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DISHING OUT THE REAL SCOOP: Technology Sales Pros Serve Up Their Views of the Marketing Scene

This American Marketing Association (AMA) and Information Technology Association of Canada (ITAC) roundtable event was held on February 24, 2005.

The Panel

Dave Wharry, Vice President, Global Sales and Marketing, Alias
Peter Coffey, Enterprise Sales Director, Allstream
Christopher Corey, President and General Manager, Borland Canada, Inc.
Sandra McPhee, Director, Midmarket, Ontario, IBM Canada Inc.
Luc Villeneuve, Vice President of Sales, Ontario Region, Sun Microsystems of Canada Inc.

The discussion was moderated by Bob Becker, Principal, SMA.

From a sales perspective, what do you think of marketing?

Marketing is the essence of the organization. The corporation has visions of where we want to go etc. Marketing creates the awareness and brand around this - creates the demand
The challenge is to draw a bright line around what marketing really is. When someone buys our software, we don't know why they bought it. 30% say it is because of the brand. Campaigns are built around the brand. Marketing means building the brand, creating the demand and creating contacts.
Marketing means: 1.) branding - which opens doors 2.) market intelligence - has huge value as well to determine what we need to do next 3.) driving demand - sales is instant focus and marketing is more long term. Sales and marketing have different metrics to measure success.
Marketing opens doors = branding, lead generation and product position. Sales doesn't care about the long term - they have monthly and quarterly objectives.
Tricky thing about marketing - you can go to market with a great new vision but the sales force struggles with communicating what the vision means. Sometimes marketing is 6 months ahead of sales. Sales person looks at 5-6 customers at a time whereas marketing looks at thousands of customers - understands the market place at a higher level.
Sales see the value in branding but sales needs marketing to understand his/her customer. Sales expects marketing to spend time with the customer before going to market.

What is the greatest benefit marketing brings to the table?

Creating enough awareness to open the door for meetings with executives. If marketing can give a sales person a leap up - that has a lot of value. If the marketing message is too abstract or obscure, sales cannot utilize it.
How does marketing help you open the door - whether it be events or messages out to the market. It is best when sales and marketing come together to understand the market.
Marketing has changed significantly. I have seen a dramatic rise in the importance of PR versus direct marketing. Educating the customer, getting the right mix is key. 1 million visits to our website each quarter - marketing categorizes these visits as leads, sales call them contacts. Sales people don't see direct marketing as important as web based initiatives. Marketing needs to stay on top of innovation.
Business development - partnerships, alliances and channels are developed through marketing - which sales is really not that good at.
There are new initiatives and products all the time. Marketing needs to determine what is real and what will work and not be just a fad. Marketing needs to convince sales that we are focusing on the right initiatives/products.

Is it marketing's responsibility to deliver qualified leads to sales?

Sales would say that it is marketing's responsibility to deliver leads but it is sales' responsibility to educate marketing on what is a qualified lead. It should be a shared responsibility to define a qualified lead.
Sales management has a bigger responsibility to track the lead to an ROI - middle management in sales needs to pick up this responsibility - determine who gets the lead, the right person and then track the lead, what is working and what is not.
Sales writes off marketing leads. What you realize is that sales is writing off millions of leads a year. Sales should focus on what we need to do to drive the business - look at each lead before writing it off.
Reality is that a senior executive is not going to fill in a response card. You need low cost staff to dig through the crap and the gold leads - have an internal sales person to qualify before the rep picks it up.
Often the marketing leads are extra to the sales department = "yeah, I'll get to it in time..." It is an extra effort for sales to respond to the marketing leads.

How can marketing communicate better with sales?

When working in a region, marketing doesn't seem to understand the needs of that particular region. De-centralizing marketing works well. A marketing person specific to that region working closely with the sales force.
I agree with that - an advocate within marketing who understands the region.
Sales has a chip on their shoulder - "we bring in the money and marketing spends it and by the way.if your campaigns do not bring in the leads then I am the one that gets laid off". Sales needs to also know that the marketing department has the same pressures - they are on the line for it as well.

