Hear about Iron Mountain's process journey in the uncharted waters of sales and marketing, including: Insight into typical sales and marketing processes that are commonly in need of improvement The challenge of applying process concepts into functions that traditionally resist formal process design Ways in which the organization was able to make process improvements stick

1. Process Discipline &
Marketing
Oxymoron or greenfield opportunity?
John Donlon
Research Director, Marketing Operations Strategies
October 22, 2014

2. Agenda
• Process improvement examples in marketing
• Marketing’s process priorities
• Key takeaways
• Q&A
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3. Example 1: Marketing Asset Production
Problem Statement:
The cycle times for producing marketing
assets that support demand generation
activities have great variability. In particular,
producing an email took between 6 and 84
calendar days, with an Interquartile Range
(IQR) of 28 days. With inefficient asset
production, lead generation was
inconsistent, resulting in surges and
droughts of leads for the sales team.
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4. Fewer Snowflakes
Goal Statement:
In six months, shrink the variability
of email production in half—from
28 to 14 calendar days—as
measured by the IQR.
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5. Customer Quotes
We try to work quickly and stick to the deadlines we establish, but
when the demand managers drag their feet on reviewing their
assets, it causes delays and there’s nothing we can do about it.
(Shared Services)
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We need the Shared Services
team to take on more internal
customers. The move to bring
this function in-house has
started paying dividends, but
now we need to standardize
the process so that it can be
scalable. (Management)
If I want to take a long time reviewing
the assets for my own campaign,
that’s my prerogative. (Demand
Manager)
Leads come to me in waves and
that’s difficult to manage; either
I’m overwhelmed or I have
nothing to do. (Sales)
It’s getting to be the norm
that demand managers
wait until the last minute
and then request a rush
job. We probably enable
that behavior by allowing
it, but what can we do–
they’re our customers?
(Shared Services)

6. Production Requests Job Management
Jobs performed in
order of due date
Requests logged months in
advance
Required info not ready at
time of request
Asset Reviews
Multiple people
reviewing the asset for
the same thing
Lack of accountability in
timeliness of review
Legal review time
highly variable
Timing of Web team
engagement is inconsistent
Poor coordination with
Marketing Ops
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Cycle Time
Variability
Systems
Demand managers not
responsive after
requests are logged
Systems require
admin work to record
activities & times
Supporting systems require
multiple handoffs
Production Partners
Resources work on
multiple jobs at once
Multiple reviews
required
Requests logged at the
last minute
Work duration
managed to due dates
Cause and Effect Diagram

7. © 2014 SiriusDecisions. All Rights Reserved 7
• Primary goal was
achieved: IQR was
reduced from 28 to 11
(Goal of 14)
• Median cycle time also
dropped from 20 to 14
days
• Both Total and
Production Only
showed clear reductions
in median cycle time
and variability
Results

8. Example 2: Lead Management
Problem Statement:
An effective lead management
process was put into place two
years prior, but lacked ownership.
As a result, lead flow procedures
were followed inconsistently, leads
would go unattended for long
periods of time, and feedback
mechanisms were not monitored.
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9. Own It
Goal Statement:
Assign distinct process ownership
and improve MQL-to-Close
conversion rate from 7.2% to 10%
by end of year.
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10. Rearchitected Demand Waterfall
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11. Root Cause Analysis: Why Don’t Leads Convert?
25%
20%
15%
10%
5%
0%
Disqualified Nurture -
Marketing
Duplicate Nurture -
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Sales
Engagement
24%
11%
4%
2%

12. Root Cause Analysis: Why Are Leads Disqualified?
40% 35%
35%
30%
25%
20%
15%
10%
5%
0%
25%
14%
8% 6%
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3% 3% 2% 2%

13. Four Metrics that Matter
Volume
Conversion
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Rate
Cycle Time Deal Size

14. Results
7.2%
10.0%
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15.4%
13.3%

15. Top Process Priorities
Key Processes Characteristics Approach
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Audit
Assess
Optimize
Monitor
• Many handoffs
• Historically poor
coordination
• Regional variations
• Unclear ownership
Tier 1
• Lead Management
• Campaign planning
• Content management
Tier 2
• Demand execution
• Planning &
• Measurement
• Data management

16. Key Takeaways
• Alignment between sales and marketing is a constant challenge
• Sales and marketing are more data-driven than ever
• Lead with the business outcome, not the process mumbo-jumbo
• Snap a baseline, measure results and publicize wins
• Assign ownership, utilize playbooks and consider gamification to kickstart
compliance
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17. @L2R_Guy
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