There is an interesting blog post over on Geoffrey James' Sales Machine blog at BNET that discussed the top 5 lies marketing tells sales. While these lies may be true, the post focuses entirely on what doesn't matter instead of what does.
What matters is finding a way to unite the marketing and sales silos within an organization to create a lethal revenue producing machine. Not the bickering and lies each silo tells one another in losing companies.
That type of focus within any company will only lead to a bankruptcy court filing. For some companies this will be the only way out because they just don't get it and never will. For others it will be an opening to take market share and crush the competition.
The choice is up to you and you should be doing everything in your power to understand the massive changes taking place within Sales 2.0 organizations so you can reap similar success in your business.
Marketing & Sales in a Sales 2.0 Organization
The companies that will be the leaders of tomorrow will remove the barriers between marketing and sales. Sales 2.0 companies will use the value each organization represents to fuel off each other and create more predictable and sustainable revenue. No organization is better than the other because they each bring unique value to the table and contribute to each others success.
Some companies are implementing Sales 2.0 processes, people and technology to create lean, mean revenue producing machines. Their cost of sales is lower than the average company in their industry and their people are better trained. Their marketing department generates consistent, quality leads that get turned over to the sales force keeping sales reps' pipelines full. Their sales reps focus solely on selling, not lead generation. Closed loop is tracked and analyzed so they know what is working and what isn't. Quite simply, if your not a Sales 2.0 company yet you will lose to the one's that are. They have a distinct competitive advantage over you.
Don't panic yet. There is time to learn and position yourself and your business to win in the New Sales Economy. That's what the New Sales Economy blog is all about.
So where should you start? First, it helps to know who is using Sales 2.o and winning so you can begin to understand how you can do the same.
Checkout Oracle, Genius.com, Webex (Cisco), Salesforce.com and EMC. Some of these companies stories are in Anneke Seeley's and Brent Halloway's new book entitled Sales 2.0: Improve Business Results Using Innovative Sales Practices and Technology. If you want to understand in depth the shifts taking place in the sales and marketing profession go read the book. It's well worth it and it will provide you with an understanding of how Sales 2.0 is changing the way companies and sales reps sell.
Next, set up a Google alert for Sales 2.0 and begin to read everything you find interesting on Sales 2.0. If you immerse yourself long enough you will be amazed at the possibilities and opportunities that adopting Sales 2.0 can bring to you or your business.
I started off this post by saying Geoffrey James' post was way out of focus and now I hope you see why. It's a great blog but it missed the mark on this one. Don't focus on the differences between the marketing and sales silos at your company. That's just sweating the small stuff. Start focusing on how to leverage marketing and sales to drive them together into a revenue producing machine using Sales 2.0.
The world is changing and it's going to require a different mindsets, approaches and processes to succeed in the New Sales Economy. Make sure to subscribe to the New Sales Economy blog so you won't miss all the Sales 2.0 & Social Media tips to help you connect, create more opportunities and increase your business! You can also follow me on Twitter @ChadALevitt.
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