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Project Kickoff & Activation Calls

 

What takes place during sales discussions through to when a project is transferred from Sales to Delivery?

 

 

Step # Owner Time (mins) Action
1 Salesperson 10

New Statement of Work (SOW) document is submitted to customer.
2 Salesperson 10 Receive signed SOW, outline agreement in Hubspot, and check “Ready for Execution” to route for manager assignment.
3

Director of Operations and Director of CJ

 5 Consult management team workload and Customer Journey SME (if applies) to determine manager assignment. Update Project Lead(s) and Strategist (if applies) fields in Hubspot with resources selected.
4

Project Lead and/or Customer Journey PM

Strategist (if applies)

 1 Receive New Project Assignment alert email from Hubspot.
5

Project Lead

 5 Contact Salesperson to clarify any information in the SOW.
6

Project Lead

 2

Using shared calendar, schedule the INTERNAL Kickoff Meeting. Include:

  1. Salesperson
  2. Strategist that is outlined within the Project Transfer (if applicable)
  3. Customer Journey Manager (if applicable)
  4. Subject Matter Expert based on services TSL will execute
    1. SEO: Kyle Starkey
    2. PPC: Ryan Nicholson
    3. UX/CRO: Norma Shepardson
7

Project Lead

 30

Run the INTERNAL Kickoff Call. Go through the Internal Kickoff Call Agenda. Is the scope defined/ clear/ goals agreed upon? Is the TSL team in agreement to proceed as outlined?

  • YES go to step #11
  • NO go to step #10
8

Project Lead

 30

Using shared calendar, schedule the INTERNAL Project Rescope Meeting. Include:

  1. Salesperson
  2. Strategist that is outlined within the Project Transfer (if applicable)
  3. Customer Journey Manager (if applicable)
  4. Subject Matter Expert based on services TSL will execute
    1. SEO: Kyle Starkey
    2. PPC: Ryan Nicholson
    3. UX/CRO: Norma Shepardson
9

Salesperson

 2

Using shared calendar, schedule the EXTERNAL Kickoff Meeting. Include:

  1. Strategist that is outlined within the Project Transfer
  2. Salesperson
  3. Customer Journey Manager (if applicable)
  4. Subject Matter Expert based on services TSL will execute
    1. SEO: Kyle Starkey
    2. PPC: Ryan Nicholson
    3. UX/CRO: Norma Shepardson
10

Project Lead

 3 Send the Kickoff Call Agenda to all attendees on the meeting invitation.
11

Project Lead

 30

Run EXTERNAL Kickoff Call per the agenda that matches your campaign type.

Digital Programs: Refer to main resources site to locate services-specific information.

Customer Journey Programs:
12

Project Lead

 5 Send Kickoff Call Recap Notes email to the customer.
13

Project Lead

 30 Build out the project in Clarizen per processes here.

 

Internal Kickoff Call Agenda

Purpose: Sales handoff of project to the assigned Project Lead and/or Customer Journey manager.

Reference the Sales Discovery document(s) provided by the Sales owner.

Customer Background

  • Company overview - what is the customer's industry and go-to-market message?
  • Have we completed a campaign with the customer recently, or are there any campaigns in market now?
  • What was the customer's experience like, who managed, what projects did we complete?

Campaign Background

  • Who was involved in consulting or planning this campaign thus far?
  • Will there be expectations to complete work within a certain timeframe?
  • Review specific Scope of Work details, budget, expenses.
  • What are the customer's goals and expectations about results?

 Kickoff Planning:

  • Customer Stakeholders:
    • Who are the points-of-contact for day-to-day campaign communication? Review names and roles.
    • Who is the customer's boss?
    • Who will make decisions about project timeline?
    • Who will be directly responsible for approvals?
    • Who are the reviewers/stakeholders involved in the decision-making process?
  • TSL Team:
    • Who will manage the project?
    • Who will be a customer-facing Subject Matter Expert?
    • Who will support with execution of work? Should they attend the kickoff call?
  • Agenda:
    • Are there any non-standard agenda topics that need to be discussed?
    • Confirm TSL attendees' roles on the call
    • Confirm availability for kickoff call. Sales sends calendar meeting invitation

 

External/Client Kickoff Resources

 

External/Client Kickoff Call Guides

This call should follow a flow of:

  • Introductions
  • Overview of Statement of Work and Services TSL will deliver
  • TSL's process
  • Requests for access to information or resources we need to deliver the work
  • Recap of the call and next steps/action items

 

Kickoff Call Guides: Opportunity Identification Services

There are 4 kickoff call guides below and the PM should choose which to use based on the campaign and customer type:

 

SQL Guarantee Programs

Hi XXX, it’s great to meet you, I’m X. So, let me just quickly explain the TSL team that you’ll be working with:

  • I am the program manager on this campaign; I will be the day-to-day contact and will coordinate the weekly checkpoint calls, and creation of any tracking and supporting documents.
  • X will be our program quality manager on this campaign- he/she will be the quality overlay on this campaign. He/She will remain engaged and will be cc’d on everything and will join most of calls that we have. We will be in close communication on this campaign and he/she will be there to help in any way needed and to ensure that the program runs smoothly. You can also reach out to him/her with any questions or concerns or if I am out of the office.
  • Then there are the business development team members (BDTM for short). As the program manager, I will oversee the BDTMs. These are the folks that will be prospecting directly into the accounts.
  • If at any point you are concerned about the campaign or the communication level, please let me know so that we can touch base.

