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Bridging the Gap Between Sales and Marketing

Today, numerous business challenges impede the development of dynamic, collaborative relationships with customers. Fierce competition, fostered by the ever-changing global economy, compels organizations to allocate enormous resources for product-centric initiatives - strategizing, positioning, branding and tracking competitors' every move - none of which directly benefits customers. Additionally, the advent of advanced communications systems and resources like the Internet bred a new group of highly savvy consumers, who are less reliant on sales teams for product specifications, market data and third party validation.
 
Jointly, these trends erode customer loyalty and challenge organizations to get back to the basics of addressing customer-specific needs. And many organizations have sought to do so - with technology. In fact, a plethora of "solutions" promise to bolster customer retention, while increasing customer acquisition. But can these applications truly deliver the information necessary to cultivate lasting, profitable customer relationships?
 
Missing the Mark
CRM and SFA technologies promise to deliver a panacea for sales teams' - and customers' - headaches. In the end, though, these software solutions don't fully address the multiple issues plaguing marketing and sales teams. SFA systems simply help salespeople better manage the process - and hopefully, condense the sales cycle. They don't necessarily increase topline sales. CRM software's shortfall is in bridging the seemingly eternal communication chasm between marketing and sales departments.
 
So how can a company cater to demanding, technologically sophisticated customers? How can they personalize customer interactions and tailor product offerings to win more business, more quickly, and keep more of it? Believe it or not...technology is the answer - in part.
 
Operating on a "Need to Know" Basis
To successfully serve customers, a dramatic shift in focus must be embraced. Instead of using product-driven marketing, companies must transition to customer-centric models. The mantra should be "1:1 relationships built on knowledge and needs." This requires two major changes: 1) retraining staff to tap into the human component of their jobs and leverage interpersonal skills to listen and understand their clients, and 2) employing technology that delivers the right information to the right person (customer or employee) at the right time.
 
A critical component to a successful customer relationship involves the dissemination of timely, relevant information. But even in the age of real-time, online, instant access - to just about anything - sales teams still flounder, trying to bring the most relevant information to bear on their interactions with prospects and customers in order to close more sales, increase volume or simply maintain an account.
 
Enter the concept of Marketing and Sales Effectiveness (MSE). A recent report by the Yankee Group states, "MSE is a new category of tools aimed at filling a missing link [between] CRM and truly effective selling." MSE facilitates "one-stop shopping" - in real time - for critical information, allowing representatives to focus on customers, instead of onerous research and data sorting. MSE provides them with the right information, for the right prospect, at the right time - helping slash sales cycle time, improve customer win rates and boost the corporate bottom line.
 
By giving sales representatives complete access through a single framework to all account activity, industry data and proprietary research, organizations greatly increase their ability to understand and serve customers, as well as consistently distribute core messages across their network. Empowering employees with meaningful, personalized, actionable data, allows them to identify cross-selling opportunities, accurately represent a full range of products and services and quickly understand customer requirements. The end result is collaborative, dynamic customer interactions that build loyalty and increase sales.