Having been in sales for my entire professional career, I’ve witnessed one side of the ongoing jihad between marketing and sales. Now that I’m the newest member of the Forty team, I can finally come clean and admit that I think the whole thing is silly.
Marketing is sales, and sales is marketing. Together they are more powerful than apart, much less if they are combative.
The argument that sales is more one-to-one and direct as opposed to marketing’s one-to-many relationship is valid – however flawed. The fact is you are still dealing with the most important thing in the world to your business: your clients and your extended network. Without those clients and prospects, you won’t be in business much longer. Both teams should have the same goal – more and better customers.
If both sides of this war worked closer together and started working with the same goal in mind, there wouldn’t need to be a sales team and a marketing team. There will be a team that is responsible for getting your prospects and clients into and through your sales process. Are there different skill sets involved? Certainly. But there are different skill sets on your hometown football team, but they are all part of the same team. The quarterback won’t be out there stopping a running back, and the linebackers aren’t throwing Hail Mary’s downfield.
Get rid of the enemies outside of your department or on the other side of the office, and start having your sales team use some of the marketing team’s talent and strategies to broaden their skills and look at the long-term play. Start your marketing guys down the path of working on the right steps to create action like your sales team. Eventually, you’ll have your teams collaborating, cross-pollinating, and communicating as one unit.
If you want to hear more conversation about this check out when Forty’s own James Archer joined me on the Don’t Sell Me Bro Podcast where we talked about this and more.
