Category: Jo.e Pulse

How Do I Build a Marketing Ops Team?

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Hi Jo,

After several years in a single-person marketing operations team, my company is now willing to invest in growing MOPs.

Encouraging as it is to have initial support from leadership, this will be my first time in charge of building out a team.

How can I hire, structure, and lead a MOPs team effectively? What should I account for in my plan?

Thanks,
Leading Leah.

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Congrats on getting buy-in, Leah.

By giving the green light to growth, your company is showing they take the success of MOPs seriously.

Creating a team from the ground up is no easy feat, but as a new and rapidly evolving function, building and leading a team in the MOPs space comes with a few unique challenges to plan around.

Here’s a rundown of the key considerations your strategy should address:

Competencies

While the tools and processes in your organization will determine some of the fine print, the essential mix of skills in a MOPs team broadly breaks down as follows:

  • People leader who understands marketing technology platforms.
  • Day-to-day owner of each marketing system and tool.
  • Data expert to own reporting and data warehousing, with expertise in BI tools (e.g. Tableau).
  • Someone to handle day-to-day deployment and requests from Marketing, building campaigns, emails, and other tactical pieces.

Note: Depending on your budget for headcount, multiple functions can live in one individual; for example, you might own admin or reporting while leading the team.

 

Role design:

Whether you’re hiring one person or several, indicate in the title if each role is a generalist or specialist position, and to what extent the position’s deliverables roll uphill and have the candidate interfacing with C-Suite.

A smaller team might have a MOPs Manager (wearing all hats) and a Junior MOPs Specialist in support.

In larger organizations, you tend to see Senior Directors and VPs of MOPs along with Managers of Martech and Analytics. Note how those roles suggest degrees of seniority and focus.

 

Attracting candidates:

The benchmarks of expertise in MOPs are different from more standardized functions like IT.

It’s not uncommon to see job postings for senior MOPs leaders that ask for 10-15 years of experience—in a function that hasn’t existed for that long.

Without prior experience hiring in MOPs, collaborate with HR to research the correct compensation and realistic skill sets for roles in the space.

We’re in a candidate-driven job market right now, so your offers need to be compelling to poach top talent.

 

Nurturing internal talent:

For the same reason, recognize and reward effort.

Don’t overlook junior colleagues from adjacent teams (e.g. Marketing, IT) who want to learn new things.

Some of the best professionals get their start after an organization gives them the chance to grow, so keep an eye out for ambitious internal candidates.

 

Leadership initiatives:

MOPs people are driven to excel and willing to take a swing at things; you want to harness that competitive nature in productive ways.

Your team should understand what success looks like, so share high-level KPIs for the organization that cascade downwards to Marketing and MOPs.

Encourage your team to create job descriptions for more senior roles above them.

This accomplishes several things:

Clear upward career trajectories will incentivize people to act for the jobs they want.

If your team is displaying these advanced competencies, it’ll help in negotiating promotions, training, and raises with HR.

You’ve got this,

Jo Pulse.

How Do I Create a Webinar Campaign?

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Hey Jo,

I’ve been asked to manage a webinar campaign at work.

It’s my first time taking charge of webinars, and I’m unsure of all the processes to account for and the information I need to gather.

Where do I start with webinars? What do I need to do to make this succeed?

Thanks,
Webinar Willa.

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Willa, thanks for writing in.

Putting a webinar campaign together for the first time isn’t always easy, but it’ll be a rewarding experience and a good step forward in your role.

From my time working on webinars over the years, I’ve found there to be a pretty low general awareness from other stakeholders towards the demands of webinar campaigns and the required preparation.

 

“The concept of your webinar needs to be compelling and have a solid strategy.”

 

Before you can start to build a registration page, the concept of your webinar needs to be compelling and the strategy solid.

So, before focusing on anything technical, take some time to clarify the fundamentals. Your manager and team are there to help.

 

Key points to establish:

👉 Purpose: What’s your webinar trying to accomplish? Who’s the target audience?

👉 Content: What’s your webinar about? Who’s presenting?

👉 Delivery: Which webinar software will you be using? Is it integrated with your marketing automation platform?

