I suggest that the old ways of Demand Generation need to be rejected. Marketing Sherpa says 80% of your prospects find you. They do so with nudging from traditional methods like cold-calling and telemarketing, however the final step when they move to becoming an engaged prospect is now delivered by the prospect searching for a solution to their problem.

This means we need to place marketing breadcrumbs in front of the prospect so when they are ready to start picking them up you guide them toward your company as quickly as possible. I suggest this means thinking about a new concept. Demand Discovery. We are now trying to find out where the demand exists.

In the days of consultative selling we really did generate demand. We would find a problem we could solve. Find someone that cared about it. Articulate the problem. Articulate the solution. Articulate the value of our solution. Then we financially justified it. We were essentially generating demand. Now we must find the the demand that already exists.

This moves us to putting a much heavier focus on using email marketing, analysts, SEO/SEM, Social Media, Webinars. Proactive marketing where we are putting breadcrumbs in our prospect’s paths. If we want to be successful in this new world we need to think differently about what we are trying to achieve.