Marketing 911
Marketing 911, is the podcast where we tackle the toughest marketing challenges at the executive level.
Whether you're navigating complex strategies, trying to reach your target audience, or facing shifting market dynamics, we're here to provide you with actionable solutions.
From digital transformation to customer retention, if it's a marketing crisis, we're here to help you solve it—before it turns into a full-blown emergency.
Marketing 911
Mastering Marketing and Sales Alignment: Bridging the Gap for High-Tech Success
Prepare to unlock the secrets of seamless marketing and sales alignment with our special guest, Eric Mann, a veteran in the sales leadership arena. Discover fresh perspectives on how bridging the gap between these two crucial departments can significantly elevate the success of high-tech campaigns. Eric brings his wealth of experience to the discussion, emphasizing the power of result-oriented collaboration and the art of handling tough questions from both sides. We delve into the dynamic relationships between marketing managers and sales leaders and explore how field marketing professionals can adeptly navigate corporate expectations while catering to field needs.
In this episode, we don't shy away from addressing the cultural shift towards data-driven decision-making in sales. Eric shares his personal journey from a computer science graduate to a sales leader, illustrating the transformative impact of integrating sales and channel operations. We highlight the gradual embracement of data within sales teams, which has evolved from a source of skepticism to a cornerstone for shared knowledge and collective growth. With insights on leadership from his time at NetApp, Eric offers valuable lessons on fostering a culture of empowerment and open communication between sales and marketing, setting the stage for a harmonious organizational partnership.
Hello, this is Brian Backstrank, co-host of Marketing 911, here with my partner.
Speaker 2:Richard Bliss. Happy to be here, brian. I think we have a guest today, don't we?
Speaker 1:We do A very special guest. We have Eric Mann, who I have known, or we've both known for quite a while. He has run multi-billion dollar regions from a sales and general management standpoint. I worked closely with Eric on the marketing side and today we want to talk to that never-ending pain point for marketing people marketing and sales alignment. You hear it over and over in every high-tech company. People have different definitions of it. Marketing, people have their idea of what alignment is. But today we're going to ask a professional salesperson, eric, to have a discussion around this. So Eric, starting at the top, when somebody says to you marketing and sales alignment, what does that mean to you?
Speaker 3:says to you marketing and sales alignment. What does that mean to you? Well, first of all, brian and Richard, it's a pleasure to be here. I was very excited to be asked to be on your podcast, so I'm thrilled.
Speaker 3:When it comes to your question regarding marketing and sales alignment, it was always really critical for me in running the sales organization, especially if you're running a P&L, to understand when you are running a campaign or you're spending money on anything, what are your expectations going to be in the outcome. So the alignment for how marketing thought about the exercise that we were trying to accomplish or the things that we were trying to do together were always really critical for me, and I looked for marketing teams that would be okay with being asked tough questions and result-oriented. So you couldn't just come to me, brian. You couldn't just come to me, brian. You couldn't just come to me with a hey, eric, I have this great idea. We're going to spend a million dollars, but it's going to get you this many leads. We would drill into that not forever, but we would want to be aligned on if we're going to use that money. Is that the best way to use it and are we in agreement on what those outcomes that we were looking to accomplish and, as you know, there are many different aspects of what marketing can mean from.
Speaker 3:I mean, we had you, brian, writing scripts for our business development reps. We had some of our marketing guys interpreting what was coming out from the technical engineering and making it sales speak right, so that they could understand it, so that they could. The output from that was incredible. It also helped speed the process for our sales reps to come up to speed and be more productive quicker. I mean it's almost impossible to put a number on that, but we used to measure how long it would take for sales reps to come up to speed and be more productive quicker. I mean it's almost impossible to put a number on that, but we used to measure how long it would take for sales reps to come up to speed and be productive in our day.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So I 100% agree and I think we also would have an agreement on the shared goals right. I think a lot of times marketing and sales sales views it as I think a lot of times marketing and sales sales views it as hey, I'm responsible once it gets in the pipeline to close, and marketing stops their responsibilities when the lead is bad. That's totally not the way it needs to run. Both marketing and sales're out in the region and they're marketing managers and they're in a region with a strong, experienced sales leader who, I'll say, believes they understand what marketing should do and it becomes difficult for that marketing manager to deal with saying no, or how do they go about making sure they're doing the right thing but at the same time, not alienating their sales leader? I'm sure you've seen that and you've got, because I know we talked about it often.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah, you're hitting on quite a sensitive topic because within sales and marketing there's a lot of ownership. So sometimes the sales organization or sales leaders can feel I own the number, I have a job to do which is close the deals, and I need my field marketing person to do A, b and C and the direction for what marketing or corporate marketing might want them to do or ask them to do may not completely align to that. I think it does make it difficult for some field marketing people if they're working for a manager that sort of crosses over the line into telling marketing what they need to be doing. We had a good checks and balances so that we would try and manage the expectations of those local managers. But what you described does happen all the time and I do think that the field marketing the best of the best are going to have to figure out how to do both, knowing that they are serving one but they also are serving the field as well.
