Sync or Sink: Accelerating Revenue Growth Through Sales and Marketing Alignment

Sales and marketing have traditionally worked in silos – chasing different metrics that keep them working toward separate outcomes. But, as B2B buyers increase digital and multichannel buying, businesses can no longer afford to rely on traditional outbound practice for customer acquisition. 70-90% of the buyer’s journey is completed prior to engaging a vendor, making brand awareness and thought leadership essential influences on the sales cycle. When you rely that heavily on another vested party, conflict is inevitable – especially when commission is on the line.

Marketers and salespeople are worlds apart personality-wise. Marketers are longer-term focused and largely risk-averse, whereas salespeople tend to still be geared toward transactional selling and an “always be closing” mindset. Where sales sees quota-carrying as a commission opportunity, marketing sees it as a risk – one that causes blind prospecting, content misuse and messaging abandonment. Either way, each group often undervalues the other’s contribution.

Trust is fragile. Since both sales and marketing are now tied to the same outcomes, neither is usually keen to take accountability for revenue shortfalls. In moments of stress, bad behaviors from either division – such as process wandering, hard selling or scattergun marketing — can cause friction and break down collaborative relationships.

Sales professionals often fail to see that there is a direct correlation between sharing digital content and increasing inbound leads. In fact, up to 65% of a marketing team’s digital content never enters the customer’s hands. This misunderstanding of “value” is usually caused by data blindspots. Sales has no visibility into (or influence on) marketing’s content production schedule, and can’t see how buyers interact with these materials – or how they increase the probability of winning a deal.

Salespeople and marketers have always been measured against different KPIs. Sales professionals are paid and rewarded against their bookings, whereas marketing measures itself against lead generation. Now, they are equal contributors and equally accountable for revenue outcomes. Those who continue to separate outcomes based on discipline – rather than sharing them as a unit – see a lack of collaboration or ownership over revenue shortfalls.

When sales and marketing teams align, businesses achieve a holistic view of the entire buying journey – making it easier to measure the impact of top- and middle-funnel engagements on bottom-line outcomes. This helps businesses to undertake more precise strategy planning and forecasting.

Lead quality is a notorious friction point for marketing and sales teams. Up to 79% of MQLs never convert into sales, due to a lack of nurturing or qualification. When teams are aligned, they share clear criteria that define what a high-quality lead looks like – making it easier to identify, target and prioritize high-value accounts.

With marketing providing more qualified leads and content that actually support the sales process, the sales cycle is shortened. The buyer has moved through a fully aligned and seamless process between the awareness and decision stages, without distraction or complication. This means faster pipeline velocity and reduced time to revenue.

When sales and marketing teams are held to the same outcomes and share a common objective, it inspires greater team morale and productivity. A harmonized sales and marketing workforce may also exhibit lower attrition rates and reduce employee turnover.

80% of content created by marketing teams is never used in sales, according to LinkedIn. Alignment can improve sales enablement by creating open, collaborative discussions between both divisions, enabling marketing teams to create more proactive and effective content, based on sales’ feedback.

Strategic gaps are outside the control of the salesperson – but have a huge bearing on success. Examine target customer profiles, total addressable markets, messaging and value propositions, enablement tools and industry authority before pointing fingers toward the team. Generally, business-wide revenue underperformance stems from strategy shortcomings rather than individual weaknesses.

Any well-run sales or marketing department should have a rich repository of customer and performance data at their fingertips. Use these performance analytics to identify patterns or trends that are directly relevant to your win/loss ratio. Understand why revenue targets aren’t being met and look for KPIs that are continually falling beneath chosen benchmarks.

Marketing data has a place in the ICP identification process. Insight into keyword searches, SEO and buyer intent data solidifies reach, messaging, tonality and targeted advertising processes. Whereas sales will have concise data on deals won, what worked on similar accounts and how customers have moved through the pipeline previously.

Combined, marketing and sales metrics create holistic and heavily sought-after datasets that account for the entire customer journey. This “fuller picture” shouldn’t be swept under the rug for the sake of pride. Collaboration also ensures consistent focus. Salespeople have been known to start at an outlined persona and then wander in chase of quota or commission – leaving both parties firing in completely different directions.

Today’s buyer expects sellers to build rapport quickly and provide value by actively anticipating their needs. Understanding their behavioral patterns and consumer habits is essential to effective segmentation – but 52% of professionals say a lack of sufficient data is a stumbling block. By establishing a defined ICP from minute one, businesses can invest in the right prospect data and effectively segment their audiences for improved targeting and better ROE.