👉 Promotion: Do you know which channels you’ll use and how you’ll allocate spend? What copy and assets do you need?

Look back at past webinar campaign report data to inform your decisions here.

👉 Scope: Ask a colleague to work with you to develop a webinar blueprint or briefing form that contains all of the relevant information.

This can help to establish and convey the scale of the work involved to other team members as you go through the process.

At this stage, you can start working out the flow of processes and getting stuck into the technical side.

👉 Share your steps: You want all your relevant stakeholders to understand the steps, timescales, accountable team members, and dependencies involved in getting each piece of the puzzle together.

A visualization tool can help you communicate your processes succinctly.

👉 Templates and testing: Program templates are likely to save you some time.

Once you’ve uploaded them with the relevant details, loop a colleague in to test them out.

Play with it until you can register for the webinar, get the correct emails flowing at the right time, and generate a link to access the session.

👉 Self-serve: Self-service updates will make your life easier after you start the program. Create a shared space where relevant teams like Sales can see automatic updates with registrants and attendees.

 

“Think about how you want to engage your registrants after the webinar.”

 

👉 Follow-up: Think about how you want to engage your registrants after the webinar, whether you send a follow-up email to suggest other relevant webinars or set up a nurture program.

After you’ve got performance data on the webinar, bring your team together to show how your processes worked and share the results.

You’ll get the opportunity to reflect on what went well and what you can improve for the next campaign.

But this is also your moment of recognition; congratulations, you pulled it off.

You’ve got this,

Jo Pulse.

How Do I Show My Boss My Value?

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Hi Joe,

I’m not sure what to do.

As a MOPs professional, I do so much for the company and am always juggling a ton of things on any given day.

 

“My boss thinks I only work in Marketo, but I actually take care of so much more!”

 

My boss thinks I only work in Marketo, but I actually take care of so much more!

What can I do to show them my contributions and how I’m actually spending my time?

Thank you,
Undervalued Uriel

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Hi, Uriel,

I wish this weren’t a common problem, but it is.

So often, MOPs “teams” are made up of a small group of people that sit under Marketing or Sales, reporting into leaders that don’t fully understand what MOPs is and how much effort it takes to get it right.

It’s a challenge, particularly for small teams that are left to manage multiple tasks and projects without much investment or support.

There’s hope on the horizon, though.

The talent pool of MOPs professionals and leaders is growing every day, and that means that companies are far more likely to hire managers and directors who understand how many plates you have to spin in a role like yours.

In the meantime, here are some of the things you can do to improve your current situation.

 

Have a transparent conversation

Your manager doesn’t know what they don’t know.

And while it’s not your job to educate them, you can have a frank conversation about the different things you’re doing and how you can’t do them all.

Going into this conversation, take the time to:

➡️ List out tasks you do

➡️ How much time you spend on them, and

➡️ Prioritize them based on how much value you feel they add to the marketing team.

If you feel that you need another person on the team, share your advice around how you would divide the tasks to make the most impact. At the end of the day, you’ll be the MOPs expert in that conversation, so make sure you show that expertise.

 

Take a forward-looking approach

Another important conversation to have with your manager is about the direction you want your career to take.

As you know, there are so many paths and specializations to follow in MOPs.

Choosing a path and communicating that to your manager will help them understand that you can’t be the “catch-all” for MOPs, and it will give them the opportunity to support you with the training and mentorship you need.

Pair this with strategic thinking around where your organization can take MOPs moving forward, and a good manager will be even more inclined to craft a role that is right for you.

 

Don’t be afraid to make a change

If none of that works, then it might be time to look elsewhere.

You deserve to work for a team that understands how important your role is — so start looking for one.

Companies that have built a strong marketing ops culture will have various people in MOPs roles, including a director or VP who has years of experience in the space.

The job descriptions will also be telling.

If the hiring manager has written down a laundry list of tasks they want a specific MOPs role to fill, you can bet they don’t fully grasp what MOPs is all about.

 

“Your future is in your hands — and it’s bright.”

 

Your future is in your hands — and it’s bright.

As MOPs continues to grow as a space, there are going to be so many more solid opportunities for you to build your career with. Just wait and see.