Is the image that marketing spends the money and sales makes it creating the tension between them ?

Sales spends $$ too. Sales needs to understand what is a reasonable amount of marketing $$ to spend. What is the ratio of spend versus sales? There should be more strategic planning = everyone in the room to plan what marketing initiatives we should take. Marketing and sales do speak a different language, which is okay - it brings different views to the table.
$$ spent on branding seems reasonable to sales. The other campaign spend needs to be tracked to show sales that it does drive revenue.
There is a misconception by sales that marketing activities this quarter will help them this quarter. Marketing initiatives take 6-12 months to generate ROI - sales needs to understand this.

Why isn't marketing reporting to sales?

Sales is short term focus, marketing is 6-12 months or longer focus = driving the future.
Assuming we can communicate, it is a healthy friction. Marketing needs the long term focus which sales does not have.
If marketing reported to sales, sales would try to make the marketing people sales people - there would be no foresight into the future.
If the organization has common strategic focus then it is okay for sales and marketing to be reporting to the same person.
Smaller companies can have sales and marketing reporting to the same person - this wouldn't necessarily work with a larger organization. Sales needs to be thinking strategically and long term as well as immediate results. Marketing measures the success by number or press release, number of vets etc. Sales measures success on the individual sale. Marketing should be marked on ROI as well.

Sometimes US subsidiaries handle marketing from the US and sales from Canada . What issues does that create?

Larger revenue is generated in the U.S. so the reality is that the focus will be placed there. The frustration comes down to $s and cents earned and where the spend and focus will be placed.
An organization with an " Americas " model intelligence is an American focus whether you are in Brazil or Canada . A lot of the $$s get moved to where we don't necessarily need marketing. Need to move dollars over the border into our growth area. It is difficult.

What is one metric that you value the most in measuring marketing success?

Percentage of sales closed versus the opportunities uncovered. What you do with the information captured - using the data collected to drive out a set of actions.
ROI - accountability and measurement on $$ spend.
ROI - difficult to get to a granular level - knowing the client knows about the product before hand - knowing marketing is doing the job
Close loop process - ROI is difficult to measure with marketing. Ensuring marketing is focusing on the right area - i.e. web promotions and focus as the huge revenue area for our company.

Are marketers as close to customers as sales people are?

Our marketing department needs to spend 15% of their time on the customer. We believe that it is important for marketing to face and know the customer.
Definition of customer is very broad so sales knows a part of the customer better but marketing knows a different part of the customer better as well.
Having sales people come into a marketing role and vice versa makes both a better sales person and marketing person.
Having a marketer with a mix of experience definitely helps.
It is a huge challenge - consumer products companies really know their customer well. IT has a more difficult time of determining all about the customer.
We are still experiencing the "dot net" hang over. Really, IT marketing has only been marketing for 10 years. Consumer goods have been marketing for hundreds of years! IT industry is immature - constantly changing as well as the fact that the customer is constantly changing.
Good to bring in a marketer from consumer products - total focus on marketing. IT industry tends to have tech people go into sales and then go into marketing - not someone with a true marketing/branding background.

What advice do you have for marketing?

We are evolving as companies - we need to evolve the brand and expand the brand.
Keep the message simple and consistent even though the offering itself is not simple.

What should marketing's role be for existing customers?

Branding should create the visibility and presence in marketing. Customer service should be the sales role, not marketing. The one customer area where marketing comes to play is PR - building profile for the customer.
Every customer - old or new - should be seen as a "new" customer.
Don't lose sight of your existing customer - keep communicating and be in touch with them - keeping the logo in front of them. Every customer has a different buying cycle - their pains, which need to be addressed, cone at different times - so keep communicating so that you are there when the pain arises.

Do you have a final message from a sales perspective to give to marketing?

Don't be shy..we will listen to you - speak your mind.
Sales needs to recognize that they need marketing. We need to work together.
Understand the customer. Create a buzz about the product in the marketplace.
Be cautious as marketers, don't over promise and then under deliver. Set expectations at a reasonable level.
Get skin in the game..own the revenue and the customer.

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