It’s an age-old question: How can two very different but inexorably linked functions, marketing and sales, become better aligned to deliver stronger business outcomes?
In today’s digitally driven, non-sequential world, alignment should not be the ultimate goal. Instead, business leaders should be working to unify the entire prospect-to-customer lifecycle by moving from a functional or process view of marketing and sales to an experiential view.
One of the unintended consequences of todays’ customer experience (CX) movement is that it has become largely synonymous with the post-sale servicing of the customer. Once marketing has done its job creating brand pull, filling the funnel with qualified leads and the salesforce accepts.
At a minimum, research has shown that today’s buyer values—beyond price and product functionality—are characterized by a universal interest in simplicity, emotional gratification and a frictionless experience.
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Paul Cole is president of Los Angeles-based customer experience software provider InQuba North America.