8 lead lifecycle Complexities you wish you could already solve

You’re going on a [CUSTomer] journey. A journey through memory. Your destination? A place and time you’ve been before. To reach it, all you have to do is [blank].

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Picture this—you’ve created the greatest cookie-cutter, out-of-the-box lead lifecycle of all time that your MAP and CRM experts say is fool-proof. You’ve promised your boss and leadership teams that they can start seeing revenue climb after a ridiculously quick turnaround date, say yesterday. You go to launch, or simply Q/A because you work smarter, not harder, and discover all your best-laid plans are for naught. Chaos ensues, and now you must unravel the sins of database time. Whatever could have gone wrong?

Is your lead lifecycle as murky and flooded as the plot to Reminiscence? Welcome, cosmic quipstars, to the ops topic of the day, where complexity is just another asteroid to dodge in the vast expanse of your tech stack universe. Buckle up as we dive into the eight lead lifecycle complexities you wish you could already solve.

1. Tracked contacts vs tracked accounts VS Tracked Opportunities

   Hot take, but the reason ABM fails is not because people don’t understand how to leverage the fancy tools leadership buys. 9/10 it’s a data issue where there isn’t a proper pull-through on key data across your lead, contact, account, and opportunity objects. It’s like going on a treasure hunt without a critical clue. Can you get to the gold in the end? Yes, but it’s going to take you a lot more time getting there, and we all know how time is money.
   
   It’s critical to associate all important data points to each object throughout the customer journey to properly track revenue, marketing ROI, and forecast what is coming down the pipeline. Ensure data is properly associated during key record creation, workflow updates, and conversion points. Build reports to identify when these steps have been missed to quickly resolve and ensure your data is up to snuff.

2. Partners and all that applies

   Depending on your business model, if you’re in the B2B space and you aren’t all about ABM, you most likely are all about channel marketing (AKA partner marketing). Depending on how you engage with partners, you may have a seamless process where you’re easily able to identify a partner and how they engage with an opportunity and future customer. Most cases, that partner is shooting from the hip, hitting the sheriff (your CRM) but not your deputy (customer), and you as mayor don’t know what happened. Partners can bring in lots of business but if they aren’t properly associated to customers, things get lost in translation.

   Understand how partner relationships work and how that data translates across your tech stack. Is your partner identifying the customer via a form? How is that data relayed back to your tech stack and how do you connect a partner back to a Closed Won Opportunity? The devil is in the details, my friend.

3. The Ignored Return customers

   First off, let’s clarify what I mean by “return customers” because this can get confusing quickly. For customers that have left and come back, those would be considered former or past customers, not return customers. Return customers are those who buy your product again, or another product from your business.

   When focusing on return customers, some businesses only go so far in the lead management process to identify a Closed Won Opportunity only the first time and then leave the customer to fend for themselves until the business wants more of their money. It feels like a friend that only hits you up when they want something from you, and it feels icky.

   Without clear processes and outreach campaigns, you risk losing out on the ripest, low-hanging opportunity. Did you know that it can cost 5-10x more to acquire new customers than return ones? While it’s important to fuel the pipeline, return customers are where the long play is at.

   Scenarios where return customers can get lost at sea with Tom’s bestie, Wilson, are:
   A sales owner leaves the company and customers are not properly reassigned
   Contract renewal data is not properly associated to the contacts, accounts, and opportunity
   Customers aren’t able to return through proper lead management cycles due to relationship types
   Parent-child hierarchies aren’t connecting opportunities to the right children records

   From a lead lifecycle perspective, there needs to be a way to identify customers that you can upsell or renew, and you need to easily create new opportunities and associate them to the right contacts and accounts to track this. Leverage relationship type fields and stage and status fields to enroll users into relevant campaigns and ensure you’re able to connect them with the right team members at your company. Tracking contract renewal date will also come in clutch as you can work backwards in automated touch point campaigns.
   

4. The dreaded dupes

   If there’s one thing that can turn your marketing dreams into nightmares, it’s duplicate leads. They’re like those pesky recurring nightmares that won’t go away. Duplicates can wreak havoc on your data and processes worse than Taylor Swift ever could with her exes. Investing in a robust deduplication strategy is the elite swat team you need to keep your data pristine and your operations seamless. Tools like LeanData and Incycle can absolutely come in handy when cleaning up your rogue records, but also having clear data handling processes in place for these records will keep the chaos at bay, especially if you’re limited by budget.
   
   Dupes tend to happen when you don’t have contact and account relationships set up properly, parent-child relationships set up properly, or your partner records properly associated to end customers. Sure there are other reasons for why you have dupes, such as bad manual data entry or system automatic associations, but it’s mostly those first three scenarios that will slime up your data waters.