So, let me start by asking you this: have you used an outside firm for lead generation in the past?

  • If yes – What was your experience?

Ok, so let’s review the program details.

  • For this campaign we have a lead/SQL goal of X.
  • Opportunities will really vary based on the customer’s wants and/or needs. We aim to find the business problem at the company that your solution sets could address and make a determination on that contact’s disposition toward further discussion with one of your representatives about the stated problem, business pain, or pending projects.
  • With that being said, we aim to really open the door to allow your team and you to start a relationship and nurture the account from there. So, it’s important to note that our activities are designed to create awareness so that you can start your sales cycle. We may speak with some folks that are just realizing they have a problem and want to begin their evaluation journey and others may be further down the process and are now looking for quotes, but the key aspect is that they will all be open to hearing more from your organization and including you in their evaluation process.
  • When we find a prospect that has a need and is a fit for your organization and the campaign message, we will send it over as a lead. A lead is, by our definition, something that is BANT-qualified. So, it will be a prospect who has indicated that they have a current pain or project that your company could potentially address, and for which they plan to evaluate solutions within the next 12 months. The prospect must also have explicitly identified himself or herself as a part of the decision-making and/or evaluation process. And, we will work to obtain budget information whenever possible but will always confirm that they can set a budget if value is seen in your solution.

Once an opportunity is discovered:

  • TSL will alert you by sending over an opportunity report in the form of a 1-2 page pdf document. This report will contain details about the company, the prospect’s details, details about the account’s current environment/solutions and most importantly, a summary of their needs that we’ve uncovered through our call with them. This is essentially meant to serve as a snapshot of our initial call and is intended to give you a firm starting point for your discussions.
  • All leads will be sent in the form of a conference call so, we will not only alert you with an email containing the opportunity report, but we will follow up that email with a calendar invite for the date/time, with details for the bridge that you or your rep will need to call into, and with the report attached. We ask that you or your rep join calls 5 minutes prior to the scheduled date and time so that you have an opportunity to discuss with the BDTM any pending questions you may have regarding the lead report. We also ask that, when possible, you stick around after the conference call is finished for just a few moments so that you can provide any feedback you may have about the call to our BDTM.
  • We do request that when we send you a lead report you reply within 48 hours with your reps’ full contacts details. That includes name, email address, and phone number. We ask for this because reps get very busy and often will forget about a call - even when it’s set on their calendar. If we have their contact details, we can contact them directly to get them on the bridge verses having to go through you.

Now, for conference calls, we typically provide 3-5 business days’ lead time—is that enough for you to coordinate internally and assign the prospect to one of your reps?

  • [IF NO]: How much buffer time should we allow you?
  • Do you or your team have any blackout dates? Or times of the day that you tend to have meetings and prefer we try to avoid?

Lastly, on the topic of conference calls:

  • TSL will always call the prospect 24 hours prior to the scheduled date/time to confirm with the prospect.
  • In the event we send you an opportunity report and calendar invite for a time that you cannot keep, we will also take responsibility for rescheduling the call on your behalf. However, please just note that we do require 24 hours’ notice to do this. Otherwise, the lead will nonetheless count as a deliverable for the campaign, but because we strive for customer satisfaction, we will still make every effort to reschedule the call.
  • We will also take ownership of rescheduling in the event of a prospect no-show.

As for the TSL process and how the magic happens:

  • It is important to note that when we are executing this campaign, we will be representing ourselves as calling from your organization. I mention this because when you or your rep speak to the account they should NOT reference TSL Marketing (for example, “Hi, I have the report here from TSL Marketing and it looks like you’re interested in x, how can I help you?”).
    • We do this for 2 reasons:
  • One, because throughout the course of this campaign, we look at ourselves as essentially a marketing arm of your company.
  • And two, we don’t want to confuse prospects.

As we begin any outbound campaign, we put it through our tollgate process. We spend the first 3-5 weeks ensuring the campaign passes our list quality, audience fit, and messaging resonance tollgates. If we fail to pass any of the tollgates, we will identify 2 potential corrective actions and then re-start the process until the campaign passes all our tollgates. Rest assured you will be kept in the loop during this process.

Next, we always find better campaign satisfaction when we can remain in contact with you consistently throughout the campaign. We will have a bi-weekly checkpoint call to accomplish 3 things:

  • One, to assure that all leads have been received. This is the check and balance that none of the opportunity reports have been overlooked or lost in spam filters.
  • Two, to get any feedback and next step information around the opportunities. Feedback is vital for us. So for example, if you had a follow-up call that went well, but you realized that it would have actually been a little more helpful to you if you had had a certain piece of information in the report that wasn’t provided, then getting that feedback early on can ensure that we ask for that information and provide it when possible in the next opportunity reports.
  • And finally, the third goal of this call is to go through the second type of deliverable for this campaign: the progress report.
    • This is an Excel document that will be sent to you prior to all checkpoint calls. It will have a list of opportunities that have been passed to your team. The report will outline some high-level opportunity details, but more importantly, will help us understand the progress of the opportunities once your team begins nurturing them.
    • The progress report will also give you a snapshot of where we stand with our calling efforts. So, it will show how many “not interested” dispositions we’ve had so far, how many contacts we still have yet to call into, etc.

