by Fronetics | Nov 26, 2018 | Blog, Content Marketing, Current Events, Logistics, Marketing, Social Media, Supply Chain
Here’s how content can help support sales during the seven stages of the sales cycle, including personalization and building last relationships.
The sales process is often an uphill journey with lots of unexpected bumps along the way. Sales teams are all too familiar with these obstacles, but they don’t have to face these challenges alone.
Arm your sales rep with content to educate prospects during specific points in the purchasing process, and it will build his or her reputation as a knowledge source. That can be the difference in getting a foot in the door, advancing through the final stages of a purchasers’ decision, or closing a deal.
[bctt tweet=”Sales and marketing can work together to create a better understanding of the buyer’s journey, make updates on buyers insights, and brainstorm solutions to bottlenecks in the sales funnel.” username=”Fronetics”]
Strong communication between sales and marketing can help achieve big-picture goals when it comes to creating content. These teams can work together to create a better understanding of the buyer’s journey, make updates on buyers insights, and brainstorm solutions to bottlenecks in the sales funnel.
You need to take a close look at your sales process and be strategic about the times when content would be helpful — as well as the types of content that will successfully assist sales reps in educating and informing prospects. Here’s how content can support sales in each of the 7 stages in the sales cycle:
Video: 7 Stages in the Sales Cycle Content Can Help
Takeaway
Don’t forget how important it is for sales teams to be armed with informative, relevant content to support the sales cycle. It’s not enough to just produce content, sales teams need to be ready to provide this content to potential customers at every point of contact.
Want help identifying what content your supply chain and logistics company can provide to your sales team? Let us help.
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by Fronetics | Sep 25, 2018 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Marketing, Strategy, Supply Chain
Armed with high-quality, substantive content, sales teams can use inbound marketing to close deals and boost sales. Here’s the content they need to advance purchasing decisions.
Aligning sales and marketing teams is not a new concept, but one that many companies don’t follow. Think about it: the ultimate goal in business is increased revenue from sales growth! In order to achieve this goal, it’s best to focus on what the buyers’ needs are at the individual stages of the buying process and to provide content to help them move along the sales funnel.
You’re asking yourself, “How do I do that?” Easy, start combining your sales and marketing efforts to maximize what each department does best. When done correctly, content marketing can support sales goals, making it easier to generate leads and helping the sales team close business.
Valuable and relevant content is not a sales pitch but can help the sales process. Arm your sales team with content that communicates valuable information to prospects so that they have the knowledge to make more informed decisions.
[bctt tweet=”Arm your sales team with content that communicates valuable information to prospects so that they have the knowledge to make more informed decisions.” username=”Fronetics”]
Moreover, concentrate on creating the kinds of content your target audience seeks, and distribute it through the platforms on which they seek it. How-to videos on YouTube? Thought leadership on LinkedIn? Optimize the material you distribute for each channel and use your sales team to further distribute your content.
But what kinds of content does your sales team need in order to close deals? Here to discuss our top suggestions is Frank Cavallaro, CEO and Founder of Fronetics.
Video: what content sales needs in order to close deals
Takeaway: teamwork is key
Sales and marketing teams that are aligned perform better. According to State of Inbound 2018’s latest survey, sales teams closely aligned with their marketing counterparts ranked the quality of marketing-sourced leads much higher than those that were rarely aligned or misaligned. That shows that when marketing and sales work together, everyone gets more of what they’re looking for — namely, leads and sales!
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by Fronetics | Sep 13, 2018 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Marketing, Supply Chain
When sales and marketing misalignment plagues your organization, it can have motivational and financial consequences.
Imagine your business spending millions of dollars trying to fix one perceived problem — and it wasn’t even the problem, after all.
Too often, B2B companies fall victim to the dangers of sales and marketing misalignment, often without even being aware that it’s an issue. In fact, a recent study by HubSpot found that only 22% of companies report that their sales and marketing relationship is tightly aligned.
[bctt tweet=”HubSpot found that only 22% of companies report that their sales and marketing relationship is tightly aligned.” username=”Fronetics”]
That’s a big problem. And, recently, four business and marketing professors set out to explore just how bad it is for companies when sales and marketing don’t line up. In a recent article in the Harvard Business Review, Wendy Ritz, Michelle D. Stewart, Felicia N. Morgan, and Joseph F. Hair, Jr., described their findings from an experiment and interviews, designed to tackle the issue of sales and marketing misalignment, specifically in regard to the pricing of products and sales initiatives.
What’s wrong with sales and marketing misalignment?
The researchers identified three major dangers for businesses when sales and marketing don’t share goals.
