Presidents, CEOs, Sales Directors and CMOs,
Are your marketing and sales departments combining their efforts to generate sales for your company?
Or
Do they still operate independent of each other and do things which the other doesn’t know about?
How Can Sales and Marketing Cost You Money?
If they’re operating independently of each other, they are costing your company money!
Money is being wasted. Sales are being missed. What? How can that happen?
They may be duplicating each other’s efforts. Marketing may be sending emails, articles and reports with valuable information to prospects. At the same time, your sales reps may be giving them the same information.
They may also be contradicting each other. The information from marketing may say one thing and at the same time sales reps may tell prospects the exact opposite.
At best, both of these leave prospects confused. At worst, they don’t trust your company. When this happens, marketing and sales are costing your company money.
The Silos Around Marketing and Sales
Have to be Eliminated
They have to work together. When they do, they will bring prospects to your company and generate more sales.
If you think about it, this is the natural evolution for both departments.
The way a product or service is sold has changed. Sales reps can no longer sell the way they used to.
They can no longer walk unannounced into an office, talk to the person responsible for buying what they offer and make a sale.
When they try to call the decision maker on the phone, normally they get voice mail. There’s a high probability their call won’t be returned.
They can send an email. However, there is no guarantee their email won’t be deleted unopened.
Let’s Look at This from the Prospects’ Perspective
They wear many different hats at work and overwhelmed with all they have to do. They also are skeptical of anyone trying to sell them. When they need a new product or service, they try to research what’s available on their own. They also check out who can supply it to them.
If you are going to get your product or service in front of them, you have to do it a different way. The same is true for letting them know about your company and that you are the best supplier of this product or service.
That’s where your Marketing Department comes in. It it’s their role to let prospects know about your company and what you offer. The best way for them to do that is through Content Marketing.
Through ads, articles, blog posts, webinars and other marketing channels, Marketing alerts prospects to the product or service your company offers. Marketing then introduces them to your company and lets them know about it.
On an ongoing basis, they then follow up by sending them more detailed information on the product or service the prospects are interested in and why your company is the best one to provide this to them.
Moving from a Cold Lead to One Ready to Buy
In the process, they take these prospects from a cold lead, to a warm lead to a hot lead to one ready to buy. At each point along the way, the marketing materials they use is a little more convincing for the prospects to take the next step.
At the point a prospect becomes a hot lead ready to buy, the Marketing Department turns them over to the sales department to follow up and make the sale.
The Role of Sales and Sales Reps
The sales department and the sales reps must play an active role with marketing throughout this process.
They have to help marketing build a profile of the ideal prospect they want to pursue. In addition, they need to give the names of ideal prospects to marketing so that they can add them to their campaigns.
The sales department and sales reps should review all new marketing pieces which are developed and make suggestions on how to improve these. Any time a new marketing format is developed, the sales people should be part of the process.
The sales department and your sales reps have to work with your Marketing people at each step to make sure each one is successful.
In this entire process, the main goal is for your company to make all the sales you know you can. Your Marketing and Sales Departments work closely to accomplish that.
Marketing takes the lead and is responsible for turning prospects from leads to hot leads ready to buy. Sales focuses on what it does best. Your sales reps go out, make presentation and make sales.
By working closely together marketing and sales can help the company achieve and even exceed its overall goals each and every year. Their time is maximized and the company’s dollars are being spent wisely. Sales are being made and efforts are not wasted.
