Marketing-Sales: Common Language
John Counsel
Member
Posted 27-Sep-2005 01:45 PM
In the latest issue of CustomerThink Advisor, Gwynne Young comments:
"How can you get marketing and sales to work together? We wind up our focus on collaboration between the two departments with ideas for getting everyone speaking the same language. Until that happens, the experts say, all the collaborative features of your technology—and your business—won't mean a thing."
They already have a common language. They just ascribe different meanings to the same terminology. So you have the constant dilemma of two departments using the same words but not understanding each other. I call it the "The Supposition Principle".
The reason, I suspect, is due to the diametrically opposite, yet essentially complementary, nature of the two fields.
Marketing people are typically analytical, objective, rational and strategic in their thinking.
Sales people are typically emotional, opportunistic and tactical in their approach.
(Yes, I'm generalising outrageously—but on the basis of 40 years experience in both fields.)
Good sellers will latch onto anything that they believe will enhance their strike rate, so the language of marketing quickly becomes the jargon of sales. They assume the meaning of marketing terms, based on their own conditioning and experience, but they miss the reality that those terms have very precise definitions and meanings. They rarely bother to check, because their priority is emotional impact, not meaning.
So sellers hijack the language of marketing for a perceived tactical advantage with prospects, but then mistakenly assume that they actually understand that language.
It's fine to sound authoritative to a sales prospect who doesn't speak the language of marketing. It's a potentially lethal communications boobytrap when they converse with marketers who do.
The confusion, misunderstanding, frustration and belligerence this can cause is legendary, of course. As a sales manager who is also a marketing professional, I've always found that a 2-3 day basic marketing workshop, and a good lexicon of marketing terms and their specific meanings, made a world of difference to the relationship between departments and the results for both.
As a market communications specialist consulting to businesses of all sizes, I often run into people who have the title "Marketing Manager" or "Marketing Director", who use the language of marketing, but whose briefs, perspectives and attitudes are pure sales. It took me a while for the penny to drop, but once it finally did, it changed everything.
Now, when I'm introduced to a "Marketing Manager", I have a set of quick questions that tell me, reliably, whether they're a genuine marketer or a seller wearing marketer's garb.
The absolute giveaway, always, is if they have a business card or office door that says "Sales & Marketing". As Rob Frankel says in his book on branding, it's a reliable warning sign that the organisation hasn't a clue about marketing, and I'm talking to a seller who thinks that marketing is just selling.
John Counsel
CEO, The Profit Clinic
http://www.profitclinic.com
http://www.fourthgenerationselling.com
http://www.marketing4small.biz
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Alan J. Zell
Marketing vs Sales
Gwynne,You and John Counsel have brought up an age old question -- why the arms lenghth relationship between marketing and sales? It is, in my estimation, that marketing things that if it were not for them, nothing would happen; for those in sales, they believe that those in marketing do not understand what goes on between the customer and the salesperson hence, the materials, advertisements, often packaging are not practical.
Both are wrong, not because of the reasons you mentioned, but because the definitions used by each are too general or too limited.
The term or definition of "marketing" has 50 meanings, none separated by any commas. Interesting, if those in marketing would realize they have to "sell" their marketing efforts to those that sell the products/services, maybe their would be better relations betweent the two.
The definition of selling or sales, something most people not in-sales including marketing believe, is something others do . . . and don't do well.
What both do not see is that marketing and selling are just two or four or five steps in the decision making process which start within the business, first at the management level, then to the marketing, and then, to sales. This takes place long befor anything gets to customers and will have a life after information about the product/service gets in customers' hands.
The first step is "buying" of what to market. The second is "marketing" i.e determining to whom and how the product/service will be presented. Step three is determining which types presentation(s)have to be developed for different types of customers. Fourth, is "helping customers buy the product/service by teaching customes how to "sell" the product/service under consideration to others -- family, friends, associatiates, acquaintances, customers/clients or, even, the customer's own conscience. If the first step is not done well, don't expect the last step to be successful.
But, remember, the same four steps happen when customers begin to condisder the product/service when they discuss what salesperson is selling. Are they going to buy the right product/service, who will they bring in on the discussion, what types of information/materials will they need and are these materials logical to their auddience(s)'level of understanding? It is this audience that has to justify their decision to themselves and others that the purchase should be made.
So, going back to the question of why there is this arms length relationship between marketing and sales, both have to see that they are dependent on each other because they are both dependent on customers whose money pays them for what they do.
Alan J. Zell, Ambassador Of Selling
Alan J. Zell offers speaking at meetings, conferences, trade shows on selling and business topics that affect sales. You are invited to learn about programs and services and article on business topics that affect selling at www.sellingselling .com
Winner of the Murray Award for Marketing Excellence.
Member, PNW Sales & Marketing Group
Member, Institute of Management Consultants
Member, International Speakers Network
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