Demand generation is the process of building awareness and driving engagement with target buyers before they’re actively evaluating solutions. Demand generation tools help B2B companies run campaigns across multiple channels, identify engaged audiences, and nurture prospects at scale.
This guide reviews the leading demand generation platforms and helps you choose the right tools for your go-to-market strategy.
What Demand Generation Tools Do
Demand generation platforms typically offer:
Content Syndication: Distribution of gated content to third-party networks to generate leads from interested buyers.
Email Automation: Automated email sequences that nurture engaged buyers through consideration phases.
Advertising: Display, social, and streaming ads targeted to audiences and accounts.
Website Optimization: Landing pages, forms, and website tools that capture information and move prospects forward.
Lead Scoring and Qualification: Automated scoring to identify which leads are sales-ready.
Integrations: APIs and integrations with CRM, marketing automation, analytics, and other platforms.
Reporting and Analytics: Dashboards showing campaign performance, lead volume and quality, and pipeline influence.
Top Demand Generation Platforms
HubSpot Marketing Hub
HubSpot Marketing Hub is the leading integrated marketing automation and demand generation platform for small and mid-market companies. The platform includes email automation, landing pages, lead scoring, forms, ads, and reporting.
HubSpot’s strength is ease of use and integration with HubSpot CRM. You get marketing automation, CRM, sales tools, and customer service all on one platform. The interface is designed for marketing teams without deep technical expertise.
HubSpot’s challenge is that it’s less specialized than best-of-breed tools for each function. Larger organizations often find they need additional specialized tools.
Contact HubSpot for pricing.
Marketo
Marketo is the enterprise demand generation platform for large organizations with dedicated marketing operations teams. The platform offers advanced email automation, sophisticated lead scoring, content management, and reporting.
Marketo’s strength is flexibility and sophistication. You can build incredibly complex workflows, personalization, and multi-touch attribution. The challenge is complexity and cost.
Marketo is overkill for companies without 2+ dedicated marketing operations specialists.
Contact vendor for pricing.
Pardot
Salesforce Pardot is the demand generation platform for Salesforce customers. Offers email automation, landing pages, forms, lead scoring, and Salesforce CRM integration.
Pardot’s strength is tight Salesforce integration. If you’re a Salesforce customer, Pardot integrates directly with your CRM and scales seamlessly.
Pardot’s challenge is that it’s locked into Salesforce ecosystem and is less feature-rich than Marketo for complex demand generation.
Contact Salesforce for pricing.
Drift
Drift is a conversational marketing platform emphasizing real-time engagement through chatbots and live chat. The platform captures visitor intent through conversations and routes leads to sales teams.
Drift’s strength is for companies wanting to engage prospects in real-time on your website. The challenge is that conversational engagement doesn’t work for all buyer types and sales cycles.
Contact Drift for pricing.
ActiveCampaign
ActiveCampaign offers email marketing, automation, CRM, and sales tools in one platform. The interface is designed for ease of use, appealing to small and mid-market companies.
ActiveCampaign’s strength is good balance of features and usability at reasonable pricing. The platform is particularly good for companies wanting email marketing plus lightweight CRM and sales tools.
Contact ActiveCampaign for pricing.
Klaviyo
Klaviyo is a sophisticated email and SMS marketing platform that’s increasingly used for B2B demand generation. The platform offers advanced segmentation, personalization, and lifecycle marketing.
Klaviyo’s strength is best-in-class email marketing with powerful segmentation and personalization. The challenge is that Klaviyo was built for e-commerce and is less complete for B2B demand generation than HubSpot or Marketo.
Contact Klaviyo for pricing.
LinkedIn Campaign Manager
LinkedIn Campaign Manager is the platform for running sponsored content, ads, and lead generation campaigns on LinkedIn. Given LinkedIn’s dominance in B2B, this is a critical demand generation tool.
LinkedIn’s strength is unmatched access to B2B decision-makers. You can target by job title, company, seniority, and interests. Lead generation forms capture information directly on LinkedIn.
