Marketing is a tough job especially in today's business world. Thousands of marketing messages bombard us every day and it can be difficult to stand out from the noise. It takes creativity, persistence and lots of hard work to make this happen.
However, I do have a beef with marketing folks who feel compelled to dispense sales advice especially when that advice is not particularly helpful.
Yesterday's post focused on a blog article written by a marketing person and one of the author's suggestions exemplified the need marketing has to "tell" people about their product and/or company.
Don't get me wrong...
I have a lot of respect for good marketing people.
However, before dispensing sales advice, marketing departments should work the streets to see what it's like to actually sell and what works and what doesn't from a sales perspective. I guarantee that they would quickly notice that prospects get tired of hearing sellers open a sales pitch, proposal, or presentation by giving an overview of their company.
Sales people seldom tell marketers how to improve their results, yet I see many marketers who don't hesitate to offer similar advice to sales people. And, although there are exceptions to the rule, their advice often misses the mark.
Sales and marketing are both important departments. But, they are two completely different functions which means marketing folks should resist the temptation to tell sales people how to improve their selling skills.