The Ethics of Interdepartmental Communication - Sales and Marketing

Sales and marketing, as a discipline and as a department, need to work more closely to be effective. Often they operate from the top down (COO, CMO, Marketing/Sales Manager, Sales Team and, finally, Consumer), when they should operate more cyclically with the customer at the center of all efforts. Having sales teams understand marketing practices (why and how they work) and vice-versa leads to better communication between the company and the customer; this is particularly true with sales professionals who are concerned with new business acquisition. But even maintenance of existing accounts is better served by sales professionals who understand marketing. Understanding the product life-cycle and how to maximize and extend the growth phase of that cycle will benefit the entire company, if not the category. During this phase, heavy advertising is of the utmost importance and sales professionals can guarantee that these advertisements get seen by their key demographic to solidify distribution of his/her product. A better understanding of the philosophy behind positioning and how this relates to the target market and the current client base requires two-way communication between these two departments. Indeed, the entire marketing mix is best served this way.

This being said, marketers could also learn a lot from sales professionals. Sales professionals have a knowledge about consumer needs and what trends currently affect their customer (which hopefully represents the targeted market). Indeed, the results of competitive forces, and other external threats are discussed with top sales performers by key clients. There have been wonderful campaigns designed to grow brand awareness to attract new business, but the foot-soldiers – the top sales professional who is in the field, is in fact more in the know about what the demands are among new and potential clients and what communication would better attract and secure them. These two disciplines are so harmonious, it’s amazing that they are often so disengaged and even truncated at the level of sales manager.

What usually happens when these departments don’t harmonize? Let’s look at a typical scenario. A product is about to enter a maturity phase and marketing brings forth a campaign designed to extend the phase. (Typically, the maturity phase of most products require heavy sales promotion.) Suddenly the sales manager inundates her/his team with directives and quotas, usually designed to get existing clients to purchase additional lines and/or to purchase more product. The sales manager is under intense pressure to bring results to the Manager of Operations. To motivate his/her team, incentives are delivered. Carrot dangling is typically the modus operandi. While top sales performers will respond favorably to this technique (because they’ve made money this way before and because they are internally motivated anyway - the external bit just jump-starts them), the average sales person is a bit resentful. They have been speaking with potential clients and are focused on overcoming objections and uncovering leads. Now they have new quotas and new information to communicate to a client base who they’ve been struggling to reach. The new campaign doesn’t make sense to them.

We teach sales people the art of sales without the how or the why. Or we give them the wrong information. The how and why have little to do with making money and everything about consumer wants and needs. The average sales person can overcome objections when they have a better understanding about why their product exists and why the campaign exists.

Objection handling (future blog) is not the aim of sales. Marketing campaigns are not the aim of sales (though they are sometimes the how). The aim of sales is to communicate the solution to consumer needs through their product/service and to deliver that product/service in a method that is better than the competition. This communication is created by the marketing team. When these teams are not naturally interwoven, communication is flawed and the average sales person, instead of growing as a professional into a top performer, fails in this company. And so, the company has failed the sales person. Sales has such high turnover and I believe this is partly the reason. Better communication to our employees, not just our customers, is what ethical sales is all about.