Read our recent column I’m All Alone in Marketing Ops, How Do I Get Help? for more advice.

You’ve got this,
Joe Pulse

How Can I Increase Data Integrity in My Organization?

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Hi Joe,

The data situation in my organization is a mess.

Whenever it’s time for Sales and Marketing to collaborate, they both bring different insights to the table from data sets that don’t correspond with each other.

 

“We struggle to make confident decisions about campaign activities and spending.”

 

As a result, our data is unreliable, and we struggle to be proactive and make confident decisions about campaign activities and spending.

What sort of change needs to happen to improve our data integrity? How can I encourage teams in our organization to participate in sorting out our data?

Thanks,
Siloed Sam.

 

Break silos

To align your efforts, avoid duplication, miscommunication, and rogue analytics coming from each business unit, all your data needs to live under one roof.

 

“Your first move should be to invest in a central data warehouse.”

 

Your first move should be to invest in a central data warehouse.

Your teams can easily maintain the cleanliness of your data through master data management and data cataloging.

 

Allocate costs based on each team’s resources

Modern platforms like Snowflake make it simple to allocate costs across different parts of the organization.

Your organization can treat storage and processing as separate line items that can be easily monitored by different business areas. This makes it easier for organizations to manage data in a way that’s focused on their needs.

Teams with limited budgets can invite more teams to join and enable easy data sharing among them without having to cover the entire cost.

 

Get leadership buy-in

Marketing and sales teams that lack data literacy tend to shy away from data management. To overcome this, leadership needs to infuse the value of data into your culture.

Leadership can accomplish this by:

👉 Requesting data from Marketing to clarify insights and support decisions.

👉 Investing in data enablement for their marketers.

👉 Setting a course for data and reporting initiatives.

 

Find the right leaders

Any data transformation effort needs to be staffed with people who know about data pipelines, business intelligence (BI), and how to present to various stakeholders.

Depending on where these skills lie, this initiative might live under your CMO or IT.

Is IT’s partnership with Marketing strong? Can MOPs translate the technicalities for Sales and Marketing?

Consultants and agency partners can jump-start the process, but you need internal clarity beforehand on what your organization wants to achieve.

The rise of new data warehousing tools like Snowflake has made it more achievable than ever for businesses to de-silo their data with minimal upfront investment.

 

“As more Marketing activities take place online, the consequence is growth in campaign data.”

 

As more Marketing activities take place online, the consequence is growth in campaign data.

Take advantage of these newly accessible methods for sorting, capturing, and analyzing data, and your revenue machine will run more effectively than before.

If you need any other help, let us know.

You’ve got this,
Joe Pulse.

How Do I Evaluate New Pieces of Technology?

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Hi Joe,

I’ve been asked to evaluate new solutions that could replace one of our tools.

This is the first time I’m having input into the assessment and purchase of new software, and I’m not really sure how I should approach this.

I have two specific questions:

  • How can I identify the most effective tool for my company?
  • What qualities should I look for to guide the decision?

 
Thanks,

Evaluating Evan.

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Evan, it’s good that you’re thinking critically about this.

The amount of martech solutions is increasing by the day, so it’s becoming more of a challenge to cut through the noise and advocate for the best tech.

 

“It’s almost a rite of passage
for people in MOPs to get burned by a tool.”

 

It’s almost a rite of passage for people in MOPs to get burned by a tool, whether:

❌ they were oversold on its capabilities
❌ the solution didn’t gel with their stack, or
❌ it just wasn’t the right fit for the problem or goal at hand.

I’ve participated in evaluations where solutions seemed promising — useful functionalities, relevant integrations, good price point — only to not quite deliver on their purpose.

Frustrating as it is to wait out a contract, these experiences make clear how important it is to be intentional with your tool purchases and how sometimes, this is a difficult thing to get right.

 

Guide your evaluation:

 
👉 Know your agenda: What problems are you trying to solve or efficiency gains are you trying to achieve?

Whether you want to improve a particular process, consolidate multiple tools into one, or make it easier to scale, see if you can accomplish this during the trial or demo phase or determine whether it’s possible or not to do so.

