When sales and marketing alignment is the approach adopted by a business fewer leads go cold, leads take less time to convert and revenue improves.
Yet more often than not, things become combative between the two departments. Egos get in the way and you’re faced with sales and marketing teams who are so out of sync with one another. Their relationship can often resemble that of cats and dogs!
Understanding the pain point preventing the two teams from working as one could be the first step in changing this behaviour. Here are five things which could be standing in the way of sales and marketing alignment in your business.
1. Different perspectives
The different perceptions of roles and responsibilities of each team can cause conflict and confusion about each other’s contributions.
Sometimes, marketers blame salespeople for not actioning adequately on a successful lead generation campaign, while sales call out the lack of good leads from marketing.
2. Disconnected funnel
More often than not the top of the sales and marketing funnel (marketing’s primary domain) is too disconnected from the journey into the lower funnel (sales domain). Disconnection means sales can be at risk of jumping in too early or too late, potentially leading to lead leakage and lost enquiries.
3. Disagreement on the definition of a marketing qualified lead
Although both departments have the same long term goals, their perspectives on when these have been achieved can often be very different. For example, what constitutes a lead for marketing might not be counted as one by sales, meaning marketing steps back and sales fail to jump in. Ultimately, this confusion could be standing in the way of achieving long term success for either team.
4. Poor marketing automation system configuration (and lack of time, budget and resource to get it right)
Failure to configure your sales pipeline stages in your CRM with the lead nurturing which happens in your marketing automation creates problems for both teams. Leads go cold, or worse, prospects who are ready to be followed up aren’t contacted at the right time, causing them to take their business elsewhere.
5. Lack of communication
Seeing sales and marketing as separate entities, rather than closely linked networks can derail internal processes. Lack of communication and failing to have transparency between the two departments not only impacts productivity but can also build an air of distrust and frustration due to recurring miscommunications.
These miscommunications could also be hurting your customer journey. Rather than transitioning between the two departments seamlessly, customers will be aware that they’re being handed from one team to another- the worst case scenario being that they find themselves explaining the same thing to multiple people!
Having a clear plan and dedicated time to improve processes, communication, shared goals and joint working can help to reduce friction and pain points which occur between sales and marketing teams. When sales and marketing align, it can lead to a 32% in year-over-year revenue growth, but in order to achieve this, it’s important for both teams to recognise the pains which are standing in the way.
How is your sales and marketing alignment? Ask us to take a look and see the opportunities that a fresh perspective could uncover. Check out our Sales & Marketing Alignment services.