The third type of deliverable that we’ll be providing you with will be the final program export.

  • We like to plant the seed with you now, but we’ll cover this at the end of the campaign. This document is really a value-add from working with TSL. At the end of the campaign, we’ll compile all the data that we used and developed into a cleanly-scrubbed list, which will include the business intelligence that we uncovered from our calling. We’ll review this data together at the end of the campaign and then that list will be yours to integrate back into your CRM and use for any future internal marketing efforts.
  • I will say that TSL feels this document can really hold equal value to the opportunities uncovered during the campaign.

Now, let’s discuss your sales process. We want to make sure that our process flows well into your system. So just a couple questions:

  • Who would be my focal point for receiving opportunities?
  • And who will be executing the follow-up? i.e. you or another rep, or multiple reps?

Any questions on what I’ve already gone over?

  • Great; we’re almost done - just a few more things:

The fourth and final document that TSL will prepare will be a call guide. This is a document that we will give BDTMs to use for their calling efforts. We don’t use “scripts”—we consider that a dirty word—so this is meant to be used as a guide. It will outline the details of your company and the solutions offered, the message of this campaign, and questions for them to use to uncover business intelligence and potential pains. This is a document that I will prepare and then I will be sending it to you so that you have the opportunity to make any desired edits.

  • Regarding the message, we find the most success when we can focus on a broad solution area such as all storage (i.e. on-prem, cloud, backup, and DR) but also the broader the message the more success we tend to see. From my understanding you can handle these solution areas: _____. Can we focus on those solutions areas for this campaign?
  • Any collateral or reference material regarding the message will help make the call guide stronger. Do you have any you can provide?

Ok, and let’s discuss data.

  • What is the geography you are able to target? Keep in mind that the larger that geo the better. For instance, if you are located in FL, the states of FL, GA, SC, AL would be a great geo.
  • Regarding company size:
    • What number of employees are you hoping to target? For a lot of the campaigns we’ve been running we tend to pull lists of midmarket employees, like 100-1,000. Is that okay with you or would you like to narrow it?
    • Are there any revenue requirements or can we pull all revenues within that employee range?
      • [INTERNAL PM NOTE]: Unless this is a large enterprise priced campaign (which means a price per lead of $1,750+ (after PM and data fees are removed) then it has to be a max of 1,000 employees and no higher than $249 Mil in revenue. If client wants to target more than 1,000 employees or $250+ Mil then the campaign must be re-scoped to fit that market which means the lead count will decrease.
    • As far as industries go, we tend to recommend cross-industry, which includes all industries including SLED and FED. Would that be acceptable to you or do you need to remove any industries?
      • [INTERNAL PM NOTE]: SLED = State and Local government and EDucation [k-12 and higher ed], and FED = FEDeral Government).

Thank you for this information. As we wrap things up, let’s handle a few action items:

  • What day of the week and time is best for our bi-weekly checkpoint call? I will send a calendar invite shortly.
  • I will also send out an action items email with my contact information and our PQMs’ as well. It will outline the highlights of what we discussed today and the to-dos for each of us.
  • I will send a call guide and list within the next few days. When you receive them please review them and make any and all changes you feel are necessary to be deemed “Approved” for my team to use. Then, send them back to me along with any collateral specific to your organization. Once all of these items have been completed and received, your campaign will enter our queue to start calling. We believe that every campaign deserves the proper attention so we have a campaign queue and don’t put a campaign into market until we have all the items we need and proper staffing ready to really give your campaign the attention and dedication it requires. The queue typically lasts 1-3 weeks, and I will keep you in the loop at all times and you will know exactly when calling is scheduled to begin on your campaign.

That wraps up our kickoff call. I look forward to a great campaign together! Have a great rest of your day and we will speak on X DATE.

 

Hourly-Based Programs

Hi XXX, it’s great to meet you, I’m X. So, let me just quickly explain the TSL team that you’ll be working with:

  • I am the program manager on this campaign; I will be the day-to-day contact and will coordinate the weekly checkpoint calls, and creation of any tracking and supporting documents.
  • X will be our program quality manager on this campaign- he/she will be the quality overlay on this campaign. He/She will remain engaged and will be cc’d on everything and will join most of calls that we have. We will be in close communication on this campaign and he/she will be there to help in any way needed and to ensure that the program runs smoothly. You can also reach out to him/her with any questions or concerns or if I am out of the office.
  • Then there are the business development team members (BDTM for short). As the program manager, I will oversee the BDTMs. These are the folks that will be prospecting directly into the accounts.
  • If at any point you are concerned about the campaign or the communication level, please let me know so that we can touch base.

So, let me start by asking you this: have you used an outside firm for lead generation in the past?

  • If yes – What was your experience?

Ok, so let’s review the program details.