This is a big clue as to how suitable a tool is.

 
👉 Keep focused on your primary issue: You might spot something interesting about a tool that isn’t why you wanted it in the first place.

That observation can lead you to solve a different problem or open a new opportunity, but keep in mind the capability or issue that’s driven you to enter the process.

 
👉 Understand its total value: How well does a tool address the breadth of issues and functionality gaps in your company?

You might find a solution that does exactly what you need it to without broader utility or an adequate tool for your intended use case that fits optimally with other aspects of your business.

Both are valid motives for choosing a tool; consult with the stakeholders in your company who’ll use or sign off on the tool to determine which would bring more value.

 
👉 Integration: As a standalone product, is the solution you’re looking at best in class at what it’s designed to do?

Is it an established market leader or gaining positive momentum? Does it integrate well with your CRM, CMS, and marketing automation platform? These are positive signs that a solution has longevity and that it’s compatible with your stack.

Look for online reviews, Gartner Magic Quadrant placements, and partner/vendor certification with your core pieces of tech.

 
👉 Research the solution provider: It’s worth doing your homework on the solution provider just as much as the tool itself.

Take into account the deployment options, customer support, and training that the vendor offers, along with any third-party reviews and feedback from your network.

 
For more reading on this topic, check out our piece ‘Is It Worth It? The Hidden Cost of New Martech Tools.’

You’ve got this,

Joe Pulse

How Should I Approach My First Days in Marketing Automation?

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Hi Jo,

I’m due to begin my first role in marketing automation with a new company, and I’m wondering what I can do to get off to a good start.

I’m interested in the technical and data-driven elements of marketing. But I’m coming from a role focused more on campaign content.

This will be my first time getting truly hands-on with a marketing automation platform.

What things should I prioritize learning? How can I make a good impression on my new team?

Thanks,

New Naomi.

Naomi, congratulations on your new opportunity!

It’s natural that you want to shine and show your new colleagues that you’re someone they can count on. That said, don’t feel pressured to get a handle on all the complexities of your tools and the detailed dynamics of your industry and company just yet.

 

“Marketing automation platforms have a steep learning curve, and the MOPs space constantly changes.”

 

Marketing automation platforms have a steep learning curve, and the MOPs space constantly changes. When I first started in marketing automation, I found there to be no shortage of new things to learn. including the:

➡️ technicalities of the platform
➡️ priorities of the business and
➡️ ways that my new teams work together.

Confidence and fluency in these things are what you’ll develop over time as you get comfortable in the role.

For now, it’s best to focus on understanding the:

✅ essence of marketing automation
✅ fundamentals of your platform, and
✅ things your teams need from MOPs to work effectively.

 
Here are some steps I recommend you take as you settle into your new job:

 

Think user-centric:

Platforms are all about the user experience.

If someone is reading your content, you have one shot at engaging them further — what does this page or email need to convey to encourage them to download that whitepaper or click through?

Reflect on the principles of demand gen and inbound marketing. They underlie all the capacities a platform has to bring a campaign to life.

 

Resources:

Check out your platform’s support documentation, learning hub (e.g. Marketo Engage Tutorials, HubSpot Academy), and community forums.

These resources will help you to become self-sufficient, answer questions, and explore the different features of each platform. And, you can also develop a network by participating in user groups and discussions.

By interacting with people over time, you’ll increasingly establish yourself and learn more about the broader direction of the MOPs space.

 

Talk to people:

What do various people in your teams like or dislike about your marketing automation platform? What challenges are they experiencing? Talking about these things is a good way to start forming relationships, and it helps to focus your learning of the platform.

If you can discover how to solve problems that people are having, you’ll quickly establish rapport and expertise.

 

Make small improvements:

Your new team might want you to do things by the book or optimize established processes where you can.

Always be receptive to what your manager asks, but suggest potential areas for improvement along the way. Read our post ‘How Do I Get Management To Listen To Me?‘ for more ideas.

Whether you identify some tweaks to a page that could bring more conversions or introduce new visualizations that make data more digestible, it’s good to subtly show how you can improve things and make peoples’ lives easier.

You’ve got this,

Jo Pulse.

