True or false? Every campaign and piece of collateral my field marketing team launches is valuable and directly helps our sales team do their job. True or false? Sales always take advantage of field marketing programs to their fullest potential, and they follow up on every marketing lead immediately.
While we all would like to think our sales and marketing teams work in symbiotic harmony, there are always ways to improve communication and efficiency across teams.
An Emissary advisor knows what’s most important to your targets, so they can ensure your entire revenue organization is in lock-step. Our advisors act as a bridge between sales and marketing, helping both teams focus on what’s most important – the unique needs and goals of each of your clients and prospects.
Here are three ways Emissary can back-up your field marketing strategy.
Align Around Target Accounts
When sales and marketing are aligned everybody wins. Various studies have found that organizations that successfully align these two departments grew their revenues by 32 percent, increased customer retention rates by 38 percent, and achieved 27 percent faster profit growth over a three year period.
So how can you get your sales and marketing teams on the same page? It starts by making sure all parties have the same goals. To achieve alignment, sales and marketing teams must communicate consistently around their account targets.
When your team identifies a target account, bring in an advisor who used to work at that company. This inside advisor can get your marketing and sales team on the same page, by sharing exactly what’s important to your prospect. Are they budget sensitive? Are they obsessed with optimizing for performance? Do they really like professional hockey? All these elements can eliminate the guesswork as your team creates a 1:1 sales strategy for that account.
Qualify Marketing-Generated Leads
Marketing-generated leads are always high quality…right? Chances are, your sales team may disagree. No matter how much marketing invests in developing promising MQL’s, sales will always push for more leads, and better ones at that.
Field marketing teams leverage Emissary advisors to ensure their MQL’s convert to opportunities for their sales teams. Here’s how it works:
- Marketing teams pre-qualify accounts that could leverage an inside advisor and send them to Emissary.
- We match their sellers with an advisor from that account.
- Together, the advisors and sellers work to identify the most promising opportunities within the accounts and create account strategies.
- To measure success, the marketing team tracks the conversion of MQL’s to SQL’s.
Not Another Happy Hour
Don’t get us wrong, we love a good happy hour as much as anyone. But we also acknowledge that they may not be the most reliable path to ROI. Executives, especially IT executives, are invited to dozens of happy hours, lunch & learns, and sporting events every year. They’re fun, sure, but they don’t always convert to a sales opportunity.
As your field marketing team creates their event and campaign plans for the year, it’s helpful to bring in the expertise of an inside advisor. Your Emissary advisors can help inspire your event strategy and ensure that all the events you host will be appreciated by your target accounts.
VMworld or Oracle Open World? Email campaigns or direct mail? Take the guesswork out of marketing budget allocation and ensure the programs you invest in reach your targets.
Executive Insights
One of the most important parts of a field marketer’s job and a field marketing programs is making sure their quarterly programs align with the sales teams they support. Instead of sticking with the same golf tournaments and dinners, Emissary can help you develop marketing programs that ensure results. Emissary advisors help field marketers guarantee their activities reach the right targets and achieve maximum ROI.