Danger 1: Demotivation
A key part of motivation is the belief that a team can achieve its goal. When goals are misaligned, “it reduces the sales force’s perception that they can achieve either goal.”
In turn, the researchers point out that this demoralizing effect can reduce commitment to the organization, in addition to specific goals. In their experiment, they found that “the effect of misaligned goals reduced hope of the salespeople and created a defeatist climate.”
Danger 2: Goals seem insurmountable
Again, the perception that goals can be achieved is crucial. When sales and marketing are misaligned, people are much more likely to view goals as more difficult or even impossible to achieve.
The researchers point out that “while difficult goals are not necessarily problematic, the challenge is when the sales force believes that the misalignment of goals is simply unnecessary, or that the goal combination makes it impossible to be successful.” In other words, if goals don’t line up, you wind up with a sales force who feels defeated immediately.
Danger 3: It’s going to cost you
Remember the old adage, “Be careful what you wish for?” When it comes to sales and marketing misalignment, the highest cost often comes when goals are met.
“To compensate for the mismatch between pricing and sales force compensation goals,” the researchers found, “salespeople may offer additional resources such as free training, free freight, and customized products.” When goals seem insurmountable or counterproductive, sales teams find themselves resorting to desperate measures to get the job done — which can unnecessarily erode profits.
When things go right
According to a recent study by Data Room and Marketo, “Sales and marketing alignment can improve sales efforts at closing deals by 67% and help marketing generate 209% more value from their efforts.”
The survey found that sales teams closely aligned with their marketing counterparts ranked the quality of marketing-sourced leads much higher than those that were rarely aligned or misaligned. The bottom line: sales and marketing teams that are aligned perform better.
Thinking about getting your sales and marketing on the same page? Consider these six ways to boost sales and marketing alignment.
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by Fronetics | Aug 22, 2018 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Manufacturing & Distribution, Marketing, Strategy, Supply Chain
Account-based marketing has traditionally utilized outbound marketing tactics, until now.
Account-based marketing has been around for decades, but it has been gaining a lot of attention in the past few years. More and more companies are starting to use account-based marketing to increase their brand awareness with specific audiences and work together with sales teams to close deals.
But what is account-based marketing?
Account-based marketing
Account-based marketing (ABM) is a focused approach to B2B marketing in which marketing and sales teams work together to target best-fit accounts and turn them into customers. Marketers and sales teams focus their efforts on specific accounts — companies, customers, target audiences — and work to get marketing materials in front of them.
Essentially, account-based marketing takes a potential customer and turns them into their own market. “[ABM] is to address the needs of organization by connecting with all of the stakeholders within it. That’s one reason why it works so well in B2B — oftentimes you have to work with five or more stakeholders in a given sale,” writes Sam Balter, HubSpot’s Corporate Marketing Manager.
So how can content marketing help with ABM, which has traditionally been a sales strategy?
Content marketing and account-based marketing
Inbound marketing focuses on audiences finding you. Instead of pushing a message onto buyers, inbound marketing allows you to establish your brand as an industry leader and let interested audiences come to you. This type of marketing attempts to draw in potential customers through interesting and engaging content.
Content marketing is a type of inbound marketing that uses blog posts, social media, infographics, and video to expose target audiences to a brand.
Merging sales and marketing efforts
There’s no reason that ABM and content marketing can’t work together. In fact, you’re missing out on maximizing your marketing efforts if you aren’t incorporating both of these marketing strategies in your overall marketing plan.
[bctt tweet=”Traditional sales pitches are no longer pushing buyers down the sales funnel. Instead, buyers want a personalized experience, where they feel they are getting to know a brand before they make a buying decision.” username=”Fronetics”]
Today’s buyers don’t want to be ‘sold.’ Traditional sales pitches are no longer pushing buyers down the sales funnel. Instead, buyers want a personalized experience, where they feel they are getting to know a brand before they make a buying decision.
What does this mean for your ABM strategy? It means that content marketing can help educate and inform the specific accounts your sales team has identified through valuable, interesting content.
“For example, if you approach any content you create as part of the strategy with both goals in mind, you can create a piece of content that is both incredibly useful from a keyword perspective (and drives a ton of traffic to your site) while also providing all the key information that you’d like to say to your ABM contacts,” writes Stacy Willis for Impact.
When creating content for any marketing effort, the key is to make sure that your content has value. Whether you’re trying to attract a specific account or looking to increase web traffic, content marketing focuses on value and not just volume.
Creating a cohesive account-based marketing and inbound marketing strategy will help maximize your marketing efforts. Though not traditionally used together, it’s time to think outside the box and start seeing the benefits of a joint marketing approach.
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