SCORRCAST Short | Generate Demand

In this SCORRCAST Short, explore the difference between generating and capturing demand. Learn how to align marketing tactics with the buyer's journey, and why high-value content, scientific expertise, and thought leadership are key to generating demand—not just chasing leads.

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Now today's episode of The SCORR cast is focused on the difference between generating demand and capturing demand, and I'm not sure that this is thought about enough when we're building our marketing programs, understanding where our buyers are at in their buyer's journey, and what tactics capture demand versus generating demand, and the high value content creation and scientific expertise and thought leadership is something that is going to generate demand, whereas, you know, some of the lead capture and lead generating activities like paid search and paid LinkedIn are trying to capture those individuals that are already ready to to buy, or are, at least, you know, halfway through the buyer's journey. So I think you're going to really like this short episode of this forecast on capturing demand versus generating demand. Enjoy this episode. You let's talk about the difference between generating and creating demand and capturing demand. I think this is one of the most important topics in today's environment, because, you know, we hear all the time the questions of, what role can marketing play? How can marketing help support a pipeline that right now maybe is lackluster given what's going on with the economy, given what's going on in the B to B space, especially as we talk about life sciences, we see projects being pushed, projects being delayed, projects being canceled, projects being handled in house. How can marketing help support that pipeline? And how can they really own a piece of this? And I think it's so important. I talked about this in a long video on Friday, that generating and creating demand needs to be priority number one for marketers, rather than capturing demand. And I think the difference here is that generating demand is what's going to allow for that pipeline to be strong, 3060, 90, 180 days, 365 days down the line, and capturing demand is going to be more of maybe that 15 to 30 days, you know, in terms of when that becomes an opportunity. But I think when you think about it, especially in today's day and age, today's market, when you're thinking about capturing demand, the definition, if you will, of capturing demand is a really understanding and capturing who has buyer intent right now. You're capturing the companies that are capable to buy today, that have intent to buy today and probably want to use you today. And if you look at it, what maybe would you say? 5% 10% maybe, maybe the Max would be 10 to 15% of your target audience is going to fit into that bucket today, where they can buy, they have permission, they have budget, they have authority, they have the timing. They're ready to change. They're ready to outsource all the things. And so when you look at your target market as a whole, if you focus your marketing on capturing demand and capturing intent, you're only talking to 10 to 15% of the organization or of your target audience, and you're not reaching everybody that you need to be reaching, and you're certainly not positioning yourselves in a quality way. Again, as we talk about 3060, 90, 180 365 days down the line. And I like to think of this, you know, I think it's simple to explain in the B to B terms, but I think sometimes looking at it from a, b to c perspective is the same thing. If I am right now, if I am ready to buy a car today, my car has been struggling. I have been out of the I've been looking for three months now, I know my budget. I've gone through, I figured out what my down payment can be. I know what my loan is going to be, and I've done all of that research, and then all of a sudden, today, I make a decision to buy. I am in a much different buyer's journey than, let's say, my fiance or somebody else who bought a car two years ago and has no intention of buying a car over the next year, maybe even the next 18 to 24 months. We are two different buyers. So if you look at the market as a whole, let's say for B to C, maybe it's 20% maybe it's five. You're not sure, right? 5% of your audience are ready to buy today. You can't mark. It to them you need to market to the 95 to the 90% to the 85% I think, as we talk about B to B, depending on your offerings, depending on, as we talk about life sciences, right, depending on the projects, you might be looking at one to 2% one to 3% of your market is ready to buy and sign a contract today. And so your job, then, is to market and generate demand with the other 95 97% 90% whatever that might be. And that's something that I certainly want to to encourage as we talk about that. And then, you know, I think the bigger question becomes, okay? Alec, great. We're supposed to generate demand instead of capture demand. How in the hell do we do that? Right? And that's where we need to focus on activities that are going to really make it a no brainer that when they're ready to buy your company is top of mind. So they know your expertise. They know your your experience. They know the scientists on your team. They know that the case studies that you have, they know the value that you can bring to the table, right? And so I think this is a focus on on running those micro events, doing the panel discussions, the thought leadership, the scientific articles having that combination of owned media, earned media, paid media, ensuring that they know you, like you and trust you throughout that entire process. So when it comes to time to buy, they're not even thinking about it. They're saying, Yep, we're going to go with SCORR. Yep, we're going to go with your company. And so when you think about that as the journey. If they're not ready to buy today, but they might be ready to buy in nine months, it doesn't mean that you shouldn't market to them. You should focus on making sure that they know you and that they know the value that you can bring to the table, making sure that they like you. They like what your company stands for. They like the benefits that would be brought to them if they decided to work with you and that they trust you. They've seen your work in the marketplace. They have referrals, potentially, they see it from an owned and earned media perspective. And so you kind of start to trickle all of those different pieces of content throughout the entire cycle to ensure that by the time they're ready to buy that that buyer's journey is 75% of the way done. Now it's just contract language, and we're going to align and and the sales team is going to be really excited, because that's a sales and a marketing qualified lead at their fingertips. So moral of this two points to two point takeaway, okay, one, we need to market to the 90% the 95% we need to make sure that we're marketing and we're focusing on generating demand for all of those organizations, all of those companies, all the members of your target audience that are not ready to buy today but will be down the line. And number two, we need to focus on generating demand through high quality content, through value driven content and through content that's going to show the benefits and the results that will happen if they decide to work with you to really make sure that you're top of mind once they are ready to buy, once they become a qualified buyer and they're ready to make that move. Thanks so much. Have a great day. You as always. Thank you for tuning in to this episode of The SCORR cast, brought to you by SCORR Marketing. We appreciate your time and hope you found this discussion insightful. Don't forget to subscribe and join us for our next episode. Until then, remember, marketing is supposed to be fun.