The war between Sales and Marketing has always existed and has always been one of the those water cooler discussions. And yet it’s probably fair to say that the future of your company lies in your ability to make the two work better together. The reason these two departments do not gel well is due to difference in job roles and yet have the same objective. Marketing Acts Superior Many marketers have business degrees, so they think they’re better than sales reps who don’t. However, business degrees are of limited use in sales situations – because very few business schools offer courses in sales, let alone majors or degrees. Since what’s taught in b-school is (frankly) a mix of accounting and biz-blab, the superior air of the MBA’d is of little
Sales Archive
If you ask me whether people working in an organization are assets or liability, my answer would differ on whether they are sales guys or otherwise. Though selling is no science, its an art; this art can be improved upon. Those who do, aren’t stoppable. Each (great) salesman will have his own tips and tricks to sell, these are a few I believe in. Awesome photos, catchy videos, and fancy graphics are helpful, but the most important thing where sales are concerned are the words you use. Why? Words build relationships. People buy from people. Words can also guide your approach to sales, because attitudes are often based on words. And words are spoken by people, not organizations. Change just one word and you can
More than often I talk to friends who are working as sales managers and sales reps who were with me during my B School days. Listening to them comes as a real feedback from those who are using CRM hands on and triggers a thought process of simplifying the same, rather than just implementing one. Marketers often have a complain against sales reps that they do not update information in organization CRM without which major decisions are at stake. Analysing data, usually updated by sales reps, is of high importance for obvious reasons. Organizations having CRM often face this problem where Sales Reps are not motivated enough to get on to their desktops to update relevant information while their actual work is in the field. Why would they?; most of them
There is an interesting, historical note about Kikkoman Soy Sauce. As you probably know, Kikkoman is the world’s largest seller of soy sauce — the biggest marketer, the most successful marketer of soy sauce. It’s a large company that comes from Japan. They were hoping to be very successful in a very large food and beverage market — the United States. They entered the U.S. in the 1950s. They entered, as most Japanese firms do, from the West Coast in California. And they were selling soy sauce mostly to Asian grocery stores along the West Coast. They sold very little volume, because, in the 1950s, Americans were not used to consuming soy sauce. It was a foreign product. It was an exotic product. You usually
Attended my first Harvard Management Mentor session today. ‘Customer Focus’ was the topic of the day, and I was super excited. This blogpost is the summary of my learning from the class. Usually, I bypass the ‘funda’ part in a session and concentrate on what is most practically possible, however, must say, the Harvard mentors are after all, the best. Customer Loyalty Not to mention, the longer customers are loyal, the more profitable they become. Why? The answer has to do with what are known as the three Rs of customer loyalty. Retention The first R of customer loyalty is retention. An ongoing relationship with a customer creates a steady stream of revenue over time as the customer continues to buy products. The costs associated
If you are pricing your product high because it has a value worth against it; do not hesitate to communicate the same to your audience. A client wanted to launch and promote a festival event celebration with entry ticket priced much higher than other events happening in the city. The value was undoubtedly worth it with day long celebration, rain dance, unlimited food and booze on the house along with a telecast of live world cup cricket match, etc etc, but (just like all our beloved typical clients) he didn’t want to spend much in communicating the same to the target (students crowd of the city). Communication is an expensive deal, so if you do not have deep enough pockets to brand, advertise and interact,
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