Buyer Enablement is a newer, evolving concept being widely adopted across the globe's most forward looking revenue teams. It's rise has landed Buyer Enablement / Demo Automation to the #1 most searched software category on G2. Let's dive in!
In the dynamic landscape of modern buyers, sellers are constantly seeking innovative strategies to engage and convert potential customers. Thanks to consumer technologies who optimized for frictionless experiences, customers are demanding these luxuries in the often clunky, complicated enterprise technology arena. Two distinct methodologies stand out: Full Funnel Buyer Enablement and Point Solution Product Tours. While both aim to drive efficiencies across your go-to-market strategy, they differ significantly in their scope, implementation, and impact on a company's KPIs. In this blog post, we will explore the key differences and advantages of adopting a Full Funnel Buyer Enablement strategy compared to relying on Point Solution Product Tours.
Full Funnel Buyer Enablement Strategy:
A Mindset Evolution
So, what is Full Funnel Buyer Enablement? Simply put, it’s the idea that reducing friction in your buyer’s process results in higher revenue and market share capture. Specifically, the method is winning the entire customer journey from awareness to expansion and beyond. It's a collaboration between marketing, sales, and customer success to push a steel thread from the first touch, into automated discovery and L1 demos, guided- guardrail POCs, and eventually through the customer’s onboarding.
Full Funnel buyer enablement can only be accomplished with a platform that offers the following 3 technology types: product tour, live overlay, and automated sandbox technologies. Oftentimes, product tour companies will market themselves as full funnel, yet the reality is buyer’s do not want screen shot click throughs - it leaves them in distrust about the legitimacy of your product and robs them of the choose your own adventure education they demand when evaluating at the mid and bottom funnel stages. Product tour solutions do work well in top of funnel demand generation though, and we’ll talk more about that now.
Point Solution Product Tours:
A Quick Start Tool
Ok, so Full Funnel Buyer Enablement is the end goal, but what if we just want to drive MQLs top of funnel? This is where point solution product tours are helpful - perfect for simple products that speak for themselves and punchy 6 step click throughs, product tour can drive top of funnel prospects to interest.
The challenge with product tours are when marketers try to use them mid and bottom of funnel outside of demand generation use cases. It’s like using a butter knife to cut a nice piece of steak - it kinda, sorta works … but not really? Buyers at this stage need to be inspired that your product does what it says it does in addition to being given the ability to go off the rails and explore the platform in the ways that interest them uniquely.
Advantages & Considerations of Full Funnel Buyer Enablement:
Advantages:
Built for mid-market and enterprise revenue teams, robust technology platforms who support full funnel win marketers over by giving them what they want, product tours, while sales / SEs also get what they want, automated POCs and live demo overlays. Additionally, CS teams get to leverage the sandbox technology to automate onboarding and customer training. It’s a win / win with no one walking away feeling like they lost in the internal evaluation.
Low maintenance - since full funnel buyer enablement solutions typically live on your real product, the ongoing maintenance of keeping product tours or demo experiences up-to-date is significantly lower than product tours, which are similar to videos, when your product changes - you have to rebuild from scratch.
Self-education enables buyers to choose their own, persona-based adventures and explore the portions of the product relevant to their needs.
Considerations:
Price - since customers get higher value from Buyer Enablement platforms, the price is often higher than point solution product tours.
Implementation - dropping buyers into a no login required, guardrailed version of your product is technologically impressive. Depending on the provider, this technology may require a short implementation. Beware though, if the solution asks to meet w your engineers, brace yourself for a multi-month implementation that may distract engineers from delivering on roadmap items.
Advantages & Considerations of Point Solution Product Tours:
Advantages:
Cost - since the technology for point solution product tours is typically a screen shot type methodology or HTML screen capture, the cost is often very low. You can think of these as fancy powerpoint tools
Implementation - similar to the above, given how basic the technology is, the implementation is often hours or days.
Startup friendly - if you’re a startup just looking to show off your new feature, consider a video based demo or a point solution product tour. It’s more budget friendly and the capabilities will be simpler for your team.
Considerations:
Limited scope - point solution product tours can be leveraged in top of funnel demand generation only.
Feels fake - since product tours are a series of screen shots, like a powerpoint, organized in sequential order, buyers get to your AHA moment yet completely miss any feeling of the product being real. Oftentimes, buyers will walk away curious if the product is still in prototype stage since they clicked through screen shots only.
No self-education - as buyers enter the mid-funnel, they want to play with and get hands on with your product. Product tours cannot offer this - the result, you will see an uptick in POC or free trial requests to satisfy this buyer’s demand.
Revenue Operations Role in Full Funnel Buyer Enablement:
As more and more companies opt for full funnel buyer enablement, revenue operations leaders are the glue connecting cross-functional teams, aligning data, and organizing workflow triggers. While RevOps has been growing in mission critical importance, the rise of full funnel buyer enablement is a tailwind enhancing your organizational value.
Top of Funnel RevOps Checklists for Marketing Automated Demo Experiences:
UTMs set up on call to action entry points
Lead source created in CRM
Integration configured between your CRM / marketing automation platform and solution
Workflow set up triggering contacts who engaged with automated demos to attribute this to account and deal records
If gating experience behind a form fill, ensure form tags proper attribution elements and redirects to the right experience
Middle of Funnel RevOps Checklists for Marketing Automated Demo Experiences:
Align with SDRs / BDRs on L1 automated demo discovery question process
Ensure outbound and inbound templates are properly coordinated to embed automated demos
Ensure integrations flow discovery question data into proper CRM fields for easy AE insights access
Align with marketing to trigger drip and nurture sequences off of L1 automated demo discovery question responses
Configure and test proper sales routing based on buyer discovery question responses
Design and implement automated call templates based on L1 automated demo discovery question responses
Bottom of Funnel RevOps Checklists for Marketing Automated Demo Experiences:
Embed automated demo experience links into your multi-threading email sequencing technology templates, drip campaigns, and snippets
Embed automated demo experience links to follow up email templates
Embed automated demo experience links to your Digital Sales Room template
Align & Train sales team on using automated demo experience links in Live Demo Mode
Align & Train SE team on using POC / sandbox automation in SMB deals
Train Sales team on how to access Buyer Enablement Analytics & How to use in sales conversations
Train Sales team on how to create Smart Tracking Links in Solution Portal
The Final Scoop
Startups who are simply looking to increase MQLs may find point solution product tours as the simplest, lightweight tool; whereas, companies larger than 150 employees with a formal marketing, sales, and customer success functional will find these lightweight tools as too limiting for a comprehensive solution.
Regardless of your choice, lean on your Revenue Operations teams to connect the dots. Oftentimes, the difference between a successful and unsuccessful adoptions is rooted in what is referred to as Operationalizing Success. Good luck and congratulations on adopting buyer enablement, your future is bright!
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