This document discusses the importance of alignment between marketing and sales teams through content and how content can enable sales. It provides examples of how one company, Parascript, used content marketing strategies like research reports, infographics, and webinars to generate leads and educate prospects. Through content that addressed buyer personas and needs, Parascript was able to significantly increase downloads, media coverage, and sales opportunities over two years while operating with a limited budget. The document advocates for buyer-focused content that creates insights and can be easily shared and extended into the sales process.

1. The Man Behind the Curtain:
Content’s Role in the Sales
Enablement Process
Carla Johnson
Principal
@CarlaJohnson

2. SALES
ENABLEMENT
Ensuring that every seller has
the right
tools, information, skills and
processes they need to make
the most of a conversation
with a buyer.

4. THE
CONVERSATION
We create tools the
sales team asks for and
they never use them.
We send qualified leads
that fall into a black
hole.
We are trying to
create meaningful
conversations, and
marketing’s tools aren’t
relevant.
We continually have to
tell customers that our
products don’t do what
marketing and sales
told them they would.
MARKETING SALES
PROFESSIONAL
SERVICES

5. Marketing determines what tools sales
needs
Marketing often fails at telling how a
solution -
• Achieves a goal
• Solves a problem
• Satisfies a need
MARKETING AND SALES

6. Source: The Fornaise Marketing Group
of collateral
created by
marketing is
never used
by sales
50%
90%
TO

7. 20% of an organization’s salespeople
generate 60% of its revenue (CSO Insights)
Misalignment between sales and marketing
causes the typical company to underperform
by 10% in annual revenue (IDC)
MARKETING AND SALES

8. Thinking of your initial meeting, what percent of
reps were:
Extremely
Prepared
16%
Very Prepared
27%
Somewhat
Prepared
31%
Not Prepared
26%
Source: IDC Customer Experience Panel, January 2009
CUSTOMER
CONVERSATIONS

9. “The conversations field salespeople
or channel partners have with
prospects and customers may be
the last bastion of competitive
differentiation in today’s rapidly
commoditizing markets.”
- American Marketing Association

10. Delivering the right information to the right
person at the right time and in the right
place.
MARKETING AND SALES

11. Create “Promise Keepers”

12. CARLA JOHNSON :: Principal
@CarlaJohnson

13. TODAY’S
CONVERSATION
Collaborate
Educate
Liberate

14. “People will
forget what you
said, people will
forget what you
did, but people
will never forget
how you made
them feel.”
- Maya Angelou

15. Collaborate
Learn and understand what sales
wants to achieve
• Brand awareness
• Lead generation
• Customer acquisition
• Engagement
• Thought leadership

16. Source: Managing Content Marketing
CONTENT
MARKETING
FUNNEL

17. Can’t we all just get along?

18. Educate
What’s your “story”?
Who do you tell it to?
When/how to tell it?
What do you want to
accomplish with it?

20. Liberate
Your story only works if people
are free to tell it
Content is key

21. V E R Y W H E R E
U B L I S H
N C E
R E A T E
E
P
O
C

23. CASE
STUDY

24. CASE STUDY
• Handwriting Recognition Software
(1996)
• Serviced postal markets and check
processing – declining industries
• Needed to move out of siloed markets
and provide technology for more
applications

25. CASE STUDY
• Needed better market and partner
recognition
• Needed to provider partners and end
users with more tools to become
successful
• Believed sales tools and leads
paramount as they built partner
program

26. CASE STUDY
2012 – Foundational Year
• Refreshed branding
• Persona development
• New website/refresh collateral
• Content audit
• Mapped content to persona/buyers’
journey
• Began email communications
• Partner portal

27. CASE STUDY
In 2012, Parascript commissioned
research with AIIM
Results
• Hundreds of registered downloads and
webinar attendees
• Blog content
• Media coverage
• Interviews with nearly every
technology analyst firm
• A year’s worth of storytelling and
internal reinforcement to position our
products that continues to evolve

28. CASE STUDY
2013 – Build Leads
• Estimated outbound leads 50%
• Bigger focus on content marketing for
other 50%
• Because of budget, needed prospects
to find Parascript and self-qualify

29. CASE STUDY
Sales
Marketing

30. CASE STUDY
In 2013 they refreshed the research, in
an easy-to-read infographic
Results
• Hundreds more registered downloads
expected
• Instant media coverage resulting in
more downloads of the complete
study from our website (all tracked in
Hubspot)
• More blog content

31. CASE STUDY

32. CASE STUDY

33. CASE STUDY
1000s 1000s 1000s 18.1% 4.6%
YTD 2013:

34. CASE STUDY

35. CASE STUDY
Study and Infographic continue to
provide content opportunities
Additional Benefits
• Foundation for a recent channel
webinar and upcoming end-user
webinars, anticipating several hundred
more prospects
• Top-level content for our nurturing
campaign

36. CASE STUDY
Key Learnings –
Content helped validate a new market
Used content to generate a storyarc
and extended that seamlessly into sales
enablement

37. FINAL
THOUGHTS
• Think: Buyer Enablement
• Commit to culture change
• Find your common purpose
• Go beyond information – create
insights
• Make it easy to give content “legs”

38. Carla Johnson, Principal
Type A Communications
(720) 344-0987
carla@goTypeA.com
www.goTypeA.com
Type A Communications
@carlajohnson