  • For this campaign we will be making dials for a total of X hours and sending over opportunities as we uncover them. For this project there is no lead guarantee, as such we will be in close communication regarding results we are seeing. If we have concerns that the message isn’t resonating, or the list seems to be off, we will be sure to communicate this with you proactively. We will also make recommendations for adjustments if necessary. If at any point you feel that you are concerned about the campaign or the communication level, please let me know so that we can touch base.
  • Opportunities will really vary based on the customer’s wants and/or needs. We aim to find the business problem at the company that your solution sets could address and make a determination on that contact’s disposition toward further discussion with one of your representatives about the stated problem, business pain, or pending projects.
  • With that being said, we aim to really open the door to allow your team and you to start a relationship and nurture the account from there. So, it’s important to note that our activities are designed to create awareness so that you can start your sales cycle. We may speak with some folks that are just realizing they have a problem and want to begin their evaluation journey and others may be further down the process and are now looking for quotes, but the key aspect is that they will all be open to hearing more from your organization and including you in their evaluation process.
  • When we find a prospect that has a need and is a fit for your organization and the campaign message, we will send it over as a lead. A lead is, by our definition, something that is BANT-qualified. So, it will be a prospect who has indicated that they have a current pain or project that your company could potentially address, and for which they plan to evaluate solutions within the next 12 months. The prospect must also have explicitly identified himself or herself as a part of the decision-making and/or evaluation process. And, we will work to obtain budget information whenever possible but will always confirm that they can set a budget if value is seen in your solution.

Once an opportunity is discovered:

  • TSL will alert you by sending over an opportunity report in the form of a 1-2 page pdf document. This report will contain details about the company, the prospect’s details, details about the account’s current environment/solutions and most importantly, a summary of their needs that we’ve uncovered through our call with them. This is essentially meant to serve as a snapshot of our initial call and is intended to give you a firm starting point for your discussions.
  • All leads will be sent in the form of a conference call so, we will not only alert you with an email containing the opportunity report, but we will follow up that email with a calendar invite for the date/time, with details for the bridge that you or your rep will need to call into, and with the report attached. We ask that you or your rep join calls 5 minutes prior to the scheduled date and time so that you have an opportunity to discuss with the BDTM any pending questions you may have regarding the lead report. We also ask that, when possible, you stick around after the conference call is finished for just a few moments so that you can provide any feedback you may have about the call to our BDTM.
  • We do request that when we send you a lead report you reply within 48 hours with your reps’ full contacts details. That includes name, email address, and phone number. We ask for this because reps get very busy and often will forget about a call - even when it’s set on their calendar. If we have their contact details, we can contact them directly to get them on the bridge verses having to go through you.

Now, for conference calls, we typically provide 3-5 business days’ lead time—is that enough for you to coordinate internally and assign the prospect to one of your reps?

  • [IF NO]: How much buffer time should we allow you?
  • Do you or your team have any blackout dates? Or times of the day that you tend to have meetings and prefer we try to avoid?

Lastly, on the topic of conference calls:

  • TSL will always call the prospect 24 hours prior to the scheduled date/time to confirm with the prospect.
  • In the event we send you an opportunity report and calendar invite for a time that you cannot keep, we will also take responsibility for rescheduling the call on your behalf. However, please just note that we do require 24 hours’ notice to do this. Otherwise, the lead will nonetheless count as a deliverable for the campaign, but because we strive for customer satisfaction, we will still make every effort to reschedule the call.
  • We will also take ownership of rescheduling in the event of a prospect no-show.

As for the TSL process and how the magic happens:

  • It is important to note that when we are executing this campaign, we will be representing ourselves as calling from your organization. I mention this because when you or your rep speak to the account they should NOT reference TSL Marketing (for example, “Hi, I have the report here from TSL Marketing and it looks like you’re interested in x, how can I help you?”).
    • We do this for 2 reasons:
  • One, because throughout the course of this campaign, we look at ourselves as essentially a marketing arm of your company.
  • And two, we don’t want to confuse prospects.

As we begin any outbound campaign, we put it through our tollgate process. We spend the first 3-5 weeks ensuring the campaign passes our list quality, audience fit, and messaging resonance tollgates. If we fail to pass any of the tollgates, we will identify 2 potential corrective actions and then re-start the process until the campaign passes all our tollgates. Rest assured you will be kept in the loop during this process.

Next, we always find better campaign satisfaction when we can remain in contact with you consistently throughout the campaign. We will have a bi-weekly checkpoint call to accomplish 3 things:

  • One, to assure that all leads have been received. This is the check and balance that none of the opportunity reports have been overlooked or lost in spam filters.
  • Two, to get any feedback and next step information around the opportunities. Feedback is vital for us. So for example, if you had a follow-up call that went well, but you realized that it would have actually been a little more helpful to you if you had had a certain piece of information in the report that wasn’t provided, then getting that feedback early on can ensure that we ask for that information and provide it when possible in the next opportunity reports.
  • And finally, the third goal of this call is to go through the second type of deliverable for this campaign: the progress report.
    • This is an Excel document that will be sent to you prior to all checkpoint calls. It will have a list of opportunities that have been passed to your team. The report will outline some high-level opportunity details, but more importantly, will help us understand the progress of the opportunities once your team begins nurturing them.
    • The progress report will also give you a snapshot of where we stand with our calling efforts. So, it will show how many “not interested” dispositions we’ve had so far, how many contacts we still have yet to call into, etc.

The third type of deliverable that we’ll be providing you with will be the final program export.

