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How to Have a High-Performing Smarketing Team

by Article by Remington Begg Remington Begg | January 15, 2016 at 8:30 AM

Diversity_Smarketing.jpgCompanies with good alignment between Sales and Marketing Teams achieve 20% annual revenue growth in a year. In order to get this growth, you must create a stable and lasting partnership between the two teams with a strategic approach that treats them as a single, revenue-generating organization, not adversaries. This organization is called the Smarketing Team. if you need a refresher on how to incorporate one at your company, check out a more detailed blog here.

But just creating one isn’t enough. You have to equip your Smarketing team for success. In order to get the maximum ROI out of your Smarketing Team and take your company’s profits to places you never thought possible, make sure you do the following:

Attract the Right Talent

First things first: in order to have a high-performing team, you need to build it with people looking to be high performing. Not everyone will be onboard with that it takes to make a Smarketing team great, and that’s okay. Look for people who have high standards for themselves and want to be a part of a team with those same standards. Trying to hire a bad fit or forcing a current employee into a position they don’t fit in won’t make your Smarketing team anything but dysfunctional.

Encourage Healthy Debates

In a healthy Smarketing team, Sales doesn’t tell Marketing what to do or vice versa. Instead, there’s conversations and debates back and forth on which direction to go. If you’re properly conducting your Lead Scoring, there shouldnSmarketing_Performance.jpg’t be a whole lot of arguing over which Leads are good to contact, but there’s certainly wiggle room in how to conduct your scoring. Let these conversations flourish instead of squashing them.

Keep Everyone Goal-Oriented

Make sure your Smarketing team has their eye on the larger prize and that should help with any Sales vs. Marketing drama. Establish an overall goal that everyone is responsible for and make it visible. This could be something like 10 new customers a month or a 50% conversion rate from Lead to Customer. Set key metrics to measure it, so if there’s ever too much debating or falling off task you have a clear goal to bring your team back to.

Promote Diversity

Ensure that your Smarketing team has people of both genders, different races, a wide span of ages, unique mindsets and personality types. Diversity unlocks innovation and drives growth. A Smarketing team filled with one type of person will get exactly one kind of growth. That puts some pretty serious limits on their success. Different backgrounds will bring about different strengths, making your Smarketing team stronger as a group.

Support Work-Life Balance

Most successful Smarketing teams have members who are highly engaged at work, but have a very fulfilling life outside of the office. As hard as your team works for your company, make sure they bring just as much intensity to their social life and hobbies. This way, they’ll return to work rejuvenated and ready to face a fresh day with excitement.

There’s many other ways to successfully mesh a team and make them work well together. Do you have any other suggestions that have worked out well in your own Smarketing team? Comment below or tweet me all about it! If you haven’t begun to implement a Smarketing team at all, it isn’t too late. Download our free eBook Lead Scoring: The Smarketer’s Guide so you know exactly how to get started.