In this economy, the only way for a company to change its course of business is to determine how best to market and sell its products and services to companies in industries that are thriving in both strong and trying times. As manufacturers in these target industries look for new suppliers and partners to help them reach their goals, your organization needs to be top of mind and known in the market as a reliable and value-added resource.  Now more than ever, customers are requiring vendors to prove their value beyond simply offering generic products for a lower price. Manufacturers today demand that their partners/suppliers understand their business and processes as well as provide and implement solutions and offer recommendations to make them more competitive by producing more products faster and by lowering operating costs by reducing scrap.

Calling on and penetrating target companies is getting more expensive and more difficult as automated phone systems and emails have become the norm for communicating. To succeed today in expanding your organization's reach, companies need savvy sales and marketing professionals that understand their customers' manufacturing processes along with the sales process. The organizations must also be able to develop effective digital, print and event (in-person) integrated marketing programs that reach key market and industry contacts and have the ability to manage and extract the relevant G2 from the sales, CRM and other business systems to uncover new opportunities for sales growth. It means effectively developing this three-pronged approach utilizing customer facing events, traditional print advertising/PR and digital marketing using the latest social media sites like LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook. More importantly, companies have to manage their marketing programs using marketing automation as well as SFA/CRM technology to track the Marketing spend and Sales/Channel follow-up efforts to ensure that they earn a return on investment and sales growth through these targeted activities.  

Contact me at michael-cotton@sbcglobal.net to learn more about Marketing/Sales 360 strategies and how you can PIVOT your programs for success.