It is no shock that marketing and sales teams often fail to collaborate. Research by the Harvard Business School highlights that marketing and sales teams can sometimes be in “all-out war” over resources, and this can have an adverse effect on business.
Also, surveys have found that more than half of businesses don’t have a specific program to align sales and marketing teams. This oversight can result in 45% of qualified leads buying from a competitor within a year. The same survey found that only 16% of business thought their marketing and sales teams were collaborating.
Three Sets Of Tasks
Leaders need to split tasks into three groups: marketing, sales or a combination of both. Certain marketing only tasks include market research, competitive analysis, segmentation, brand position and other non-direct promotional activities. Sales tasks include personal selling, distribution management, merchandising and account management.
The tasks which both teams could be jointly responsible for include strategy formation, lead generation, pricing and forecasting.
So why can’t sales and marketing work together on these activities? Well, there are five principle reasons why they don’t.
- They compete for funding.
- Marketing think selling is easy.
- There is no corporate culture to support cooperation.
- Traditional divides between departments are still present.
- Their mindsets. Marketers tend to be proactive while salespeople tend to be reactive.
Aligning The Two Teams
The answer to solving this issue is simple. Both teams need to understand their vital position for business growth. They also need to be trained to cooperate and use their strengths to better the organisation.
This can be done through initiatives such as holding inter-team meetings, coordinating promotional offers (including emailing promotional offers to the sales team) and allow teams to sit in on each other’s work. These activities could help both teams to have a renewed appreciation for each other.
How Marketing Can Help Sales
Of course, the real challenge is for marketing to prove its worth. They can only do this by ensuring their activities are supporting the goals of the sales teams and not counterproductive. Here are five ways that marketing can achieve this:
1. Create Content Based On Sales Team Goals
Each month or week, the sales team will have a set goal, for example, “sell X units this month/week.” The marketing team can create content, like blog posts, promotional emails and other materials to generate and qualify leads to pass on to the sales team.
2. Share Information
A survey in 2015, found that 63% of all businesses don’t have marketing and sales teams sharing information. However, marketing teams can help sales by passing on information such as consumer behaviour. This information can be used by the sales team to make better decisions on who are good leads to prospect and sell to.
3. Create Sticky Information
Case studies and testimonials are very influential to customers as they help to build trust. If a marketing team can produce these for the sales teams to use in their prospecting, then the time taken for initial contact to a sale could be reduced.
4. Nurture Leads Better
It can take between 5 and 12 interactions for 80% of customers to buy. That is a long time and a lot of money to spend on customer acquisition. This can be reduced if leads are better nurtured. Marketing can drip-feed information to customers and build trust before any salesperson calls the prospect.
5. Join The Conversation
Marketing people often know their products inside out. Therefore, they are the perfect people to jump on the phone and help convert tricky prospects. Marketing teams shouldn’t be afraid of making a sales call. Nor should they be ignored if they help. Instead, they should be rewarded when they help to bring a successful conclusion to a sale.
Are Your Sales And Marketing Teams Working Together?
Sales and marketing teams are often in conflict, fighting over resources and recognition. Instead, the departments need to combine their efforts to make their jobs easier. There are many ways that marketing can support the efforts of the sales team, and once they start providing assistance, the sales team will reciprocate.
Are your sales and marketing teams in conflict? How can your marketing team support your sales team?
Let us know in the comments below.
