By: Georgette Virgo
Marketing and sales staff working for business-to-business (B2B) employers want to work from home. According to WFH Research and the Survey of Working Arrangements and Attitudes, 12.7% of full-time employees work from home now, while 28.2% have adopted a hybrid work model. And based on Buffer’s State of Remote Work report, 98% of workers want to work remotely for at least some time.
The problem is that employers are worried about productivity and other business objectives like sales leads and revenue growth during remote setup. On the other hand, employees want trust and the freedom to work in a way that improves their quality of life.
The new book “Imposters on the Zoom!” by B2B marketing agency founders John Buie and Jason Hagerman lays out simple templates, checklists, and accountability programs that most B2B leaders can implement today to relieve the tension around critical business outcomes and employee satisfaction. This way, marketing and sales employees can do remote work from anywhere, and the business can generate more leads and revenue without heavy-handed in-office policies.
Why Leaders Are Worried About B2B Marketing and Sales Teams Working Remotely
A Harvard Business Review study found that 23% of managers believed remote workers were less reliable and had lower accountability levels than their in-office counterparts. And they do not hide it well, as data from Blind Workplace Insights says 61% of employees felt their managers doubted their productivity while working remotely.
The same Harvard Business Review study found that 40% of managers had difficulty assessing the work quality of remote employees. Another study by MIT Sloan found that 36% of executives were concerned that remote work could hinder creative processes and teamwork.
“B2B employers might or might not be right to feel this way,” Buie mentions. “I had the same worries early in my career. But in time, I found a lot of those worries were more closely related to a lack of systems in my business. This lack created accountability and made it easy for my staff, my leadership team, and everybody in the organization to stay on the same page about critical outcomes like sales leads, business revenue, and marketing activities that kept those north stars centered for us.”
A System for Trust, Accountability, and Successful B2B Lead Generation
According to data from FlexJobs, 57% of workers would look for a new job if their current company did not allow remote work.
Buie says, “Rather than resisting what most marketing and sales employees want, leaders should look for ways to adapt and set clear boundaries or expectations around out-of-officework.”
Hagerman says that most of the growth in sales leads they generate for their customers comes from consistently and comprehensively applying the B2B content marketing services discussed in “Imposters on the Zoom!”
“Most sales leads don’t come to manufacturers or distributors through off-the-cuff strokes of genius around the office,” he says. “They come from following clear steps that put consistent, compelling messaging in front of prospects at the right times, in the right places, and bringing them down the sales funnel in greater numbers every month. This system can also be accomplished in this work-from-home economy by implementing systems that outline exactly what needs to be done, by whom, and when.”
The book, “Imposters on the Zoon!” documents and explains every step in the template Buie and Hagerman use to generate sales leads with remote and in-office teams. Businesses can use the book as their standard operating procedure (SOP) so team members working remotely know exactly what is expected of them, and leaders can easily evaluate their performance based on their SOP.
“B2B leaders need to see marketing and sales teams deploying tactics that generate leads and revenue,” Buie says. “As long as processes for accountability are in place, that can beaccomplished by a team working in the next room or on the next continent.”
B2B Marketing Assets That Drive Revenue Regardless of Office Settings
According to data from McKinsey, prospects consume three to seven pieces of content before engaging with a sales rep.
Buie states, “With a repeatable system full of checkpoints where leaders can easily see what’s been done and what has to be done, B2B marketing and sales teams can produce quality content at scale that nourishes prospects’ needs for information.”
“These contents can be merchandized across the business’ digital footprint just by following the steps in our book. By doing that, the business does three things: it attracts new leads that never would have found the business before; it encourages prospects who are familiar with the business but haven’t directly worked with them to identify themselves and engage as a sales lead; and it gets existing customers to spend budget more often with the business. So the remote team’s work by following the template results in more leads and more revenue.”
Buie explains these new leads are important as 20-40% of a B2B’s annual revenue should come from new customers. He mentions, “An actionable step most businesses can take today is to look at that revenue ratio. If it doesn’t align with the 20-40%, look for a new lead generation approach and implement it as quickly as possible.”
The shift toward remote work and hybrid work models presents challenges and opportunities for B2B lead generation. The book “Imposters on the Zoom!“ by John Buie and Jason
Hagerman offers a practical framework for addressing these challenges by providing clear systems and templates that enhance trust and accountability. With these strategies, B2B companies can effectively generate leads and drive revenue, regardless of whether their teams do remote work or in the office.
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