If salespeople had an honest conversation with their marketing team, and we mean a really honest discussion, it might go something like this:
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Hey marketing team.
We know you're really busy creating educational blogs to generate traffic for our website...
but we don't really use those when closing deals.
Also, 90% of B2B sellers don't use sales material; we think it's irrelevant and hard to personalise for our customers.
But you know what, we heard that businesses with an aligned sales and marketing team could achieve 208% higher marketing revenue, making us 67% better at closing deals.
So how can we get this right?
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Excellent sales enablement content is invaluable, and it's not hard to achieve; you just have to be willing to have the difficult conversations, commitment to communication and relationship-building between sales and marketing. So...
...what exactly is sales enablement content?
Here's a fun definition:
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Marketing team: What do you want?
Sales team: An easy conversation with ready-to-buy customers
Marketing team: How can we make this happen?
Sales team: When leads have self-served on all the generic questions about our products and services and are ready to discuss their specific requirements.
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In essence, sales enablement content comprises the resources that sales use to close deals. These resources may include, for example, eBooks, calculators, knowledge bases, case studies and videos.
How is powerful sales enablement content produced?
The short answer to this question is sales and marketing alignment. Setting up regular creative sessions between the sales and marketing teams will help to generate ideas and lay all the facts out on the table. Marketing will be most interested to know about the typical questions that buyers are currently asking; they'll then be able to determine the type of content and the format in which it will be most helpful to the customers.
To kick off your sales enablement collaboration session, here are some questions to ask:
- What type of questions signal that a buyer hasn't decided to buy yet?
- Where do you encounter the most resistance from clients?
- What are buyers most concerned about in regards to our brand and products?
- Are there stakeholders involved in the purchasing decision, and what do buyers need to bring them on board?
The content that's created as a result of these brainstorm sessions will then be tailored to the customer's specific pain points, factoring in their position in the buyer's journey.
Open the floodgates of communication
87% of sales and marketing leaders agree that collaboration between teams enables business growth. Part of that collaborative process includes feedback. Your marketing team won't know whether their efforts have achieved the right results without communication and input from sales. It's important to provide specific and constructive direction to accurately identify the areas that need improvement and adjust the content accordingly.
It's okay to let your marketing team know if you feel that something hasn't gone too deep into the topic or if it's missed the mark in terms of getting the client's question answered. Give them the precise information they need to create valuable content that will enable more sales. While it's essential to be polite and respectful, it's not productive or constructive to be vague and complacent. Ultimately, the goal of both teams is to ensure the growth and success of the business, and part of that includes constructive and consistent feedback.
Be in it for the long haul
This is, after all, a relationship, and commitment is required. Also, inbound marketing activities are always undertaken with measurability in mind – we need to collect data and review the outcomes. There's no way of knowing if your sales enablement content woes have been solved without giving the process enough time to generate data. This data is then used to evaluate the impact of the sales enable content so that both sales and marketing can verify their ideas.
The collaborative approach between sales and marketing must continue, and both teams should be accountable for their contribution to the process. If friction has existed in the past, now is the time to let bygones be bygones and inject some fresh enthusiasm into the relationship, knowing that both teams are unified by a common goal: growing the business.
To achieve sales and marketing alignment, HubSpot recommends these best practices:
- Hold regular meetings
- Use a team email to share and receive information
- Establish a content creation process
- Co-ordinate content marketing campaigns with sales
- Set shared goals that both teams agree to
- Share and analyse reports together
- Position salespeople as experts through content
- Give marketing hands-on experience in the sales process
- Place sales enablement materials in an easy-to-access location
- Encourage a personable, social relationship between both teams
When sales and marketing align, great sales enablement content is inevitable. You both understand each other's priorities and learn to speak the same language. Any business wishing to implement inbound methodology has to get this part right because friction between these two teams will continue to set you back. It's counterproductive and costly to keep producing content that goes into the abyss and is never used to close deals. So, what's holding you back from ironing out the creases and starting on a fresh page?
