A lot has been written about this subject in the recent years, and even as studies on the subject conclude that marketing-sales alignment is imperative for company success, companies are wrestling with various challenges when it comes to implementing it. Learn why aligning sales and marketing is important, how sales-marketing alignment can benefit your company, and how you can go about achieving it.

1. SALES & MARKETING
ALIGNMENT--
CLOSING THE GAP WITH AMP

2. Sales-Marketing Alignment—An Introduction
Sales and marketing alignment is o ne topic that commonly comes up in any discussio n
related to improving marketing and sales effectiveness. Traditionally, businesses
functioned with the single goal of selling. The Sales function was the core of all
business operatio ns. The role of a traditio nal marketer didn’t extend beyond drafting
creative advertisements or copywriting. Now, prospects are at the core of any
business and all other corporate functions revolve around them. CRM collects critical
data, marketing generat es leads and tracks client and prospect behavior, and every
salesperson acquires critical input from prospects about their needs. Sales -
marketing alignment is the recognitio n that all of this data must be continuously
integrated if the business is to resp ond effectively to its core mission: satisfying
customer needs. A lo t has been written about this subject in the recent years, and
even as studies on the subject conclude that marketing -sales alignment is imperative
for company success, companies are wrest ling with various challenges when it comes
to implementing it. This whitepaper explains why aligning sales and marketing is
important, how it can benefit your company, and how you can go about achieving it.
Why the sales-marketing alignment is imperative?
A study by Aberdeen Group revealed 88% of companies that perform best are the
ones which implement closed loop marketing and leverage technology to aid its
marketing functions. For a company to be able to provide
value-added services to customers, it is essential that both
marketing and sales integrate the knowle dge they acquire
from their day –to-day interaction with the market, and
then use it to continuously refine e ach prospect
interaction. Sales -marketing alignment bridges the
informatio n gap betwee n marketing and sales. For
example, suppose the marketing team knows the exact
mode and time of communication a prospect prefers. It will
be able to easily pass that data to the sales team . The
process of supporting this on -going information flow is the
heart of true sales -marketing alignment.
A study of UK-based B2B firms reinforced that companies with po sitive collaboration
between their sales and marketing functions performed better than those without it.
Here are some key reasons.
Powerful buyers: Buyers today are more informed and in control of the buying
process than before. Thanks to the internet, your buyers have instant access to all
the informatio n they need before making a purchase decision —including informatio n
about your competito rs. This sce nario warrants that marketing is in close -contact
with prospects from day one. Marketing must be aware of every website visit, every
download, and every form sign -up by the prospect. Even after the prospect is passed
on to the sales team as qualified lead, the marketing team must be aware of every

3. prospect move that will help them determine the prospect’s position in the sales
cycle.
Competition: With competition
becoming more intense, companies are
looking for ways to build a better
relationship with their buyers. A study
by MathMarketing concluded that the
businesses with greatest degree of sales
and marketing alignmen t grow faster,
close 38% more deals and lose 36%
fewer customers than their non -aligned
counterparts. Better marketing and sales
alignment enable companies to enhance
customer experience, allowing the
business to approach prospects with relevant offers and communication materia ls—
at the right time. This wouldn’t be possible if marketing is not cued in on the
interactions between sales and the prospect.
Increased pressure to improve ROI: Both sales and marketing are under a lot of
pressure to cut costs and improve revenue gener ation. By aligning sales and
marketing functio ns accurately, companies can improve marketing ROI, and boost
sales effectiveness. A research by CMO Council and Wall Street Journal revealed that
sales leverages less than 50% of the materials created by marke ting while spending
around 40% of its time on preparing buyer -specific sales materials; and only 20% of
salespersons are actually successful in doing so. An accurate sales -marketing
alignment would mean that marketing is always in the loop as far as sales and buyer
requirements are concerned, making the right sales materials available at the right
time.—thus reducing wastage costs on marketing front while improving sales
effectiveness by allowing salespersons to concentrate on what they do best —selling.
What does the sales and marketing alignment do?
Today, marketing means a two -way communication between the customer and the
business. It is no longer just announcing that you exist . It is engaging the prospect in
a conversatio n with you and adding value. It is about building a real relationship with
the prospect rather than trying to sell them something. For example, the role of the
salesperson doesn’t end the moment a sale is made. It exte nds beyond sale into
customer satisfaction and discovering how to anticipate future needs. Every post -sale
meeting provides the entire enterprise with new data to develop better solutions to
customer needs.
In today’s business environment, marketing and sales cannot function mutually
exclusive of each other. This is where sales -marketing alignment comes into the
picture. For a business to be able to reach its ultimate aim of customer satisfaction,
an integration of sales and marketing is essential. Sales -marketing alignment allows
for sales and marketing to come together to create a superior customer experience.