Speaker 1:So you, of all my marketing roles, uh, you're the only one where I reported directly into sales and was dotted line to the CMO, and it was an incredible balancing act, particularly since you and I were on the East Coast and the rest of global marketing was on the West. In terms of what it is, global marketing was asking us to do what I knew would really work in the field and making sure that I'm doing what you need me to do. So it is absolutely a balancing act in field, mario, but something I truly enjoyed, because once you get that true balance, you're in great shape.
Speaker 3:I completely agree, but I also think that we took a long-term view of what we were trying to accomplish. So, if you take that, sales organizations are so driven by daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly and then the year, whereas marketing takes a much broader perspective. They're looking quarterly, half-year and a full year. And what we did even in thinking of you and I when we were together, there was a point in time that maybe it's better served that you report directly to the CMO and come dotted to me for some period of time and then come back, come under me, so that you saw what that was like to be in either organization.
Speaker 3:And I think if you're only in one organization only then you're only going to be predisposed to that metric. And what you were able to see and do was by having alignment to sales and working for the sales leader. You saw what they wanted and what was going to make them happy. And then, when you went back and worked for the CMO, you still were able to make sales happy while continuing to make now your new boss or the CMO happy, and they don't always align. It's completely different than field marketing, than digital marketing, than the other types of marketing that the CMO has to wear, as they're incredible and you taught the sales guys, I think, a lot when you worked in their organization. They had to listen differently than when you. Why do they have to listen to you? You work in marketing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, 100%. And I remember when there were quarterly off sites with the CMO and the rest of the extended marketing organization, myself and my peers in EMEA and APJ it was interesting because we would come in with a complete viewpoint of here's what's going on in the street, here's what's going on with partners and sales, here's where they're struggling and just because of what they do for a living, the global teams right. They spend most of their time meeting with other marketing people and they're pulling together campaigns and they're pulling together the digital pains and they're pulling together the digital. We provided that real street and that wasn't always. You had to be careful how you went back to the rest of the marketing team and did not espouse you're off track. It wasn't that they're off track. It's that. Part of our job was you have to listen to us and adjust what you're doing, because this is what's going on in the street.
Speaker 3:Well, I would agree. I think that the first for salespeople, they they give the credibility to those that are dressing up in their uniforms. So if you're coming and putting on their jersey, coming to work with them and playing on their team, you're going to to gain the respect and therefore they listen a lot more. And I do think that for sales there is a bit of like. We want people to be aggressive. They're chartered to carry a number, to deliver on these high expectations, and they're measured constantly and with that they want ownership. They're A-type people and we like that. But then we don't like when they tell other organizations what to do. So marketing is one that had to work completely within the bounds of coming over and being within the sales organization and then going back within those. And I think that it's a testament to what you did when we worked together to understand both sides. But you also were able to articulate to them what they were looking for, what the sales was looking for. And I can give you an example of some of that.
Speaker 3:When we were charted, we wanted to come up with a campaign. We were going to spend X amount of dollars. I didn't fully understand why we were going to spend this much money. And then we were looking for what the results were going to be. And what you were able to demonstrate was if we can measure the results and then track it from end to end, which at first I really didn't believe. I was like, yeah, it seemed like it would be fake. It just seemed like if the marketing person puts something in and then the sales rep checks it, are we really going to get factual data from what was end to end? And I think that I was a non-believer at first, but the belief was in.
Speaker 3:Over time, the amount of data that we did collect became very useful. The amount of data that we did collect became very useful, and then that useful information enabled us to make very smart, good, fast decisions. And it's not just making the decision. That was important. It was actually then executing off of that, because there's a lot of organizations that spend a lot of their time on procrastinating on what is the right decision to make, and they procrastinating on what is the right decision to make, and they and they end up spinning loops and loops.
Speaker 3:We were one that was going go out there, let's, let's do it and make it, make a decision. If it's wrong, at least we're going to know it right away and change. And then that change is so important to adjust versus not doing it for a long period of time or doing something and then not facing the facts that it's not working. And I do think that that's when marketing was closer aligned to sales. You could make those minor adjustments just faster. And there's so many more facets today to what marketing has to do in the field than when they were doing five years ago and 10 years ago. It's a job that's much more difficult today. Yeah 100%.
