Don’t Make Me Pull This Car Over: Why are Marketing and Sales Fighting Again?
As I reflect on my career in B2B marketing, one question constantly surfaces: Why is it so hard for marketing and sales to get along? Both teams aim to inspire prospects to become clients by conveying compelling stories about the businesses they represent. They are fundamentally on the same team with shared goals. Yet, in practice, these departments often find themselves in conflict, frustrated with each other, and quick to blame the other for a lack of success.
Starting my career in sales before transitioning to marketing, I’ve gained a unique perspective and empathy for both teams; this has been a huge value for me as a marketer as I have tried to bridge the gap. This experience is a core reason I ventured into consulting and fractional marketing leadership—believing that I can foster better collaboration between these crucial business functions.
The Sibling Rivalry: Sales and Marketing
Sales and marketing teams are a bit like siblings who are constantly sniping at each other but also share a deep bond. They have so much in common but seem to always find ways to clash about small things – often because they can’t seem to hear each other.
Timing Discrepancies: Marketers typically think in terms of quarters and years, focusing on the longer-term impact of their efforts. Marketing takes a while to cook – and is a process of iteration, testing, and optimization that can take years to perfect. Conversely, sales teams have a more immediate timeline, thinking in terms of weeks and months as their compensation depends on meeting short-term sales goals. When a salesperson urgently needs to close deals by month-end, the marketer may feel helpless as their strategies are geared toward future returns while the salesperson feels let down because marketing seems unwilling to help when they need it most.
Role (Un)Clarity: Sales teams might hope that marketers hold a secret backlog of leads ready to hand out, which is almost never the case. Leads are sent over as soon as they come in, as speed is often a factor in moving a lead to an opportunity. A prospect’s decision process starts long before actual sales contact, often through the content provided by the marketing team; studies show a prospect’s decision-making process is anywhere from 60-90% complete before they ever talk to a salesperson. Unfortunately, it can be difficult for sales to fully appreciate marketing’s role prior to that first discovery call.
Frustrations and Miscommunications
Marketers, at their core, are storytellers. We craft a compelling narrative to the prospect and then hand the ball off to the sales team to continue the story through the close. Sales teams sometimes fail to continue this narrative or don’t engage with it effectively, frustrating the marketers who have worked hard to develop the opportunity for them. Sales may find that the story they are telling hasn’t been well-supported by the marketing materials, and are having to readjust the prospects’ perceptions. A top-performing sales and marketing team will have their story down and be able to seamlessly guide a prospect through it. When there is a disconnect, the story can become disjointed or confusing and drive the prospect to a competitor.
Sharing Credit and the Blame Game
When the process is completed, it is nearly impossible to fully understand who did what to ultimately close the sale. It’s relatively easy to give the sales team credit; after all, it was their blood, sweat, and tears that got the prospect over the hump – and that is no small task. But a great team will recognize that sales and marketing worked together to create a compelling and foundational business case for the prospect to choose them over their competitors. When the deal falls through, both teams often blame each other – the sales team feeling the leads got were poorly qualified and marketing suspecting sales wasn’t able to move their quality lead to become a customer. The reality is likely that they are both right, and better continuity on the team might have prevented the lost sale.
Driving Success Through Collaboration
The key to overcoming these challenges is recognizing that success is a collective effort. Here’s how to achieve it:
Shared Planning: Create collaborative marketing plans where both teams outline how they will work together. Discuss the customer journey from the first touchpoint all the way through the sale, ensuring that both sides understand and respect each other’s contributions, know what they owe each other throughout the process, and have a healthy way to share feedback.
Credit Sharing: Acknowledge that credit for your wins is free – clients don’t become clients without sales, marketing, and many other teams all firing on all cylinders. Celebrate together! When things go south, understand there is always something each team could have done better and learn from the loss so you can get better the next time. A loss is never just one thing – and assigning fault is not helpful in improving the process.
Efficient Communication: Regular, open communication between teams fosters understanding and appreciation of each other’s efforts. Empathy and realistic expectations can bridge many gaps. Use data to help tell the story of how these teams are working together. Set service-level agreements between teams to maintain accountability.
Empathy and Alignment: When developing a marketing plan infused with mutual understanding and empathy, aligning marketing efforts with sales needs becomes a lot easier. Listening to each team’s motivations, accountabilities, constraints, and unique capabilities can create a cohesive strategy that benefits the entire organization.
By fostering a culture of empathy, collaboration, and shared success, we can transform the relationship between sales and marketing from sibling rivalry to a true partnership for success. This approach not only drives revenue but also builds a strong, collaborative internal culture that celebrates collective victories and makes your company a great place to work.
