This isn't creepery on our part - far from it. It's simply that being the S&M Director (never a more appropriate combination of initials) is an almost impossible job. Why? Because although both elements of the job have a common goal (and in a perfect world should work together), in reality it ends up as either a constant feud between sales and marketing or a clear win for one side that ends up damaging the business.
The problem is that sales and marketing - although having a common fundamental aim - have different ways of going about it.
The two should work in harmony. Marketing should set 'em up and sale should knock 'em down - but it so seldom happens that way. The marketers think the salesforce are target-focused neanderthals who don't give a tuppenny toss about the brand. The salesforce think the marketers are effete, namby-pamby dreamers who couldn't survive three minutes in the commercial world.
I'm exaggerating to make a point, but that's it, isn't it?
The difficulty comes in the way the two parts of the organisation operate. Sales is about NOW - it's about developing and closing prospects in the short term. Targets are monthly, perhaps even daily. That sort of target mentality doesn't give a damn about a brand development that'll pay off in a year, it wants to know about NOW. Marketing takes (at least it should...) the longer view. Where's the market moving? What are the trends? How do we anticipate and capitalise on them? 'Now' is no use to the marketer - she's interested in the future.
At the most basic level, that means the salesforce resent every penny spent on the brand - they'd spend it on reducing the price of the product or service so it was simpler and quicker to sell. The marketers pull their hair out as they see the salesforce devaluing the brand by discounting. Stalemate.
In our perfect world, the S&M Director manages to keep the contemptuous and feuding camps apart, using the tensions to his advantage. But it doesn't happen that way. One 'side' usually wins and rules. I've worked in businesses where the Salesforce are the gods - and in others where the Marketers sit on Olympus and pass down their wisdom. Neither worked well...
You can see it so clearly in many industries - but let's look at the motorcycle industry. Open any bike magazine and you can see pages and pages of ads. Not one demonstrates an understanding of the brand - they're all 'sales NOW' ads. Even Harley Davidson - a brand so powerful that its devotees will tattoo it into their skin - is leading on a price and finance offer. Sales has won. It always has in Bikeland. Look back to copies of the motorcycle press from the 1940s and it's just the same - leading on price and platitude. OK in the short term, but looking at the figures shows an industry with some serious long term problems.
It's perhaps because the industry is dominated by concessionaires and importers who have always had a powerful sales focus. And because they're concessionaires, trying to turn a profit, investing in the brand has seldom been their priority. The saddest thing is that manufacturers seem to be happy to allow the brand to evolve at their hands rather than control its progress and development.
The thing is, you only have your brand. Now, a technological advantage is eroded in months. A price advantage is destroyed in hours. Very, very few products are unique anymore and points of difference are tiny. So what's left? Brand. That's it. That's all that differentiates you from everyone else. Harley understand it - big time. The Japanese manufacturers? Not yet - but they'll need to.
So if you're an S&M Director, you have our very, very best wishes. Lion taming's an easier career.
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