How Marketing Activities Can Destroy Persuasive Momentum

For many companies, marketing clearly owns the critical element of engaging a prospect and initiating persuasive momentum. Unfortunately, awareness, lead generation and lead nurturing activites often fail to miss the mark.

Read some stories about how marketing activities create persuasive momentum dead-ends.

Failing to initiate persuasive momentum

A basic momentum starting point: marketing helps the prospect make the connection between their need and the product's ability to satisfy that need. The earlier this is done in the buying process the better.

Once a buyer has framed their need, entire product categories can be excluded. If the need-solution connection isn't made, the product won't even be considered for purchase.

Failing to create momentum

A single response to a marketing program or campaign is not persuasive momentum. Momentum is created as the prospect's repeated actions build their confidence. For this reason, marketing's approach must be one of extreme integration.

Marketing content must cover enough of the prospect's questions and concerns to help build that persuasive momentum. That content must be available in the channels the buyer visits.

Early sales hand-offs

You might think that once that initial response is made, marketing can turn over the prospect to sales. Sales will then take the prospect the rest of the way through the company's sales process.

This approach might work if the prospect is an extrovert and is ready to have a conversation. But what happens when the prospect doesn't want to enter the company's sales process? What happens when they don't want to talk with a sales person yet?

Marketing must work to build the momentum that motivates the prospect to initiate the sales conversation.