LinkedIn’s challenge is cost per lead is often high. You need clear ROI targets before significant spend.
Visit LinkedIn Campaign Manager for details.
Google Ads
Google Ads offers search, display, and YouTube advertising. For B2B companies, search advertising targeting your industry keywords is valuable for capturing buying intent.
Google Ads strength is intent-based targeting. People searching for category terms or your product name are actively considering solutions.
Google Ads challenge is cost per lead for B2B keywords is high. Most B2B companies find ROI better on LinkedIn or ABM platforms.
Visit Google Ads for details.
Demand Generation Strategy Framework
Most successful B2B demand generation programs use multiple channels:
Content Distribution (30% of budget): Syndicate gated content to third-party networks to capture interested audiences. Content syndication generates many leads with varying quality.
Email Marketing (20% of budget): Nurture engaged audiences with relevant email sequences. Segment audiences and personalize messages based on interests and engagement.
Advertising (40% of budget): Run targeted campaigns on LinkedIn, Google, and display networks to build awareness and drive engagement. Focus on high-value audiences and accounts.
Website Optimization (10% of budget): Optimize landing pages and forms to maximize conversion. Test different messages, calls-to-action, and form fields.
Demand Generation Content Strategy
Successful demand generation depends on compelling content:
Gated Content: Whitepapers, reports, guides, and data that provide value in exchange for contact information. Content should address top buyer challenges and questions.
Video Content: Video is high-engagement for demand generation. Build industry reports, expert interviews, and educational videos.
Webinars: Live and on-demand webinars that educate and engage your audience. Use webinars to establish thought leadership and capture engaged audiences.
Guides and Benchmarks: Industry benchmarks, best practices guides, and playbooks that buyers reference when evaluating solutions.
Case Studies: Customer case studies showing business results. Include specific metrics and outcomes when possible.
Demand Generation Metrics and ROI
Measure demand generation program success with:
Cost Per Lead (CPL): Total demand generation spend divided by leads generated. Track CPL by channel to optimize budget allocation.
Lead Quality: Not all leads are equal. Track lead conversion rates (leads to sales-qualified leads) by source to understand which channels produce quality leads.
Pipeline Generated: Track pipeline value from each demand generation channel. Some channels generate high lead volume with low conversion; others generate lower volume with high conversion.
Cost Per Pipeline Dollar: Divide total demand generation spend by pipeline generated to measure true ROI.
Sales Cycle Length: Track whether leads from demand generation channels have longer or shorter sales cycles. Some channels produce faster deals.
Customer Acquisition Cost: Ultimate metric is blended customer acquisition cost. Allocate all sales and marketing costs and measure cost per customer acquired.
Best Practices for Demand Generation
Focus on Audience Quality Over Volume: It’s tempting to generate as many leads as possible. Focus instead on lead quality and fit. A smaller number of well-qualified leads will deliver better ROI.
Build Your Owned Audience: Demand generation often relies on paid channels. Build your own email list and audiences over time. Your owned audience is more valuable and lower cost than paid channels.
Integrate with Sales: Demand generation fails when sales doesn’t follow up promptly on leads. Ensure sales processes leads within 24 hours and provides feedback on quality.
Test and Iterate: Demand generation is both art and science. Test different messages, audiences, channels, and content. Iterate based on results.
Measure Multi-Touch Attribution: Demand generation touches often aren’t the last touch before sales engagement. Use multi-touch attribution to measure true pipeline influence.
Conclusion
The best demand generation tools depend on your company size and existing stack. Small companies benefit from HubSpot’s all-in-one approach. Mid-market companies often find good balance with ActiveCampaign or Klaviyo plus LinkedIn advertising. Enterprise companies justify investment in Marketo for sophisticated automation.
Most successful demand generation programs use multiple channels: content syndication, email, advertising, and website optimization. Measure ROI based on pipeline generated and customer acquisition cost, not just lead volume.
Demand generation is an investment in building awareness and engagement with future customers. Success requires compelling content, clear audience targeting, consistent messaging, and commitment to measuring and optimizing based on results.
