by Tim Hughes | @Timothy_Hughes | LinkedIn
How do we get that balance between Sales and Marketing?
As a salesman I am often torn between the arguments for awareness and the need for leads. OK, I lied, we need leads and we need them now.
With my “sales” hat on, I recall the day of the first brain storming session for my book “Social Selling – Influencing Buyers and Changemakers” I had a meeting with a sales leader. In this meeting, he (why is it always a he?) leaned across the desk and said to me (profanity removed) “Tim, this Social Selling is all very well, but where are my F—— leads?”
And talking to sales leaders day in and day out as I do, the number one issue for sales leaders is the lack of leads.
If I want to be “purist” sales, you can create brand awareness as you are creating the leads.
But realistically, the likelihood we will get through to a senior decision maker and do this “cold” is unlikely. Having worked for a small software house with little or no profile, cold calling was hard. Compared to say a known brand.
Having worked for an organisation where I think we got pretty close to getting the balance between brand and leads. The answer? Talking to each other. In the world of digital marketing people call it Smarketing, but put simplicity it means talking and working together.
Smarketing – What does that really mean?
Isn’t strange that we can walk into a buy and meet and talk with people without and pre-conceptions. Then we work for a company and there is an “if it wasn’t for those people over there, everything would be great”.
So drop the pre-conceptions and invite the head of sales / marketing for a coffee. It’s not a sign of weakness, it’s a sign of leadership. The two of you are going to be heroes.
We Stopped Throwing Stones and Met for Coffee, now What?
The next thing is you need to agree that sales and marketing working together is for the better of the company and you two. Now it’s going to get hard, change is.
Quick check list:-
- Bury the hatchet
- Agree a common language, for example, what is a lead
- Invite each other to your meetings
- Now here’s a difficult one, be open and invite feedback ….
It’s at that point when things can get nasty, be brave. Let’s not forget the things we learn’t about constructive feedback. Give a positive, give the negative, follow up with a positive.
Certain things are rubbish and this isn’t about blame, it’s about fixing things. Again we are back to talking about things. Maybe you need to realign resources?
I’ve seen people admit that events were crap after all and maybe the resources needed to be deployed. Salespeople would complain that leads were created but they already knew about them. Maybe an Account Based Marketing (ABM) approach would be better. Could the mid-market be better served by partners / resellers?
It’s not a 5 Minute Job
Starting with that coffee, change can take time and changes may require, further changes as things settle.
Working with Marketing was just one of the many changes I’ve seen, from first meeting excellence, social selling, partner enablement, this was all done with total co-operation between sales and marketing. Noe nothing is perfect, but it makes for better results and better working environment.
We are a Social Media Agency. We do three things: Social Media Strategy, Social Selling and Social Media Management. Drop us an email and let’s talk about how we can make an impact on your organisation.
