In this episode of Demand Gen U, Kaylee Edmondson, Advisor at Chili Piper, shares how she transitioned her team from lead generation to demand generation strategy—and convinced leadership to support the shift.

Episode Summary

The episode covers the practical steps of making the jump from lead gen to demand gen, including building internal buy-in, starting small, and gathering the customer insights needed to guide the transition.

Key Takeaways

1. Conviction Through Documentation

Kaylee created a Centers of Excellence document demonstrating how demand gen could address company growth challenges while shifting focus to buyer behavior. This ultimately gained CEO approval.

2. Permission to Crawl

Rather than asking for full implementation, Kaylee requested permission to start small. This “crawl, walk, and run” approach allowed the team to learn and test demand gen strategies with lower organizational risk.

3. Customer-Centric Insights

Direct conversations with customers and prospects proved invaluable, providing real-world perspectives on what drives conversions—something the team wished they had prioritized earlier.

How to use this resource in evaluation

Use How Chili Piper Made the Jump From Lead Gen to Demand Gen as a working prompt for your buying committee, not as a standalone takeaway. The useful question is how the idea turns into governed campaign execution: which accounts are included, which contacts are reachable, which channels carry the message, which budget controls apply, and how results are reviewed after launch.

Bring the resource into a demo or internal planning session and ask each owner to inspect a different layer. Demand generation should review the audience and offer logic. RevOps should inspect CRM, marketing automation, and reporting flow. Sales should confirm whether the campaign creates context they can act on. Finance should ask how spend, conversion quality, opportunity creation, and pipeline are connected before budget expands.

  • Audience fit: define the exact account, contact, customer, or intent segment this idea should reach.
  • Campaign controls: confirm approvals, exclusions, budget limits, creative variants, and launch readiness before spend starts.
  • Measurement path: decide which leading indicators matter early and which pipeline outcomes matter before scaling.
  • Next action: turn the concept into one reviewed campaign object, one owner, and one follow-up date.

The strongest walkthrough should make the resource concrete: a campaign plan, visible guardrails, and a reporting path that a revenue team can inspect without relying on native ad-platform summaries alone.