Speaker 2:But I'll say at this point, eric, while it's much more difficult, there's a lot more data as well. Right Now, they get to track in a way that before it was almost impossible. Right? What's the old adage? I'm wasting half of my marketing budget, I just don't know which half right. And so now, with the tools that are out there the ability, the feedback, whether you're using something like Salesforce or something where that data is coming in, and you can do historical research and say hey look, we determined that these behaviors seem to turn into a sale, so let's make sure we start to put the marketing team is able to say let's put that in front of sales. Sales is able to recognize oh hey, marketing didn't just check a box, they actually had some impact. I didn't see it, but the data seems to be showing that, and I think it's become a much easier for sales and marketing organizations today to talk to each other. Is that the truth or are they still struggling to have that conversation?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I still think that there's a lot of struggle and some of that struggle is good. It's friction and friction in organizations. That is how putting in data and then it's looked at and no one really believes in the data, then it's just crap. Then I do think that, although that you can collect a ton of crap and be like, well, I got a billion dollars worth of pipeline it's at least I know it's a billion. If it goes below a billion, something must be wrong. But even though we know that 80 percent of it is crap. So I count 80 percent of it then as as, as you know, crap and I got 20 percent of reality. But I better be really good at that 20 percent or I'm screwed.
Speaker 1:Yeah, 100 percent. I remember it was interesting because they were not all these tools. Eric, when I came to work for you and the previous company, I was collecting data on spreadsheets because I knew how important. I hated standing in front of sales at those meetings and talk about the fluff and because you just you get questions you can't answer. So how much pipe did you get? And so I was collecting data on a spreadsheet and I remember I went to the sales meeting for the first time and I stood up and showed the data. Nobody believed me. The sales guys were like, yeah, it's good you have data, it's crap. And then, when I came to NetApp, it was right at the cusp when they were starting to get tools. But it definitely took some education to get to the point where people are saying, all right, this is what the data is. Let's agree to it and not debate whether it's all crap or not.
Speaker 3:Well, but most sales organizations and salespeople are anti-data collection. They viewed it as management data. Right, I have to enter this for somebody else. I don't need it for me to run my campaign. You might need it for you to check out guns everywhere else, and I think that part of that is true. However, it's one team and as one team, that information makes the team better, and it's almost like sharing a success story. If a sales rep shares a success story, doesn't share let's say, doesn't share the success story, just keeps it to himself. Then there's three or four other sales reps that missed an opportunity to hear how someone else won that campaign. But to the sales rep, what do they get out of sharing it?
Speaker 3:We almost used to come up with, like you know well, we'll reward people for telling success stories. Like, why should we? I can remember a woman like why would you have to reward someone for doing something that's part of their job? Why don't we make it part of their job that this is what they do? And it was like okay, that's a good idea, we'll make it a part of their job. As part of their job. It's like these things they they ever useful.
Speaker 3:We used to do a kickoff, richard, when we used to have either even tom mendoza speak or some guest speaker come in and speak for an hour, we'd say, if they took one thing out of it, that they go back to their, to the field and use it's worth it. That's why we go back to the things. Even if they, even if they heard 80 of it before, it's a 10 that they didn't hear that one thing. And if they go and take that and practice it and you have a. You know, when you have a hundred people it might might be that you know you would hope that your hit ratio is higher, but when it's a thousand people in the audience, you know that you're looking at trying to make an impact and then have it be enacted when it's out in the field and then enforced, yeah, nothing like it tough to do.
Speaker 2:It's been a great conversation, eric. Um, you learn all of how did a computer science guy end up in sales? So? And a hockey player on top of that a four-year hockey player, computer science and now has had experience running huge sales organizations.
Speaker 1:Where did that come from? By the way, before he answers, a Hall of Fame hockey player.
Speaker 3:That's funny For a Division III hockey program, which I think kids might think that that's actually really cool. Back then Division III wasn't much. It's pretty cool, I guess that know. Thyself was real important and as much as I loved math and loved computer science and loved solving problems, I didn't want to code, I didn't want to be an engineer and I happened to. My dad was a salesman. He sold water coolers for 27 years and he taught us from any job along that path you do right. So whether it was from selling newspapers to you know to working in the supermarket, I had probably two, three jobs through college to pay through college and I think that I loved the people aspect of sales. I enjoyed the technical side of it but I really loved the people portion of it.
Speaker 3:And then, given the opportunity to just be at some fast growing companies and with some spectacular leadership, just be at some fast-growing companies and with some spectacular leadership. Netapp was probably just an incredible leadership. From Rob Salmon to Dan Warmenhoven and Tom Mendoza. You had people that you were given a lot of responsibility. Early P&Ls I was at EMC for 13 years and ran a billion and a half dollar business. We were not given a P&L and we were basically how many headcount you need? Go and hire it, that's it. You ran a top line, not an overall P&L.
Speaker 3:When I came to NetApp it was like I asked can we do these things? Can I have the? By the way, the channel reported directly into global sales. So if you take this, brian, before you got there I went to Rob and I said, hey, I never owned the channel. I've had bigger jobs in this. What about the channel reporting into the field to me, running the East? And they're like, let's try it. Rob was like go, go, go, try it. And again, just like you, coming to me instead of going to for a little while. The whole channel organization now has the answer to what was sort of our directive and they're coming to our meetings. Before they would, they they would come when they wanted to. Right now, they had to attend all of the sales meetings like brian.
