Where is the Disconnect between Sales and Marketing in B2B Business?

Marketing and sales look like siblings working in tandem. Marketing creates opportunities and Sales in enchases those opportunities. Together they make a rosy picture.

Having worked for few weeks in a B2B sales profile I can say that when it comes to B2B business, Sales and Marketing behaves like distant cousins. They no longer work in tandem and there is a huge disconnect between them.

I will try to explore where and why this disconnect? Why it should not be there?

B2B business is driven by motivated sales team rather than Marketing evangelists. Marketing people do play a role but it is at the very high level. They have very less clue of what is exactly happening on the ground level. On the other hand sales people think that they are the ones who are putting up all the hard work on the ground. They are the ones who are actually connecting with channel partners, promoting the brand and bringing in the numbers. They pay special focus on developing a channel through channel partners as most of the business is done through them only in most of the cases. Mostly sales force relies on their contacts to build and expand this channel. They will use pricing, products differentiation and every trick in the book to build channel. But they forget one important aspect in this whole picture, “Branding”. But this is not their prerogative; marketing people should be doing it!!!

In B2B scenario one can say that Marketing team has fewer stakes as they don’t have to reach to individual customers. Their target audience is greatly reduced. Marketing people think that it’s responsibility of Sales team to develop the channel and they spend virtually no effort in marketing the company to the channel partners. The whole focus is on customers who do not interact with the company directly, but through the channel partners. What an irony!!!
Hence the disconnect lies in sales and marketing teams approach towards channel partners. Both of these teams have individual plan in isolation and seldom seem to work in tandem to tap these channel partners.

One solution to this issue is to have a marketing team dedicated to market the company to the channel partners. Their effort should be in sync with the effort of marketing team focusing on brand building and marketing to customers. This marketing team should work on branding collaterals, special programs, promotional schemes focused on channel partners. At the same time Sales people should work closely with this team to make them aware about their requirements.

Common sense should prevail…Soon…

Marketing: A rocket science??

Marketing is considered proprietary to Pepsi colas and HULs. It is considered as something done inside the glass ceilings. But have even experienced marketing tactics (if not strategy) adopted by smart businessmen running small showrooms.

Marketing and Small showrooms may sound like a oxymoron but believe me effective marketing strategies are adopted at these place at virtually no cost. Let’s dwell it into a bit more.

Making connection with customer is what every marketer strives for. Look at Airtel ads, they are really able to make that connection, but at a stupendous cost. Recently I visited a small apparel showroom. The way the shop keeper was able to connect with my family was overwhelming. The moment we entered we got acknowledgment of familiarity from his side. Then he started to connect with me by talking about his relatives doing MBA and working with blue chips companies. At the same time he talked about apparel choices of young people. With my family he connected by talking about my marriage.

I think me must have read some book on physiology. Something likes “Iceberg”. Nonetheless that worked wonders for him and he was successfully able to convert our visit into sales. He did a great job in marketing plus sales. Marketing by conveying functional benefits the product offers, building authenticity by sharing that he himself uses the brand, boasting about reputation of his showroom etc. At the same time he successfully performed the sales by felicitating customer to make an intelligent choice.

Without ATL, above the line (phew!!!) advertisement he conveyed information about product once customer arrives. He just relies on word of mouth which further depends on how well he markets/serves to his existing customers. So he just has those 30 minutes to market as well as perform sales. The real moment of truth…So even without iota of knowledge about marketing /sales fundamentals shopkeepers often do wonders in their businesses.

This was just one side of the coin. Now look at the other side.

Do you really think big empires like P&G, Coke, Adidas can do the same thing? Because of their sheer size their distance from customers is huge. So they need to have number of channels to get sensitized about customer needs and to connect with customer. At the same time they sell their products through resellers and not directly (mostly). This makes it even more difficult for them to reach customers. So they need marketing plans, advertisement plans, and what not to sell the products.

All this makes me wonder if marketing is just about common sense or hi-fi strategy docs. Do I really need to study marketing courses or I will learn through experience. I am still figuring it out…

Give up the control and flourish

Visiting big retail chain and watching thousands of products displayed elegantly has always been an exhilarating experience for me. One hundred types of Soups, great variety of organic food, stimulating collection of sausages has always given the kick to gourmet like me. But never in my life had I tried to explore the reason, why retail chains emphasize so much on display of products. Marketing aficionados told me that the reason is obvious, not even worth discussing. More product display means better exposure, which further coerce customers to buy, which otherwise they would not have bought. For the good marketing student which I am, I took the logic and convinced myself that the use of million square feet of floor space to display products is to stimulate latent customer needs and in process fuel sale.

But one day something happened which impelled me to question this fundamental, which for me was nothing less than a gospel. I was buying toffee from small mom and pop store. The shopkeeper took the money, signaled me to take anything I want for the sum I paid and turned his face away. Now I had the choice to pick any thing I want to. I don’t have to wait for shopkeeper to handover the things to me. I felt liberated, literally. I felt like a free bird. Like a true iconoclast I wasted no time to frame perspective of my own about the whole situation.

Displaying items alone can’t make customer buy anything. But the display of products in retails is meant to give control in the hands of customers. It makes them feel liberated. He thinks that he has been emancipated. This emancipation is manifested in his purchase behavior. He ends up buying bizarre products, which otherwise he would not have bought.

Given an option to choose between two restaurants, one would tend to choose the restaurant with more choices, even though he may always order the same things. This happens because more options mean more control. More control aggravates his latent needs.

This perspective can be extended to plenty of other areas also.

Business model of Dell for mass customization, millions of tariff plans by telecom service providers, elaborated menu all put the control in the hand of customer and lets him decide his fate.

So if you want to boost those falling sales curve go ahead and give the control in the hands of the customer. He will for sure pay you back, generously.