How Do I Get Management to Listen to Me?

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Hi Joe,

I’m having trouble getting respect from my marketing leadership.

Working in marketing ops means I understand the processes between Marketing and Sales, what’s working well and what isn’t, but I don’t think my boss values my insights.

My role involves lots of procedural responsibilities like building emails and handing leads over, which I think creates the perception that my contributions aren’t important to the big-picture strategy.

How do I get my boss to listen to me? How do I make them see that my work adds value?

Thanks,

Ignored Isabel.

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Isabel, I know this is tough.

Getting your boss to really appreciate the value you provide in MOPs can feel like pushing a boulder up a hill.

After years of progressing my career in MOPs and working with senior leadership figures, I’ve seen a real blind spot from management towards the complexities of marketing operations.

That said, the disconnect goes both ways.

A mistake I often made earlier in my career was to assume that everyone in a company speaks the same language. What comes fluently to us in MOPs can sound downright alien to people in other fields. For instance:

➡️ Data flows
➡️ Systems maintenance
➡️ Martech infrastructure

It’s rarely apparent to leadership at face value how these components help the company to work productively and achieve revenue targets. Add those things together — poor understanding of MOPs, communication that doesn’t touch the bottom line — and you get a lack of respect.

 

“A story of your value in MOPs
that makes your impact on the business clear.”

 

You’re doing great work that’s worthy of recognition. What’s missing is a story of your value in MOPs that makes your impact on the business clear.

Here’s some advice that can help you gain a seat at the table:

 

Unpack the strategy

Automating a ton of processes doesn’t mean your job is simple.

Every email you build or webinar you host comes after weeks of planning to make sure your campaigns run smoothly and reach the right audiences.

This is how you characterize your role to people who think you’re here to take orders; less plumbing, more architecture.

 

Know the room

You’re at a crossroads between technical know-how and commercial priorities.

Your CTO and IT team might relate to the grittier aspects of your work, but for Marketing and Sales, it’s all about how you’re planning and budgeting for successful campaigns and generating leads.

For responsibilities like vendor relations and data governance, you’ll need to surface how doing those things well helps your company be productive and profitable.

 

Unify your data sources

Reporting and analytics aren’t just ‘nice to haves’ — they’re the best instruments for painting the picture of your impact.

Give your tech stack some TLC and join together all the reporting elements that show how you’re performing against KPIs.

 

Share the right numbers

The most compelling move you can make with data is to leave behind the everyday operational challenges — the amount of tickets you’re handling, processes you’re running — and look at revenue.

👉 How many MQLs converted to SQLs?
👉 How many of those turned into closed deals?
👉 What dollar value are they converting?

Those data points prove your contributions to business growth, so own them.

 

“Persistence
goes the distance.”

 

Getting management to listen means changing their perspective of your value. It might not happen overnight, but persistence goes the distance.

Read our post How Do I Show My Boss My Value? for more advice.

You’ve got this,

Joe Pulse.

Help! I Have to Start Attribution

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Hi Jo,

My company wants to start doing attribution, so I’ve been asked to put together a plan.

Here’s the problem: I have no idea how to do this right.

I’m uncertain about the practicalities my plan should account for or what results to expect.

What kind of commitment is attribution really?

How do I create and carry out a plan that works?

Thanks,

Attribution Amy

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Amy, it’s good that you’re thinking critically about this.

Years back, when my marketing team first took on attribution, we were very excited by all the models and ways of understanding how people engage with campaigns.

My expectation

I was under the impression it was a plug-and-play type deal. Three months down the line, it’ll spit out numbers that tell you exactly where to spend, hands-free.

The reality

Three months in, I had nowhere near a confident grasp of how to use different models and data setups, nor was I making any decisions to optimize spend.

My sales and marketing teams were frustrated — the results we thought were coming were nowhere in sight—and so was I.

 

“I learned something important from that experience:
attribution isn’t magic.”

 

I learned something important from that experience: attribution isn’t magic.

To really work for your business, it’s a gradual process that takes:

✅ long-term refinement
✅ consistent methodology, and
✅ clear communication between Marketing and Sales.

That understanding is your plan’s guiding star.

