The Pig in the Pipeline

If you’re not familiar with midstream transmission processes (like I know most of you are), you may not have heard of a pipeline “pig”.  A pig is a device that is sent though a crude oil pipeline to periodically clear out the residue left by heavy petroleum.   My sentiment is that marketing and sales professionals need to periodically run a pig though their sales pipeline, and to focus their attention on the activities which will result in closing sales, not just filling the pipeline.

Far too many marketing professionals and probably and equal percentage of sales professionals focus their time and treasures on “filling the pipeline”—creating or attending networking events; investing in sponsorships;   fostering a referral network.  All these are worthwhile endeavors, and frankly easier to do than to mine the relationships that already exist.  There’s no pressure to sell, to engage in a deeply meaningful business conversation that might reveal a selling opportunity.   Just chances to smooze, enjoy a glass of wine and some brie on a toast point, and move on to the next new contact, pausing so slightly for another carrot stick. 

My assertion is that marketing and sales professionals should be more strategic about how they fill and cycle through their existing contacts.   Most managing director with whom I’ve worked has 400-500 contacts.    About 10% of those are individuals who have been, or are currently, clients.   I estimate another 20-25% is referral sources, leaving approximately 300 potential buyers or purchase influencers.  Greater marketing and sales attention on that subset is far more likely to result in transactions than by merely adding more prospects to the top of the funnel.   If you subscribe to the traditional five stage pipeline model (Contact-Prospect-Qualified-Proposal/Close), you know that the chances of winning at the Qualify stage are far greater than the Prospect or Contact stage).  But it is exponentially more difficult to master the discipline to segregate buyers, identify needs, develop solutions to address those needs, and rally the team to make a presentation, which is why we too often default to the wine and cheese circuit.

I’m not suggesting that marketing and sales professionals abandon the activities of fostering new client and referral contacts; my belief is that a balanced, more strategic approach is more productive and potentially less expensive.  Have you seen the price of brie lately?  

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The Leaky Funnel is a smart book about professional services sales pipeline, and if you haven’t read it, I would recommend doing so.   It’s a quick read and has some good reminders about pipeline management.