As we continue to witness the battle of power and of our lives against the deadly virus, I got thinking about another kind of battle. A battle so real in this post-COVID world that it is truly scary. It is the battle for eyeballs. When the world is going digital, how can sales effectively win this battle?
Rethinking sales & marketing in the “Analytics” world
Have you counted the number of times “data” or “analytics” or “data analytics” has been said on the news lately? It can very well be turned into a fairly successful drinking game. The elections are a prime example of how digital marketing has transformed the way we work. Designed to be “old school, drag down” politics, elections have been reinvented to showcase the best-in-class data analytics driving high value-add digital marketing. This has not been an easy transition. Politicians have dedicated millions of dollars towards this in their campaigns, a luxury most enterprises do not have.
In a digital world, the functional boundaries between product marketing, marketing communications, outside sales and inside sales are all starting to blur. There is a clear chasm between businesses that are using traditional marketing methods and those who are innovating with digital sales and marketing automation. Some will survive and cross this chasm in time, and some will not. So how can businesses bridge this divide between old school sales & marketing and digital strategies, effectively and without burning a hole in their pockets?
Get inspiration from “as-a-Service” model
If we look at how well technology businesses have adopted the SaaS model, we can take inspiration from it and do the same to rethink marketing. The Subscription-as-a-Service model allows businesses the ultimate flexibility, even as they benefit from virtual storage, virtual networks in a secure environment. Why not look at digital sales and marketing the same way?
This one change allows you to upgrade to tools with the latest capabilities, on-demand, while utilizing its capabilities to the tee. The sales and marketing automation world are dynamic, and the tools are ever-changing. HighSpot, Hubspot, SharpSpring, Cien, Crayon, Gong.io, Doodly, Drift, Echo, and Bambu are some of the high-tech sales enablement and marketing automation tools in the market today. These tools use advanced artificial intelligence, real-time data analytics, machine learning – and as these technologies advance, so do the capabilities of these tools. How can you practically keep up with this? How many tools can your in-house team learn, let alone become experts?
Realistically speaking, you can only scale your in-house team to use 20 percent of the tool’s actual capabilities.
Create an extended team
One of the main concerns most organizations have when it comes to outsourcing is risking the loss of brand and identity. This is where an augmented model would work the best. The marketing elements that best resonate with the persona of the company should remain in-house. The digital enablement components to best get the message in the right context to the right audience is best outsourced to a digital marketing and sales enablement specialist. What companies cannot afford to do is have their team learn about emerging digital marketing strategy, become expert users of the automation tools (that are ever-changing), create ever-demanding digital content, and take on a high degree of risk of falling in the depths of the chasm.
So, are you ready to tune-up your digital sales and marketing presence and capture those eyeballs? In this time of COVID-19, where digital is a reality, your answer should be a resounding YES!