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The marketing department is often the primary creator of digital content used for customer facing interactions such as lead generation and sales presentations. Unfortunately a lot of content created by the marketing team doesn’t actually get used.

Instead what we’re seeing are sales reps going out and creating their own content for their specific selling needs and challenges.

Today’s article explores digital content creation by sales reps, and why they perhaps shouldn’t be creating their own content.

Last time we scraped the surface of sales objections, and why current digital content marketing strategies are reshaping what it means to prepare for objections.

Today we expand on the discussion and detail all of the types of sales objections a seller may face when trying to obtain commitment and close the deal.

Sales reps are expected to effectively overcome objections and add value to the discussion, yet with less information than ever before. Buyers are becoming more empowered with marketing content that dangerously tips the scales of knowledge and puts the seller in a disadvantaged position.

Today we dig into the world of handling objections with a buyer empowered to self-educate and formulate their own unknown buying criteria.

This week we’re taking an introductory approach in analyzing the sales playbook. If you haven’t heard of a sales playbook or aren’t using one yet, this blog will certainly be of interest to you.

This week we are analyzing the effectiveness of traditional sales training strategies. We look to determine why these strategies are no longer effective, and how sales enablement can enhance training to ensure effectiveness.

The Creation of a blog requires proper planning and research, especially if you want it to get attention online. Breaking through the noise of competing blogs can be a challenge, but when you understand the importance of providing the right content to the right audience; it becomes at little simpler. You need strong sales and marketing alignment in order for your marketing team to produce the most relevant and interesting content for your target market.

Digital content marketing has grown exponentially, and created vast swaths of valuable content for Sales teams to use at every conceivable point of the sales process… but they aren’t. Sales and Marketing alignment is part of the problem, but many buyers and Sales Reps share similar feelings on the matter. A 4-step method may hold the answers to unlocking digital sales enablement solutions.

Easier to find; harder to reach,

There was once a time when the only way to reach someone was by letter, phone, and in person. Today, finding someone has never been easier, you could throw their name into Google and probably get 2 social media hits, contact details, personal characteristics, job competencies, their network, and etc.

But with all the ease of access, it seems harder than ever to actually reach someone. Today’s buyer is significantly more fragmented, operating on several social media platforms, likely using multiple mobile devices with potentially several operating systems.

Oh, and did we forget to mention? They’re also more empowered as buyers!  Your trusted sales process is turned inside-out with the abundance of online information, allowing buyers to meet you for the first time yet be half way into your typical funnel. How can you manage this?

How can you get the most value from your creative and marketing partners?

Gartner, Inc. recently reported new research showing that 50% of CMO’s digital marketing is outsourced. (U.S. Digital Marketing Spending Survey, 2013) This represents a significant investment in outside resources. With average marketing spend sitting at just over 10% of revenues and marketing budgets forecast to increase 6% in 2013, agencies – especially digital agencies – represent a huge investment.