4. Simply put, sales -marketing alignment invo lves bringing the two core functions of a
business —sales and marketing -- onto the same platform. Thi s seems logical , given
that ultimately , sales and marketing are both working towards a single aim —revenue
generation for the company. However, more often than not, each of these functions
adopts a different approach towards this aim. A study by the CMO con cluded that
30% sales groups polled believed marketing is not in sync with the prospects and
hence ignores key areas such as customer acquisitio n and retention. In fact, only 7%
of the respondents said that sales and marketing worked to gether very effectively.
Sales -marketing alignment is all about bridging the gap between these two functions
so that traditional ‘Marketing vs. Sales’ conflicts are not flagged off.
What is the key ingredient in sales -marketing alignment?
The key ingredient in sales -marketing alignment is
prospect insight —which iro nically is also one of
the key challenges. M arketing doesn’t have access
to real-time data with respect to prospect
interaction with the company. There’s no way for
marketing to assess the prospect’s positio n in the
sales cycle or to get updates about the most
recent interactio n prospects had with sales. This
affects the sales team in two ways:
1. Marketing passes barely qualified leads —
which otherwise should have been nurtured, to
the sales team
2. Marketing sends irrelevant communication to the prospect or generates sales
materials that are not of use to the sales team for that particular stage of
negotiation
Sales spend too much time on leads that are probably not even ready to purchase.
End result? Sales is frustrated. First, by the lead quality and then by insufficient
marketing support.
In order to bring abo ut a seamless integration of its marketing and sales functions,
these streams must have as single and complete view of the prospect.
What are the benefits of sales-marketing alignment?
Better marketing support for sales: By aligning sales and marketing, businesses
can enjoy better marketing support for sales. A real -time, 360° view of prospects
and their interactions with the business will help marketing become proactive.
Marketing will be able to anticipate prospect -related sales requirements and offer
sales the kind of support they need, on -demand.

5. Enhanced buyer experience: Well-synchronized sales and m arketing functions
enable marketing to provide the sales teams with personalized sales materials that
enhance buyer experience through a higher degree of relevance, consistency and
personalization.
Improved lead quality and shorter sales cycles: With a 360° real -time view of
prospects, marketing will be a ble to decipher which prospects are truly sales-ready
and which ones need to be nurtured. As a result, only the best leads would be
passed on to sales, while marketing will continue to cultivate others till they are
better qualified. From the sales perspective, improved lead quality leads to shorter
sales cycles, as the ti me taken to close a deal is shorter.
Better Lead Management : Sales and marketing alignment promotes better lead
management by bridging the gap between the parties involved in lead creation and
follow-up. So, if 25% of the leads provided by marketing don’t turn into sales, the
company has access to relevant data to evaluate where in the ensuing sales process
a lead failed.
Improved Marketing & Sales ROI: Real time prospect insight provides information that
helps marketing focus its efforts and resources on the most likely prospects , as a
result , increasing the returns on marketing and sales investments .
Personalization: By bridging the gap betw een lead creation and follow -up, closed -
loop marketing yields data that will allow every subsequent follow -up with a specific
contact to become more focused . The company will be able to adopt a higher degree
of personalizatio n in its marketing efforts and product offerings.
Apart from those mentioned above, studies cite various other benefits of marketing -
sales alignment including increased re v enue and profit generation, decreased
marketing and sales costs, and better custo mer retention and acquisition .
How can AMP help you bring about sales and marketing alignment?
AMP allows you to bring about sales -marketing alignment in the following areas

6. Multi-channel marketing & sales materials creation
On-demand sales materials creation for multiple marketing channels: AMP
empowers your sales team to generate the sales materials of their choice the instant
they need them. Your salespersons will be able to create personalized sales
presentations, HTML e-mails, social media fan pages and even personal websites —
without depending o n marketing.
Lesser pressure on your marketing team: Enabling sales team by create sales
materials on demand takes the pressure of your marketing team. Marketing can
create templates for every piece of sales collateral, and the salespersons can edit
the templates to add a personal touch as and when needed.
As a result, your marketing team will be able to support more requests from sales,
and serve the sales team with the sales m aterials they need on -demand. Not just
that, by giving editing rights to sales, AMP ensures that the deliverable from
marketing is actually usable by sales, while the template -base, database -centric
approach ensures that your salespeople don’t lose time in making the edits.
Brand management
Does giving your salespeople the capacity to generate and edit their sales materials
cause you to worry about your brand becoming distorted? AMP’s brand management
capabilities ensure that your brand is not compromised when your sales team
customizes their materials. AMP allows your marketing team to retain control over
the brand elements. Your sales team can only edit the areas your marketing team
allows.
This ensures that your brand is never a victim of the gap between your marketing
and sales teams.

