Sales vs Marketing

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Permalink Reply by Terrance D. Jackson on November 13, 2008 at 9:51am

The purpose is focus. Everything must be one and at peace to be effective. Your discussion just identified why people are unsuccessful. Visit www.inkblotmanagement.com

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Permalink Reply by Skip Anderson on November 13, 2008 at 11:12am

This comment may not reflect your question exactly, Stephan, but one challenge I find is that there are differing ideas sometimes of what "sales" is and what "marketing" is. This can cause a lack of clarity about roles or projects. For example, one client was working on an initiative called "local area marketing", which really was mostly nothing more than networking and prospecting, both traditionally considered "sales" activities, yet this was looked at as a "marketing" initiative. And then sometimes "marketing" is used synonymously with "advertising." Things can get all fluid and gray and then people start to forget what their jobs are and who should do what and then riots and mass confusion ensue!

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Permalink Reply by Brad Trnavsky on November 13, 2008 at 2:52pm

I was just about to add the advertising part into the mix... too many college kids study marketing when they really want to be creative advertisers. It's a bummer because they walk away with what amounts to a fancy math degree and no real advertising skills.

I think the problem between sales and marketing comes up when marketers get lost in the math based on what "should" happen rather than what IS happening.

Salespeople in general are a bit more emotional and fire from the hip. Marketers are statiticians.

For the most part we are going to mix like oil and watter.

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Permalink Reply by tanyaacatherine on November 18, 2008 at 8:13pm

Selling is one activity of the entire marketing process which is nothing but the act of persuading or influencing a customer to buy (actually exchange something of value for) a product or service. Marketing activities support sales efforts. Actually, they are usually the most significant force in stimulating sales.
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Permalink Reply by Karl Goldfield on November 22, 2008 at 9:01pm

Sales people should find themselves mired in the marketing process. If you do not give feedback and try and help marketing you are not helping them focus on the right leads. Sales plans should incorporate marketing strategy and marketing plans should incorporate sales strategy.

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Permalink Reply by Steele03 on December 1, 2008 at 10:35am

I couldn't agree more, Karl. There's a common goal; Sell the product. So both teams should work together and keep tabs on one another.

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