1. TMH Consulting & Investment Group all rights reserved. 2015
The Marketing and Sales bridge
6 steps to align your commercial strategy to boost sales
May 2015
By: Thomas Michael Hogg and Leon Felipe Garcia

2. The Marketing and Sales Bridge page | 2
The Sales Director´s opinion:
- "The marketing department is only concerned
about branding, events and awards. What about
revenues? Our marketing manager does not
even know our key accounts´ needs nor how we
sell to them."
The Chief Marketing Officer´s opinion:
- "Our sales force does not differentiate our brand.
We communicate our company's differentiators
through all of our communication channels, but
not through the most important one: our sales
reps."
We have heard those statements many times during client meetings and there was always one area to blame
"our neighbor department." Between your sales people and the marketing guys very often exists an area of
opportunity to "build a bridge".
The alignment of the Marketing and Sales departments leads us to a successful commercial strategy
which delivers topline growth. Every CEO is eager to rely on a high performance commercial team. But very
often these two areas lack to bond as a team that works together.

3. The Marketing and Sales Bridge page | 3
1. ALIGNMENT TO SALES METHODOLOGY
THROUGH COMMON OBJECTIVES
The Marketing department needs to create qualified
leads that have a high propensity of resulting in deals.
The Sales department has to drive these qualified
opportunities through the sales process to a closed on
won status. Therefore, the whole commercial team
needs to know annual, quarterly, and monthly goals
per segment, region, key accounts, and products (or
services). Furthermore, everyone has to be aware of
the lead generation objectives. Because if we do not
achieve our lead generation objectives, the journey in
the sales process may be very unpleasant and we may
avoid experience of too many unqualified leads that do
not deliver sufficient sales results.
In order to generate qualified leads and revenues, the
marketing department needs to fully understand the
sales methodology and process.
2. BI-DIRECTIONAL COMMUNICATION
FLOWS
A common understanding can only be obtained by an
ongoing and evolving communication between the two
departments. The CMO needs to be part of the weekly
top management sales meetings. Communication does
not mean writing emails nor sending presentations.
Effective communication means formal and informal
meetings on a steady basis. Trust and honesty are two
basic ingredients for efficient communication. Ask
yourself: how many top management meetings with
effective and efficient communication take place in
your company between the head of marketing and the
head of sales.
3. DEFINED ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES
When it comes to roles and tasks, very often we notice
two common patterns:
- There is no such description which defines clear
alignment responsibilities. The Marketing
department must have clear sales, market
penetration, and lead generation goals, measured
by KPIs. A second step would be to link these
objectives and responsibilities to incentives.
- The responsibilities are well-defined, but hidden in
a HR file and not communicated. There is no clarity
as to these roles, and they are not measured by the
top management.
4. FORMALIZED METRICS AND REPORTING
Having a common set of objectives, indicators, and
reports is crucial in order to be able to deliver
outstanding results. Therefore, we recommend to
measure and discuss the following issues:
- Lead Generation by marketing channels
- Target Market penetration. How many leads and
sales are generated by the marketing department?
- What is the hit rate of the marketing leads? How
much $ value (net sales) are coming from
marketing initiatives?
- Does marketing provide a key support for high-
margin products / services / projects?
- Sales reps are mainly measured by the so called
"exit indicators" - Sales deals closed and revenues.
But what about "entry" indicators that measure how
good a sales rep penetrate the target market and
reach first meetings with new potential key
accounts.
The definition and the follow-up of these common
marketing and sales indicators are very important.
Benchmark companies even have a marketing and
sales KPI dashboard that is constantly supervised by
the CEO.

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5. STANDARD TERMINOLOGY
Do we speak the same language?
- Cost per click
- Ad impressions
- Inbound Marketing
- Sales service quote
- Sell-through rate
- Above and below the line
- Hit-rate per channel
- SEO & SEM
- Key accounts and target market by segment
- Top- vs. Bottom-line growth
Every manager has its own definition or sometimes he
or she ignores the importance of a thorough and
common understanding. What are the key expressions,
terms and metrics your sales and marketing
department use? Are you certain that a sound
understanding and prioritization of these terms exist?
6. JOINED CUSTOMER VISITS
"I have never seen our marketing manager
participating in a sales visit", Sales Director.
Often the marketing guys are busy sitting on their
desks or having unlimited agency meetings than
having customer meetings with the sales team.
The CEO has to push the marketers to be in the market
and to understand the sales process and challenges.
Sales people should invite the marketing department
to their key account sales meetings. You`ll be
surprised with the support and insights you could get.
ABOUT TMH CONSULTING & INVESTMENT GROUP:
TMH Consulting & Investment group is an international
consulting firm, founded 2012 in Monterrey, Mexico.
TMH designs impact-driven strategies & business
models for leading companies and non-profit
organizations. TMH delivers a strategic clarity and
direction to the client's growth plans. Fields of
expertise: Strategic Planning, Marketing & Sales
Strategy and Market Research.
For more information please contact us and visit our
website.
Website: www.tmh.com.mx
Email: info@tmh.com.mx
take a
huge budget allocation, will surely give you a
short term competitive advantage and sales
Thomas Michael Hogg