Outbound marketing is a big waste of cash for most organizations because they’re buying activity rather than pipeline.
An agency sends thousands of emails on behalf of their clients. The client receives a spreadsheet filled with random responses but no one on their sales team wants those leads and the client’s calendar remains empty.
This is the standard trap that companies fall into.
Why You Need Real Sales Meetings
The key to rapid growth is to have meetings that result in sales. You must have a system set up that will take cold data and convert it into legitimate sales opportunities.
The following contains the most accurate and current information about lead generation.
The Bottom Line When Buying Outsourced B2B Lead Generation Services
Don't skim over this section. Your financial future will depend on it.
These are the factors that you must consider before committing to an outside sales team:
Activity Is a Lie
Don’t pay for the number of emails that are sent or calls made, but only for qualified meetings and sales accepted leads (SAL).
Data Is Everything
If a vendor cannot demonstrate that they use verified and multi-sourced contact information, you should immediately walk away. Poor quality data will destroy the reputation of your email domain.
Handoffs Kill Deals
Your outsourced sales development representatives (SDRs), and your in-house account executives (AEs) need to share the same CRM system. If you have poor mapping of your CRM, you will be losing revenue.
Verticals Matter
An agency may be able to provide great results for enterprise-level healthcare-type organizations yet be completely inept for mid-market SaaS. Choose an agency with industry-specific expertise.
You must keep a close eye on the metrics that affect your top-line revenue.
Looking Past the Hype to Find a Good Vendor
The lead generation market is exceptionally competitive. Many high-level agency blogs and generic information are competing for attention in search results.
There are ultimate guides provided by the agency Belkins, extensive detail from the agency MiniLoop, and how-tos from the agency TDSGS. All providers appear to offer similar testimonials and are positioned with the same willingness to provide you with quality over volume.
Little, if any, of the actual mathematical formulas are provided for comparison.
To successfully navigate the vendor market, it is necessary to look beyond all the hype, and demand operational evidence from your vendor. This means requesting access to your vendor's specific operational processes (workflows), data sources, and historical conversion rates.
The Pipeline vs. Volume Trap
Leading agencies tend to focus their reports primarily on top-of-funnel metrics.
They may show excellent open rates and large numbers of total clicks; however, this means very little if those clicks do not translate into SQLs (sales qualified leads). There is currently a shift away from top-of-funnel reporting to report on pipeline metrics.
The smart buyer will evaluate vendors based upon their ability to impact revenue.
A vendor who only focuses on lead volumes is living in the past; rather, the smart buyer is interested in the rate of meetings that convert to sales opportunities. The smart buyer will look for the percentage of meetings that are booked vs. those that actually attend and are added to the sales pipeline.
Verifying the Vendor's Claims
Don't believe in any vendor's case study that does not contain exact numbers.
When a vendor boasts of a "massive boost in sales", request proof supporting that claim by requesting specific numbers which point to that increase. For example, Belkins and other similar providers produce long and detailed case studies about their work. Ensure to review and pay close attention to the percent increase in sales, costs to acquire leads, and when they were obtained.
If numbers are absent from the report, the vendor's claims may be suspect.
According to a recent market report, firms that have used the same outsourced B2B lead generation services for more than 1 year will see cumulative results. For instance, an example provided reported on a 50% reduction in lead acquisition costs over time. Another example reported around a 35% increase in demo requests at the time of a product launch. You need to ask for this level of detail before making a purchase.
Core Models for Outsourced B2B Lead Generation Teams
There are several ways to structure your external team.
Don't simply buy a generic package and apply it across the board. Be sure to match up the agency model to your internal capabilities, as well as your growth stage.
The Complete External SDR Team
This is the most extensive option available and also the heaviest.
Agencies such as LeadsAtScale and Salaria Sales provide a complete outbound engine. They take care of everything from data input to writing, sending, and phone calls. Your internal team won't do anything until the meeting has been booked.
This is ideal for the very first stages of any SaaS startup.
If you are an early-stage SaaS startup needing 30 qualified demo meetings/month to reach your ARR goals, but you don't yet have an internal SDR team, then this is a solid option that provides instant capacity.
Appointment Setting and Enrichment
There are times when you only need help to support the current efforts of your internal teams.
Niche agencies like Understory Agency may be very focused on specific verticals, so therefore will have access to appointment-setting services that are highly targeted. They will also add to/enhance your current data sources, search for missing points of contact, and warm them.
