In this episode, we explore common pitfalls B2B marketers face in demand generation. We discuss the importance of aligning marketing efforts with revenue goals, the nuances of defining an ideal client profile, and the critical role of buyer behavior in campaign success.
Watch the full episode for actionable insights and strategies to refine your marketing approach and drive meaningful business outcomes.
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B2B marketers often run into issues with their demand generations efforts when they are aiming for the wrong incentives, have misaligned expectations, or are pressure to act quickly rather than strategically.
Let's unpack some of the most common mistakes we see marketers make when trying to generate demand—and, more importantly, how to fix them. The goal is to help you step back, assess your approach, and align your work with what actually drives pipeline and revenue.
Optimizing for MQLs Over Revenue
One of the most common, and costly, mistakes in demand generation is prioritizing marketing qualified leads (MQLs) over actual revenue. Often, this stems from a misalignment between marketing and sales on what a "qualified lead" really means.
Without a shared definition, marketing may chase lead volume rather than lead quality, optimizing for form fills or engagement metrics that don’t translate into pipeline. This misstep is usually driven by how marketers are measured—not by a lack of skill or intent.
MQLs can serve as a useful proxy, but the real goal is business growth and profitability. When marketers lose sight of revenue as the true north star, MQLs can quickly become a vanity metric.
Solution: Know The Business Outcomes
To fix the mistake of over-optimizing for MQLs, marketers first need to reconnect with the bigger picture: what the business actually values. MQLs are merely a proxy for business growth—not the goal itself.
Marketing’s role is to influence outcomes like revenue growth, profit margin, and market share. But this doesn’t mean marketing should be measured exactly like sales. Marketing contributes to growth through long-term efforts like brand building, awareness, and positioning—factors that may not drive immediate revenue but are critical to sustainable success.
When marketers focus on business outcomes rather than isolated metrics, they’re better positioned to make strategic decisions that actually move the needle.
Solution: Align Marketing Metrics with Business Goals
Once marketers are grounded in business goals, the next step is aligning internal metrics with those objectives. First, you'll want to refine the definition of an MQL. If the criteria become too loose—like counting anyone who fills out a form regardless of fit or intent—marketers risk flooding sales with unqualified leads.
To avoid this, MQLs should reflect both intent and ICP fit. Equally important is establishing a strong feedback loop with sales. If marketing operates in a silo, with no visibility into how leads perform after handoff, it becomes impossible to refine targeting or improve outcomes.
Consistent communication and collaboration between marketing and sales is essential. Shared systems, clear feedback, and joint definitions of success help ensure that marketing isn’t just generating leads—but generating the right leads that support real business growth.
Static ICP Definitions
A common mistake in demand generation is relying on a static, overly simplistic definition of your ideal client profile (ICP)—often limited to firmographics like industry, company size, or job title.
While these factors are foundational, they don’t reflect whether a buyer is actually in-market or showing real interest. Building your ICP only on surface-level criteria ignores all the behavioral signals that indicate buying readiness, leading to wasted spend and low-converting campaigns.
Solution: Incorporate Behavioral Signals
To strengthen your ICP strategy, start layering in behavioral data—how prospects engage with your content, navigate your site, interact with emails, or signal interest through third-party platforms.
Only a small fraction of your target market is in-market at any given time. By tracking actions and intent signals across the buyer journey, you can identify and prioritize prospects who are more likely to convert, and tailor campaigns to nudge them toward action.
Behavioral insights act as a real-time feedback loop, helping you refine your efforts and reduce waste.
Solution: Establish a Clear ICP Definition
Behavioral data doesn’t replace your ICP—it refines it. The best approach is a hybrid model: define your ICP based on fit (e.g., firmographics and technographics) and layer in intent signals (e.g., engagement, buying behaviors, sales interactions).
Your ICP should remain relatively stable once you’ve achieved product-market fit, but it should also evolve as you discover which sub-segments convert most effectively.
Tools like HubSpot’s lead scoring or Clearbit enrichment can help you quantify ICP fit, while periodic audits of closed-won data allow you to spot patterns in who’s actually buying.
Keep your ICP anchored to your brand positioning, but responsive to how your buyers behave in the real world.
Launching Ads Without Research
Many demand generation teams rush into paid ad execution without doing the foundational work of buyer research or positioning. It's an understandable mistake—tight deadlines and pressure to show results often push marketers straight into getting a campaign built and launched.
But skipping this critical step can lead to generic, ineffective ad copy that doesn’t resonate with the right buyers. Without a deep understanding of what your audience cares about and how they express their problems, your ads are more likely to miss the mark, no matter how well they're technically optimized.
Solution: Focus on Effective Ad Copy
One of the biggest challenges in paid campaigns is striking the right balance in your ad copy. Marketers often default to using keywords and feature-heavy language that aligns with internal messaging or landing page content—but not necessarily with what buyers are searching for or thinking about.
Your copy should reflect your buyer's voice, rather than your sales deck. Focus on pain points, real-world problems, and language that feels familiar to your target audience.
Ads aren’t just keyword-matching, they’re conversations. Your job is to speak to what buyers are truly looking for, not just what your internal team wants to say.
Solution: Talk To Your Buyers First
It's tough to write compelling, resonant copy without current insights into your buyers’ experiences and thought processes. If you haven't had a customer conversation recently, you're likely guessing.
Even light research—sending out a short survey with a small incentive, or offering customers the chance to be featured in a newsletter in exchange for their answers—can reveal invaluable insights to build campaign message strategies off of.
Ask what words they used to find a solution like yours, what problem they were trying to solve, and what made your company stand out. These insights can fuel not only your ad copy, but also your landing pages and broader messaging strategy.
Scaling demand gen efforts is only effective if you stay grounded in purpose—and that starts with knowing your buyer.
At the heart of every demand generation mistake is a disconnect—from buyers, from the business goals, or from the original purpose of the work. Whether it’s over-prioritizing MQLs, skipping buyer research before launching ads, or chasing performance metrics, the fix often comes down to slowing down and realigning with what really drives results: understanding your audience, speaking their language, and measuring what matters.
Interested in learning more? Check out the rest of the episodes of Demand Gen Studio. We discuss marketing and demand generation topics, with inspiring interviews with thought leaders. See you next time!
