Speaker 1: Often sought after but rarely achieved, sales and marketing alignment is the holy grail of businesses world over. And it's no wonder why. Aligned teams work more effectively and perform better. But despite knowing this, many organizations struggle to stay aligned. Distributed workforces, fluctuating market dynamics, and office politics can make working in harmony difficult. So in this video, let's dig into just what sales and marketing alignment is and how you can ensure long-term success. Howdy guys, it's Liv here from Neighborhood where we help brands find, sell, and keep their people. So why exactly do your sales and marketing teams need to work together? Well first, we need to identify how your sales and marketing teams are different. Your sales team is responsible for not only converting leads into customers, but also managing customer relationships and overall retention. They're doing everything in their power to help the customer find their ideal solution to their problem. They focus on the entire customer journey. They're the anchor of your team because without them, how would you generate revenue? Your marketing team, on the other hand, is there to help generate those leads and make your customers aware of the things that you sell. They're the people who figure out what your customers want to hear, craft thoughtful marketing messages, and execute them to perfection. If you don't have a marketing strategy, your sales people wouldn't have many people to sell things to. So how then do you align the two teams? Well, welcome to the world of smarketing, the light bulb moment that you've been waiting for. According to a recent case study, close to 75% of all marketing leads never amount to sales conversion when your marketing and sales teams and strategies aren't aligned. Inefficient processes can only lead to misaligned sales and a waste of marketing efforts. But on the flip side, when there is alignment between sales and marketing, you can expect to see at least a 34% increase in new business revenue. So while both teams have the same goal, they don't really have the same goal because they think they're both playing on different fields. Your marketing team is trying to generate as many leads as possible, and your sales team wants to convert as many leads as possible. But neither team works together to meet their common goal. So let's explore strategies to change this around. Strategy number one, aim to create a single customer journey. The first big disconnect that creeps in between marketing and sales is how well they understand the customer. More often than not, you'll find your marketing and your sales team have different ideas for how a customer moves between awareness and making a purchasing decision. This is a huge reason why leads often don't become customers. Customers aren't stupid. They can sense the disconnect from a mile away when they start interacting with your brand. You need to get your teams together and encourage them to reconstruct their goals around a more mutually understood customer journey. This should span from the second the customer hears about your brand to the very last communication you have with them about a certain product. Strategy number two, agree on a customer persona. Again, marketing and sales teams often have different ideas about who they're actually talking to. And it's not surprising. Both teams will typically aim for different qualities in the same persona. But over time, the idea of who the customer is gets warped. The most important thing is that both teams always need to put the customer first. This comes with agreeing on a persona and how to market towards their qualities at each stage of the customer's journey. Who is the ideal customer to both teams? Well, your marketing team needs to understand who's interested in your product, while your sales team works on who's ready to make a purchasing decision. Just with the understanding of what makes a persona interested won't be the same thing as what makes them ready to buy. It's also important for your teams to be flexible with their personas. Over the last year in particular, we've seen how quickly the market can shift and change. Your marketing and sales teams need the power to adapt. Naturally, your customers' pain points will change. Pretending they won't will leave you and your marketing teams back to square one of this whole process. Strategy number three, agree on marketing first approach. Yes, we know we've been saying until now that both teams are equally valuable. But there's a huge advantage to taking a marketing first approach. Sure, your sales team could survive without their marketing peers. But in this day and age, no one likes a cold caller, or a cold emailer, or any other kind of unsolicited marketing. Your marketing team needs to figure out where your customers hang out and meet them on their playing field. Once they've nailed down where your customers are, it's time for your sales team to reinforce the marketing message and start working on those conversions. Strategy number four, track joint KPIs. Love them or hate them, key performance indicators show you what's working and what you need to fix. Usually, your sales and marketing teams will track different KPIs. Your sales team wants to know how many accounts they've renewed, what accounts they've generated, and the overall conversion rate. Your marketing team, meanwhile, is probably more interested in lead quantity and quality, advertising results, and email open rates. So how do you align their KPIs? Well, there's not a one-size-fits-all approach. But having regular meetings each week to identify KPIs is a good start. Strategy number five, use customer feedback. Let's face it, unless you're really passionate about surveys and reviews, you're not going to be asking your customers to fill them out just for the fun of it. You're sending them out because you want to see what your customers think about what you're selling, and what they think you can do better. Reading the submissions isn't just about finding the weirdest complaints to laugh about around the coffee machine, although we won't deny it's fun. You can use the information you get back to understand what your customers' pain points are, what they're looking for, what you need to do to turn those missed conversions into sales. And from there, both teams can work together to refine your brand message, then market them accordingly. If you enjoy this video, be sure to subscribe and leave a like. And if you're on YouTube, make sure you hit that bell so you can stay up to date on all of our latest videos delivered every single week to your inbox. Strategy number six, stay consistent. Whether you're selling pencils to children or industry-grade rocket fuel to NASA, the last thing you want is for your marketing and sales teams to be using different terminology. It's unprofessional. Plus, when you make your customers work harder to figure out what you're saying, a whole load of friction can get in the way of them deciding to make a purchase. The bottom line is if you're confusing your audience with mixed messaging, they're not going to trust you. And why should they? If your teams can't agree on what terminology to use, then how can a customer trust that you've got your stuff together to help them out? Your sales and marketing teams need to be working from the same brand guidelines. Handbooks explaining agreed-upon terminology are awesome for keeping everyone on the same page. And last but not least, strategy seven, build a more prosperous future with smart marketing. The truth is, it's much more expensive to obtain new customers than it is to retain them. Both teams need to work together to help keep your returning customers on your side. Aligning your teams won't be easy, but we can promise you that the effort to align your teams will be worth it. If you want to build a more profitable future for your business revenue, and honestly, who doesn't, then it's time to get around smart marketing. And if you found this video helpful, feel free to share it with someone that you know that needs a hand in sales and marketing alignment. You could also subscribe to our blog, where you'll find a bunch more tools, tips, and templates to help you find, sell, and keep your people, just like Neighborhood does. But for now, that's it from me, happy smart marketing.