  • We like to plant the seed with you now, but we’ll cover this at the end of the campaign. This document is really a value-add from working with TSL. At the end of the campaign, we’ll compile all the data that we used and developed into a cleanly-scrubbed list, which will include the business intelligence that we uncovered from our calling. We’ll review this data together at the end of the campaign and then that list will be yours to integrate back into your CRM and use for any future internal marketing efforts.
  • I will say that TSL feels this document can really hold equal value to the opportunities uncovered during the campaign.

Now, let’s discuss your sales process. We want to make sure that our process flows well into your system. So just a couple questions:

  • Who would be my focal point for receiving opportunities?
  • And who will be executing the follow-up? i.e. you or another rep, or multiple reps?

Any questions on what I’ve already gone over?

  • Great; we’re almost done - just a few more things:

The fourth and final document that TSL will prepare will be a call guide. This is a document that we will give BDTMs to use for their calling efforts. We don’t use “scripts”—we consider that a dirty word—so this is meant to be used as a guide. It will outline the details of your company and the solutions offered, the message of this campaign, and questions for them to use to uncover business intelligence and potential pains. This is a document that I will prepare and then I will be sending it to you so that you have the opportunity to make any desired edits.

  • Regarding the message, we find the most success when we can focus on a broad solution area such as all storage (i.e. on-prem, cloud, backup, and DR) but also the broader the message the more success we tend to see. From my understanding you can handle these solution areas: _____. Can we focus on those solutions areas for this campaign?
  • Any collateral or reference material regarding the message will help make the call guide stronger. Do you have any you can provide?

Ok, and let’s discuss data.

  • What is the geography you are able to target? Keep in mind that the larger that geo the better. For instance, if you are located in FL, the states of FL, GA, SC, AL would be a great geo.
  • Regarding company size:
    • What number of employees are you hoping to target? For a lot of the campaigns we’ve been running we tend to pull lists of midmarket employees, like 100-1,000. Is that okay with you or would you like to narrow it?
    • Are there any revenue requirements or can we pull all revenues within that employee range?
      • [INTERNAL PM NOTE]: Unless this is a large enterprise priced campaign (which means a price per lead of $1,750+ (after PM and data fees are removed) then it has to be a max of 1,000 employees and no higher than $249 Mil in revenue. If client wants to target more than 1,000 employees or $250+ Mil then the campaign must be re-scoped to fit that market which means the lead count will decrease.
    • As far as industries go, we tend to recommend cross-industry, which includes all industries including SLED and FED. Would that be acceptable to you or do you need to remove any industries?
      • [INTERNAL PM NOTE]: SLED = State and Local government and EDucation [k-12 and higher ed], and FED = FEDeral Government).

Thank you for this information. As we wrap things up, let’s handle a few action items:

  • What day of the week and time is best for our bi-weekly checkpoint call? I will send a calendar invite shortly.
  • I will also send out an action items email with my contact information and our PQMs’ as well. It will outline the highlights of what we discussed today and the to-dos for each of us.
  • I will send a call guide and list within the next few days. When you receive them please review them and make any and all changes you feel are necessary to be deemed “Approved” for my team to use. Then, send them back to me along with any collateral specific to your organization. Once all of these items have been completed and received, your campaign will enter our queue to start calling. We believe that every campaign deserves the proper attention so we have a campaign queue and don’t put a campaign into market until we have all the items we need and proper staffing ready to really give your campaign the attention and dedication it requires. The queue typically lasts 1-3 weeks, and I will keep you in the loop at all times and you will know exactly when calling is scheduled to begin on your campaign.

That wraps up our kickoff call. I look forward to a great campaign together! Have a great rest of your day and we will speak on X DATE.

 

Pass-Based Programs

Hi XXX, it’s great to meet you, I’m X. So, let me just quickly explain the TSL team that you’ll be working with:

  • I am the program manager on this campaign; I will be the day-to-day contact and will coordinate the weekly checkpoint calls, and creation of any tracking and supporting documents.
  • X will be our program quality manager on this campaign- he/she will be the quality overlay on this campaign. He/She will remain engaged and will be cc’d on everything and will join most of calls that we have. We will be in close communication on this campaign and he/she will be there to help in any way needed and to ensure that the program runs smoothly. You can also reach out to him/her with any questions or concerns or if I am out of the office.
  • Then there are the business development team members (BDTM for short). As the program manager, I will oversee the BDTMs. These are the folks that will be prospecting directly into the accounts.
  • If at any point you are concerned about the campaign or the communication level, please let me know so that we can touch base.

So, let me start by asking you this: have you used an outside firm for lead generation in the past?

  • If yes – What was your experience?

Ok, so let’s review the program details.

