Bouncing On The Marketing Mattress

October 21, 2011 at 4:11 pm | Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment
Tags: business development, business prospecting, lead generation, marketing, Public Relations

A great brand and superb marketing materials can really help a company to establish visibility and credibility with it’s audience. So too can PR and advertising help to pave the way to a successful service or product.

But they simply pave the way or in my mind, they are the mattress upon which sales must bounce.

A fantastic sales rep can close business without the benefit of marketing collateral and a brand promise.  Yes, they can, although they have to work harder and longer in order to do so.

Marketing helps the sales effort.

But make no mistake about it, marketing does not pull through closed business. It can help…it does help but people, processes and qualified sales reps acting on exquisitely crafted sales campaigns are what really generates most new business.

Most sales consultants know this is true and so when they meet a prospect they often (always?) inquire about the marketing campaign that is in the wings. They also review the web site, social media platforms and other such marketing initiatives that are “out there” for all to see.

But rarely, and I do mean rarely, do marketing professionals ask definitve questions about the prospect’s planned sales campaign that will integrate with their marketing program. It’s almost as if they are engaged in marketing for marketing’s sake.

How do I know this?  Simple. I’ve been a sales consultant for 24 years and I can count on one hand the number of times that our firm has been brought in by the marketers working on a program.  Yet in a large volume of our projects we make a concerted effort to identify the right marketing resources for the job and then send out RFPs to help us / our client make our selection.

I’m not sure why this schism exists but it does. I also know that clients would be better served if we all just played nicely together.

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