Using Tech to Get Sales & Marketing Teams on the Same Page

Erika Josephison Jun 28, 2024 8:00:00 AM

Sales and marketing misalignment not only complicates internal processes, but the mixed messages can also confuse customers, frustrate team members and leave sales teams feeling unsupported and out of the loop. These issues can turn into real problems in the modern selling environment, where having the whole team on the same page can mean the difference between winning the deal or watching the prospect walk away (and buy from someone else).

The good news is that there’s an easy solution: get your sales and marketing team on the same page and working from the same playbook. The not-so-good news is that some traditional mindsets and divided goals may surface as you make this transition. The problems are conquerable, of course, but it may take some cultural shifts and technology tools to get everyone paddling in the same direction.

Start by acknowledging the fact that sales and marketing want the same things—increased revenues and success for their companies—but don’t always follow the same path to achieving those goals. Here’s why:

Marketing departments focus on long-term brand-building and lead generation. They work to establish positive brand images, craft compelling messages and take other steps to generate interest in their organizations’ products and services. Some of marketing’s core tools include content marketing, social media and targeted advertising (among others), all of which come together to create a single, cohesive brand for customers to engage and interact with.

Sales teams typically set their sights on short-term revenue targets and getting deals closed, and for good reason. They’re the rainmakers in the scenario, and they rely on marketing to help generate leads and cultivate overall demand for specific categories of products and/or services.

Both departments play vital roles in their companies, and that’s exactly why getting them synchronized is such a powerful—yet often unattainable—goal. The magic happens when these two groups do get on the same page and start working toward a similar mission. They effectively become the power couple that your company never knew it even needed.

Tech & Automation to the Rescue

Any mismatch between sales and marketing can lead to friction. For example, marketing may feel like its lead generation efforts are being undervalued if sales aren't being made. And sales may consider marketing’s efforts ineffective if those actions don’t turn into sales immediately. Left to grow unfettered, these sentiments can push companies to a place where sales and marketing teams work in opposition of each other. This, in turn, can significantly impact productivity, sales and revenues (not to mention corporate culture).

“Sales and marketing teams both play an integral role in generating and converting leads into sales for a business,” one Forbes Expert Panel of PR, media strategy and ad executives points out. “However, these two departments may not always effectively communicate with each other and can get ‘stuck’ when it comes to closing the sales loop.”

One panel member says that one of the best ways to get marketing and sales teams on the same page is to automate workflow and ensure that data (leads) are being moved to the right places in real-time with instantaneous notifications. For example, a prospect comes in from social media advertising, that data is automatically entered into the CRM (or Google Sheet, etc), and then the sales team/ members receives Gmail or SMS notifications.

There also must be a common goal and a path to get there. “The problem most companies make is not creating a feedback loop for converted sales,” another Forbes panelist cautions. “Start by implementing a tracking system throughout the entire customer journey through a sales close. Then, have a reporting system that informs marketing with when and why each sale was made.”

Making the Magic Happen

Creating great synergies between marketing and sales also requires good two-way communications between the teams, which should meet regularly, share feedback and offer suggestions to one another. For example, marketing associates can lean on sales reps for help identifying customers who might be up for participating in a case study. In return, sales reps can enlist marketing to help produce engaging content that assists them in creating sales pitches and addressing their customers’ specific pain points and inquiries.

Both sales and marketing departments can benefit from a more focused, streamlined content development and management approach. By integrating the strengths of an enterprise resource planning (ERP) platform and one or more sales-enablement tools, organizations can give these two departments a single resource to work from when collaborating with one other and engaging customers.

A comprehensive sales enablement solution gathers all your content into a centralized, organized location, making endless searching a thing of history. When they have a user-friendly enablement platform that seamlessly integrates with their ERP, sales and marketing professionals never have to go on a wild goose chase for content ever again—it’s all right at their fingertips.

Combining these platforms helps companies create a cohesive system for aligning marketing and sales not only with each other, but also with their organization’s back-office operations. This seamless information flow enables better decision-making, improves the customer experience and increases customer engagement.