When a New CMO Meets the Sales Manager, Sparks Fly

“What can I do for you today?” Cyndi asked the new CMO as he settled into the chair facing her.

“It isn’t what you can do for me,” Tom said. “It’s what can I do for you.  While I’ve only been on the job for a few weeks, maybe there is something Marketing needs to do for you,” he said with a bemused smile.

If the mediocre are always at their best, who are “the mediocre?”

At the end of another blog entry (one of the best read)  titled “All know the way; few actually walk it. ~Bodhidharma,” I quoted Giraudoux’s famous saying, “Only the mediocre are always at their best.”  

As typically happens when we read something like this, we assume “the mediocre” is always someone else.  It’s certainly not us.

You'll Die if you Don't Listen to Customers

- Jennifer Holt and Cyndi Greenglass on WVU Marketing Communications Today Radio

"The graveyard is littered with companies who have died when they were abandoned by their customers. This is what happens when you don’t listen to them, and you lose touch with what matters."

Without the Marketer, Most B2B Companies Would be Regional Door Knockers

The message is that Marketers are the creators of wealth in B2B Companies

"Nothing happens until the sale is made," is most often quoted as a lead-in to praising salespeople. And the speaker is almost right, but we know that deep in our B2B marketing hearts, it all starts sooner than that.

Why it's Important

"In B2B, nothing happens until the marketer creates demand. Without the marketer most B2B companies would be regional door knockers; they would not be able to go beyond the reach of their salespeople. Marketing in B2B companies creates Wealth. I mean real wealth. Hardcore, measurable, bottom line profitable dollars that drives the growth of our 11,000,000 plus businesses in the US."

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You Can Estimate the Number of Leads Needed to Make Forecast

Forecasting requires marketing to estimate the number of inquiries your salespeople will need to make quota in 2018.   It is one of the CMO’s most important functions. 

Compared to most companies that just try to deliver as many leads as possible, this precise method is based on data.  It will be your data that you can point to and use as a base for your predictions.

The price of being a bad client

It sounds funny, but there is, or should be, a price to pay when we are less than pleasant, respectful, kind toward those we have hired to do a job. Just because we pay people doesn't give us the right to be rude, irritable, condescending or mean. I am reminded of this by my children when the seventh junk call of the day comes through and interrupts my day because it has a spoofed area code that "may be someone I want to talk to." They remind me that people don't typically set out to take terrible jobs because they get joy from it. They do it to put food on the table. Take that up to professionals we hire for accounting, our legal needs, sales training. They welcome you into their office in hopes that they can help you solve a problem, help make you more money and lessen your burdens. This is difficult when you arrive in attack mode carrying the weight of your day or week, misunderstandings, or even fear. Stop. Breathe.

Withholding information doesn't empower you, it paralyzes you and your company.

We all want to be valued. We all want to be secure in our position. What happens though, is that some

Marcom Manager Salaries: Are the Builders of Wealth Paid What They are Worth?

We at the SLMA believe that Marketing Communications Managers are true builders of wealth.  They make decisions that drive revenue, contribute to the success of the salespeople they work for, and drop huge dollars to the bottom line of the company that employs them.   The pay scale isn't so much bad, but we ask if it is a true reflection of the Marketing Communications Managers contributions to revenue.   You decide.