Can it be true what the title beholds? Do sales people really know more than marketers about marketing? Well, obviously I don’t think so, but I met a couple of regional sales reps yesterday, on the Piccadilly Line, that truly did.
I guess the most frightening admission was that I approached two strangers on the tube and started talking to them. Yes, I must have looked like a lunatic. I felt like one.
In short, I was on the Piccadilly Line, late morning, on my way to a client meeting. During one unscheduled stop [in a tunnel], I overheard two people having a good stab at their [IT] marketing department, with lines like “I have no idea what they [marketing department] are doing down there with their glossy leaflets”, “They are a waste of resources”, “they just need to do some TV advertising” and “They have the cheek to send direct mail to my clients”… and so on. They were on a roll.
I do not think of myself as the ‘marketer’s freedom fighter’, but their blatant disregard for marketing got me going. Hence, I spoke out. This is the bit where I felt like a lunatic. However, I kept it quick and tried to make light of my impromptu comments.
I told them who I was [naturally they were unimpressed] and asked them why they thought their marketing department was so bad. There was a load of hyperbole based on pure prejudice towards marketing. So much so, as I quickly found out that they had never met a marketer in their company. They also had no real idea what the marketing department’s plans were. Hence, their own marketing ideas must have felt like pure original-thinking genius. It was then the tube door opened; I got off, and ran.
Not much of a story really. However, it truly got me thinking about the conundrum. Marketing should be an essential and must be executed to the benefit of all business; but they, the salesmen, had a point. Not as if they knew what it was, but a point none-the-less:
With so much time and energy spent on client facing marketing strategies, some marketers score an own goal. They forget to market themselves internally and forget to inform and engage with the rest of the business. No wonder sales people think that marketers are rubbish if they never meet them and cannot see or feel the benefits of the marketing effort.
So much has moved forward in the world of B2B marketing, yet some departments stay clear of engaging directly with the sales department. It could be because there is no encouragement, or that there is no perceived need, or that they have tried and have received a tepid response. Either way, engagement with the wider business, and especially sales, is essential.
So what can we take from this? (a) It is still best not to talk to strangers on the tube and (b) that the irony is still alive, where some marketers, so adept at promoting their business, are terrible at promoting themselves!
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I couldn't agree more, it is so important - but there is so little time when execution is a 24hour a day job!
Ah James, so true... internal marketing is sadly lacking in many organisations, and as a result, the right hand often doesn't know what the left hand is doing.
Having said that, I've seen examples where the marketing department has slogged its guts out to involve every employee from every department - for example, testing ads, getting technical staff to proof-read brochures, reporting on results and so on - but it's encountered resistance from senior management, as involving non-marketing employees in marketing decisions has been seen as "time wasting".
Internal marketing is of utmost importance in an organisation to ensure all employees feel involved and trusted, carry brand messages consistently, and work towards a common goal. In my opinion it's the responsibility of senior management to implement internal marketing strategies and ensure marketing departments stick to them.
Hi James! May I share a releated story and make a suggestion. My businesses involve marketing consulting and sales training. One day the phone rang and a young voice asked, "Can you train my Apaloosa?" I replied, "Perhaps. What is an Apaloosa?" "It's a horse!" "Oh. Well, I train marketing and sales people, but not horses." Said the young voice, "What's a marketing person?" Indeed.
The first step in many of our projects is to get marketing and sales together to define terms and mutual expectations. Sometimes, as you point out, it is the first time they have done so. We marketers and sales people must promote AND collaborate. Our work exists in context ... leverage the context and prosper!
It's amazing how many people think that marketing is sales. It's not. Good marketing helps sales people sell, by all means, but marketing is closer to customer services than selling, in my opinion :)
As someone who started off in the sales team of a small-ish company, the best results I've got from marketing have always come from working very closely with individual members of the sales team. Of course I have the advantage of a sales team that work in tight verticals, above all that helps keep things interesting.
A familiar tale but organisations must lead from the top when deciding WHY they are recruiting Marketing resource in the first place.
In B2B, there is still an unhealthy tendency for 'marketing' to be perceived as the 'pens and the pictures' rather than as a key executable of delivering and sustaining business strategy - internally and externally. There is also still insufficient remit given to B2B marketing to involve itself in key areas such as new product development and account management - astonishing but true.
Some B2B organisations will have cracked this long ago but whilst other CEOs and Board room personnel continue to instil little more than a 'flower arranging' remit into their marketing function, disconnection between marketing and every other department is likely to remain.
A familiar tale. It's one thing when HR don't know what marketing are up to, but when its business development / sales / account management - it's quite another.
In too many B2B organisations marketing and sales are still not sufficiently aligned. i.e. marketing maintains the brand, manages the PR and rasies awareness with one set of messages, whilst business development / account management pursue opportunities without linking into the 'line' set out by Marketing.
