The Value in Outsourcing Sales and Marketing Together
Companies that aren’t achieving their revenue goals typically have one thing in common: their sales and marketing teams are disconnected from each other. They’ve built out expensive sales and marketing teams and set them off in their own directions. The marketing team creates what they think the sales team needs. And the sales team takes whatever leads the marketing team produces.
When the teams operate like this, they often don’t do their best work. Consequently, sales goals aren’t reached, and no one really knows why. Sales blames marketing for not generating enough qualified leads. Marketing in turn blames sales for not closing enough deals.
One solution to this problem is outsourcing. It’s a great idea to use third-party marketing firms with expertise in digital marketing and content marketing services. Likewise, outsourcing sales to a firm specializing in sales is a smart move.
Unfortunately, simply outsourcing sales and marketing isn’t enough, especially if those functions are outsourced to two or more different firms. That’s because it is highly unlikely that the firms will work close enough together to solve the problems outsourcing was intended to solve.
To achieve the best results, outsource sales and marketing functions to one firm that has the required expertise in both areas.
Here are a few of the benefits of outsourcing sales and marketing to one firm.
1. Marketing and sales strategies are developed side-by-side
Even if the marketing and sales teams are based in-house, they tend to operate with blinders on. Marketing and sales develop their own strategies and do their own thing. They rarely talk to each other to coordinate their efforts. This is a dysfunctional way of doing things.
But if a company decides to outsource marketing to one firm and sales to another firm, the lack of communication can be even worse. Even if the intent is to leverage the expertise of each firm, getting those firms to work closely together can be impossible.
When one outside firm handles both your sales and marketing, strategies are developed side-by-side. Marketing will not make decisions that sales is not aware of. You can be certain that buyers will hear the same message throughout their journey, and a more cohesive journey leads to more closed deals.
2. You get sales-focused marketing collateral
One of the biggest complaints that marketing teams have is that the sales team doesn’t use the content the marketing team creates. The major complaint that sales lobs back at marketing is that the materials marketing creates do not speak to buyers.
When sales and marketing are outsourced to one firm, these complaints are instantly eliminated. The teams are integrated and they communicate regularly. That regular communication can lead to a conversation in which sales is able to tell marketing that website leads are converting at a higher rate than email leads. This helps marketing tweak their strategy while sales is able to prioritize who to call. And if a piece of collateral just isn’t working, sales will make that clear to marketing so that they can quickly pivot and make changes.
3. Lower cost and lower risk
The cost to hire, train, and retain top sales and marketing talent is high.You need to hire entire teams of people, which means spending hundreds of thousands of dollars in salaries and related expenses every year. These expenses add a considerable amount of risk to the business. The concern becomes, “what if our investment in personnel and overhead doesn’t produce enough revenue?”
When you outsource sales and marketing to one firm, you instantly eliminate the need to hire, train, and retain talent. All of that is now the responsibility of the outsourced firm. They manage the expenses and the risk. Your bottom line is lighter, and the risk of not covering those expenses is gone. You simply pay for only the services you need to reach your revenue goals.
4. You get better ROI visibility
Traditionally, marketing teams have a hard time showing ROI. Without clear visibility into ROI, it’s difficult to justify marketing spend and to decide what to spend limited dollars on. Moreover, it’s difficult to hold the marketing team accountable.
When sales and marketing are in sync in the hands of one outsourced firm, the company can easily see the buyer’s journey from awareness to purchase. Every activity is logged in a central CRM. So if leads from the website are converting at a higher rate than leads from an email campaign, leadership can see that and easily calculate the ROI of each initiative to make better decisions in the future.
Acquirent Bridges the Gap Between Sales and Marketing
At Acquirent, we bridge the gap between sales and marketing. We have the capabilities to take the buyer through their entire journey from awareness to purchase. And we get that done at a cost that is far more manageable than if a company were to build out internal sales and marketing teams. This makes our services perfect for startups, small to medium-sized businesses, and even larger companies that are launching new products or services.
We start by talking with your team to figure out what your needs are. If we believe that more or better marketing is necessary to get better results, that’s what we’ll recommend. If the sales side is lacking, we will recommend solutions for that. By diagnosing your situation and coordinating sales and marketing, Acquirent gives you your best chance at meeting your revenue goals.