  • For this campaign we will be making X passes into X contacts and sending over opportunities as we uncover them. For this project there is no lead guarantee, as such we will be in close communication regarding what it is we are seeing. If we are seeing concerns that the message isn’t resonating, or the list seems to be off, we will be sure to communicate this with you proactively. We will also make recommendations for adjustments if necessary. If at any point you are concerned about the campaign or the communication level, please let me know so that we can touch base.
  • Opportunities will really vary based on the customer’s wants and/or needs. We aim to find the business problem at the company that your solution sets could address and make a determination on that contact’s disposition toward further discussion with one of your representatives about the stated problem, business pain, or pending projects.
  • With that being said, we aim to really open the door to allow your team and you to start a relationship and nurture the account from there. So, it’s important to note that our activities are designed to create awareness so that you can start your sales cycle. We may speak with some folks that are just realizing they have a problem and want to begin their evaluation journey and others may be further down the process and are now looking for quotes, but the key aspect is that they will all be open to hearing more from your organization and including you in their evaluation process.
  • When we find a prospect that has a need and is a fit for your organization and the campaign message, we will send it over as a lead. A lead is, by our definition, something that is BANT-qualified. So, it will be a prospect who has indicated that they have a current pain or project that your company could potentially address, and for which they plan to evaluate solutions within the next 12 months. The prospect must also have explicitly identified himself or herself as a part of the decision-making and/or evaluation process. And, we will work to obtain budget information whenever possible but will always confirm that they can set a budget if value is seen in your solution.

Once an opportunity is discovered:

  • TSL will alert you by sending over an opportunity report in the form of a 1-2 page pdf document. This report will contain details about the company, the prospect’s details, details about the account’s current environment/solutions and most importantly, a summary of their needs that we’ve uncovered through our call with them. This is essentially meant to serve as a snapshot of our initial call and is intended to give you a firm starting point for your discussions.
  • All leads will be sent in the form of a conference call so, we will not only alert you with an email containing the opportunity report, but we will follow up that email with a calendar invite for the date/time, with details for the bridge that you or your rep will need to call into, and with the report attached. We ask that you or your rep join calls 5 minutes prior to the scheduled date and time so that you have an opportunity to discuss with the BDTM any pending questions you may have regarding the lead report. We also ask that, when possible, you stick around after the conference call is finished for just a few moments so that you can provide any feedback you may have about the call to our BDTM.
  • We do request that when we send you a lead report you reply within 48 hours with your reps’ full contacts details. That includes name, email address, and phone number. We ask for this because reps get very busy and often will forget about a call - even when it’s set on their calendar. If we have their contact details, we can contact them directly to get them on the bridge verses having to go through you.

Now, for conference calls, we typically provide 3-5 business days’ lead time—is that enough for you to coordinate internally and assign the prospect to one of your reps?

  • [IF NO]: How much buffer time should we allow you?
  • Do you or your team have any blackout dates? Or times of the day that you tend to have meetings and prefer we try to avoid?

Lastly, on the topic of conference calls:

  • TSL will always call the prospect 24 hours prior to the scheduled date/time to confirm with the prospect.
  • In the event we send you an opportunity report and calendar invite for a time that you cannot keep, we will also take responsibility for rescheduling the call on your behalf. However, please just note that we do require 24 hours’ notice to do this. Otherwise, the lead will nonetheless count as a deliverable for the campaign, but because we strive for customer satisfaction, we will still make every effort to reschedule the call.
  • We will also take ownership of rescheduling in the event of a prospect no-show.

As for the TSL process and how the magic happens:

  • It is important to note that when we are executing this campaign, we will be representing ourselves as calling from your organization. I mention this because when you or your rep speak to the account they should NOT reference TSL Marketing (for example, “Hi, I have the report here from TSL Marketing and it looks like you’re interested in x, how can I help you?”).
    • We do this for 2 reasons:
  • One, because throughout the course of this campaign, we look at ourselves as essentially a marketing arm of your company.
  • And two, we don’t want to confuse prospects.

As we begin any outbound campaign, we put it through our tollgate process. We spend the first 3-5 weeks ensuring the campaign passes our list quality, audience fit, and messaging resonance tollgates. If we fail to pass any of the tollgates, we will identify 2 potential corrective actions and then re-start the process until the campaign passes all our tollgates. Rest assured you will be kept in the loop during this process.

Next, we always find better campaign satisfaction when we can remain in contact with you consistently throughout the campaign. We will have a bi-weekly checkpoint call to accomplish 3 things:

  • One, to assure that all leads have been received. This is the check and balance that none of the opportunity reports have been overlooked or lost in spam filters.
  • Two, to get any feedback and next step information around the opportunities. Feedback is vital for us. So for example, if you had a follow-up call that went well, but you realized that it would have actually been a little more helpful to you if you had had a certain piece of information in the report that wasn’t provided, then getting that feedback early on can ensure that we ask for that information and provide it when possible in the next opportunity reports.
  • And finally, the third goal of this call is to go through the second type of deliverable for this campaign: the progress report.
    • This is an Excel document that will be sent to you prior to all checkpoint calls. It will have a list of opportunities that have been passed to your team. The report will outline some high-level opportunity details, but more importantly, will help us understand the progress of the opportunities once your team begins nurturing them.
    • The progress report will also give you a snapshot of where we stand with our calling efforts. So, it will show how many “not interested” dispositions we’ve had so far, how many contacts we still have yet to call into, etc.

The third type of deliverable that we’ll be providing you with will be the final program export.

  • We like to plant the seed with you now, but we’ll cover this at the end of the campaign. This document is really a value-add from working with TSL. At the end of the campaign, we’ll compile all the data that we used and developed into a cleanly-scrubbed list, which will include the business intelligence that we uncovered from our calling. We’ll review this data together at the end of the campaign and then that list will be yours to integrate back into your CRM and use for any future internal marketing efforts.
  • I will say that TSL feels this document can really hold equal value to the opportunities uncovered during the campaign.

