation campaign.
If you’re new to lead generation or at least new to the more advanced techniques and strategies, it’s actually not a bad thing for you to spend extra.
True, any extra spending is generally a bad thing. However, if you’re struggling to justify your current ROI, it’s best to understand it in terms of your learning curve.
It’s like playing a new role-playing game. You don’t know what you’re going to face as you progress. That’s why you buy a few extra items and a power-up here and there just to be safe. Yet, as you learn to master a game, these things become unnecessary and you don’t spend as much as you used to.
Don’t worry. The time will come when you won’t need as many.