The Problem with B2B Sales Pitches

Outbound marketing can take many forms - direct mail, email, telemarketing, advertising, etc.  Most of the time these outbound communications are sent to an audience that has no knowledge or relationship with you or your business.  And typical the results are dismal.

But despite poor results, we keep emailing blasts, picking up the phone - perhaps because activity gives the appearance of at least trying.

Stop and think for a moment what kind of reaction your pitch is getting from the recipient.  In a Forbes article, Sales Approaches That Are Doomed To Fail or Backfire, David DiSalvo talks about the likely response.

This is a classic example of avoiding the Marketing Hourglass - a term Duct Tape Marketing coined to describe the phases a prospect must go through to become an ideal customer:  Know, Like, Trust, Try, Buy, Repeat, Refer.

Inbound marketing is a much more effective method of providing the prospect with the information they need to move along that path.  People prefer to search to get initial information on the products and services they wish to buy. Does your website offer information that they will find useful and is written from the perspective of solving their problems; rather than describing what you sell?