An eternal problem, no matter what business you are in. It may be invisible at first glance, it may not surface so quickly, but if you look closely, everything will fall into place. Meet their majesty, marketing and sales.
Healthy competition generates the development and invention of new tools, so there should be competition between marketing and sales departments: internal disputes, brainstorming sessions, lively discussions, debates - without them, external actions in the market will be faceless and unlikely to merit the attention of the buyer/client. And mutual help and support are worth a lot. However, there are often moments when the struggle goes beyond all acceptable limits, and we face a life-and-death battle.
Popular "accusations" of sales by marketing:
- No one understands the meaning of the word "strategy";
- They think we print calendars and order T-shirts and diaries;
- without our well-thought-out pricing policy, sales would have been below cost for a long time;
- they do not understand the word "planning";
- they would rather go to the "fields" and not do any work;
- they believe that they make the money - and how would they do it without the tools we have given them?
- they believe that they would have managed their marketing budget much better;
- they believe they know the market much better, even though they don't have any figures;
- they are against everything new: prices, tools, programmes, tactics.
Popular "accusations" of sales to marketing:
- They only make signs and believe that the market can be studied by them - you need to communicate with customers;
- they spend an incredible amount of money, and we don't know why;
- they talk about a strategy, but it remains on paper because it is impossible to implement it operationally;
- how do they affect sales directly? They are in space!
- How can they raise prices every time? They will sell it themselves!
- why did they plan the most popular product to be less than three times as much this time? What am I going to sell?
- Let them make calendars and T-shirts and leave the rest to us - they still don't understand market trends and don't know the consumer profile;
- They are only trying to please their bosses, forgetting about the market.
I would agree that if one of the departments is not working well, then all of the above accusations, unfortunately, become a cruel reality, but let's talk about good examples.
Here's how you can set it all up:
- Marketing is a science, and I have never met a science called "sales" (I hope, Sales won't throw tomatoes at me), which means that
- Marketing and sales are two parts of a single whole, it is one single department with one head (ideally), and inside marketing can be divided into any components, depending on the needs of the business (inside) and the client (outside): strategic marketing, operational marketing, tactical marketing, executive marketing = sales;
- In business, as in the market, the two components of a single whole work together, according to the principle "we (marketing) invent - you (sales) implement";
- Marketing has the strategy (long-term plans, pricing policy, portfolio, management, brand management, positioning, communication channels, promotion channels, segmentation, target audience, digital), and sales has the brilliant execution of the strategy in the field;
- The customer is the centre of the universe for both marketing and sales, and you need to know them thoroughly, practically read their mind;
- Marketing must go to the "fields" - this is a must, but when thinking about strategy and trying to understand the soul of its client, it needs to rely on its eyes and ears - sales, and sales, in turn, must present facts, without emotion, without trying to get a lower price;
- any marketer should work in sales, and salespeople should work in marketing, or, according to the terminology I proposed above, go through all stages of marketing.
- Selling any product begins with selling yourself - and what is this if not working on a self-brand using all the marketing tools we know?
I will repeat once again: marketing and sales teams are one, and both are components of marketing in its classical sense for successful growth and development of business in the market, for personalisation of products and brands for consumers, for innovation, for distinguishing oneself from competitors, for creating blue oceans. And the more effective and efficient the cooperation, the more well-coordinated the teamwork, the higher the rating of the market leader's position.
If we continue to look for answers to the question of who is most important in the world, I would say that it is finance. But this is a topic for another article.
Source: AgroPortal
