Marketing Department - what do they do?
How many times have you heard this question asked, especially in Sales and Finance? Although both for different reasons.
All companies apart from fully funded service organisations rely on sales to survive, right down to the local GP. If the customer doesn’t like the ‘product’, then they won’t come back and repurchase.
Based on the premise that companies’ success is based on their sales, then marketing’s role has to be one of assisting the sales function.
This can become blurred in the areas of Direct Marketing and Internet Selling where Marketing controls the whole transaction, but we’ll leave that to another article.
1. Branding
It is critical to portray your business or organisation in a consistent and professional manner that is appropriate to the customer being targeted. It is marketing’s role to define how the company (the brand) is to be perceived in the market. The branding exercise can start with very basic, low cost activities such as standardised letterheads, marketing messages and by-lines, the use of logos and how company information is packaged and presented. The larger the company, branding then starts to include other areas such as:
PR (Public Relations) which is all about getting newspapers, magazines and TV to publish favourable articles about your company or products)
Advertising which helps your ‘brand’ become top of mind
Events to reinforce your brand to specific customer groups
Sponsorship which again assists in brand recognition
Use of media ‘personalities’ – branding by association
2. Sales Materials
Sales is all about finding new customers and talking to existing customers, both with the aim of selling product. To do this they need up to date, professional, easily accessible sales tools such as brochures, demonstration CDs, PowerPoint presentations, product sheets and case studies. And the list goes on. Sales should not be responsible for creating these. Firstly they have better things to do with their time, and secondly it is important (see branding) to ensure that these tools are consistent and professional.
3. Lead Generation
Marketing can greatly assist in the generation of sales by delivering to the sales team prospects, and the ‘hotter’ the better. These may be in the form of lists of potential customers with names, job titles, phone numbers or email addresses. They may have responded to an advertisement, or they may be potential customers from purchased lists based on their job function or demographic. If they have responded to a marketing campaign then they are more likely to be a ‘hotter’ prospect.
4. Advertising
This is where the marketing department can sometimes lose sight of its role. It is where grand ideas combined with large marketing budgets can result in creativity taking preference over selling more products. How often have you seen an advertisement on TV or in the paper that you thought was absolutely brilliant? Except that if you tried to remember 10 minutes later what they were promoting you would have no idea - certainly not a great strategy for increasing sales! And advertising agencies do like big productions. Although there is no doubt that with excellent execution a ‘big’ campaign can be very effective, agencies make margin on placement as well as production. And the more brilliantly creative the ad is, the more the advertising agency will receive recognition.
5. Promotions
Promotions are another area where goals can easily be lost. Promotions have many benefits, but they must be defined in the strategy prior. Promotions can generate sales that move potentially obsolete product, increase a customer database, re-invigorate a flagging product, or become a branding exercise in their own right. Unfortunately sometimes the sales department are the last to hear about a promotion, and then don’t understand the strategy behind it. The message here is to ensure that there are excellent communications between both departments. There is nothing worse than being in sales and working hard at building strong positive customer relationships, only to be undermined by a promotion that your customer hears about through another source altogether.
6. Events
Events are one of marketing’s favourite pastimes. Travelling around the country with a road show, inviting the press to an exclusive launch an expensive restaurant, flying the dealers up the coast to a beach resort for a conference or inviting partners to the corporate box. And of course marketing must attend. Life is tough!
The truth is that there is definitely a place in the marketing mix for such events. And it is true that wining, dining and entertaining can generate both loyalty and business. Just be sure to understand and define the budgets in advance, including resulting sales that can be expected, and the branding benefits to be gained.
The Sales and Marketing Strategy
To ensure that marketing is kept on track, and that they stay true to their role, a sales and marketing plan needs to be developed that covers the following areas:
• Company goals and objectives
• Product forecasts, markets segmentation, competitive information, etc
• Sales strategies
• Supporting tactics
And most importantly – what is the marketing budget attached to each tactic and the forecast ‘Return on Investment (ROI) based on sales?
Both Sales and Marketing must be made accountable.
For example there is no point spending $100,000 on a sales promotion with forecast sales of $500,000 based on a margin of 10%. $50,000 gross margin doesn’t quite add up.
That is, unless the strategy is agreed in advance, which may be for example, to increase the customer database?
It is important at the end of the period to measure and review the strategies and tactics. It is only then that accountability, key learning's, and greater synergy can be achieved between the two departments.
Of course – it can be argued that with many of the above activities, sales can’t always be attributed to a specific campaign, and that it is the overall momentum achieved in the market by all of the brilliant, creative, innovative marketing activities combined that generates sales.
That can be true, but remember - marketing are the best when it comes to marketing themselves!!!
Machinery Automation & Robotics
1/101 Derby Street
Silverwater NSW 2128
Phone: (61) 2 9748 7001
http://www.machineryautomation.com.au