Great question. Difficult to answer, without knowing more about you as a human (feel free to reach out to me on LI and we can chat more specifically). That said, here is my general thinking on the subject: First, leverage your experience. You sales background is a huge asset. Use your experiences to help the Marketing team get a better understanding of customer pain points, buyer personas, and the nuances of the sales funnel. Your team will find your knowledge to be invaluable in crafting effective demand generation strategies that resonate with potential customers. That said, you will have a lot to learn about how the function of "demand generation" works. * Digital Marketing: Learn about SEO, SEM, social media marketing, and content marketing. This is often the largest discretionary spend in your entire company. Experts here command executive attention, have a huge impact on spending decisions and can make or break your top of funnel volume. * Marketing Automation Tools: Get hands-on experience with tools like HubSpot, Marketo, or Pardot. Learn how scoring works. Get a sense of how email campaigns are developed, what your marketable database looks like, and how you can help the team improve their segmentation efforts. * Data Analysis: Marketing data is adjacent to Sales data, but it's a whole new pile of stuff (100's of metrics across the different parts of the org) to learn. Get a sense of what matters most and what are nice to do metrics. Develop skills in analyzing data to understand campaign performance and ROI. * Content Creation: Work with the content team to understand the machinery. How does content marketing generate leads? What content is mapped to what stage? How is that content scored? You can be a big help here; help the team brainstorm new and relevant topics at the awareness, consideration and decision stages. Help the PMM team develop one pagers for sellers that actually matter. I'd suggest that you work to deepen your understanding of the customer journey from awareness to decision. Spend some time with the PMM team, growth team, or your lifecycle marketing person. Get a sense of how your organization creates create touch points that guide potential customers through the funnel will be essential in a demand generation role. What are the "aha" moments in your product that signal a potential long-term paying customer? How many touches in your SDR sequences or in your marketing nurture emails. One interesting, big concept to consider: How can you start to shift your focus from individual sales (1:1) to broader, more programmatic marketing strategies (1:Many). Consider how you can leverage what you know, and how you can apply it at scale, to attract, engage, and convert leads to closed won. Making this mental shift will be critical to your success in Marketing and Demand Generation. This is a big one, a mandatory IMO. Please please please please please communicate your career aspirations with your current manager or HR department. You need to find the right balance between being direct but non-threatening. You want them to know what you want and when, but not make them feel like you have checked out or are not worth continuing to advocate for and invest in. Managing this carefully will be key to making a smooth transition between roles. The marketing landscape is constantly evolving. Stay curious, keep learning, and be adaptable to new tools and trends in demand generation. Attend events, participate in webinars, and read read read read read everything you can get your hands on. Continuous improvement will be key to your long-term success, whatever path you choose to pursue. Of course, I'd be remiss if I did not suggest you work to connect with professionals who are already in demand generation roles. You can't go wrong seeking mentorship from experienced colleagues and industry experts. Their guidance can provide valuable insights and help you navigate the transition smoothly. Some thoughts if you are still in your Sales role: Demonstrate your capability and interest in demand generation. Spend some time with your DG partners. Offer to assist with marketing campaigns, contribute to content creation, and help with lead nurturing efforts. Showcase your company knowledge, your proactive approach and you're going to win both kudos and a better chance at landing a Marketing role. Finally, I'd recommend working to build your "T-shaped career." A generalists breadth and broad understanding of marketing concepts will help you accelerate and become successful and valuable in smaller companies. As you grow, you'll develop the long leg of that "T" - your specialization. This will become more and more important as you grow in seniority and look to take on more senior roles. Companies usually hire because they have a problem they want to address, and they are looking for folks who have specialties in addressing them. This WILL become a huge part of your later career value proposition, so start thinking about it now.

Great question! I get asked this all the time. It really all depends on your background, but I would urge you to familiarize yourself with marketing terminology like funnel stages, mqls, lead scoring, conversion rates, etc. I would also review your existing skills to see what would be transferable. Perhaps you are a strong writer, or tech savvy, or someone that is very organized and can project manage. These are all transferable skills. Sign up for free online courses through Hubspot or get certified in the latest automation tools. Find out who in your network has a demand gen role that you can interview. Lastly, whenever you are transitioning from one field to another, it's perfectly acceptable to apply for an entry-level position. Companies don't expect you to know everything, they will train you as long as you have a desire to learn.

