Inbound Marketing Blog

Did you know that aligning your sales and marketing can help your business become 67% better at closing deals? Or that companies with strong sales and marketing alignment achieve a 20% annual growth rate? There is countless research and data available that shows just how important and beneficial aligning your sales and marketing can be for your organisation, yet only 8% of companies have a strong alignment between their sales and marketing departments. The truth is, there is often a lot of internal miscommunication between sales and marketing, which results in lost leads and a loss of revenue. Yet when marketing and sales are aligned and work together, you’ll not only witness better communication within your organisation, but as data shows, you will also see an increase in sales. When attempting to align your sales and marketing team for the first time, it can be confusing and overwhelming. The purpose of this article is to educate you on the benefits of aligning your sales and marketing teams, and what you need to do to get your teams aligned.

The disconnect between sales and marketing has been around since the advent of modern business. While some progress has been made, 20% of companies still report misalignment between the two departments, according to HubSpot’s State of Inbound 2016 report. While ‘misalignment’ doesn’t exactly mean ‘war’, it does mean that the two are not cooperating as they should, and this could affect your ability to win more customers.

Sales Enablement has emerged as one of the most pressing priorities for the modern marketer. According to HubSpot’s 2016 State of Inbound report, 32% of marketers rate it as a major focus for 2017. Overall it’s the fifth highest priority for the sector, the first time Sales Enablement has ever appeared in the survey results.

In the same report, only 2% of Inbound Marketers and 3% of Outbound Marketers said sales enablement was overrated.

From relative obscurity Sales Enablement now occupies a large space on the Inbound Marketing radar. 

What is Sales Enablement? 

2017 has arrived and along with it has come the promise of some exciting new trends in the world of Inbound Marketing.

As we settle in and plan for the year ahead, now is the opportune time to assess the latest developments in Inbound Marketing and how they will impact you and your clients.

The increased need for smarketing, the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) and a surge towards video are amongst the top trends we predict will have the most impact in 2017. 

When you are a marketer, learning never stops. Whether it’s about new tactics and new technologies or new industries you have to familiarise yourself with, you know that you are an eternal student. So, what better time than the end of the year to recap what we’ve learned in 2016.

HubSpot’s 2016 State Of Inbound Report has arrived and, as usual, it’s a veritable treasure trove of information about how Inbound is changing the marketing game.