Now, let’s discuss your sales process. We want to make sure that our process flows well into your system. So just a couple questions:

  • Who would be my focal point for receiving opportunities?
  • And who will be executing the follow-up? i.e. you or another rep, or multiple reps?

Any questions on what I’ve already gone over?

  • Great; we’re almost done - just a few more things:

The fourth and final document that TSL will prepare will be a call guide. This is a document that we will give BDTMs to use for their calling efforts. We don’t use “scripts”—we consider that a dirty word—so this is meant to be used as a guide. It will outline the details of your company and the solutions offered, the message of this campaign, and questions for them to use to uncover business intelligence and potential pains. This is a document that I will prepare and then I will be sending it to you so that you have the opportunity to make any desired edits.

  • Regarding the message, we find the most success when we can focus on a broad solution area such as all storage (i.e. on-prem, cloud, backup, and DR) but also the broader the message the more success we tend to see. From my understanding you can handle these solution areas: _____. Can we focus on those solutions areas for this campaign?
  • Any collateral or reference material regarding the message will help make the call guide stronger. Do you have any you can provide?

Ok, and let’s discuss data.

  • What is the geography you are able to target? Keep in mind that the larger that geo the better. For instance, if you are located in FL, the states of FL, GA, SC, AL would be a great geo.
  • Regarding company size:
    • What number of employees are you hoping to target? For a lot of the campaigns we’ve been running we tend to pull lists of midmarket employees, like 100-1,000. Is that okay with you or would you like to narrow it?
    • Are there any revenue requirements or can we pull all revenues within that employee range?
      • [INTERNAL PM NOTE]: Unless this is a large enterprise priced campaign (which means a price per lead of $1,750+ (after PM and data fees are removed) then it has to be a max of 1,000 employees and no higher than $249 Mil in revenue. If client wants to target more than 1,000 employees or $250+ Mil then the campaign must be re-scoped to fit that market which means the lead count will decrease.
    • As far as industries go, we tend to recommend cross-industry, which includes all industries including SLED and FED. Would that be acceptable to you or do you need to remove any industries?
      • [INTERNAL PM NOTE]: SLED = State and Local government and EDucation [k-12 and higher ed], and FED = FEDeral Government).

Thank you for this information. As we wrap things up, let’s handle a few action items:

  • What day of the week and time is best for our bi-weekly checkpoint call? I will send a calendar invite shortly.
  • I will also send out an action items email with my contact information and our PQMs’ as well. It will outline the highlights of what we discussed today and the to-dos for each of us.
  • I will send a call guide and list within the next few days. When you receive them please review them and make any and all changes you feel are necessary to be deemed “Approved” for my team to use. Then, send them back to me along with any collateral specific to your organization. Once all of these items have been completed and received, your campaign will enter our queue to start calling. We believe that every campaign deserves the proper attention so we have a campaign queue and don’t put a campaign into market until we have all the items we need and proper staffing ready to really give your campaign the attention and dedication it requires. The queue typically lasts 1-3 weeks, and I will keep you in the loop at all times and you will know exactly when calling is scheduled to begin on your campaign.

That wraps up our kickoff call. I look forward to a great campaign together! Have a great rest of your day and we will speak on X DATE.

 

Plug-in Campaigns or Kicking Off Partners within Distributor Campaigns

Hi XXX, it’s great to meet you, this is X. So, let me just quickly explain the TSL team that you’ll be interfacing with:

  • I am the program manager on this campaign; I will be the day-to-day contact and will coordinate the weekly checkpoint calls, and creation of any tracking and supporting documents.
  • X will be our program quality manager on this campaign- he/she will be the quality overlay on this campaign. He/She will remain engaged and will be cc’d on everything and will join most of calls that we have. We will be in close communication on this campaign and he/she will be there to help in any way needed and to ensure that the program runs smoothly. You can also reach out to him/her with any questions or concerns or if I am out of the office.
  • Then there are the business development team members, BDTM for short- as the program manager, I will oversee the BDTMs. These are the folks that will be prospecting directly into the accounts.

So, let me start by asking you this: have you used an outside firm for lead generation in the past?

If yes – What was your experience?

Ok, so let’s focus on the program’s details:

For this campaign

  • If we have a per partner lead guarantee - We have a lead/SQL goal of X .
  • If no lead guarantee per partner – This is a round robin campaign in which there is no lead guarantee per partner but we try to keep them as even as possible. With that being said it is suggested to widen your geo focus to help you get as leads as possible.

If at any point you feel that you are concerned about the campaign or the communication level, please let me know so that we can touch base.

  • Opportunities will really vary based on the customer’s wants and/or needs. We aim to find the business problem at the company that your solution sets could address and make a determination on that contact’s disposition toward further discussion with one of your representatives about the stated problem, business pain, or pending projects.
  • With that being said, we aim to really open the door to allow your team and you to start a relationship and nurture the account from there. So, it’s important to note that our activities are designed to create awareness so that you can start your sales cycle. We may speak with some folks that are just realizing they have a problem and want to begin their evaluation journey and others may be further down the process and are now looking for quotes, but the key aspect is that they will all be open to hearing more from your organization and including you in their evaluation process.
  • When we find a prospect that has a need and is a fit for your organization and the campaign message, we will send it over as a lead. A lead is, by our definition, something that is BANT-qualified. So, it will be a prospect who has indicated that they have a current pain or project that your company could potentially address, and for which they plan to evaluate solutions within the next 12 months. The prospect must also have explicitly identified himself or herself as a part of the decision-making and/or evaluation process. And, we will work to obtain budget information whenever possible but will always confirm that they can set a budget if value is seen in your solution.

