Stop running cold campaigns: Use awareness to drive demand

B2B marketers are under increasing pressure to deliver results, which amounts to filling the pipeline with high-quality prospects as quickly as possible in most cases. The urgent need to move quickly and generate as many leads as possible forces many marketers to put all their eggs in one basket and fire off cold emails, cold calls and other cold campaigns.

While these activities may be built on sharp targeting, optimized messaging and irresistible offers, they won’t deliver the results you need if your audience doesn’t know you. Your campaigns will have to work a lot harder (and cost a lot more) to convert.

…if your audience doesn’t know you. Your campaigns will have to work a lot harder…

In my recent post on why “The Brand vs. Demand Debate Is Over,” I made the case that you need brand and demand working together to drive growth. Today, I want to drill down on that a bit more.

Warm up your audience

Say you’re on LinkedIn and you see an ad for a webinar. The topic seems like something you’d be interested in but you don’t know the company offering it and registration is gated. You have to give them your info to learn more.

What are the odds you’re going to sign up? Pretty low.

None of us is inclined to give companies much time, attention or information about ourselves without knowing we can trust them. And yet so many cold demand gen campaigns expect people to behave differently. Newsflash: they won’t.

In a lot of cases, the audience isn’t just unsure what you stand for; they might not even understand what you do. That creates friction that drives up your cost per lead (CPL) and lower your conversion rate.

On the other hand, if someone knows what you do and has already engaged with your content, they’re more likely to convert.

In other words, warming up your audience is vital to boosting your chances of conversion. Here’s a simple two-step approach for campaigns:

1. Start with awareness ads. Run short, high-quality video or thought leadership ads that highlight your perspective on an industry challenge or a new approach to your buyers’ problems. The goal isn’t clicks — it’s building an audience.
2. Retarget engaged viewers. Once people have watched your videos or interacted with your content, then move them into a targeted ‘engaged audience’ stream. Now you can run your conversion phase of the campaign, whether that’s promoting a webinar, a lead-gen form, gated content or whatever else you may have cooked up.

Multiple studies have shown, and I’ve seen it first hand, this “awareness first” approach consistently delivers better conversion rates but more importantly a significantly lower cost per lead. And, this “two-step” approach frequently increases lead quality as these prospects are engaging with multiple posts and/or pieces of content.

Multiple studies have shown… this “awareness first” approach consistently delivers better conversion rates but more importantly a significantly lower cost per lead.

Awareness takes time

Now, I acknowledge with full sympathy that some of this could make performance-minded B2B marketers break into a sweat. You’ve got demand goals to hit and awareness campaigns don’t always offer immediate, trackable ROI. But here’s the key mindset shift: awareness and demand aren’t competing efforts — they’re compounding ones.

When you run ongoing brand awareness campaigns — thought leadership, paid media, PR — you’re building familiarity in your market. Over time, that familiarity amplifies the impact of your demand campaigns.

This is especially true in B2B, where buying cycles are long, complex, and involve multiple stakeholders. Rarely does a cold lead turn into a closed deal in a few clicks. Buyers need repeated exposure to your message.

That’s why you need to play the long game even as you work to deliver on your short-term goals. Ongoing brand awareness lays the groundwork. It fills the top of your funnel with new audiences and ensures that when your next demand campaign launches, you’re not targeting cold prospects. Instead, you’re leveraging an awareness-demand flywheel that creates consistent growth.

To recap:

1. Awareness builds familiarity. More prospects recognize and remember your brand.
2. Demand campaigns convert awareness. Recognition increases conversions and lowers costs.
3. Positive experiences reinforce your brand. Satisfied customers share, refer and advocate.
4. The cycle continues. Your next campaign starts from a warmer, wider base.

Each element amplifies the other — awareness fuels demand, and demand sustains awareness. That’s the loop that drives long-term success.

Each element amplifies the other — awareness fuels demand, and demand sustains awareness. That’s the loop that drives long-term success.

Awareness first builds better demand

The next time you’re building a demand gen plan, ask yourself: how many of these prospects actually know us? If the answer is “not sure” or “not many,” then you need to start with an awareness phase.

If you’ve already run awareness campaigns previously, you have a head start on the right path. Make that engaged audience the starting point for your demand gen efforts and don’t stop building awareness. It’s an ongoing process. Even a small spend in this area will help.

The key is to stop treating brand awareness like a “nice to have” or a separate initiative. It’s a force multiplier — one that drives better results, lowers acquisition costs and builds a stronger, more sustainable pipeline.

Check out our Get Found series for more insights on how to build better integrated marketing campaigns. And stay tuned for more content on this critical topic over the coming weeks.