30% happens, plan for it.
3:1 ratios between suspects, prospects, leads, qualified leads, opportunities and deals is my experience. $100 per lead is in the ballpark (I’ve seen much higher and lower but this is the average in my experience).
20-30% of your marketing budget should be flexible ‘dry powder’ because something always comes up.
Launches are for rookies, campaigns are for pros and programs are for real-deal players. A launch that supports a campaign that supports a program is great. In my mind, launches are about 3Ps, campaigns 1P (promotion) and programs are about 4Ps.
Random acts usually start with ‘if we get one good deal from that event or activity, it justifies our investment’. NO! That logic means that we do anything with a positive ROI which would assumes that we have unlimited resources and that prioritizing segments and tactics is not our job (ie. it’s the sales guy’s job who is banging on our head to do xyz). Helping marketing people be accountable is a full-time job and one of the most frustrating responsibilities. However, if you can’t reign in random acts, you will be exposed for it and rightly critiqued by your executive peers.
My favorite operational topic is my next post after this on measurement, but I would be remiss not to bring it up here as well.
How many leads do really need? How many can the field or inside sales team really handle? How would we know if the launch was successful? How much money can be saved by cutting down our investment in traditional activities without necessarily cutting them? These are the questions that need to be answered and should not be delegated. These answers directly determine the marketing mix. If the company is launch, lead and random-act happy, then you really have products, sales and junior people running marketing.