Speaker 3:These marketing guys were on every one of our calls. They were now seeing what that was like. We were now a lot of our people, a lot of the sales guys, were now seeing what that was like. We were now a lot of our people, a lot of the sales guys were now seeing what the marketing job was like and, by the way, it wasn't as easy as they thought it was Right. So they both sides learn a lot and then, if you keep it for more than a year, people think it's going to stay, and then you really get synergy, you really get cohesiveness, and then you really get the team. Then, if you take it away and you move it to a side for a little while, you could just do it because it's the right thing to do at that time.
Speaker 3:And I think that the leadership that we had at NetApp was just spectacular because we were mature enough to know that, hey, if this is the right thing for the company, I can't be this.
Speaker 3:I have to own every piece of the organization in order for us to be successful Became something that we really did well from for many years. It wasn't just like we, we did it for one or two years, we did it for a long stretch. And that's a testament to, to really the executive staff, uh, from from steve como to um, to to warren manhoven, um to ge Georgians and to other guys that really came in and did a phenomenal job, and they in the relationship between engineering and the field also. They came to the field, to the customers. They weren't just in their box dictating. I see a lot of. I sit on the advisory board for a handful of companies and you see a lot of this is what you sell, this is what you say, but they're not out in the field knowing what the and then they're reading a lot of the reports that they come, that they come back, but it's almost like they're they're reading the report but they're not living the actual customer experience.
Speaker 3:We got, we got, we I don't know we had. We had a great time we were very lucky.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was the best ride of my life. No question, no question, it was um, I hope that this was.
Speaker 3:I hope that this was um somewhere near what you were. Hopefully you can get like maybe we go with that 10 rule. That was maybe one thing I said.
Speaker 2:That was that might be okay you know what was that other thing you said before we started recording?
Speaker 3:if you haven't said it, in the last 30 you haven't said it in 30 days. You never said it at all.
Speaker 2:Yep, I'm going to take. I've written that one down. That's my takeaway from this.
Speaker 3:It's like, oh, it's true, though I say that I'll tell that to any leader, you know, because when I first started doing it, richard, I felt like I was every 30 days we would do these, like you know, all hands, or these things, and every time I had to, I felt like I was um, you know, john stewart, I needed to have, I needed to be fresh and new. I can't, I can't tell them the same thing, and it was like, oh, you know what? Yeah, you can, and so. So then there's a couple things that you say every time yeah, like okay, I'm saying this every single time that's my, that's my thing I spent a lot of time I companies
Speaker 2:I train companies on linkedin right, and I've had some people who have sat through a dozen of my presentations and they're like I learned something new every time and I'm like that's because you're not listening, but it becomes. You're right, it's, it's I and and this and this is marketing as well. Right, we grow tired of our own message long before our customers and our prospects grow tired of our message, and we also have to remember that message. It's not that much different from what we, which is why, as you, know leaders, really, people are looking up to them.
Speaker 3:They have to stay within that leadership role, you know. So they can't do some of the things that they would like to do they sometimes shouldn't do because they have to be perceived as they're the leader. They don't do those things. They're not going to go out for the drink. They're not going to go out, maybe drink. No, it's 10 o'clock at night. There's younger people that are still hanging out. They can go past that time. You don't have to. You're not being judged by how late you could stay up now or how much you can drink.
Speaker 1:Richard, no, I had the eight o'clock rule. Nothing good happens after eight o'clock I would be.
Speaker 3:I think mine was midnight.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was midnight.
Speaker 3:But yours was midnight, but that was my parents.
Speaker 1:That was my parents Right.
Speaker 2:It's our parents who said that nothing good happens after midnight. Exactly.
Speaker 3:My parents said it to me and I said it to my kids, so it's definitely keeps going around.
Speaker 2:Eric, this has been great. Thank you very much for joining us. We're going to have to have you back, Brian. This was awesome.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, there's a lot we can we can talk about by first meeting you and I had Eric and you put a whistle in front of me.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, that, Richard know that story.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:So Eric had hired me and I went into his office in New York and I'm nervous sitting there and he's saying, all right, this is big. And he says I got something for you. And he slides a whistle, a plastic whistle inside and I look at it. I go what the heck is this for? He goes don't blow it.
Speaker 2:Well, we're going to end on that. Don't blow it, hey, eric. Thanks again very much. This has been Marketing 911. You've been listening to Eric Mann joining us. I've been here with my co-host, brian Baxter. Right, brian, that's right, eric, thanks so much, Richard thanks.
Speaker 3:Brian, my pleasure.
