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Valentine’s Day 2022. I’m tempted to draw on a theme of warmth and inspiration and good old lovin’ for this week’s email, but the cynic in me just can’t do it. So instead let’s just focus on how we can accomplish some of our sales and marketing goals and have fun doing it – okay?

Give this song by the Black Crowes a listen with me as we see what the experts are saying this week.

Leads – Dime by the Dozen?

As I speak to clients early in the year, lead generation becomes a heated topic. It seems that many clients confuse lead generation with appointment setting. Both can be critical components of any demand gen strategy, but there is a difference!

According to B2B Marketing Zone, lead gen and appointment setting may collaborate – and they certainly work toward the same goal of driving sales – but they have distinct starting points. While lead generation focuses on piquing customer interest and creating quality leads, the practice of appointment setting aims to nurture those leads and successfully deliver them to your sales team.

I would argue that appointment setting can be a part of ANY lead generation strategy or campaign. The ‘appointment’ is merely the hand-off tactic from marketing to sales. We all know that lead follow-up can be involved and difficult… having a warm hand-off to move things from marketing to sales can help ensure that your lead process isn’t quite so hard to handle!

Most Downloaded Apps of 2021

Actions speak louder than words, right? So what do the most downloaded apps of 2021 tell us? App Annie has gone through all the most popular apps to determine which were the most popular in the last year. Which of these is important to your B2B strategy?

Most downloaded apps in 2021:

1. TikTok
2. Instagram
3. Facebook
4. WhatsApp
5. Telegram
6. Snapchat
7. Facebook Messenger
8. Zoom Cloud Meetings
9. CapCut
10. Spotify

Where users spent the most money:

1. TikTok
2. YouTube
3. Tinder
4. Disney+
5. Tencent Video

Monthly active users:

1. Facebook
2. WhatsApp
3. Facebook Messenger
4. Instagram
5. Amazon

Some of these apps obviously have their users come runnin’ back for more, don’t they?

We’ve seen TikTok experience explosive growth, so its top slot in two of these lists shouldn’t come as a shock. But think about how much people order on Amazon… and it didn’t make the top five for consumer spend (it didn’t even make the top ten)!

Do your 2022 plans line up with this breakdown? Or does it have you considering a shift in your strategy?

As always, don’t hesitate to call me to brainstorm or just say hello.

Looking forward,
Rick

Rick Endrulat, President | ricke@v-causeway.com | www.linkedin.com/in/rickendrulat

The post Don’t Mix Up Lead Gen and Appointment Setting! appeared first on Virtual Causeway.