Throughout history, businesses have repeatedly encountered the same problem with their sales and marketing teams: misalignments. Sales and marketing misalignments are very common and businesses that divide their sales and marketing teams rather than work together are disadvantaged. Ready to kickoff your alignment strategy now? Get started by reviewing our Ultimate Guide to ReVOPS (sales & marketing alignment) here.
At length, both teams have a similar goal of boosting sales and revenue, so it's important to align your sales and marketing teams and keep them in sync. Plus, the buying patterns of today's B2B customers have significantly changed and marketing teams must align with the sales teams through the entire sales cycle to nurture leads and create better customer experiences effectively.
So, what is sales and marketing alignment? Sales and marketing alignment is a unified system of strategies and goals that allows sales and marketing teams to function as one entity. You should care about sales and marketing alignment because when they work together around one revenue cycle, they significantly enhance their ROIs, increase sales productivity, and grow revenue.
Simply put, if you want to improve your sales dramatically, you should align overarching growth strategies and the information between the two departments. But how will I know that my sales and marketing teams are not in sync?
How Do I Tell if My Sales and Marketing Are Not in Sync?
A small misalignment between your sales and marketing teams is usually the start of your problems. When they aren't in sync, your company misses growth opportunities. But when the two are aligned, they can increase your company's growth up to 35%.
Still, most organizations fail to align their sales and marketing teams – as a result; most opportunities are missed. Sales and marketing are two different departments but should be working together seamlessly towards one goal.
Here are some revealing signs that your sales and marketing teams aren't in sync:
Your Marketing Team Only Focuses on MQLs
Marketing departments normally focus on the wrong KPIs (Key Performance Indicators), which can be a massive obstacle between the two departments. MQLs (Marketing Qualified Leads) are usually ideal for measuring the performance of your marketing department; unfortunately, it only favors the marketing team alone. Sales departments are not measured by their ability to generate leads but by turning leads into clients.
That brings a huge obstacle to the department's goals – one that afflicts the sales team more. If your marketing team only focuses on increasing leads instead of closed bookings, it can be a sign that the two departments are not in sync.
In such circumstances, ensuring your marketing team sets a revenue goal concerning closed bookings is recommended to guarantee that the marketing departments are mindful of the sales department when assessing leads.
The Sales Team Designs and Uses Their Sales Content Exclusively
The marketing department is mainly tasked with creating sales content like case studies and one-pagers. Such types of collateral, referred to as sales content, differ entirely from marketing content. While marketing content can be vague and raises brand recognition, sales content is a bit targeted and mainly about the products or services.
With that in mind, "sales" in "sales content" can be confusing – marketing teams are usually given the role of creating that type of collateral. And if the marketing department is excluded from that process, your departments are likely on different pages.
Marketing departments are typically more well-equipped to create sales content than sales teams since it's generally what the department is made to do. So, if the sales team takes over that role, it probably means the two departments lack communication or are not in sync.
Getting Sales and Marketing in Alignment
Although sales and marketing teams have a similar goal, their strategies and success metrics are mostly distinct. And even with their similarities, it can be hard for the sales and marketing teams to understand each team's unique obstacles or even keep up with what each team is doing, leading to disconnection.
These differences usually result in miscommunication and other problems with misalignment. If the misalignments are not managed effectively, it can cost you a lot of time, money, and, ultimately, your customers. Unsurprisingly, the deviation between sales and marketing departments can cost you tons of money. For instance, if the sales department is unaware of strategies to sync with the marketing team and promote a product.
To avoid misalignments, the two teams should have regular meetings, share contact information, and inform the other team of any current projects they're working on. Basically, transparency between the two departments and testing different strategies can benefit both teams. But before we discuss those strategies, let's spare some time and highlight some sales and marketing best practices:
Share the Reports and Analysis
What do the sales and marketing departments track and assess? What have they learned from that analysis? Just as we aim to keep an open communication channel between the two teams, ensure each department has shared its findings. You'll never be certain what your sales team and marketers can learn from simple and unrelated KPIs and analysis.
Set Shared Goals
Sales and marketing departments operate with different KPIs, so they can have individual goals. For instance, sales can focus on the monthly revenue and the marketing team on website traffic. Still, there are a few shared goals between the two teams, like lead value. Identify shared KPIs for your marketing and sales department and instruct them to work together towards that goal.
What Are the Consequences of Not Having Your Sales and Marketing Aligned?
To ensure you know how to align sales and marketing teams, here are a few tips and strategies you can leverage:
Sales Objections and FAQs
Often times we project that our marketing campaign will be a success, but then it fails to pull in enough leads and sales. While it's okay to analyze it yourself with your marketing mindset, getting feedback from your sales team can be accurate.
The sales team often has better insights into how the clients think, what attracts them to your product, and the main objections that affect deals from closing. When marketing teams understand what closes and losses a sale, they can be better equipped to position campaigns that will generate value.
Ineffective Communication Between Departments
Every department is created differently, but mostly sales and marketing teams are positioned in different offices. And even if the teams are in the same office, their duties are different, so it's hard to know what the other team is doing.
To avoid miscommunication, establish a deep connection between the sales and marketing teams and look for ways to collaborate the two teams. One of the most strategic ways to align the two teams is to have an open dialogue. You can learn something new from your counterparts. Plus, both teams are working towards a similar goal.
When you have the tools to reach your goal, the path toward growth will be clearer. At The Insight Studio, we believe in these approaches since all our strategies are always aimed at helping companies grow and empowering them. And we do this by collaborating with HubSpot to ensure your sales and marketing teams are aligned.
Why Sales and Marketing Alignment Is Important to Your Business
So, does my organization have to align sales and marketing departments? Absolutely, yes! If you want your teams to work to their full potential and increase your company's revenue, they have to be on the same page. And remember, communication is key. Allowing the teams to communicate constantly helps them understand their goals, perspectives, and challenges between the departments. In turn, you'll have a clear perspective of the company's overall mission and identify ways to collaborate with the teams.
If you need help aligning your sales and marketing strategy, work with inbound marketing experts like The Insight Studio to ensure the process is successful. To learn more about our HubSpot sales and marketing consulting services, schedule a time to talk to one of our experts or visit our website.