5. The mismatched Stages vs statuses

   Is it a stage? Is it status? Is it something different altogether? And does one system or object call it stage and another call it status? All answers could point to yes. If it is, that may be a huge part of why things have gone awry. When tracking leads throughout the process, it’s best to have one macro and one micro level data set to help with reporting and provide clear queues to marketing, sales, and even customer success, on where the customer is on their journey and how that record should be treated. Consider the Stage to answer “Where Are They” and the Status to answer “What Are They Doing.”

   
   Pro tip: Having a stage as MQL and a status of MQL does little for you in providing context. Consider leveraging MQL Statuses “Handraiser” and “Scored Up” to provide more clarity of a lead. Statuses may also come in handy when identifying where a customer is, such as “Onboarding,” “Upsell,” and “Renewal.”

6. THE [Messy] System(S) nuance

   In today’s ever-evolving tech ecosystems, you must understand not only your core data points, but also, how they get updated within and between each system against each object throughout your tech stack. You may have one well-oiled engine between your MAP and CRM, but perhaps your CRM is receiving status updates from a rogue, unidentifiable integration (cough cough sales enablement tool) that is throwing all your data out of whack.
   
   The “easiest” path forward is confirming core lead management data points across the tech ecosystem are documented and there’s a clear view of how they are updated throughout the tech ecosystem—per system integration, per object(s), per workflow(s). The unfortunate reality is sometimes, tech stacks are disjointed, different teams manage different systems and the workflows within and visibility is limited. This is where data mappings with key stakeholders become key and open conversations become paramount.
   
   If you’re limited by data/system access, make the business case for why it’s important there is a documented data trail and work with key team members to get answers. 9/10 there is usually someone who knows where the data lies. If it’s a non-starter, then present the impact of what you can and can’t do with this roadblock.
   
   Pro Tip: Make sure you’re pulling in unique ids (unique identifiers) to each record association for easy search across data tech stacks. Aka if mapping to a contact object between your MAP and CRM, pull in the respective system to record for easier troubleshooting.

7. The Handoff between marketing and sales

   This handoff is like passing the baton in a cosmic relay race. If marketing and sales aren’t in sync, leads fall into the abyss and the business loses. Clear communication, aligned goals, and seamless processes with clear SLAs ensure that every lead transitions smoothly from marketing nurture to sales engagement, avoiding the dreaded black hole of missed conversions and opportunities.
   
   One thing that helps is a “clean your room” board/report that identifies when a lead or an assigned owner is outside of their normal lead status SLA. This helps identify patterns or inconsistencies within the process and provides a quick path forward to close those gaps and bottlenecks. The number one rule though is once a contact hits a status between MQL and Closed Won, they should be moving (somewhere) or your data integrity gets called into question.

8. Relevantly IDENTIFYING AND Tracking MQLs

   Finally, the age-old debate—when should sales make contact and how? Reach out too soon (especially in a creepy invasive way) you kill the potential. Wait too long or talk to them generically, you lose the deal. Gone are the days when a generic MQL lead score will lead to a quick touch and sale. It’s important to identify what is the intent of the MQL? Have they engaged enough and are they worth the sales team’s time?

   To increase conversions and revenue, businesses need to quickly answer these three things:
   Does the lead have intent?
   Is the lead interested in our business?
   Is the lead the right(ish) fit for our business?
   
   This is where scoring and grading models may help, as well as the MQL statuses mentioned above such as “Handraiser” and “Scored Up.” Implementing that (and throw in an intent or product focused data field) and sales will hit a home run.

Conclusion

Navigating the complexities of the lead lifecycle is like embarking on a journey through (data) memory. With the right tools, strategies, and a touch of cosmic wit, you can turn these challenges into opportunities for stellar success. Remember, in the vast expanse of marketing operations, every lead is a star waiting to shine. So, quipstars, keep your CRM telescopes ready and your data pristine. Your next marketing supernova is just a blip away.

Love what we are laying down? Let’s journey together through the cosmos of marketing brilliance! Explore more insights at ELC Unlimited to elevate your marketing operations to cosmic levels. 🚀🌌

This blog takes you on a cosmic journey through the galaxy of lead lifecycle management, tackling eight complex challenges like aligning tracked contacts, accounts, and opportunities, mastering partner marketing data, leveraging return customers, eliminating the dreaded dupes, clarifying stages vs. statuses, navigating system nuances, ensuring smooth handoffs between marketing and sales, and pinpointing MQLs. With expert insights and practical strategies, it aims to keep your data pristine, processes seamless, and your marketing operations shining like the stars. Buckle up, quipstars, for a stellar guide to turning lead lifecycle chaos into cosmic success.