Why Don't Sales and Marketing Get Along?

First, they compete for the same resource – the money needed to invest behind their initiatives to drive the activity each feels critical to making the numbers.  Sales wants to fund traffic driving promotions while marketing would rather promote brand building efforts that raises the consumer’s value perception and therefore margin.

Second, sales and marketing have a cultural difference.  Sales focuses on individual customers and is therefore willing, almost to an obsession, to build one-off programs, services or products to satisfy a customer’s need.  On the other hand, marketing’s objective is to develop a relevant and compelling positioning that differentiates the brand for a segment of the customer population versus just one customer. So how do you solve this dilemma?

By becoming a customer insights champion, knowing more about your customers than anyone else in the organization, marketing can first gain some respect.  Nothing gets more attention than knowledge.  This respect will then lead to a willingness to talk and debate the benefits of both strategies, selling now versus building a brand.  Every company goes through stages when it needs to generate cash now – marketers need to understand that requirement and get on board.  If they do, they then can help educate the sales team as to the value of a strong brand building campaign, and how that effort will ultimately payoff in bigger bucks down the road.

By understanding the sales team’s motivation and helping them hit their marks, the marketer will be invited back for more discussions and idea generations.  Bottom line, honey attracts more flies than vinegar.

Comments

[Rick Lightburn]

Marketing's job is not necessarily "building a brand."
A brand is a tool -- frequently a very powerful tool, yes, but not necessarily the right tool.
When everyone in the organization (including sales) understands HOW a brand helps sales, then there will be no question about the ROI of marketing.
"Marketing" needs to stop thinking of their job as building a brand, and instead thinking of how to increase net revenue: building a brand might be a way, but there might be others.