Over the last few weeks, I’ve talked about the why sales and marketing don’t get along, how to better align them around the sales funnel and the need to clearly define the stages. This week, I found a LinkedIn group, Business Development – The Missing Link Between Marketing & Sales, which clearly piqued my interest and got me thinking about the role of business development and whether that was another piece of the solution to better align sales and marketing.
In that group, they were having an interesting discussion over the last few months around whether Business Development is the Missing Link between Marketing & Sales which raised a number of valid and thought-provoking points but what quickly became apparent was the different responsibilities assigned to, or definitions for, the BD role.
Normally, sales is clearly defined and their responsibilities are well understood, including but not limited to building customer relationships, account management, and closing deals. The role of marketing appears to vary more between organizations but generally includes creating the brand, broadly communicating the value proposition and building awareness. In some cases, and I strongly believe this should always be the case, marketing generates and nurtures leads and closely supports the sales team with tools and campaigns.
However, I’ve seen people with business development titles have a number of different responsibilities including partner marketing to channel sales and product evangelism to product sales. In the discussion, these varied roles became even more clear to me and the point was raised that business development is a mix of marketing and sales but does that make them the best group to link both together?
I think it really depends on the organization and how the responsibilities are defined. I do worry that there may be a lot of overlap if business development was inserted between the marketing and sales organizations in terms of generating leads and moving them through the sales funnel. Maybe the key is to look at this more from a timeline perspective in that sales is more short term focused on fewer and very qualified leads whereas business development targets longer term prospects or new market opportunities and verticals.
Regardless of how the responsibilities are defined, it does not change the need for communication, alignment on the funnel and direct relationships between all parties involved. It’s also critical from a sales funnel perspective that everyone understands what stage they are responsible for and the criteria to pass a lead to the next stage. I also think it would be a big mistake if BD was the link and sales and marketing no longer communicated directly or regularly.
In the end, it may be the size and stage of company that dictates if there is a BD people and what they do. In larger organizations, there is clearly a role for BD but I’m not sure the main responsibility should be to link marketing and sales. Instead, they are part of the team and need to add value by supporting what sales and marketing are already doing.
For start-ups, they usually don’t have the resources for sales, marketing AND business development. In many cases, two or three of those jobs are rolled into one team or even one person. At a start-up though, a BD person may be the best choice as quite often the start-up needs to figure out what market to go after, educate it, and deal with a long sales cycle that may not appeal to the more traditional sales person.
What are your thoughts on the role of BD and whether it can be the link between sales and marketing? Let me know in the comments below or join the discussion on LinkedIn.
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