What's your process for figuring out what metrics to hold demand generation accountable for?

I start with the business goal—usually revenue or pipeline—and work backwards from there putting a bottoms up plan. Then I map the funnel and separate what marketing can truly influence from what sales owns, so there’s no overlap or confusion. From that, I pick a small set of KPIs across three areas: • Output (pipeline created or sourced) • Efficiency (conversion rates across funnel stages) • Velocity/quality (how fast deals move and how much closes) I pressure test each metric by asking: if thi ...Read More

Demand gen is responsible for every stage of the funnel but accountable for stages where they have ~50%+ of the influence on that stage compared to sales. For example,  Demand generation at the awareness stage is 100% responsible for delivering that message to the masses by driving the DG machine to those target accounts.  Demand gen can support leads that come in by educating them through email and display even while sales reps work that lead.  Demand gen also supports leads down to stage 2-3 S ...Read More

Start with understanding what the business cares about most. All Demand Gen teams are expected to help drive pipeline and bookings, but you should try to get as much context on both as possible. For example, is the business trying to move upmarket? If so, over what timeline? To what extent do your current-state investments support that objective? Are you hiring new reps? If so, in what segments/markets? The closer you can align your Demand Generation strategy to business objectives, the easier i ...Read More

Understanding what factors influence your company's buyer cycle is the first step, including the company's goals, market, and target audience.  1. Define your goals: Start by understanding the goals of your company and how demand generation fits into those goals. Are you trying to increase revenue, expand your customer base, or drive more engagement or a mix of them? Your goals will guide your metrics. e.g. for an early-stage startup, it is more important to create awareness and build a marketab ...Read More

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 ...Read More

Ultimately you want to work across the company's leadership team and determine what is most important to them and what success for marketing and demand generation looks like. If leadership is not bought into what marketing is measuring or finds important, then it will create a disconnect that is difficult to overcome. Now, seeing that all companies and leadership teams are different, I strongly recommend trying to tie your demand generation efforts as close to company revenue and tangible ROI as ...Read More

I’m going to approach this question from a product-led growth (PLG) perspective. My process for identifying the appropriate metrics consists of mapping out the user journey along with its associated metrics. For example, a user will sign up, experience value, engage, stay retained and hopefully refer others and expand. Then I would identify the metrics that align with this flow. This would consist of metrics such as: Count of sign-ups Sign-up rate A quality metric based on your goals Activation ...Read More

The process I use to determine which metrics to hold demand generation accountable for can be summarized into four key steps: 1) Assess the Current Situation Go on a listening tour: Speak with key stakeholders across marketing, sales, and customer success to understand how demand generation is currently perceived and what outcomes they expect. Gather insights into past campaigns, successes, and failures to build a baseline understanding. Gather tribal knowledge: Learn from team members with hist ...Read More

The metrics you hold demand generation accountable for will vary depending on the stage of your business and the maturity of your analytics 🔍. A startup, for instance, will need to focus on different metrics than an established brand. Similarly, how well you understand your full funnel will dictate whether you prioritize testing new strategies or doubling down on proven tactics. Here’s my (made-up-on-the-spot) step-by-step process for determining the right metrics: Understand Your Funnel 🧩: Map ...Read More

I always start with pipeline and am hard-pressed these days to find a DG team that doesn't have pipeline as their key result. The pipeline conversation should happen with all pipeline-generating teams – to ensure every team knows how much pipeline they're responsible for AND agrees on what's considered “marketing pipeline” vs “sales”, etc.  Then I work backwards from pipeline. I look for the biggest impact levers I can pull in each channel - increasing conversion on the website; getting more mee ...Read More