sales side view of marketing automation, AI and the sales process

John Leonelli, head of B2B sales for the Americas at Babbel is a company which provides language learning software that can be subscribed to and an eLearning platform. The company was founded in Berlin in 2008. Five years later, it launched a European-focused division. Recently, they entered the American market where businesses of all sizes seek help with Spanish to English and English to Spanish language skills.

We spoke with him at HubSpot’s Inbound Conference where he shared his sales-side perspective of marketing. He also discussed what tools he finds important, what worries him and the impact AI has on business.

Q. So who are your clients?

A :Outside regulated industries like schools, municipalities, and government, we found that the majority of the organizations with the greatest need were manufacturing, production services, construction, and agriculture. These are the accounts who are looking for an English ESL program or a Spanish to English program. They want to ensure that people are safe, and can communicate in a safe manner regardless of their fluency and competency. It should also provide opportunities for career advancement.

We’re at the HubSpot Conference, so I’m sure that’s what your CRM is. What are the parts you use most?

Q: I use forecasting dashboards, and reporting dashboards. These dashboards are what really bring together our marketing and sales teams. I work with people like our performance marketing specialist, who is more focused on campaigns and workflow. We come together to discuss reporting, channels, activities, and touches. This allows us to have a full funnel view.

As a sales leader, my main focus is forecasting. I want to make sure we have a good forecast, track the pipeline and be able to share all our key metrics with our executive team.

Q. What types of segmentation do I do?

A:We divide by size. We segment by size. SMB is anything with less than 100 employees. Enterprise is anything over 3000. We also segment by region, looking to see where we have the most success with campaigns in different states. Are we also creating and closing opportunities in these regions? We are looking at our total market as a strategic target. Hubspot was able to provide us with the information we needed about our existing customers and our available opportunities. We can then look at this data, and decide, “OK, let’s work together on marketing.” Where can we double down on paid campaign and amplify that with outbound outreach.

Customer experience is a priority in B2B

Q. How do you deal with marketing?

A : I’m fortunate to have a leader who is also in charge of our marketing team. It all comes together when it comes to campaigns and visibility of the different types of accounts we have in our pipeline. What types of customers are currently in our base? How can we communicate that feedback to our performance marketer and our content marketer so that they run outbound campaigns, coordinate with performance campaigns, and target the ideal customer profiles in the regions that are most relevant? It’s the customer profile that we have identified as having a higher win rate, and a higher average deal. It helps us deliver this data, which will prompt these conversations and give us visibility so we can narrow down our campaigns according to where we are seeing success.

A: Each of these is a huge business sector with many sub-sectors. Can you personalize your marketing efforts?

A Due to the wide range of industries and personas we serve, we do a lot segmentation based on industry, size, and persona. This allows us to send a tailored message at the beginning of the sales funnel, and continue to do so throughout the entire process.

Q. Can you give me an Example?

A :In the month of August, we started to focus on identifying and developing our ICP. The campaign was based on OSHA’s Safe and Sound Week, where companies are encouraged to commit to implementing or improving workplace health and safety.

We ran a campaign to test the effectiveness of this approach. We sent vertical and persona-based messages to these accounts, and were able close a deal two weeks earlier than expected. HubSpot allows us to collaborate, and to be able to accomplish all of these things at the same time.

Q. What would you like more assistance with?

A :Being ahead of the risks in deals. As a sales manager, I always keep my eye on that. I try to listen to as much as possible in order to identify moments of coaching for the salesperson and moments of productivity that we can share with the rest. Visibility with regard to deal risk is important. Even if you have the best analytics and tools, it’s still necessary to identify the gaps in the next step. As a sales leader, I find that pipeline visibility and risk are always challenges.

Q. What is your impact on generative AI?

A: Messaging. I’m no copywriter, and neither are most salespeople, but I believe that is where creativity comes from. Iterating on the messages AI generates. AI can inspire creativity. This is where I found it most useful, and we teach the team how to use it for vertical persona-based messages. It can be done in-house or by consultants. Either way, it’s important to iterate on the message. AI will always have a new way to help you be concise or to make your point more clearly.

The first post A Sales-Side View of Marketing, Automation and AI was published on MarTech.