Why Marketing Should Take the Lead on Sales

Successful marketing is the single most important factor in building a business, especially in today’s highly competitive B2B space. While there were once major organizational differences between the marketing and sales departments, they are often one and the same today. A big reason for that has to do with the data that drives B2B success today—data that sits at the core of the marketing function but powers success in the sales department, as well as other vital functions of the business.

Data-driven marketing is essential to a B2B business. In addition to being the core driver of revenue, it also provides the means for establishing a competitive advantage within a category. Marketing is vital for business expansion and growth, it enables greater efficiency within the sales process, it enhances customers satisfaction and loyalty, and it’s responsible for developing and preserving a brand’s image within the marketplace.

Marketing should be infused into—and, in fact, take the lead on—every aspect of a B2B company’s customer journey and sales process:

• Top of the funnel: Marketing provides branding, air cover and thought leadership that establishes a business as a memorable player in its category.
• Through the sales funnel: Marketing crafts personalized collateral designed to connect at the individual level, depending on a person’s role and position in the sales funnel.
• When a purchase is made: Marketing is responsible for ensuring product and service collateral and follow-up is tailored to the buyer’s specific needs.
• When a purchase isn’t made: Marketing continues to engage the prospect as appropriate, via retargeting and continued education on how the company can solve the specific challenges of that person and their organization.
• Customer service and success: Marketing crafts and delivers tailored retention and renewal offers.
• Internally: Beyond driving all aspects of revenue-generating activities, marketing sits at the crux of company culture and serves to shape and communicate a company’s values both internally and externally.

Given the importance of marketing across the sales process and broader organization, it’s absolutely essential that this department have access to the freshest and most comprehensive data sets available. That’s where our Identity Graph comes in. Our Identity Graph enables marketers to enrich their B2B data with B2C identity in order to level up their efforts across the entire funnel. Importantly, it provides the bridge needed for B2B marketers to communicate with prospects at an individual, personalized level, both in their professional channels as well as their personal channels.

Our Identity Graph stands apart from other industry data sets in the following ways:

• Accuracy and scale: We have an expansive data set that is consistently refreshed to ensure that it is never stale, providing B2B marketers with the accuracy that comes with the most up to date and relevant data.
• Privacy by design: Built with privacy at its core, Identity Graph relies on anonymized hashed emails. Personally identifiable information (PII) cannot be tied back to individuals.
• Interoperable: Identity Graph segments and lookalikes can be used across all channels and are based on real people, not cookies. In other words, Identity Graph future-proofs your marketing for the cookieless world.

By employing audience data that can bridge the gap between the personal and professional attributes of B2B audiences, marketers can unlock new opportunities and higher ROI from their digital advertising investments.