While it’s important that you not let your sales team dictate your promotional strategy, their influence cannot be underestimated. After all, they’re the ones out in the trenches day after day with their collective fingers on the market pulse more than anyone within the confines of the home office.
All the market research in the world, while absolutely vital, cannot replace the instant, and sometimes emotional, feedback that can only come from face-to-face interaction with your audience. And who better to relay that feedback than your team on the street?
Once they bring you into their loop, it’s just as important to pull them into yours. They need to know your outbound communications plan … what’s being done, to whom and when? Are you running ads? Doing more mailings? Planning industry events? They need to know all about them, in advance, to avoid surprises.
Above all, you need them to buy into it … and share some ownership.
Furthermore, as you rely on their ability to face the market reaction to your promotions, they’ll be depending on you to help prepare them to respond deftly and consistently with your messaging.
There is no “us and them” in a successful organization. And the sooner everybody gets on the same page, the sooner you can turn it.
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