Justify sales and marketing integration
Here are four powerful reasons to justify your investment in improving your demand generation, sales process and marketing integration.
1. Unproductive prospecting wastes 25% of total sales time
According to IDC’s Technology Marketing and Sales Barometer study, demand generation offers the greatest potential for improving revenues by improving and coordinating the process of lead definition, qualification, scoring and nurturing. The IDC study shows that approximately 25% of sales’ time is spent on unproductive prospecting, while 60% to 70% of reps ignore leads from marketing.
2. $21,600 annual investment for sales support and training
IDC claims the average company spent $12,500 on sales support (enablement which maximizes the sales organization’s ability to communicate value and differentiation in clear, consistent and compelling ways) and $9,100 on training annually per rep per year. IDC concludes that better teamwork and focus by sales and marketing on sales support and lead follow-up can increase sales productivity by $260,000 per rep per year.
3. Buyers go to the Internet before calling a sales rep
Today, more buyers are contacting vendors after they have done their own research on the web. They search out and understand competitive offers and value. They may even analyze vendors’ strengths and weaknesses to cull the selection list. All of this requires a change in how you coordinate your marketing and sales efforts, track client interactions in your systems and empower your reps with this knowledge.
4. 40% of marketers empower sales reps with click-throughs
According to the Email Experience Council (EEC) study, only 40% of marketers empower sales reps with click-throughs of opened e-mails and subsequent web navigation, literature requests and event registrations. This critical digital body language can increase the rep’s knowledge of the prospect’s interests to leverage the opportunity, as well as increase value the prospect receives with each interaction. Prospects appreciate that you know them and do not require them to re-enter information that is passed through to landing pages.
In the next blog, we will examine How to use buyers’ digital body language to empower your reps (steps 5-7) and conclude this series.
