This is a great question! Demand generation marketing and content marketing should work hand-in-hand to achieve broader marketing objectives. When identifying KPIs and metrics to measure demand generation and content marketing together, you should consider the type of content being distributed and the channels through which it's being distributed. This will help determine your KPIs. For example, a blog post may not have the same KPIs as a gated piece of content or a video. The channel mix of promotions will also factor into KPIs. Is this a larger integrated marketing campaign that will require a more extensive mix of promotions and budget? Or is this a smaller campaign, perhaps targeted at a specific/smaller audience, that won't require as much external distribution and promotion? Once you understand these components, you can determine your KPIs. Here are some general KPIs to consider: * Number of site sessions to a blog post * For gated content: Conversion rates, form fills * Number of video views * MQLs, SQLS, sourced opps and/or influenced opps from the content being promoted (how many deals/opps were generated or influenced by this content) * Impressions * Share of voice * SEO metrics - keyword rankings, organic search traffic to the content

I look for three traits when I hire - 1) does this person have a strong sense of ownership especially around accountability and delivering results, 2) openness for feedback and a growth mindset - do they enjoy learning and want to improve on their approach and outcomes, and 3) will this person be a good culture fit. At a former company I've worked at, we used to call this the "eye of the tiger".

We use a centralized dashboard that aggregates data from all our tools (e.g., CRM, marketing automation, analytics platforms). Each channel has its own set of KPIs that align with its role in the funnel. For example: * Top-of-Funnel Channels (paid social, SEO): Impressions, clicks, and conversions to MQLs. * Mid-Funnel Channels (email, nurture campaigns): Engagement rates, MQL to SQL conversion. * Bottom-of-Funnel Channels (ABM, sales assist): SQL to opportunity and pipeline generated. Weekly syncs help us identify trends and recalibrate if needed. Transparency is key—everyone on the team knows the KPIs we're tracking and their impact on the broader goals.

Depending on your organization’s goals bringing in sales, CS, and operations can be key to running successful Demand Generation campaigns. I have more experience working in the B2B Enterprise space and the relationship with Sales and CS has been important to success. * In large-scale Enterprise sales (where deal lengths can extend beyond a year), the Field (sales, sales engineers, etc.) is critical to moving a deal from TOFU opportunities to POC and closed-won opportunities. Sales can help you understand the core influencers and buyers in the sales cycles and the problems customers are trying to solve. It’s important to align on the top accounts and how you are best positioned in the market. * Customer Success becomes more important in B2B buying cycles because customers who churn are very costly to the business. In addition, happy customers will buy more over time. If you have a large product portfolio, CS can be another seller for you, helping drive additional upsells and cross-sell opportunities in the buying cycle. Both of these teams help accelerate opportunities and can provide a unique perspective you may not have considered in past Demand Generation campaigns. 

Framing KPIs in terms of control and impact: if you control it or influence it, you can own it. In Demand Gen, we can control lead quality, MQLs routed to sales, and even the initial stages, such as Sales Accepted Leads, meetings, and early-stage opportunities. However, once we move past meetings and into opportunity creation, we enter a gray area. At that point, we’re less in control of what sales is doing during meetings or POCs, making it harder to be accountable for bottom-of-funnel outcomes. Similarly, in a self-serve model, it’s challenging to be fully accountable for results that are dependent on the product experience and UX. We can drive engagement with emails and in-app messages to guide users toward a successful trial, but ultimately, accountability for product and UX changes lies outside of our control.

Enterprise demand gen is complex. Buying committees are large, and the buying cycle is long. According to a Google/Bain study, B2B buying committees have an average of 17 stakeholders, and on average, it takes 40 touchpoints for each of these buyers to influence the B2B buying decision. Below are four steps to help you get started. * Step 1: Start with creating the content by persona mapped to the buyer's journey. Create content for primary and secondary persona. According to Gartner, B2B buyers have six jobs to be done to make a purchase 1. Problem identification 2. Solution exploration 3. Requirements building 4. Vendor selection 5. Validation 6. Consensus creation Use this as a framework to create content. This will serve as the foundation for your campaigns. Also, in the age of AI overviews and search GPT, consider structuring your website to follow the above framework. * Step 2: Invest in integrated, multi-channel digital campaigns to drive awareness and engagement with an ABM mindset * 1:1 ABM campaigns targeted at 10-50 strategic accounts * 1:few ABM campaigns targeting up to 300 accounts grouped by vertical/industry * 1:many ABM campaigns targeting up to 5000 accounts based on ideal company profile (ICP) criteria * Step 3: Build a webinar program * Top-of-funnel thought leadership webinars * Middle-of-funnel How-to webinars * Bottom-of-funnel Demo webinars * Step 4: Plan offline tactics such as highly targeted executive roundtable events and direct mail campaigns to accelerate the pipeline and drive closed won deals

