When a company has insufficient results, is it the fault of salespeople or rather of marketing service? The answer is not always obvious. But one thing is certain, to achieve your goals, you must, not seek a scapegoat, but rather define a strategy that works better. With smarting, your sales and marketing departments will be in close collaboration. You can better pilot them for the greatest good of your business.
According to a study by the Aberdeen group , there is a 20% increase in the turnover of companies that align their marketing and commercial strategy. However, in the sales process, and especially in the context of digital marketing, these two poles are often in rivalry . And when one of them is ineffective, the other is accused of not being efficient enough. However, we will see in this article that by optimizing your approach using Smarketing, your business will necessarily emerge.
What is Smarketing?
The term smarting comes from the merger of the word " dirty " and " marketing ". It is a technique which consists in working together the marketing service as well as the team of sellers. The goal? Develop a common strategy in order to perfect the customer experience, better control performance indicators and thus achieve the objectives set more easily.
In principle, these two services have the same objective: that of maximizing profits for the company. Nevertheless, the salespeople will rather have a short -term vision since they will be awarded on each sale. Besides, the marketer will be to generate income to Middle Long Term thanks to qualified leads.
These two departments are often competitive and their relationships can be tense, especially when the results are not there. Besides, marketers sometimes complain that salespeople do not convert enough leads into customers. Conversely, the sellers claim that if the objectives are not achieved, it is that the contacts obtained thanks to the marketing pole have not been well qualified.
Smarketing goes beyond their difference and rather focuses on their complementarity . By adopting it, you will set up a strategy to perfectly perfect communication between the two departments. For this, your teams will have to communicate with each other more often and that they opt for the same strategy. Thus, you will have relevant information and reliable performance indicators and easier to pilot.
Smarketing, what benefits?
Smarketing is essential for a company, at all levels. Communication between commercial and marketing services will be beneficial to achieve objectives within the company, which will naturally boost your turnover. In addition, your customers' purchasing journey will be improved. Finally, it will help you establish a more perfected strategy focused on transparent performance indicators.
A lever to boost your turnover
To increase your turnover, there is no secret, you must convert the most prospects to customers. However, leaving the seller and the marketer to work separately, there may be mutual misunderstanding. By adopting Smarketing, you will develop a strategy in which the data will be used , not for the benefit of a single service, but for the whole of the company .
To do this, the purchasing process must be at the heart of your concern. The marketing department will provide more qualified leads thanks to the data collected by the sellers. The latter will use information at their disposal to convert as much lead as possible . They will then go up the analyzes collected to perfect the marketing objectives. It is a virtuous circle , which will ultimately boost your turnover.
To avoid friction in the sales process
The sale was often considered as the exclusive field of salespeople. However, marketers also hold an important place in this process knowing that it is up to them to generate leads. By using smarting, the two teams will be co-responsible for the results, they will therefore no longer reject the fault in the event of a non-deputy objectives.
Here, communication is the key to success. The two departments must have the same targets and to easily align their results. Each pole will then undertake to carry out its role so that the conversion of MQL (Marketing Qualified Leads) to SQL (Sales Qualified Leads) is simplified and fruitful.
This communication will result in better dynamics within your business. Instead of rejecting the fault, the commercial and marketing services will find the points to improve as well as the strategies that have worked.
Marketers will therefore observe consumer behavior and establish an action plan for their marketing campaigns. They will increase the notoriety of the brand on all channels so that salespeople can increase their sales force.
Besides, the sales team will contact the marketers to allow them to optimize their future decisions . It will also set up an effective marketing strategy to improve the company's return on investment.
A technique to improve the purchase route
traditional marketing strategy is no longer suitable since the purchasing process must be fluid . With the digital age, when visitors are interested in a product, they will first learn, make a comparison and consult the opinions of other Internet users before contacting salespeople. They therefore tend to be more and more independent in their customer journey.
However, for a prospect to become a customer, there is a whole path to be accomplished which is in the field of the two departments. If they agree on the line to follow, thanks to Smarketing, this will facilitate the management of each prospect.
Thus, the marketing team takes care of the sales process first. It will transform visitors identified into leads. She will arouse each person to express his interest in the offer in order to qualify them in MQL. Then the seller will relay it. He will conclude sales by converting these MQLs to SQL, that is to say in real commercial contact.
A key element in the Inbound Marketing strategy
inbound marketing strategy allows you to conquer prospects by focusing on brand image and website positioning. The difference with the Outbound or traditional marketing is that the targeting is well determined here. The objective is to attract strangers, to convert visitors to leads, and finally to retain customers without necessarily going to them .
Thanks to the exchange between the two services, you can identify the weaknesses and provide the areas for improvement in your current management. This will give you an effective marketing strategy, which will allow you to touch your targets. That said, your conversion rate will increase since you will have managed to reach your potential customers more easily.
lead generation dynamics and the conversion of simple intention into purchasing action . However, if your sellers and marketers do not align their methods, some leads may not grow. This is why, smarting is essential for your strategy.
Smarketing is a real marketing strategy that offers both a risk vision better control the KPIs . In addition, the rapprochement between the two departments is beneficial both internally and for the relationship between the company and the customer. The information thus obtained, added to good management of performance indicators can help the company boost its turnover . So why not opt today for smarting within your company?
