This Is What Happens When Your Sales and Marketing Team Don't Mesh It isn't pretty.

By Daniel Newman

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

B2B businesses consistently struggle to align their sales and marketing teams and yet, it is imperative these two groups work in tandem to ensure the core business model succeeds.

Otherwise, a continued disconnect between sales and marketing could impede your long-term growth or worse, result in the shuttering of your organization.

When marketing turns it back on sales

An increasing number of businesses today are making significant investments in social media and content for their owned and earned media channels; others are investing in SEO and lead generation campaigns. But one thing is for certain; most companies do not have a sound plan for integrating the efforts of a marketing campaign with their sales team.

Related: 6 Ways to Be an Effective Leader

For instance, the content created by the marketing team may work wonders for drawing prospects in through the first few levels of the sales funnel, but what happens as they travel down the funnel? What happens when they reach the point of closing a long-term sale? Is the content created complimentary to what the sales team might need to close the sale? Not always. This is where the disconnect between the marketing team and sales team become apparent.

The sales team has first-hand knowledge about existing customers and prospects. The sales team knows what kind of leads to look for, what their pain points are and/or what attracts them to particular products and services. These are rich insights that can help the marketing team create content that is fine-tuned to catch current -- as well as prospective -- customers' eyes.

When sales gives marketing the cold shoulder

Recently, I worked with a company that collected 1,200 leads through their web campaigns. However, when I spoke with their sales team, they had no idea what happened to the leads. Exploring the situation further, I found out that this wasn't really a rare occurrence. It is unfortunately very common, especially in smaller businesses, for web leads to be mishandled as they are passed from person to person or department to department. If they're even passed on at all!

Related: 8 Tools That Can Make Employees More Efficient

According to recent lead nurturing statistics, 79 percent of marketing leads go without a response from sales. This is due to poor communication between teams, and cliquish "hoarding of information" — holdovers from another era of marketing and sales. Why work hard to bring in leads if there won't be a substantial effort to manage them? It's not unusual for the marketing teams to transfer leads that aren't sales-ready, forcing the sales people to find their own leads; it's equally common for the sales teams to disregard marketing sourced leads.

When these problems surface, customers and prospects feel lost and turn to a competitor who they feel can do a better job of listening and catering to their needs.

Integrating marketing and sales may seem like a difficult task at first, but trust me, it's worth every effort. Strategic planning, creating scope for open dialogue between both teams, building an environment of mutual trust, and encouraging your organization's departments to make customer satisfaction their common goal are strategies that will help you break down the silos holding back your business

Related: How to Keep a Leadership Team in Sync

Wavy Line
Daniel Newman

President of Broadsuite

Dan Newman is the president of Broadsuite where he works side by side with brands big and small to help them be found, seen and heard in a cluttered digital world. He is also the author of two books, is a business professor and a huge fan of watching his daughters play soccer. 

Editor's Pick

A Leader's Most Powerful Tool Is Executive Capital. Here's What It Is — and How to Earn It.
Lock
One Man's Casual Side Hustle Became an International Phenomenon — And It's on Track to See $15 Million in Revenue This Year
Lock
3 Reasons to Keep Posting on LinkedIn, Even If Nobody Is Engaging With You
Why a Strong Chief Financial Officer Is Crucial for Your Franchise — and What to Look for When Hiring One

Related Topics

Business News

More Americans Are Retiring Abroad, Without a Massive Nest Egg — Here's How They Made the Leap

About 450,000 people received their social security benefits outside the U.S. at the end of 2021, up from 307,000 in 2008, according to the Social Security Administration.

Business News

7 of the 10 Most Expensive Cities to Live in the U.S. Are in One State

A new report by U.S. News found that San Diego is the most expensive city to live in for 2023-2024, followed by Los Angeles. New York City didn't even rank in the top 10.

Growing a Business

The Best Way to Run a Business Meeting

All too often, meetings run longer than they should and fail to keep attendees engaged. Here's how to run a meeting the right way.

Fundraising

Working Remote? These Are the Biggest Dos and Don'ts of Video Conferencing

As more and more businesses go remote, these are ways to be more effective and efficient on conference calls.

Business News

Woman Ties the Knot at White Castle Almost 30 Years After the Chain Gave Her Free Food as a Homeless Teen

Jamie West was just 12 years old when she ran away from the foster care system.