To achieve alignment, you need an agreement. Sales and Marketing are on the same team. Okay, let’s be honest: At most companies, it doesn’t actually feel that way. According to a Corporate Executive Board study, 87% of the terms Sales and Marketing use to describe each other are negative. According to our own research, 59% of marketers admit that they have no formal agreement with sales to determine both teams’ responsibilities, so it’s no wonder that sales and marketing alignment isn’t happening.

Figuring out how to unify sales and marketing isn't easy. But once you figure out the basics, you've opened the doors to tremendous opportunities for growth and learning.

The marketing strategy blog post I probably shouldn't write.

Lots of firms do not have a clear, bottom line focused marketing strategy for qualified online leads.

(Despite the fact they could win on the web!)

A couple of recent personal experiences have generated this post. Here are my two main points that sales and marketing people in small-to-medium size businesses may not know:    

You can sell with social media.

(If you know what you are doing.) 

That’s not the conventional wisdom of a lot of sales and marketing professionals (for good reason). And...

As SocialSteve wrote in his blog post, Time To Rethink Social Media, “Facebook is changing the way it treats brand’s posts and their distribution (or lack thereof)."  You really can’t blame Facebook. Free business advertising doesn’t make for a sustainable business model, and I believe their shareholders would agree. So pony up some dough or don’t bother with a Facebook page for business.

So where does that leave social selling? My money is (and always has been) on LinkedIn!  And here's why...