 

8 attribution tips:

👉 Use a dedicated vendor: Unless your entire job is attribution, there aren’t enough hours in the day to build this effectively on your own. There’s no native ability in CRMs to pivot campaign memberships against opportunities, which is how you start to calculate ROI.

👉 Establish common terminology: Marketing and sales need shared definitions of what it means to source, touch, and influence leads, the same classification of sources vs mediums, and a mutual understanding of how your CRM accounts for revenue and opportunities. This helps to keep your data clean and for Sales to set accurate goals.

👉 Clear data collection: Use UTMs wherever you can, and be consistent with tagging traffic coming into your website.

👉 Get your tools in sync: Many attribution platforms use Salesforce campaign objects. To keep accurate data flowing, check that these are synced correctly with the relevant marketing automation platform (MAP) programs.

👉 Get your processes in order: Make sure that Sales is using opportunities in Salesforce and regularly reporting pipeline and revenue in there. You’ll need these updates to sync to Marketo or your MAP of choice.

👉 Figure out spend: You might think organic traffic is free — but how much are you paying someone to update and optimize the website? Agree with your boss on how to factor in less obvious expenses. Even estimates are useful for arriving at accurate ROI calculations.

👉 Budget for time: Your platform might take 6-12 months to launch. And if it’s a 2nd or 3rd gen platform that offers website cookie tracking, implement that collection right away if you think you’ll need it in the future.

👉 Small goals = achievable goals: Set goals as part of a gradual roadmap that incorporates more robust models only as you get more comfortable with attribution. Small wins that you actually achieve are better than grand plans gone off the rails.

Attribution is a complex business. You want to go far, not fast.

You’ve got this,
Jo.

Do I Have a Future in Marketing Ops?

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Hi Jo,

I’m new to Marketing Operations, and it feels like a wide-open field.

On a given day, I’m planning and budgeting for email campaigns, learning how new integrations work, and working with different teams on issues far and wide.

Sales needs leads scoring, Marketing wants to know where to spend ads, and IT and Data Science need input on the processes for managing our systems and data.

It’s a lot.

I appreciate the challenge and variation of my job, but that same nature makes it difficult to figure out if I’m in the right place or how I might progress. How can I succeed in Marketing Operations? How do I know if I’m on a path with a bright future?

Yours,
Unsure in Utah

Unsure in Utah, you’ve come to the right place.

My journey to marketing operations wasn’t planned. I became the Marketo person for my team while working in demand gen. This was long before MOPs was a carved-out role.

 

“You’re at the crossroads of
many different corners of the company.”

 

I got to grips with how the tool works, how to handle and maintain data, and how to run reports — but that didn’t quite prepare me for the real, full-time deal in MOPs.

You’re at the crossroads of many different corners of the company. The good news is you get to choose where you walk.

 

Determine what excites you

Ask yourself: Of all the things that I’m doing, what really excites me?

If it’s the tactical side of planning and analyzing campaigns, Campaign Management might be for you.

Digital runs on a parallel track, but it takes similar skills with creativity and data, one if you’re equal parts art and science.

Read our post “When Is It Time For a Career Change in Marketing Operations?” for more on this subject.

 

Everything is a learning opportunity.

Here’s the beauty in MOPs: Everything is a learning opportunity.

You’re around different people with unique perspectives, there are new and interesting problems to solve, and new tools and technology, like AI, give you more time/resources/insights to experiment.

There’s always a need for your skills, so if you take the reins and specialize, you’ll go far and fast at once.

 

Positive signs you’re in the right place in MOPs

Wherever you are right now, here are some positive signs that you’re in the right place in MOPs:

👉 You’re being challenged — and you like it.

👉 You’ve got a problem-solving mindset, and you’re learning and growing from putting it to use.

👉 You’ve got access to senior figures, managing upwards and making your opinions heard. This is a tell that your company takes its investment in MOPs (and in you) seriously.

👉 You’re passionate (or at least curious about) your industry and space, what you’re selling, and who you’re selling to.

 

“You’re not an order-taker.
You’re a strategist. A doer.
An expert.”

 

That’s quite a bit to think about, Unsure in Utah.

