Why is B2B Lead Gen Challenging

B2B lead generation is challenging for marketers – that is a fact. The process itself is complicated, and starting a lead generation program is a tedious task. That said, marketers know it’s a necessity that they can’t do without.

But if B2B lead generation is that important, how come it’s still causing a lot of confusion, and why is it still a challenge? 

Well, three factors come into play here:

Factor #1: The Process Is a Complicated One With Too Many Players Needing to Agree to One Approach

Let’s say you work for a B2B company. You need to convince the sales team (the ones who’ll sell the products or services) to join your lead generation program. So, you agree on B2B lead generation tactics. And you need to convince your content team (the ones who’ll create the content) to do the same.

Your content team agrees. They agree on the content campaign that they’ll run within the program. But the sales team says that they only accept leads submitted through their CRM. They want to choose who they want to talk to. So the sales team needs the lead generation team to comply with their strategy.

Today, too many players are involved in lead generation, each with their own preferences, expectations, and requirements. Who makes the final call? Who’s responsible for the outcome?

The outcome is that there’s confusion. And that leads to mistakes.

Factor #2: Marketers Are All Over the Place When It Comes to B2B Lead Generation Tactics

As mentioned above, marketers are confused. And it’s not their fault. Not only are there too many players, but also, there are so many tactics they can use. Selecting the right ones for the situation isn’t an easy task. That’s why they try to go for too many tactics at once. They become scattered.

For example, this story comes from a real company. Their lead generation program included all these tactics:

• Cold calling

• Webinars

• Social sharing

• Blogging

• Publishing case studies

• Content distribution

That’s a lot of tactics. And what’s a lead generation professional supposed to do?

How can you convince the sales team to participate in a program when you haven’t yet figured out where to start with your cold calling campaign? How can you convince the content team to participate when you haven’t even decided what content type you’re going to create? In addition to the confusion, some marketers use tactics with a low ROI.

Factor #3: There’s Still Much Confusion When It Comes to Technology

The lead generation process is already complicated. Technology complicates it even more.

Because of technology, two things happen.

First, there are too many tools available. There’s no best tool. It’s like comparing apples to oranges. And marketers don’t know what tool to use for lead generation.

Second, with all these tools, marketers end up with an overload of data. They go crazy collecting data, analyzing it, and then they wonder what to do with it.

All in all, lead generation is still a challenge simply because it’s so complicated.

29 Lead generation strategies for 2022

Conclusion

There’s no denying that lead generation is essential. It’s important for those companies which want to gain more customers. But as we saw, lead generation is tricky. And here’s the takeaway:

The solution doesn’t lie in more complex strategies. What you need are more innovative strategies. For one, B2B lead generation can be easier when you can identify website visitors.

Visitor InSites can help you with that. We can provide you with B2B intent data so you’ll know more about the specific people searching online for relevant keywords. Contact us to know how this can help you with your B2B lead generation strategies!