Extending marketing’s influence down the funnel

If there is one thing that all marketers agree on, it's that the content they produce is not yielding the desired ROI

In fact, an impressive 65% of marketing content is not used by the sales team, according to a study by Forrester. This means that only 35% of content created by marketing actually delivers any returns. This could be because the content is simply not relevant, but it could also be because content is being created and never sent down the funnel to be leveraged by go-to-market teams. At the same time, sellers continue to request relevant materials which they can use to engage increasingly demanding and well-educated audiences.

Why does content matter?

68% of buyers prefer to gather information themselves rather than interact with the sales rep, which puts huge pressure on sales teams. Right from the start of the customer relationship, they need to bring value to their interactions.

This creates completely new challenges for customer-facing teams, as they need to prove their knowledge and the value of the solution they are selling from the outset. For marketers, this means reshaping how they think about their content strategy. They need to not only truly know what resonates with their audience to create the right content, but also work with sales enablement to provide guidance on how sellers can leverage that content.

In this new reality, marketers need to think of sellers as a channel for their content, and leverage sales enablement to help sellers understand what they need to know, say, show and do to get through to the customer.

The effectiveness of your marketing strategy is at stake

In this context, the question of marketing effectiveness also arises. Content in the form of core messages, value propositions, sales arguments, product information, studies and more is a central part of every marketing strategy. A marketing strategy might be brilliant, but it will not yield results if salespeople are not upholding it. If a sales rep is unable to communicate important messages and represent the company, brand and products, your marketing strategy will fall flat.

Today, content is often buried in the depths of a filing system that is inflexible and difficult to search, resulting in sales reps either sending urgent messages to marketing teams, or creating their own content to use in their meetings. So it's no wonder that so much valuable marketing content goes unnoticed, and big contradictions arise: marketing teams wonder why sales are not using the carefully created content, and sales feel like marketers do not create content to support them. There are hardly any feedback loops; many marketing and sales teams work in silos. Marketing leaders need to redesign the way they work with sales teams, because old problems require new thinking.

The solution is relatively simple to articulate, but needs to be implemented carefully. It is all about the alignment of marketing and sales – two functions that should work hand in hand right now to drive growth. A way to achieve this, is to work with sales enablement to ensure that content is not only easy to find, but comes with the right guidance for salespeople to land it with their customers. In conjunction with using analytics to know what content works and what its impact on the bottom-line has been, marketers can become more strategic partners to the business.

Sales Enablement: at the interface between marketing, sales and CX

This is exactly where sales enablement comes into play: at the interface between marketing, sales, and customer experience, because sales enablement helps sales reps do their jobs better. It means equipping sales teams with the tools, skills, and assets they need to successfully interact with customers and close deals. Sales enablement helps salespeople to have the right content at hand at every point in the customer journey and offers guidance on how the content and messages can be used most effectively to engage customers, ultimately creating a better customer experience.

In fact, sales enablement is becoming more and more important in many organisations. New research by SalesEnablement Pro revealed that 62% of companies already have a sales enablement person, program or function in place. Another 13% plan to provide dedicated resources for sales enablement in the coming fiscal year.

Sales enablement technology: understanding the customer experience better

Marketing and sales teams already rely on a number of tech tools, from CRM systems and marketing automation to AI-based engagement, all of which help them do their jobs better than ever before.

Sales enablement is no different, and technology can greatly benefit both enablement practitioners and revenue generation teams alike. The right sales enablement tool gives sales reps access to content more intelligently, making it easy to discover exactly what they need for their customer conversations at the right time.

Marketers also benefit greatly from leveraging sales enablement technology, as they can learn more about what is making the field tick, in real time. With the right tool, they can gain valuable insight into how content is used , and how customers interact with it, helping them better understand and optimize the customer experience.

The impact is noticeable: companies that use technology in sales enablement report a win rate that is seven points higher compared to those that do not use sales enablement technology, according to the study by SalesEnablement Pro.

One thing is certain: Sales enablement is a continuous effort which requires an organised effort from all revenue and customer-facing teams. Sales enablement also offers a great opportunity for marketing leaders, because by enabling the sales team to create an outstanding customer experience through sales enablement, marketing teams can increase their influence down the entire revenue funnel.

Would you like to learn more about sales enablement? Just send us an email or visit our Definitive Guide to Sales Enablement.