Though Marketing and Sales must go hand-in-hand to achieve any positive growth, in reality it is mostly the reverse. While bad marketing for a good product can be as disastrous as taking a joy ride in a sabotaged aircraft, poor turn over need not necessarily be blamed on unrealistic marketing policy alone.
Before delving deeper into the subject it needs to be mentioned here that though there is a lot of relationship between the two, but it can be safely stated that 'Marketing' is a much wider term than 'Sales'. Sales are basically a part of Marketing. In other words, a company has a marketing policy, and sales is one mean in which the company tries to meet its marketing plans.
But ironically there is often a conflict between these two departments. The Marketing people can feel the pulse of the industry and provide leads, but are often rebuffed by the Sales people who argue that their 'feelers' were off beam. Sales people often claim that the figures fell shorter than the projected volume because of this. Whatever be the cases, it is evident that each undervalues the other to such extent that their integration, a factor much is needed to keep the business going, ultimately becomes a myth.
To achieve synch among Marketing and Sales it may become necessary for the Marketing people to get involved in all levels of product development, taking along the Sales personnel with them so that they too can appreciate the leads to be ultimately supplied by the Marketers. In other words, starting at the ground root level and then progressively going up together, instead of taking up the marketing at any mid-stage alone might be fruitful. Also, Marketing's increasing influence in each phase of an organization's growth deeply affects its relationship with Sales.
But in spite of the tension between these two departments, both Marketing and Sales need to work together for the success of any business. Performance of other departments too vastly depends on this relationship. And that is why modern day management attempts to create a friendly atmosphere where marketing and sales works in synch.
Sales, Marketing and the Internet
When it comes to the online world, can marketing and sales be differentiated? Is the act of selling over the Internet through an online store an act of marketing? Or is it sales?
Well the fact is, selling a product or products or a service over the Internet is primarily sales. And the act of supporting this function is marketing.
Take for example the online major Amazon. When the company does promotional exercise through channels such as popular Television, radio, magazines and billboards, then all these activities can be termed as marketing efforts that are geared towards creating a brand consciousness and brining in web traffic to promote and support sales.
But in many smaller stores, marketing and sales often become one and the same as most of these businesses cannot often afford a bigger marketing exercise and limit themselves just to the exercise of sales.
HOW COMPLEX IS THE PRODUCT?
It's always important to start with the product in considering any aspect of your sales and marketing strategy. Is the product complex to sell? Is it complex to install? If a typical installation is highly complex and customized for the client, there may be a high level of services required that can only be delivered by experts within the company. If this is the case, a direct model usually work best.
If there is what I would term a "medium" complexity to the product, this often lends itself to the utilization of VAR and System Integration partners. This class of partners is attracted to products that allow them to bill configuration and service hours, which is really how they make their money. This key here is that the product isn't so complex that the partners can't be reasonably trained on the product, to deliver these services somewhat independently in the field, with a minimum of hand-holding by the vendor.
The last case is a product which is very simple and standard, or has minimum customization that can be performed by the end user. This level of product complexity usually lends itself to multiple distribution channels, including direct and mass market channels, which provide great distribution breadth, but minimal support. VARs and Integrators may also sell products of this nature, but they won't put much focus on them, since they don't drive service revenue. VARs will essentially "take orders" for this type of product as a convenience to their clients. They won't be a "strategic" channel for this type of product, but since they are a large channel, the sales can still add up to a substantial total--so you shouldn't ignore them if they are appropriate.
HOW HIGH IS THE PRODUCT PRICE?
A high price can lead you in two different directions: Direct-only, or to a VAR/Systems Integration distribution strategy. If you're selling an Enterprise Software Product into a narrow niche, with an average deal size of $2M, you're probably going to end up selling the product direct.
If, however, you selling a $50-100K average sized deal, and the addressable market is a bit larger and more well-defined, it's very possible that the VAR/Integrator channel may provide real leverage.
For products that fit into the $9.95-$995.00 range, a multi-channel marketing and distribution model may once again be your best bet. Products in this price range usually are very standard or have user-customizable features, and lend themselves to "sales-intensive" distribution channels, rather than support intensive. This could mean a focused direct marketing model with direct downloaded software sales from a website, or sales through computer retailers or mass market stores.
WHAT DOES THE PROMOTION MIX LOOK LIKE?
High priced, directly distributed products tend to have very simple promotion plans. The reason for this is that high priced products typically have small focused markets, so it's pretty simple to get your marketing message to the customer. The simplest promotion strategy is what I call "Door to Door marketing." Door to Door marketing means relying on the sales force exclusively to promote your product--with little or no investment in marketing programs. Or maybe due to limited resources, your promotional budget only allows a monthly Ad in a highly targeted trade journal. These aren't strategies that I generally recommend, but for narrow markets, it is sometime appropriate. Bottom line, simple promotional strategies are generally only advisable for direct distribution approaches.
If on the other hand, you have available to you a large budget and a wide variety of promising promotional programs, that often is coupled with a broad distribution strategy. If you're promoting in many different places, that may drive demand in a variety of different channels. In general, I say use them all. And I'm rarely a proponent of selling "indirect only"--you tend to lose valuable information without a direct link to the customer. You will also leave money on the table by giving up margin on customers that would prefer to buy direct. But occasionally companies are so dependent upon channels, that it doesn't make sense to manage the channel conflict, and deflect the ill will that selling direct sometimes generates within a channel.
WHAT CHANNELS ARE AVAILABLE TO YOU?
Oftentimes, the decision on how to sell is made for you. If your company is in a missionary situation where you are creating a new market, or you are in a very narrow niche, you usually don't have any choice but to sell direct. If it's a new market, channels might develop later. But in most cases, selling direct initially, either solely or in conjunction with channels, is highly advisable. There is no channel in the world that will be able to figure out how to sell a product--that the company itself hasn't figure out how to sell itself. It's always good to conduct trial and error marketing/sales campaigns directly, and then transfer that knowledge to your channels.
If you have a product that is broadly attractive to a variety of channels, and you have the resources to promote and sell effectively through all of them, I say go for it. As I stated early on in this article, it's my belief that this is the best way to optimize your return on assets. The only caution is to make certain that you have the necessary resources, and are in a position to support all channels. If not, it's better to "go slow" and add channels one at time--if you alienate a channel, they have a very long memory, and it will be hard to get back in their good graces.
One type of partner we haven't discussed yet is the OEM. In some cases, there may be a large, dominant player in your business that you are tempted to pursue as an OEM channel partner. While occasionally this leads to making the principals of a small company quite rich, I've found in most cases its fools gold. No one sells your product like you do. Most OEM deals that I see end up with revenue levels in the range of 5-10% of the small company's initial expectations. This can still be a substantial, important source of revenue. But the message I'll leave you with is that I prefer early OEM deals to be non-exclusive, rather than exclusive. The exception is for a product that fits in a new market you don't plan to participate in directly. Too many times I've seen clients "bet the farm" on a major OEM early in theie development, and the company was either killed or severely wounded by the experience. Pursue OEMs, but it is usually best to do so as part of an overall, comprehensive distribution strategy.
HOW DOES THE CUSTOMER WANT TO BUY?
Finally, the most important question to consider is "how and where does the customer want to buy?" One of my most closely held beliefs is that you maximize revenue by offering the customer a product that is priced, packaged and sold via the channel he is most comfortable with. So if your prime prospect is a direct buyer, sell direct. If it's a diverse audience that has a number of preferences on where to buy, strive to be in all of those channels. This may be the most important advice that I can provide.
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