This may be because B2B marketing, in several sectors, still doesn't have sufficient recognition or remit to lead (or at least confidently contribute to) business strategy, product development and account management. 'Marketing' is still seen as the pretty pictures, corporate events and exhibition stands.
Of course 'Marketing' in its truest sense has to link up with every facet of an organisation to be successful - not least product development, sales and account management. It also has equal obligation to manage the needs of internal stakeholders to ensure an organisation is clear and consistent on the purpose of its existence.
The key is for CEOs and Board rooms to be clear on why they are recruiting a 'marketing' resource in the first place, what the remit is and the fit within the rest of the business.
Unfortunatley some Board rooms still see marketing as the 'pens and the pictures' rather than than a key executable in delivering strategy internally and externally.
As somebody who has been involved in SME IT sales for a number of years, I believe that when marketing and sales work together then the benefits are obvious and the results can be amazing.
However, inevitably a number of issues occur which creates a disconnect between the two functions and these are, if not counterproductive, then more often than not a waste of money and resource.
Whilst I have great respect for quality marketeers sadly the truth is that your trade is let down by a lot of practioners whose insularity fails them and their colleagues.
This may be a peculiarity of the SME marketplace where potentially budgets and resource do not stretch to quality research that I would expect to inform plans.
However,even at its most basic who better to inform plans, understand impact and shape product futures than customers or potential customers.
The reticence of marketeers to fully engage in this process I find staggering.
So who better to engage with than those who do this on a day to day basis i.e. the salesforce (and by all means interpret the results of this as you see fit but at least do it and use it to help shape the vision) rather than engaging in dry theoretical excercises to inform plans and then bemoaning the lack of engagement of colleagues by not involving them and selling them the vision in the first place.
I think I’ve seen the two ends of the spectrum in my (fairly short) career so far.
I worked for part of the Sales force of one of the world’s leading publishers a short time ago and saw for myself how the two departments can exist in a perfect symbiotic relationship.
Sales and Marketing sat adjacent to each other and had weekly meetings to report on progress and successes. Every week we were regularly out at functions, the pub, etc and shared the rewards of both departments. This close relationship resulted in us not only representing the company better (by presenting a united front with a consistent message) but also in generating more leads than would otherwise have been created.
This was a perfect example of how your Sales and Marketing departments should ideally function and I was genuinely surprised when I saw this in action because for much of my working life I had seen the exact opposite.
During that time, I had worked with a rival publisher where the two departments were in separate buildings altogether. I could only recognize the marketing manager by name and had never spoken to him despite being in charge of a large sales team that effectively represented the company because we had daily contact throughout the industry we represented. Internal e-mails weren’t really paid enough attention to and unhealthy competition existed between the different departments amongst other things. No wonder the brand suffered despite the sales team performing impressively over target.
I’m sure there must be some other stories out there?
Sadly, I agree with the comment: "the truth is that your trade is let down by a lot of practioners whose insularity fails them and their colleagues".
So many marketers seem to operate anonymously within an organisation and don't communicate their strategy effectively. I presume that this could be because marketers would be held to account directly when it is easy for them to avoid the same scrutiny that others perform under.
There seems to have been an overwhelming agreement that businesses can only benefit (and should do as a matter of course) by opening up channels between marketing and sales departments, as well as the wider business.
Excluding some finger pointing [see above], a strong theme of rectifying this has come through. Make it a Board issue [senior management]. The Board agree a process, structure, objectives and goals between marketing and sales – and then measure its success and reward accordingly. This does not mean just putting them together under one banner, but actually investigating the terms with which each party needs to work against, in order to execute their objectives with more meaningful impact.
The critical success factor will be reporting back on how the improved internal relationship has increased efficiencies and profitability with the company. Otherwise, everybody will think it is a waste of time, and go back to how it was!
B2B marketers often forget that folks in the sales department (i.e. salespeople, reps, dealers and distributors) are their customers too.
I recommend that my marketing clients meet with their salepeople every couple of weeks for briefings on what each team is up to (or up against).
I also recommend that marketers ride along on sales visits or listen in on sales calls at least once a month. It will open their eyes to what marketing support the salespeople need to be more effective in competing and selling, and it will give them a chance to build report one salesperson at a time.
I am about to leave an SME due to a complete mis-understanding of marketing and my role. I am more than academically qualified in my area and I believe the issue with marketing is that there alot of 'marketers' out there who aren't marketers. They started off in admin/sales etc. and arent properly trained, I dont care what anyone says 'experience marketers' arent worth their weight. This is the real problem and it goes across many sectors. They cannot possibly know all the right techniques and the trained marketers spend their time upselling the proper way to do things. I replaced a 'marketer' in my firm who was a designer by trade and we appear to have two totally different marketing scripts. I would like to see all 'marketers' CIM qualified. It must be a profession in it's truest sense of the word for it to be taken seriously. I'm off to FMCG B2C where I will be embraced with open arms... Sales knowing more than marketers? No chance! Youve been talking to the 'experience' marketing people again!
Speak to a CIM bod - they'll put you right.