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Inbound Marketing Analysis: ROI With Sales and Marketing Integration

Posted by Carole Mahoney on 1/5/12 8:54 PM

How Hubspot Increased Revenue 6000% over 4 years.

Last week I had the pleasure of hosting a Hubspot User Group with Mark Roberge as our guest speaker. In case you are unaware, Mark is the VP of Sales at Hubspot. Together he and Hubspot CMO Mike Volpe were a key part to the increased the tech start-up company's revenue increase of 6000% over 4 years.

Pretty impressive. So how did they do it?

sales and marketing integrationSales and marketing integration.

If you missed #HUGMEtoo, don't fret, you can download Mark's slides and watch our recording on YouTube. I will let you dig into those and draw your own conclusions.

I want to give you some of the inside scoop that happened AFTER the #HUGMEtoo meetup.

Beyond Sales 2.0 and Inbound Marketing, Smarketing Is Born

Later at brunch with Mark and Rick, I got the opportunity to talk with Mark and his father, Rick, (my Mr. Miyagi) at brunch. Our common language? Numbers.

Between the three of us, our experiences and conversations in the field, we came to one consistent conclusion. Results happen when sales and marketing have a singular process. Sales alone is not enough. Marketing, (even inbound marketing!) is not enough. The companies that have embraced and implemented this process are experiencing growth and building sustainable business development.

So Why Isn't Everyone Doing It?

I have talked to a record number of people over the past few days. It's January. People seem to still be waking up from the holidays.

Last month the people I talked to told me that what happens for sales in Q1 effects them throughout the year. Like in football, points scored in the first half set the pace for the rest of the game. Everyone talked about making Q1 a record quarter.

Fast forward 2 weeks to January. What are those same people talking about? Operations. Packaging their solution.

What is the one thing they are not focused on? Sales. Seems like a dysfunctional cycle to me.

What Should You Be Doing?

What was the one thing I still remember from my conversation with Mark? Smarketing, or sales and marketing integration, is where it is going. From small start-ups to large corporations, the process integration from sales and marketing is the next step to 21st century business development.

Sales training alone won't do it. Inbound marketing alone won't do it.

You can do it.

Topics: smarketing, sales and marketing alignment, sales and marketing strategy, sales and marketing integration