Sales and Marketing teams view the business world through very different lenses. While marketing strives to create a good impression and play on emotions, sales is focused on the bottom line.
Each is capable of fostering success. But when both sides work together, their efforts can lead to exponential growth.
Change is a Group Effort
Scale doesn’t happen on its own. In the literal sense, you can’t grow without employees. But it’s more than that. It’s up to you to shift gears and open the door to collaboration, encouraging your teams to work side-by-side instead of against each other.
Create opportunities for your sales and marketing teams to connect and focus on shared goals and objectives. When unified, it’s easy for each department to understand how their success ties into the success of the company and maximizing ROI.
Transparency Makes a Difference
In a recent Demand Gen study, nearly 50 percent of sales reps and marketers reported communication as their biggest alignment challenge. To scale, you must be able to empower others to shine using their own skills – and that starts with open, honest communication.
To ensure your Sales and Marketing teams speak the same language, have them define processes and criteria to optimize the funnel together. The teams need to agree on certain term definitions and key metrics such as:
- Key Performance Indicator (KPI)
- Lead quality definitions (aka your Marketing Qualified and Sales Qualified leads)
- What prospects to target
- Lead nurturing processes
Complete transparency will make it easier on both sides to understand internal frustrations and discover the best ways to cater to customer needs together.
Data Drives Growth
How do you reinforce transparency and collaboration between departments? Let the data guide you.
Closed-loop reporting allows marketers and sales reps to make better data-backed decisions based on what drives the most ROI.
A closed-loop report essentially combines all data and insights collected from sales and marketing. You can then begin to determine and eliminate weak links and start focusing on creating content that will reach buyers instead.
Growing Pains are Expected
Scaling a business can be a bumpy ride full of challenges and blockers, so having an agile mindset is crucial.
Don’t just anticipate growing pains – embrace them. Although you face many hurdles along the way, keep in mind that nothing delivers scale like alignment.
Alignment happens when your Sales and Marketing Teams begin to collaborate as a group, openly communicate and make decisions based on data. With the right preparation and perspective, your company will make changes, grow revenue and expand while staying customer-focused.