7. Smart sales prospecting & improved marketing support for sales
AMP allows your sales and marketing teams to get behind the scenes with the
prospects. Most of the guesswork that go es into creating and designing effective
marketing and sales campaigns is eliminated. You get a solid foundation based on a
panoramic view of information about custo mer preferences and market taste. A 360°
view of prospects means your marketing and sales teams know each interaction your
company has with its leads. Examples incl ude: website visit details such as pages
visited, duration of visit, links clicked; interaction through e -mails or social media
channels; webinars and whitepaper downloads.
Your sales and marketing teams get a holistic, single view of your leads. Since
marketing shares sales ’ view of the lead, they are on -target when it comes to
providing marketing support for sales. Not just that, the 360° view of the prospects
make cross-selling and up-selling easy. Your sales perso ns can stay in contact with
their clie nts even after the deal is closed.
The benefit for marketing —being appraised of every lead movement, which enables
them to revive old leads by acting in the right manner, at the right time.
Improved marketing & sales focus through smart contact segmentation
AMP automatically categorizes your leads into different segments , based on pre -
defined conditions set by your marketing/sales teams. This auto matic segmentation
allows your marketing and sales teams to identify who their top contacts are,
allowing them to focus on leads that are most -likely to provide business.
Smart contact segmentation helps marketing and sales focus on the most important
leads. This improves your sales effectiv eness and marketing ROI because the
resources—time, dollars a nd energy are spent only where positive results are
expected.

8. Quality lead generation
By giving your marketing team 360° view of its prospects, AMP helps them generate
quality leads. Your marketing team can judge the lead’s quality based on its
interactions with your company. And not just that, AMP also has scientific lead -
scoring capabilities that lend a tangible element to lead quality.
AMP ensures that your marketing and sales teams have a mutually agreed upon
definitio n of lead quality. It also ensures that the lead scoring process is closely
connected with prospect attributes and behavior. That means no more guess work
from marketing on lead type —no more complaints about poor quality leads from
sales!
Social media automation
AMP helps your marketing team create custom Facebook fan pages, profile pictures
and twitter backgrounds —tools that help your marketing team enhance your online
brand presence while connecting with your prospects and customers. AMP also
automates the process of soc ial media updates, automatically posting the scheduled
update at the scheduled time.
One of the reasons for the sales -marketing disconnect is because marketing is
considered to be far -removed from on-field activities and feedback. Through social
media, AMP offers an exciting opportunity for your marketing team to get real -time
feedback from the ultimate source —your customers.

9. Marketing & sales campaign effectiveness measurement
With AMP, your marketing and sales teams have mutual access to customer analytics.
Critical prospect data is no longer quarantined within individual corporate units. All
informatio n is available for the development of effective marketing and sales plans
respectively . AMP allows you to measure the effectiveness of your marketing and
sales campaigns. Your marketing team will know what works and what doesn’t. AMP
generates reports including prospect -customer based report, campaign based report,
reports based o n marketing/sales material types and more!
When marketing has a clear view of what is successful and what is not, it doesn’t
have to wait for sales to tell it to them. Leveraging the analytics, marketing can
immediately make changes to the necessary sa les presentations or other sales
materials so that they yield better results —even before sales can complain of them
being ineffective.
Sales -marketing alignment calls for processes, technology and systems that break all
walls between the marketing and sa les teams and the prospect. A holistic prospect
view, real-time pro spect and sales insight, coupled with strong, consistent
communication channels can help businesses bridge the gap between marketing and
sales, bringing about the much so ught sales-marketing alignment.

10. For the past 14 years, MindMatrix, In c. has focused on alignment of sales
and marketing functions for over 34,000 sales and marketing professionals
worldwide. Unique to the industry, MindMatrix offers Next -Generation
Marketing Automation software on a single unified platform for Sales and
Marketing. Our solutions bring about a seamless integration of the two key
functions helping our clients derive the maximum benefit from their
investment in sales and marketing.
Our product offerings for sales include on-demand sales materials creation,
lead prospecting, and smart lead management. On the marketing front, our
solutions cover demand generation, brand management, quality lead
generation, lead nurturing, social media automation, lead scor ing, and
marketing materials creation across print and digital media.