I’ve been involved in some way or another in helping companies to mobilise their workforces for the past 15 years, and there’s no doubt that the pace is quickening. I’m therefore delighted to have been invited by SAP to contribute to their excellent “21st Century Sales Warrior's Guide To Mobility”. 

It’s been a real pleasure to collaborate in the creation of the guide with a group of authors who I’ve long admired, including Dave Brock, Matt Heinz, Bob Thompson, and Peter Ostrow of the Aberdeen Group.

It would be hard to find anyone prepared to argue against the benefits of sales and marketing alignment. It’s a proven fact (we’ll come on to the results in a moment) that well-aligned organisations grow revenues faster. So, if alignment is such a good thing, why is it so difficult to achieve?

It’s a topic that I’ll be discussing at today’s Funnel 2012 event in London. Without giving the entire presentation away, I'd like to share some of my conclusions about why alignment often proves difficult - and offer you some ideas that could help you improve it.

Why bother getting aligned?

According to a recent Aberdeen Group report, “alignment of marketing and sales goals is a key strategy for many organisations seeking revenue and customer growth amid economic and market challenges”. Poorly aligned organisations are quickly falling behind their best-in-class competitors in the critical areas of revenue growth, sales productivity and return on marketing investment. But how can you tell if your organisation has an alignment problem?

Everything suggests that 2012 is going to be a very difficult year. Economies around the world are slashing growth projections, unemployment is rising and buyers are behaving in an ever more risk-averse fashion. Against this challenging climate, can you afford to be wasting a single ounce of sales or marketing effort?

It’s November already - less than two months to go before the end of the year. I’m sure that your sales team is very focused on closing as much business as they can in 2011 - but how is 2012 looking? It may be shaping up as an Olympic Year for the UK - but is your organisation's sales performance going to be in the running for a gold medal next year?

What are the factors that separate many of today’s top-performing B2B sales and marketing organisations from the rest? Having outstanding products and services that are truly relevant to a well-defined target audience is clearly important. But when you look at the factors that truly separate the fastest growing vendors from the rest, it’s often their ability to execute that really impresses. They have the ability to align their entire sales and marketing organisation around a common set of winning strategies and tactics.

The latest research by Aberdeen Group, SiriusDecisions, CSO Insights and others suggests that organisations with best-in-class levels of Sales and Marketing Alignment are able to achieve revenue growth rates 20-24% faster than their poorly-aligned competitors. So why is it that well-aligned organisations remain in the minority - and what can business leaders do to change this?

Missing even a single sales forecast can be a painful experience for everyone involved in the process – from salesperson to manager to shareholder. So what are the keys to consistently accurate sales forecasting? The latest research from the Aberdeen Group offers some important indicators…