This model works well for a growing company that is entering new marketplaces.
If you have poorly performing internal SDR teams, you can use a partial service to fill in the gaps. The external candidate handles the outreach and the internal SDRs close the warm leads.
Email Deliverability Quality and Bounce Protection
In terms of deliverability of emails, it is becoming harder than ever.
Email verification and bounce protection are two areas that companies like MiniLoop are very strong in. And this is not simply a nice feature; it is a life-or-death necessity for your domain. When your agency is using inexpensive, unverifiable data it will cause your emails to go directly into spam.
It is important that you ask your vendor how they obtain their contact lists as well as how they verify email addresses before sending them out. If you do not receive a clear answer that includes factual and practical information, you should not allow the vendor access to your domain.
How to Check if a Vendor is Good
Stop using standard templates to audit potential vendors.
Instead, utilize this specific framework to conduct a thorough audit of any vendor. Look for real evidence and not just a sales presentation.
Sales Acceptance Rate
The most critical measurement of lead quality is the sales acceptance rate.
This measurement will provide insight into how frequently your internal account executives (AEs) are accepting leads that have been sent to them by the vendor. If an agency sends 100 meetings but your AEs decline 80 of them because the companies are unsuitable, you are not receiving a return on investment (ROI) for these leads.
You need to track this figure on a weekly basis.
When the acceptance rate decreases, this indicates that the agency is booking leads that no longer match your ideal customer profile (ICP). To increase the likelihood of meeting your ICP, take action to re-evaluate your targeting immediately.
Multi-Channel Outreach
The “spray and pray” methodology of conducting high-volume email blasts does not yield the best results anymore.
Agencies should implement a multi-channel methodology. This means they will utilize a combination of several methods to create touch points with a prospect. Some of the more popular tools being used today to create these combinations include AnyPost and SalesHive.
Request to see a sample of the various methodologies used in combination, as well as the frequency of those combinations, e.g., a combination of automated touches and manual intervention, as soon as possible. AI tools can be utilized to provide early automated touches for story development, but a human will need to take over the touch point when a lead demonstrates intent.
Asking for Clear Pricing
Pricing within the marketing/advertising industry tends to be highly nontransparent. Numerous search results do not discuss pricing on a reliable basis. In order to be competitive and fill your pipeline, it is essential to map pricing according to expected ROIs by ideal customer profile segment.
Are you investing in a monthly retainer? Are you paying for each seat booked? Are you paying by qualified lead?
You should know exactly what triggers an invoice. If you are paying for each meeting booked, then be sure your agreement specifies what constitutes a "qualified meeting". If you do not, you run the risk of paying for useless conversations with junior employees.
Contracts That Protect Your Money
SLAs are your only safeguard against poor performance by your marketing partner.
Don't sign an agency's generic template service level agreement (SLA); you need to include clauses that protect your pipeline and reputation.
The Lead Disqualification Clause
You have the right to disqualify a lead if it is not a good fit without paying for it. Write this into your agreement. Specifically, include a clause that grants your account executives (AEs) the right to disqualify a lead within 48 hours if they determine it does not meet all of the following criteria: industries, job titles, and confirmed company sizes.
If a lead does fail the criteria, the agency is required to provide a replacement lead at no charge.
The Domain Reputation Guarantee
Your primary email address is likely the most valuable asset that you have; you must, therefore, insist on secondary domains for all outbound email campaigns. Additionally, include a clause stating that the secondary domain must maintain a bounce rate of less than 2%.
If a marketing partner damages your secondary domain, they will be responsible for purchasing and warming up a new one.
The Mandatory Weekly Review
The failure to properly communicate with your marketing partner can ruin your marketing efforts.
Monthly reviews are an opportunity for both parties to assess the marketing strategy and to make any necessary adjustments to maximize the impact of your marketing efforts. In the analysis section, you will review recording(s) of your calls and analyze your sales acceptance rate for improving your message delivery.
If you are using an agency and they miss these meetings, you will impose a penalty against their monthly retainer fees.
Mastering CRM Handoffs for Outsourced B2B Lead Generation
You booked a meeting for an agency, but if that meeting was lost in your software, that meeting is now worthless.
The greatest operational delays occur during the transfer of data from the agency to your internal team. You must create a seamless transfer of data from one place to another.