For now, I’ll leave you with this. You are not an order-taker. You’re a strategist. A doer. An expert.

That’s your future in MOPs.

You’ve got this,
Jo Pulse

How Can Our Teams Create a Better Customer Journey?

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Hi Joe,

The sales team at my company is struggling to close, and it’s become clear that the leads they’re receiving aren’t correctly qualified.

Upon taking a closer look, it seems there is a significant lack of alignment between Marketing and MOPs, especially when it comes to managing leads as they progress through our funnel.

Any advice on how our teams can get back on the same page – and help our Sales team close more deals?

Thanks,

Alignment Anna

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Hi Anna, thanks for writing in.

This is a challenging issue.

The unfortunate news is that it’s a common issue.

The good news is that it’s one that can definitely be remedied with a few tactical moves.

 

“Good communication is
critical to this solution.”

 

I should start by saying: good communication is critical to this solution. Without regular discourse and updates from all sides, alignment between teams is nearly impossible.

With that out of the way, I do have some more practical tips that will improve collaboration between MOPs and Marketing, ensuring they are fully calibrated when it comes to managing your buyer’s journey.

 

1. Plan and document lead progression metrics.

Leads are constantly coming into your database from several different ingestion points, such as

👉 landing pages
👉 paid advertisements
👉 events, and more.

As these leads are collected and segmented, it’s important to put relevant metrics in place that clearly demonstrate the requirements that must be met in order to progress a lead through your system.

For example, these metrics should specifically indicate when a site visitor is converted into a lead, then a marketing-qualified lead (MQL), sales-qualified lead (SQL), sales accepted lead (SAL), and so on, until they eventually become a customer.

Once your teams understand – and agree on – what these metrics are, I encourage you to create a well-defined, metrics-based map of the buyer’s journey that everyone can refer back to.

 

Well-defined buyer’s journey
=
sustained alignment.

 

Having accessible, detailed documentation like this is a reliable way to sustain alignment and eliminate future confusion. It ensures that your MOPs, Marketing, Sales, and even Demand Gen teams know the exact metrics and qualifications that push leads through funnel thresholds – leading to efficient collaboration and more effective campaigns.

Constantly testing these metrics for accuracy is important, too, as it ensures the desires of your Marketing team are aligned with how your audience is interacting with your content.

 

2. Clearly define buyer personas.

It is also important that everyone is on the same page about the categorization of leads as they relate to the type of buyers you want to target. For example, is your company looking to target C-level executives, lower-level managers, or something in between?

The answer to this question must be consistent for every team. Clear buyer personas allow Marketing to create more relevant content, nurture campaigns, and personalized messages that should be delivered at the right time in the buyer’s journey.

And while MOPs doesn’t create the actual content, the team is responsible for managing your lead database. This responsibility includes scoring and qualifying leads based on relevant metrics and characteristics that should be informed by those your buyer personas.

Some examples of these metrics include the number of:

➡️ CTAs a lead has clicked within marketing emails over the past several months.
➡️ service- or product-specific webpages visited.
➡️ interactions they’ve had with sales personnel.

 

3. Leverage tracking for timely content

Once your company’s buyer personas and lead progression metrics are well understood by all teams, the next step is to implement solid processes that track leads throughout the buyer’s journey.

Where is the lead in your sales funnel? Are they at the top of the funnel at the awareness level, in the middle of the funnel past problem identification, or near the end of the funnel and ready to purchase?

These are questions that your MOPs team can answer through the use of good tracking and filtering in your MAP.

This will allow personalized content send-outs, such as nurture campaigns, to be meticulously timed, reaching leads at critical points in their journey.

 

Bringing it all together

Your MOPs and Marketing teams can work together to create the best buyer’s journey possible by:

1️ Documenting proper lead progression metrics for all teams to see.
2️ Clearly defining buyer personas that inform these metrics and steer content creation.
3️ Implementing good tracking processes to enable timely content send-outs.

Ultimately, following these steps will improve your organization’s conversion rates and reduce headaches for your Sales team.

For more advice on aligning sales and marketing, download ‘The Roadmap to B2B Marketing Success.’

You’ve got this,

Joe