Basic email platform engagement. But most importantly, Are emails qualifying leads for outreach. Do emails speed up the qualification process. Do leads that engage with emails perform better in the sales cycle

Demand generation often serves as a bridge between sales and product, but the way I collaborate with each team can vary significantly. Here’s my high-level approach: * Understand business goals and metrics: Focus on understanding the goals and metrics each team owns. Sales typically tracks revenue-related KPIs like pipeline and bookings, while the product team focuses on adoption metrics - such as activation and retention - and usage, including breadth and depth. In self-serve model, product might also prioritize the growth of paying customers and self-serve revenue. To align demand generation efforts, work to establish shared goals or, at minimum, clarify how marketing supports these objectives. * Use BI reporting for alignment: I eliminate silos with joint dashboards built in Tableau and Looker, tailored to each team’s needs - real-time pipeline for sales, usage trends for product. Understanding how data is captured ensures reporting aligns with their priorities, keeping everyone on the same page. * Create consistent rituals: We review these dashboards in weekly or bi-weekly cadence with respective teams, spotting business trends and adjusting demand gen/ sales/ product strategies. Note: You can also create separate reporting for operational purposes, tailored for the marketing team to use alongside joint dashboards Example of marketing/ sales alignment: * Marketing contributes % into the overall pipeline. * Marketing/ sales meet weekly using Tableau, pulling data from Salesforce and other sources and analyze top-funnel (eg. leads, MQLs, SQLs) and down-funnel metrics (eg. meetings, Stage 1 opps), tracking conversion rates between stages. This reveals issues - like slow MQL-to-SQL progression - prompting discussions and joint solutions. Example of marketing and product alignment: * Marketing plays a crucial role in driving customer acquisition and activation. * Collaborate with the product team to use Tableau or another tool to track and visualize performance metrics end-to-end, from acquisition through to retention and paid conversion.

It depends on the stage of the company and your goals. If you have huge brand recognition and can rely on organic (web or social) or word of mouth, you may not need ads to amplify your programs. Otherways, advertising is a great way to get in front of an audience. Another amazing (and often forgotten) application is that ads are a fantastic place to test and learn and then apply to other channels. In ads, you can control the audience, the test, and the message.

Being the first demand generation hire is incredibly exciting. You’re in a position with endless opportunities 🌊, but that also means you’ll need to balance owning many KPIs with focusing on the ones that truly matter. Here’s how I would approach it: 1. Own All KPIs, But Prioritize What You Report 🎯: * As the first hire, you’ll naturally be responsible for tracking a wide range of metrics. You’ll care about things like blog performance (e.g., low bounce rates 📉 or high engagement 📊) because these help you understand what’s driving traffic and conversions. However, not every KPI needs to be reported to stakeholders. * Your job is to filter the noise. Stakeholders like the CEO or leadership team will only care about KPIs that directly move the needle 📈. 2. Track These Key Metrics for Stakeholders 🔑: * Opportunities Generated * Demo Requests * MQLs (Marketing Qualified Leads) * Total Leads * Closed-Won Opportunities from Marketing Efforts 💼 3. Stay Informed on Supporting Metrics 🧩: * While stakeholders may not care about metrics like blog bounce rates or webinar attendance on a granular level, these are crucial for your strategy. Use them to inform decisions about content creation, conversion paths, and campaign optimization. 4. Be Patient With Big Wins ⏳: * Early on, wins might feel small and less frequent. That’s normal. Over time, as you refine your processes and track your progress, those wins will compound, creating a powerful growth story 🚀. By focusing on KPIs that matter to leadership while using supporting metrics to refine your strategy, you’ll build a strong foundation for demand generation success—and create impressive results to showcase on your resume 🌟.