CRMGuru
March 10, 2005
by Alisa Gilhooley, VP of Marketing, The SAVO Group

Excerpts:

“Early in my career….I'd drop everything and scramble to support the revenue opportunities [that salespeople would call about, with urgent needs, daily]….

But I also knew that this model of marketing-sales interaction was decidedly not effective.

Marketing had the best knowledge of the product and the skills to communicate it—and yet, as a resource-constrained department fighting too many fires at once, how could marketing apply expertise consistently in a way that would benefit many? Sales was skilled at building relationships and uncovering customer needs—but without immediate, tailored marketing support, what choice did sales have but to sacrifice critical face-to-face interaction time to devise its own materials?

Fortunately, as my career evolved, so has the availability of technology as a means to facilitate sales effectiveness….’Next practice’ platforms now exist to help align marketing and sales around those crucial customer interaction moments that are so tightly tied to bottom-line results.”

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