MODERATOR
Rachel McClary, Former Global Vice President, Marketing, Diebold Nixdorf
PANELISTS
Evan Kent, Vice President Marketing, US Energy & Services, Schneider Electric
Jacob Baldwin, Global Manager, Digital Operations, Emerson
Jeanine Martin, Former Vice President, Global Sales, Conduent
Steve Spokane, Vice President, Marketing Operations, Change Healthcare
Thomas Loving, Senior Director, Digital Marketing, nThrive
SESSION ABSTRACT
Ever had the sales organization describe marketing as “glorified event planners” or “the team to get them golf balls to bring to their next client visit”? Too often marketing is misunderstood, underappreciated and misrepresented within the highest levels of the company because of inability to fully internalize what we do and why, especially within sales. Are you caught in the circular conversation with your most important stakeholder telling you that marketing isn’t delivering them leads, yet you’re telling them they’re not converting the leads you’re giving them?
Today’s business environment mandates a strategic contribution from marketing, but are we organized to deliver against that need and to dissolve the marketing myth most executives have? How can we align with sales to help the company achieve their financial targets?
KEY TAKE-AWAYS
• A guide for aligning marketing with sales
• Insight on what sales expects and marketing wants
• Key findings on how to balance sales’ need for everything, done yesterday,
costing nothing
OVERVIEW
In any revenue marketing organization, marketing and sales must work synergistically
toward achieving shared financial goals; absent this relationship and the revenue
marketing journey becomes more challenging.
TAKE-AWAY
• Marketing deserves a “seat at the table” with sales, but has to earn it more and
more over time
• Credibility, collaboration and communication should be top priorities
IMPLEMENTATION GUIDELINES
Important to get sales and marketing departments to better communicate:
• Support Sales and enable them to do their job – ranges from value proposition to sales tools, to making sure Marketing has a clear funnel with up-to-date
information
• Marketing = eternal customer for sales; Marketing should have a proverbial seat
at the Sales roundtable
o Score behavioral traits on every lead that comes in
o Make constant communication/collaboration a priority
o Keep customer service in mind every step of the way
BEST PRACTICE
Marketing excels at articulating value to customers in the outside world, but might do a
better job at doing the same with internal teams.
• Follow every lead regardless of whether or not it seems like the perfect fit
ACTION ITEM
• In the world of sales representatives, there are three R’s: Respect, Recognition
and Reward
• Try to align activity with as many of these as possible
FINAL THOUGHT
Take responsibility for the alignment of sales and marketing, and make it a top priority.
Set up parameters internally for people to try and exceed: healthy competition can be
very galvanizing for salespeople.
Recent Comments