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You could be the most driven and innovative marketing team in the world, but without sales buy-in, your lead generation strategies are going to fall flat.
Friction between sales and marketing teams is unfortunately common when it comes to lead generation. Sales reps are often concerned that marketers are out of touch or wasting precious budget on broad campaigns, while marketers harbour fears that sales reps are too focused on making individual sales and hitting their targets.
But the truth is these departments need each other to succeed.
It's clear that sales and marketing professionals are aware of this, with 60% saying that misalignment between the two teams damages the financial performance of the business.
But how do you bridge the gap between them and create a lead generation strategy that allows both departments to work together cohesively?
Well, it’s actually a lot easier than you’d think. Here is our simple strategy for getting sales onboard with your lead generation activity.
Encourage communication and collaboration
Communication is crucial when it comes to aligning your marketing and sales teams, which is why it’s so important to maintain open communication channels at all times.
This makes it possible to arrange regular check-ins, share updates on lead generation activities, align goals, discuss lead quality and more.
In order to do this, you need to foster a culture of collaboration between both departments. Encourage each team to share insights, feedback and ideas regularly so they can continually improve lead generation efforts and conversion rates.
This can be facilitated by holding face-to-face meetings, as well as getting the right tools in place to make communicating with one another quick and easy.
Regular face to face or video calls are crucial in my opinion, as they help build up rapport and trust. When people feel more at ease with one another, they’re more likely to be honest and share valuable insights, which in the long term will give you stronger results.
- Holly Jones, Marketing Manager
Understand sales needs and align your goals
Before you implement any new lead generation activities, it's essential that the marketing team understands the needs and goals of the sales team. That way, they can create shared goals and ensure that the objectives of both teams are aligned.
For example, both should have a shared understanding of what constitutes a qualified lead and what the desired outcome of all lead generation activities should be.
This is where collaboration comes into play. Arranging workshops to generate buyer personas, discuss the target market, map the customer journey and sales funnel and determine which content will be most effective can ensure both teams are aligned in their goals and needs.
Recommended reading: The easiest way to align sales and marketing (it's really not that hard)
Educate the sales team
Collaboration and alignment is about more than just asking sales ‘what can we do for you?’ - it’s about educating sales on the marketing process and the lead generation activities you plan to implement.
This will help them understand how these activities will generate high-quality leads that are more likely to convert into customers.
Don’t assume sales automatically understand every marketing activity. Take the time to explain the whys and the benefits as this can make a big difference. When the sales team understands the value of what marketing is doing, they’re more likely to embrace it and use it effectively.
- Holly Jones, Marketing Manager
It also provides you with an opportunity to showcase what marketing can do and to take on board any feedback from sales that can help shape and improve your strategies.
By educating the sales team and showing them how marketing can benefit their sales efforts, they're more likely to continue sharing ideas and working closely with the marketing team in the future.
Provide the right tools and resources
It's vital to get the right tools and resources in place to allow the sales team to communicate and collaborate with you effectively.
Tools like company intranets, live chats, task managers and customer relationship management (CRM) systems are going to be key to success. However, it’s also about providing the right marketing materials to support sales.
Having one central platform, like HubSpot, is key. It speeds up the process, ensures both teams can access the same materials, see what messaging has gone out, and have access to all lead information. Without it, there's a lack of transparency, which can lead to inefficiencies.
- Holly Jones, Marketing Manager
Did you know that an average of 60% of content created in the marketing department is never used by sales?
Not only is this a huge waste of time and resources, but it proves that sales are not getting the right resources. This makes it harder to generate and nurture leads.
So, in order to get sales onboard and start making positive changes, both teams must work together to come up with a content strategy and determine which products to push and when.
In doing so, marketers can produce genuinely helpful sales collateral that reflects the buying stage and encourages profitable action.
This can also influence your marketing and lead generation campaigns, ensuring they're more likely to convert to high-quality leads.
Provide quality leads
Of course, the best way to get sales buy-in and align the teams is to focus on generating quality leads rather than quantity.
One in four (23%) sales reps say that better quality leads are their top requirement from the marketing team, with just 7% saying the leads they receive from marketing are high quality.
So, by working with the sales team to define the criteria for a high quality lead and tailoring your lead generation efforts accordingly, you can begin to produce better results. This will encourage the sales team to work more closely and collaboratively with marketing.
Track results and gather feedback
Sales and marketing teams are often misaligned because there is ambiguity around the value each team brings and how they complement one another.
By implementing the right tracking metrics and tools to monitor the performance of your lead generation activities, marketers can continue to prove their value and contribution to sales.
Both teams must agree on which metrics are most beneficial, as this makes it easier to demonstrate the impact that your marketing efforts are having on the sales pipeline and revenue.
Armed with these results, both teams can begin to see what works and what doesn’t.
You should also continuously seek feedback from the sales team on the quality of leads being generated and the effectiveness of your follow-up strategies.
You can then use their feedback, along with any success stories they may have, to refine your lead generation strategies and optimise your campaigns.
Reap the benefits of sales and marketing alignment
By following all the steps we’ve outlined above, you can better align your sales and marketing teams and create a unified approach to your lead generation activities. With both teams communicating with one another and working towards common objectives, you can ensure your marketing efforts contribute effectively to driving revenue and business growth.