Once an opportunity is discovered:

  • TSL will alert you by sending over an opportunity report in the form of a 1-2 page pdf document. This report will contain details about the company, the prospect’s details, details about the account’s current environment/solutions and most importantly, a summary of their needs that we’ve uncovered through our call with them. This is essentially meant to serve as a snapshot of our initial call and is intended to give you a firm starting point for your discussions.
  • All leads will be sent in the form of a conference call so, we will not only alert you with an email containing the opportunity report, but we will follow up that email with a calendar invite for the date/time, with details for the bridge that you or your rep will need to call into, and with the report attached. We ask that you or your rep join calls 5 minutes prior to the scheduled date and time so that you have an opportunity to discuss with the BDTM any pending questions you may have regarding the lead report. We also ask that, when possible, you stick around after the conference call is finished for just a few moments so that you can provide any feedback you may have about the call to our BDTM.
  • We do request that when we send you a lead report you reply within 48 hours with your reps’ full contacts details. That includes name, email address, and phone number. We ask for this because reps get very busy and often will forget about a call - even when it’s set on their calendar. If we have their contact details, we can contact them directly to get them on the bridge verses having to go through you.

Now, for conference calls, we typically provide 3-5 business days’ lead time—is that enough for you to coordinate internally and assign the prospect to one of your reps?

  • [IF NO]: How much buffer time should we allow you?
  • Do you or your team have any blackout dates? Or times of the day that you tend to have meetings and prefer we try to avoid?

Lastly, on the topic of conference calls:

  • TSL will always call the prospect 24 hours prior to the scheduled date/time to confirm with the prospect.
  • In the event we send you an opportunity report and calendar invite for a time that you cannot keep, we will also take responsibility for rescheduling the call on your behalf. However, please just note that we do require 24 hours’ notice to do this. Otherwise, the lead will nonetheless count as a deliverable for the campaign, but because we strive for customer satisfaction, we will still make every effort to reschedule the call.
  • We will also take ownership of rescheduling in the event of a prospect no-show.

As for the TSL process and how the magic happens:

  • It is important to note that when we are executing this campaign, we will be representing ourselves as calling from your organization. I mention this because when you or your rep speak to the account they should NOT reference TSL Marketing (for example, “Hi, I have the report here from TSL Marketing and it looks like you’re interested in x, how can I help you?”).
    • We do this for 2 reasons:
  1. One, because throughout the course of this campaign, we look at ourselves as essentially a marketing arm of your company.
  2. And two, we don’t want to confuse prospects.

Next, we always find better campaign satisfaction when we can remain in contact with you consistently throughout the campaign. With that being said, we will have a weekly checkpoint call. During this routine checkpoint call we like to accomplish 3 things:

  1. One, to assure that all leads have landed—this is the check and balance that none of the opportunity reports have been overlooked or lost in spam filters; and
  2. Two, to get any feedback and next step information from you on opportunities. Feedback is vital for us. So for example, if you had a follow-up call that went well, but you realized that it would have actually been a little more helpful to you if you had had a certain piece of information in the report that wasn’t in there, then getting that feedback early on can ensure that we start aiming to get that information in the next opportunity reports that we send to you.
  3. And finally, the third goal of this call is to go through the second type of deliverable for this campaign: the progress report.
    • This is an Excel document that will be sent to you prior to all checkpoint calls. It will have a list of opportunities that have been passed to your team. The report will outline some high-level opportunity details, but more importantly, will help us understand the progress of the opportunities once your team begins nurturing them.
    • The progress report will also give you a snapshot of where we stand with our calling efforts. So, it will show how many “not interested” dispositions we’ve had so far, how many contacts we still have yet to call into, etc.

Now, let’s discuss your sales process. We want to make sure that our process flows well into your system. So just a few questions:

  • Who would be my focal point for receiving opportunities?
  • And who will be executing the follow-up? i.e. you or another rep, or multiple reps?

Any questions on what I’ve already gone over?

  • Great, and we’re almost done, just a few more details to review with you:
    • As this effort is part of a larger campaign the message as already been outlined and is X.
    • As far as geo goes, this is a US wide focused campaign and it is recommended that you try to widen your geo as much as possible. For instance, if you are located in FL, the states of FL, GA, SC, AL would be a great geo. With that being said what states can you cover?
    • Regarding company size: For this campaign the company size has been set at X to X.
    • Lastly as far as industries we go- for this campaign it has been determined we will be covering X.

Ok so as we wrap things up, here are a few action items for us:

  • What day of the week and time is best for our bi-weekly checkpoint call? I will send a calendar invite shortly.
  • I will also send out an action items email with my contact information and our PQMs’ as well. It will outline the highlights of what we discussed today and the to-dos for each of us.

That wraps up our kickoff call. I look forward to a great campaign together! Have a great rest of your day and we will speak on X DATE.