4 Benefits of Aligning Marketing Technology With Business Strategies

Marketing operations have become increasingly complex. Not only are there thousands of martech tools to choose from, but the expectations placed on modern marketing executives by their peers in the C-suite require the skill and mastery of an accomplished circus performer, and we’re talking Cirque Du Soliel, not Ringling Brothers. Bestselling marketing author and TED Talk speaker, Bryan Kramer, puts it this way:

“CMOs are the designated miracle makers. They’re busy innovating, creating strategies, crafting messages, bringing in leads and surrounded by tools and data. The demands facing CMOs can feel impossibly tough, and having to take ownership and accountability for what feels like every decision is hard-hitting.”

The Elite Mission of Marketing Ops

Yes, it’s a heavy burden that’s placed on CMO’s and the marketing department as a whole, but there are ways to lessen the burden. Just as planets being in alignment can have a measurable impact on the earth’s gravitational pull, aligning marketing technology (martech) with sales, marketing and business strategies can have a measurable impact on marketing’s pull in several areas, including customer experience, revenue, productivity, growth, etc. When both people and technology are pulling their own weight, the burden of performance placed upon marketing ops teams and their leaders is significantly lessened, and more importantly, great things have been proven to happen.

Measurable Motivation for Alignment

When sales, marketing and martech are working in unison, the power to reach business goals faster, coupled with the dramatic enhancements to organizational performance across Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) is nothing short of astounding. If you’re having trouble getting other decision-makers to endorse the idea of making alignment a top priority, consider sharing a few of the latest stats we’ve gathered to get them excited about the potential your company has to slay competitors. For example, companies with tightly aligned sales and marketing strategies enjoy:

36% Higher customer retention rates

38% Higher sales win rates

32% Annual revenue growth

24% Faster revenue growth over a three-year period

27% Faster profit growth over a three-year period

The High Cost of Doing Nothing

What happens if you don’t make alignment a priority? Studies show that it costs your organization quite a bit. For example, Aberdeen Research group found that companies with poor sales and marketing alignment typically experience a four percent decline in revenue. In addition, International Data Corporation (IDC) found that B2B companies that do not align sales and marketing teams around the right processes and technologies experience a 10 percent increase in costs due to inefficiencies, missed opportunities, etc. For most, ignoring the problem is an expensive option that produces more stress and frustration, than tackling it head-on.

Four Long-Term Benefits of a Fully Aligned Approach

1. Enhanced Customer Experience

Perhaps the most important benefit realized by organizations that brings sales, marketing and martech into alignment is the big impact it has on the customer experience (CX). A recent Forbes article stated that today 89 percent of companies compete primarily on the basis of CX. The article went on to declare CX is now the ultimate competitive differentiator, and companies looking to win in this arena must not only “be there” for customers, but “be consistent” in all of their communications and dealings. When your customer receives relevant messages (marketing); personalized through data insights and delivered across all channels (martech); and is able to engage with a company rep (sales) who has instant access to their history and preferences (martech, again), you’ve created the kind of CX that boosts KPIs such as: customer satisfaction, brand loyalty, retention, and customer lifetime values.

2. Increased Sales, Revenue and Growth

One of the great byproducts of an optimized CX is an increase in sales, which leads to an increase in both revenue and growth. Of course, CX optimization is just one of the variables that leads to a win in the Triple Crown of sales, revenue and growth. When you have empowered sales and marketing teams to join forces, communication improves between the two departments, and with customers. The teams can learn from one another, share goals, identify opportunities and improve efficiencies. According to research performed by Marketo, when sales and marketing teams are aligned, leads are 67 percent more likely to become clients. That’s a lot of sales, revenue and growth!

3. Reduced Manual Tasks and Increased Efficiencies

Perhaps one of the more difficult benefits to accurately measure, yet one of the most instantly felt is the time and productivity recovered when sales, marketing and martech are in alignment. When everyone has a clear understanding of joint goals and processes, it is easier to identify opportunities to automate processes, streamline workflows and enhance efficiencies. A survey of marketing leaders found that the number one benefit reported by marketers who automate more tasks is “saving time.” Indeed reducing and/or eliminating manual processes helps teams to be more productive and boosts morale by enabling people to focus on mission-critical tasks.

4. Focused Investments in Results-Driven Campaigns and Channels

Another long-term benefit of a technology-enhanced, strategic alignment between sales and marketing is the ability to quickly identify the campaigns and channels that are driving sales. When sales teams are equipped with marketing-approved campaigns for a variety of channels, and you track their performance via martech, such as a marketing dashboard, you gain instant visibility into the campaigns and channels that resonate and the ones that need work. Moreover, you can reduce budget waste by focusing future investments on the campaigns and channels that are delivering the biggest pay-offs.