Tweet

Sales vs. Marketing or Sales + Marketing

Guest post by: Gregory Kopchuk

Article Overview: What is the right way to do business?

Sales vs. Marketing or Sales + Marketing

Many people in sales ignore marketing because it appears to be some form of black magic that no one really understands while it uses all of a company's money. Yet, we have always needed marketing, because it's easier to sell to our target market. But is this really true? For many of us we have found that when we start cold calling, bold calling, or networking that the vast majority of our target market has never heard of us or the product/service we offer. So did all our marketing do anything for us? Well not at first glance.

So what is all the hype that the consumer is more educated and will spend a great deal of time researching your type of product/service on the internet? How can they do that if they have never heard of you?

Consider this; Amazon.com built a multi-billion dollar business without sales people. The same with Zappos and eBay. How do they get millions of dollars in sales when we are wearing out our shoes, getting sore fingers pushing buttons on the phone and networking for pennies? How do they get customers coming to them and buying?

Intrigued by this question, I decided to figure out the black magic or voodoo of marketing. I began several years back by reading all about marketing and I learned nothing. Then I stumbled upon a book called Strategic Marketing Management by Mark E. Parry and my understanding of marketing changed overnight. He talks about the idea of using attributes, benefits, and values to market to your customers. I was suddenly starting to see the light. I then had a telephone conversation with Mark to see about arranging a marketing workshop to help develop my marketing message. Within the first 5 minutes of the conversation, he totally cleared up what marketing was all about. He asked me if I was familiar with SPIN selling. I said I had used that process for over 20 years. He then said that marketing was the same as SPIN selling. Talk about your Blinding Flash of the Obvious (BFO)! Marketing was the same as SPIN selling. Suddenly all was clear. So if marketing is SPIN selling then if your marketing is effective do you need a sales force? The answer is no you don't. Amazon, eBay and Zappos don't have a sales force; they have order takers or the customer does it all on their own.

I also took some time to go to a conference where Verne Harnish was speaking. He is the author of the Rockefeller Habits. His main topic was about marketing. After his presentation, I asked him if "marketing is targeted, effective, and informative do you need a highly skilled sales force?" He said No.

So that was the second confirmation in the negative sense for the marketing side. The following day we had a presentation by Harry Beckwith, author of What customers want and Selling the Invisible. I asked him the same question and his answer was the same. As a salesperson, this revelation shocked me. I realized that a highly skilled salesperson is a marketer. That is why sales people understand marketing and advertising so well. They are out there doing it day in and day out. That is why I noticed that when I was working with my marketing team to write effective emails that I consistently wrote better emails and received better responses than theirs.

It was because I had a way better pulse on the customer than the marketing people did. Heaven help me if the marketers became as informed about the customer as I did. I would probably be out of a job. This is why many businesses rely on highly skilled sales people to get sales; it's because the marketing has failed them. What would happen if the marketing and sales people got together? You would have an unstoppable growing business. The problem is because most business owners don't understand marketing they cut it first or don't do it at all and rely on the super salesperson to do everything. If I had the great kind of marketing that Parry, Harnish and Beckwith talked about my job of selling would be strictly order taking. Now, the trick is to get my marketing to that point. Until then my sales skills will be much in demand.

Related Articles
  3 Good Reasons Marketing Should Qualify Leads Before Passing to Sales
  Sales VP's and Marketing VP's - Should the Roles be Combined?
  Judicial Branch Needed to Keep Sales Lead Management Honest
  Those idiots in sales just don’t get it
  Who Cares More-Sales or Marketing?
  Market First, Sell Second to Increase Sales in 2011
  Mistakes of a Marketing Budget Strategy
  How to Guarantee Internet Marketing Sales! ~GET RESULTS FAST
  Filling the Gap Between Generation and Conversion
  SALES & MARKETING - ARE THEY COMPATIBLE FOR MARKET SUCCESS?
  Sales and Marketing: Know and Apply The Separate But Equal Ideology
  How To Set Up Your Budget for Marketing
  Sales and Marketing - Yin and Yang, or Oil and Water?
  Marketing Success vs. Sales Success
  It's time for Marketing to work from a system!
  Sales without Marketing is a huge blunder
  First Sell What the Customer Wants; Not What You Want to Win More Sales
  Questions Every CEO Should Be Asking His Sales Managers
  Education Based Marketing the New Sales Paradigm for Relationship Selling
  Does Your Sales Training Program Pass or Fail the Rope Test?

Article Tags: business, demand, marketing, profit, ROI, sales, Small business, SPIN selling



Related Forum Posts
Online Sales and Marketing vs Traditional - Hi Evan, I am noticing that many of the posts in the Sales/Marketing section deal with online marketing, SEM and and SEO and Affiliates. I was wondering if it might be a good idea to separate that section into two; 1) Online Sales and Marketing; 2) Traditional Sales and Marketing
Re: Online Sales and Marketing vs Traditional - [quote="ltrahan":31w9r2iz]Hi Evan, I am noticing that many of the posts in the Sales/Marketing section deal with online marketing, SEM and and SEO and Affiliates. I was wondering if it might be a good idea to separate that section into two; 1) Online Sales and Marketing; 2) Traditional Sales and Marketing[/quote:31w9r2iz] I second the request...
niche forum categories - I think Kevin just touched on the point that I was going make... and that is developing 'categories' that stick. Sales and Marketing may be too broad for example. However I can almost guarantee you that you would see many more sign-ups if you tailored a category to 'internet marketing' for newbies. I've seen this work on other forums, however, [i:1i903wkn]it can get a little frantic[/i:1i903wkn]... Fine tuning the categories, or expanding the scope should be effective. I think a lot of IM folks are surfing right on by because they're not finding what they're looking for here... Just a few thoughts: Better Blogging Developing Info Products Internet Marketing Presentation Skills More How to's Another point is... a lot of people don't know that they can benefit from participating in forums. The signature links to their site - if they have one - can / should be motivation enough to get more involved. The more internet savvy members that have signatures seem to stick around more... Don't you think?
Different Hats - CEO Sales & Marketing & Leadership Development Company Strategic Vision 10 Alliances & Growth Strategies 10 Hiring & Managing People 8 Mentoring 8-9 Strategic Planning for Clients 10 Execution of Marketing Campaigns 9-10 (i have great people who do the nitty gritty) Financial Management 9 Bookkeeping 3 (outsourced as I really hate the fine details like GST0 Administrative Follow Up 6-7 (again have great staff) Writing & Publishing 9 (getting better all the time!) Speaking 10 (so I have been told) Self Promotion 9-10 Web development & Promotion 6-7 (learning more and have brought on players who are 10+) Babysitting Employees (1 - wont do it, that's why I work so hard to hire and motivate the people I have) Great topic Kevin!! Jude
Any ideas for potential partner sites? - Hi Everyone, I was wondering if any of you have any ideas on "potential partner sites" for our specific forum categories? For instance, is there a leading "Women Entrepreneur" or "Sales/Marketing" site you know of that doesn't have an existing online community of its own? This could be a great way to help us attract more traffic. Thanks


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

What I Really Want Is...

Work Place Counselling

Understanding Influence

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.