Editorial
The Gist
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Cross-functional collaboration. Effective integrated demand generation requires seamless coordination between marketing teams to build a unified funnel.
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Different leads, different treatment. Not all warm leads are equal. IDG tailors outreach strategies based on the intent level of each lead.
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Amplified marketing impact. IDG uses familiarity bias by sharing consistent messaging across channels, which increases trust and creates a cohesive experience for prospects.
One of the most common mistakes I’ve seen myself and other B2B CMOs make in my career is allowing different marketing motions to drift apart, rather than creating a funnel that’s greater than the sum of its parts.
It’s not difficult to understand why this happens. While everyone in marketing ultimately reports to the CMO, individual teams have their own leaders, different leads and their own goals to generate sales-ready marketing qualified leads (MQLs). For example, field marketing typically owns the leads generated from events, while the digital team usually owns the leads generated from paid search. Each team then focuses on nurturing their leads with an eye toward getting them to talk sales. That’s not a terrible approach, but it does rob marketing of its ability to compound awareness, and it can lead to a disjointed experience for your leads.
The solution is integrated demand generation (IDG). IDG involves taking a holistic approach to demand generation. It’s a comprehensive strategy that requires a coordinated effort across marketing teams, where each successive marketing motion builds upon the last to stay top of mind with leads.
Not all "warm" leads are created equal. Digital demand generation and field marketing teams can collaborate effectively in an IDG motion and create valuable synergy. The value of IDG lies in its ability to align efforts, with sales development representatives playing a key role in the process.
Table of Contents
- Understanding Lead Intent
- Aligning Digital and Field Marketing Efforts
- Maximizing Impact Through Coordination
- Using SDRs for Better Outreach
- Building Stronger, More Integrated Campaigns
Understanding Lead Intent
Alan Zhao, head of marketing at Warmly, says that not all warm leads (leads that have expressed some level of interest or buying intent) should receive the same treatment. According to Zhao, that’s because “someone who sees your ad on LinkedIn and hands over their email to download a ‘State of the Market’ report has not demonstrated the same level of intent as a prospect who has read five pieces of content and checked out your pricing page twice.”
Think of it another way. You come across an apple tree full of bright red apples. Chances are that not all apples will be equally easy to reach. Some can be picked just by reaching out your hand, while others will require you to set up a ladder. Leads work the same way. A lead that’s actively creating a vendor shortlist isn’t the same as one that’s still evaluating how to solve their business challenges. Likewise, some leads, because of their firmographics or the previous experience of individuals on their buying teams, may be closer to your competitors’ baskets.
An effective marketing organization is able to “tilt the tree” and use intense, consistent and sustained outreach. This approach encourages even the warmest leads who are least inclined to buy to engage with the sales team. Here’s an example of a field marketing and digital demand generation team taking an IDG approach.
Aligning Digital and Field Marketing Efforts
No two marketing departments are structured exactly the same, but most established departments have at least two key functions. Field marketing is typically responsible for direct engagement with prospects in a specific geography or industry, and digital demand generation is responsible for generating awareness and interest through digital channels at a global level. Field marketing typically focuses on things like in-person events or local language webinars, while digital demand generation typically focuses on things like email marketing, paid search/social and SEO. Each team is usually led by a different person, but both teams have a role to play in “tilting the tree.”
Let’s use the example of an event focused on the insurance industry. In a traditional marketing department, this kind of event would be owned by field marketing. The field marketing team would be responsible for making sure a booth is set up. They’d also make sure attending salespeople have the right collateral to communicate the vendor’s offerings and value proposition for insurance providers.
Contrast this with an IDG strategy. In this approach, digital demand generation would target local insurance providers from the event attendee list in the weeks leading up to the event. This could include, for example, display ads that highlight the vendor’s core value propositions and encourage the audience to visit the vendor’s booth at the event. Following the event, the digital team would set up a webinar about the challenges of the insurance industry, feature an insurance customer and invite those that visited the vendor’s booth to attend the webinar.
Traditional Marketing vs. Integrated Demand Generation
This table compares how traditional marketing and integrated demand generation (IDG) differ in execution, strategy and customer experience.
| Category | Traditional Marketing | Integrated Demand Generation (IDG) |
|---|---|---|
| Team collaboration | Teams operate in silos with limited coordination. | Cross-functional coordination ensures a unified marketing funnel. |
| Lead treatment | All warm leads receive similar nurturing paths. | Lead engagement varies by intent and behavior signals. |
| Event strategy | Field marketing owns events; little pre/post-event synergy. | Digital and field marketing align on pre-event targeting and post-event nurturing. |
| Messaging consistency | Messages often vary by channel and team. | Unified messaging reinforces familiarity and trust across channels. |
| Use of SDRs | SDRs are typically disconnected from campaigns. | SDRs are aligned with campaign goals and supported with contextual insights. |
| Buying group experience | Individuals in a buying group may encounter fragmented experiences. | All stakeholders experience cohesive messaging that encourages internal alignment. |
| Outcome | Disjointed experience and missed opportunities for compounding awareness. | Greater marketing impact through familiarity bias and multi-touch engagement. |
Related Article: CMO Circle: Inside the 2025 State of the CMO
Maximizing Impact Through Coordination
These are likely motions your teams are already doing. What’s different with IDG is the level of coordination between teams, which helps make sure that each marketing motion ties into and builds on top of the previous one. This approach is effective because of familiarity bias, which is the tendency to gravitate toward the things we’re most familiar with.
IDG amplifies marketing impact by maintaining coordination across all activities and taking advantage of the familiarity bias. Consistent messaging and outreach reinforce your value proposition, build trust and authority, and reduce cognitive load for prospects. This repetition and alignment across channels make your brand more recognizable and credible.
Don’t forget that most B2B buying decisions are made by buyer groups, not individuals. IDG shines in a B2B context by creating a consistent experience for multiple stakeholders. When different members of a buying group encounter the same core message across various touchpoints, it builds collective credibility and encourages internal advocacy. Prospects feel more confident in bringing in colleagues when the brand experience is consistently aligned.
Ultimately, IDG supports a cohesive journey that resonates with the entire buying group, nurtures multiple stakeholders and builds the necessary trust to drive engagement and encourage internal collaboration around your brand. While field marketing and digital demand generation are often the teams most commonly considered when planning an IDG strategy, they are far from the only ones that contribute to this approach. Sales development representatives (SDRs) are one of the most important and overlooked teams.
Using SDRs for Better Outreach
Marketers often overlook SDRs because they don’t always report to the marketing organization. But regardless of where they sit on the company’s org chart, SDRs can be equipped and trained to operate within an IDG motion.
Let’s look at the previous example of a webinar following an industry event. Assuming a two-to-four week gap between the event and the webinar, SDRs can use this time to reach out to leads on the webinar invitation list. They can share social proof of your offering's value through relevant case studies, analyst reports or other assets. This outreach can be informed by input from the digital demand generation team. For instance, an SDR can highlight a case study focused on regulatory compliance if digital demand generation flags that the prospect has engaged with this topic online.
There are only so many leads your SDR team will be able to support in this way, so it’s best for them to evaluate the initial invitation list to check their firmographics against your ideal customer profile. This can help them both save time in their outreach and refine your list of leads.
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Building Stronger, More Integrated Campaigns
Taking an integrated demand generation approach doesn’t require your teams to take on entirely new activities. They’re likely already doing much of the work. It does however require your marketing organization to collaborate more closely and take a more thoughtful approach in making sure each marketing motion connects smoothly to the next.
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