Many B2B sales leaders still don’t recognize B2B purchase decisions as emotional. Even if business leaders, say they believe there’s an emotional element in the decision-making process, little importance is actually placed on marketing and sales initiatives that strive to create an emotional connection between the prospect or customer and the company brand.

From our experience, it’s not uncommon for sales leaders to emphasize the sales process template or internal organizational structure when trying to improve their sales process. But a sales process is only a framework.

Want fast growth, higher win rates, and improved customer retention? The answer lies in tightly-aligned sales and marketing processes. Research shows it’s more important than ever that these two departments meld together – by aligning the two, organizations see an average of 32% annual revenue growth (Forrester), 38% higher win rates, and 36% greater customer retention (both stats from MarketingProfs).

The most effective prospect-facing collateral is the result of collaborative sales and marketing teams. While the marketing team is responsible for the development and design of sales collateral, it is marginally effective if it doesn’t incorporate the needs and goals of the sales team. 

Is your sales team unable to land desirable large accounts? Are you losing business from your installed base to other vendors? Do your sales and marketing teams struggle to work together because they don’t share common goals? If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, it’s time to consider account-based marketing (ABM).

Studying wins and losses is a valuable sales and marketing activity that is often overlooked in sales organizations. The best way to improve your win rates, up to 50% according to Gartner, is to align your strategies with your prospect’s buying process, needs, and goals. This can be done through a post-sale interview with the new client or lost prospect, often called a Win/Loss Interview, Report or Analysis.

As a sales consulting company selling business-to-business (B2B) solutions, we use B2B strategy for ourselves and for our clients. One problem that we see with many new clients is that they don’t have a strong segmentation strategy.

The Evolution of Modern Marketing

Traditional marketing methods are becoming less effective as the consumer takes more control over the buying process and their experience in it. With the internet and multiple screens at their fingertips, buyers are becoming more informed and sophisticated with shorter attention spans and a low tolerance for poor sales and marketing attempts. We've experienced this change at Sales Result and see many of our clients struggling with it as well.