Boosting cooperation between sales and marketing with closed loop reporting
A close collaboration between the sales and marketing teams is essential if a company is to be successful. Closed loop reporting can strengthen this relationship and optimize processes on both sides. Our guide shows what this involves.
Communication gaps between sales and marketing
It goes without saying that sales and marketing teams have to work together for a company to be successful. But communication between the various teams can still fall short of what is needed. The marketing team plans campaigns that will ideally deliver a high number of sales qualified leads (SQLs), while the sales team then handles the leads that are generated. The marketing team doesn’t usually find out what happens with those leads; conversely, the sales team frequently has no idea how the marketing team goes about generating them. The marketing team creates buyer personas, for example, but do they actually correspond to the customers approached by the sales team in order to complete purchases?
It’s often the case that not enough information is shared between the two teams, which in turn reduces the company’s chances of success. Implementing a closed loop reporting strategy can bridge that gap.
Our free guide explains what is involved in closed loop reporting.
What is closed loop reporting?
The sales and marketing teams tend to use different tools. Marketing software focuses on website analysis, boosting the conversion rate, and polishing campaigns. The sales team, in contrast, processes data about existing and potential customers in a CRM system.
Closed loop reporting collates sales and marketing data so that both teams can access the data that has been gathered, allowing them to share results and findings across both teams. This ensures that everyone is always kept up to date, from the point when a potential customer first visits the website through to when they complete their purchase. Closed loop reporting delivers important insights into existing processes within both teams, allowing both of them to adapt the measures they implement on an ongoing basis. Our guide explains how to successfully implement closed loop reporting.
The information loop delivers important findings
As the name suggests, closed loop reporting covers a closed loop, mapping the buyer journey from when a user first clicks on the company’s website through to when they become a customer. The reporting is based on the data gathered by the sales and marketing teams.
This clearly illustrates the difference between closed loop reporting and the conventional system where the marketing team tends to focus on its own area and only sees part of the loop. Closed loop reporting therefore supplements the traditional system, since it covers the complete journey of potential customers and can map the effectiveness of individual marketing measures in detail.
Complete the cycle of success with closed loop reporting
The theory is that sales and marketing teams work hand-in-hand, share relevant data with each other, and optimize processes. But how does the theory translate into practice? Our free guide explains the prerequisites for successful closed loop reporting, the other benefits it delivers, and the challenges you can expect to face.