How to Test If the Software Actually Connects
Most agencies will advertise that they can integrate with HubSpot or Salesforce. Do not accept their word for it, ask for samples of how the data from their CRM will enter your CRM.
You need to know exactly how the lead record will look once it gets into your system. Simply a name and an email address is not enough.
CRM Payload Requirements
When the agency is adding a lead into your CRM, each lead record must contain a number of required data fields:
The original source of the lead and the campaign name
Full data enrichment (company size, industry, revenue)
A link to the original email thread or call recording that booked the meeting
A specific tag that indicates this lead was referred by an external partner
Next steps for your internal account executive to take.
If the agency cannot automate this data transfer, the account executives will spend hours manually entering the data into your system.
Platforms like Datamatics BPM emphasize the importance of clean data transfers. Establish the automation before you commence your campaign.
The 90-Day Preparation
It's also essential to keep in mind that you won't see results in your first week.
Prior to getting into the actual sales process, there are various time-consuming tasks that come first. Having a realistic timeline helps both parties stay focused and accountable in delivering results.
Month 1: Starting Point
For the first month, focus on all tasks associated with building the foundation.
Your vendor should be preparing domains for your company's emails, thoroughly warming up email addresses, and producing the initial batch of targeted lists of prospects.
Your role this month will be reviewing the prospecting data, including:
Ensure the agency understands which lists fit your ideal customer profile (ICP) and why/where/how this data should come from.
Approval of prospect messages.
Connecting the customer relationship management (CRM) systems and testing the handoff process to check for proper integration.
Month 2: Calibration
Second month you will now be actually doing the outreach to potential customers.
During this time frame, you will want to track the early indicators of success, including:
Open rates
Positive reply rates
There is also the sales acceptance rate (for meetings booked) which is considered a key metric for this process.
If you find you are getting leads you think were "on target" you can adjust your messaging to be more specific and more detailed.
Getting the lead quality to improve by 30% of what they were receiving previously comes mainly from giving your vendor a better picture of your buyer personas.
Month 3: Scaling & ROI
The process by the time you are at Day 90 will be operating at peak performance.
Using all of the historical data collected so far, you can now determine the cost per lead (CPL) and customer acquisition cost (CAC) associated with your vendor’s channel.
If your agency is meeting or exceeding the set performance benchmarks, scale your budget as appropriate. If the results are not meeting expectations, you can exit the agreement or force a significant shift in the way the agency does business, via the use of the service level agreement (SLA) clauses.
Benchmarks and Real Data
You need to establish a baseline for industry-related benchmarks that you can compare your agency's performance against.
In general, the benchmarks will vary based on the industry you operate in; however, here are some upper-end expectations for mid-sized B2B software marketing campaigns:
Expected Rates of Conversion
According to the latest research and reports from various B2B marketing organizations, 39 percent of all B2B marketers identify quality of leads as their highest priority.
From the results of good external marketing organizations, the rate of conversion from MQL (marketing qualified leads) to SQL (sales qualified leads) is an estimated 10-20 percent.
If a marketing organization has a conversion rate lower than 5 percent, their targeting has been compromised.
Metrics Related to Meeting Opportunity
The booking of a meeting is just the first step.
A well-performing vendor should convert 20-30 percent of the meetings they booked to actual sales opportunities, within a 60-day window from the time of booking.
Keep track of the revenue generated from these opportunities.
Do not let the marketing organization disguise their performance through using vanity metrics. If a marketing organization books 50 meetings but generates zero dollars in the pipeline, that is a failure, and you should hold them to the same standards by which you hold your internal sales team.
Final Thoughts on Scaling Your Sales Engine
Outsourcing lead generation is not magic, it is a mathematics problem.
You are purchasing speed and capacity from the vendor. To receive a true return on your investment, you need to manage your vendor by strictly enforcing rules about what needs to happen and when. Therefore, don't listen to the general claims of high volume; instead, concentrate on actual validated data, strict adherence to your company's CRM processes and written agreements in the form of SLAs.
Protect your market niche. Insist on having documented metrics regarding the pipeline.
If you force the agency to work within these guidelines, they will eventually become a huge driver of revenue for your business. If you allow the agency to work without oversight, they will simply deplete your marketing budget. Manage the process, monitor success rates, and scale based on what converts.