When was the last time your marketing and sales teams sat in the same room?

Do they know each other’s objectives?  Are they contributing directly to the other side’s success?

Tom Grubb is the Chief Strategy Officer at Digital Pi where his role centers helping companies do great things with marketing technologies. He specializes in getting decision makers to think about the outcomes and objectives of their marketing investments.

Executives can often get distracted with shiny pieces of new marketing technology, and Tom has seen countless examples of companies focused on the “best” technology rather than the actual end goals they are looking to accomplish.

While working with clients, Tom asks a lot of questions.  His background makes him well suited for his job because he has a long history of working in the technology, marketing leadership, and product marketing spaces.  He can see the big picture, the little details and he understands the overall technology landscape.

My role really centers on helping companies do great things with marketing technologies.

Tom Grubb

As a veteran marketer, Tom understands just how important it is to have aligned metrics for sales and marketing.  It’s more important than the metrics themselves! In this episode of B2B Revenue Acceleration, we spoke to Tom about how to align key metrics, viewing marketing in a different light, and choosing the right tech stack.

Metrics and KPI

The conversation around Metrics and KPIs is not a new topic, but one that can be difficult to manage.  Tom really believes that the keys to alignment really all center around metrics. Metrics are the lynchpin that brings the strategy and teams together, so it is fundamental to get them right.

But which ones do you choose? The answer is that the best metrics are ones that sales, marketing, and executives all agree on.  It matters more that everyone believes in the metrics you choose and are on the same page rather than the details of the actual metrics themselves.

An entire business is supposed to be about delivering results. If you can’t measure results, then what are we doing?

Tom Grubb

Often, sales and marketing teams can be viewed as opposing forces.  Each side thinks what they are doing is valuable and doesn’t appreciate the hard work going on across the aisle.  But if you get sales and marketing in the same room together and if everyone agrees on who is responsible for what, there is a sense of ownership and teamwork that can’t exist without these first steps.

It’s important to have this alignment conversation about metrics early on. The sooner that all teams are working toward the same direction, the sooner the company will start to see benefits.  Sales will be able to tell marketing what they are seeing in the field, and marketing will be able to give sales better opportunities for warm leads and conversations. It’s a symbiotic relationship that fundamentally starts when the teams agree on metrics and who is responsible for what.

Let’s face it, salespeople don’t talk to accounts. They talk to people who belong to accounts.

Tom Grubb

Perception of Marketers

Marketers can often be viewed as a cost center rather than a department that is directly contributing to revenue.  Sometimes this can come from a “what have you done for me lately?” perspective of executives and salespeople. This immediately puts marketers on the defensive and sets up unhealthy dialogue.

If marketers are constantly thinking about how to defend themselves versus thinking about how they can gain market share, that is a problem.  This perception of marketers can come from impatience. The root of impatience either comes from a lack of understanding or mismanaged expectations.  Marketers often don’t have clear plan in place and that contributes to these issues.

But if executives and sales departments can start to trust their marketers, and marketers can effectively demonstrate the value they are producing with a clear gameplan, that’s when a marketing department can add a tremendous amount of value.

Tech Stack

When choosing a piece of marketing technology, Tom believes that the most important thing a company can do is look at what business problem they’re trying to solve rather than being distracted by shiny objects and new technology.

There is a staggering amount of marketing technology available, and companies can gorge on these products. Marketing technology can simultaneously dazzle and overwhelm those who don’t have a solid understanding of what they are looking for.

Tom likes to encourage companies to make sure they have a plan in place.  Get your key metrics aligned so you know what specific problem you’re trying to solve, and don’t go overkill.  Tech isn’t easy to build upon, so make sure you know what you’re getting, why you’re getting it, and that you’re aligned across all teams!

This post is based on a podcast with Tom Grubb. To hear this episode, and many more like it, you can subscribe to The B2B Revenue Acceleration Podcast.

If you don’t use iTunes, you can listen to every episode here.