The best Demand Generation candidates possess a unique blend of strategic thinking, creativity, and executional excellence. They deeply understand the product, messaging, and audience, enabling them to craft compelling go-to-market strategies. Creativity is key—they generate innovative ideas to activate campaigns and drive engagement. I was once tasked with building a campaign for a software product we were selling in the Retail space. To activate this beyond the run of the mill webinar and content, we decided to take over a luxury retail store in SoHo during fashion week. We hosted top customers for an exclusive shopping experience and a live interview with the famous designer that we also streamed online and amplified on social media. Because this was such a unique and memorable activation, we were able to close business and also drive awareness. In addition, a strong grasp of channel strategy and optimization is essential. These candidates know how to leverage paid media, content, email, events, and other channels effectively, continuously testing and iterating for performance improvement. They are resourceful and scrappy, thriving in fast-paced environments where they must do more with less. Beyond tactical execution, top candidates are natural leaders who can align cross-functional teams, collaborating seamlessly with product marketing, creative, field marketing, and sales. Their high emotional intelligence (EQ) allows them to navigate pressure with composure, influence stakeholders, and drive alignment across departments. Being data-driven is non-negotiable. The best candidates don’t just execute campaigns—they analyze performance metrics, extract insights, and refine strategies based on data. They understand pipeline impact, revenue contribution, and how to optimize for business outcomes. Ultimately, the strongest Demand Generation professionals balance analytical rigor with creativity, strategic vision with hands-on execution, and leadership with adaptability. Their ability to connect the dots between messaging, channels, data, and cross-functional collaboration makes them invaluable assets to any marketing team.

I answered this more comprehensively in another question, but to summarize: 1. Vanity Metrics: Anything that can be gamed or doesn't directly reflect impact with your target audience (e.g., raw traffic, followers, engagement metrics, etc.) 2. "Leads" Without Context: There are lots of low-value, scam-y ways you can incentivize someone to fill out a form on the internet. For that reason, "lead" volumes without context (qualification criteria) tell you very little about whether demand gen efforts are working.

* Start With Company Goals: Align OKRs with overarching business objectives (e.g., pipeline targets, new market penetration). * Set Cascading OKRs: Break down the company’s goals into actionable demand gen objectives. For instance: * Objective: Generate $2M in pipeline this quarter. * Key Results: Launch 3 campaigns, achieve $500k pipeline per campaign, drive 100 SQLs. * Project Mapping: Each OKR ties to specific initiatives. For example, a webinar might target pipeline generation for a specific segment.

One of the most challenging parts of a cross-functional role is managing a project with people across the organization who do not report directly to you or your function, but it is necessary. To be a good cross-functional leader you will need to provide clear direction and be a trusted business partner. Here are a few things I’d suggest in your work with other teams: * Leadership alignment: Ensure that the leaders in your organization and their organization are aligned on the strategic importance of the project you are working on together. The buy-in will be key. * Drive clarity: Create clear roles and responsibilities along with timelines to set expectations and, upfront, have them confirm they are bought in to be a part of the effort. * Understand their availability: Understand clearly what other priorities they may have and how this may impact their support of your project. This includes their own personal vacation schedule. Work this into your overall timeline. * Be a trusted business partner: Develop strong working relationships with them. Meet all your deliverables and timelines to show them you are someone they can depend on. * Hold a high standard for quality of work: Provide constructive feedback with a lens back to the project's original intent. Point back to the project's objective or best practices. This makes your feedback more impactful and aligned with what you are both trying to achieve. If needed, bring in other SMEs to back up your feedback so they understand it is coming from a place where you are all trying to deliver the highest-quality work. * Be open: Be willing to receive their feedback on your work and/or communication style.

Follow the Gartner B2B buying jobs framework referenced in the question on enterprise demand gen above. Address the challenges specific to the buyer persona and explain how your product/solution can help solve them. For example, a business buyer will have different challenges than a technical buyer. Personalize the messaging to their specific needs while maintaining your brand tone/voice. Be sure to test the messaging with select customers, or you can use tools such as Wynter to see if your messaging is resonating well with your audience.

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 🌟.

Socializing KPIs before and after a campaign is important. It allows all stakeholders to align, prioritize work that impacts these KPIs, and understand performance, including the reasons behind the performance. Before creating KPIs, it's important to understand the following: * Know the campaign messaging and call to action you want users to take: What do we want people to ultimately gain from this campaign? Do you want to drive users to a specific page on your site? Increase free trial sign-ups? Increase demo requests? Is this a top-of-funnel play where you'd want to measure engagement like impressions? It could be a mix of these depending on the campaign, in which case you'd want to account for these various KPIs accordingly. * Have a strong understanding of the different channels promoting the campaign: For example, if email is a large part of the promotion strategy, you'll not only want to include email metrics as KPIs but also include the percentage of sourced traffic from email versus other channels. Aside from determining KPIs, it's also important to establish goals and benchmark comparisons. To do this, you can review performance from similar marketing initiatives or research industry benchmarks and set goals based on these insights. With many moving pieces, it's crucial to communicate your KPIs once you know which ones you want to track and measure. I recommend sharing your KPIs in an easy-to-read template well ahead of your campaign launch to provide time for stakeholders to review and provide feedback. Once a campaign is launched, you can provide an end-of-day KPI performance readout, an end-of-week readout, and an end-of-month readout. Depending on the campaign's longevity, you could also provide additional KPI readouts. For instance, if the campaign is seasonal and only running for a specific amount of time, you'll want to do a final KPI readout once the campaign has ended.