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A few days ago, I met a boss who had invested in a project. Because the business model was relatively new, it was initially difficult to get customers to accept it. When discussing marketing strategy with him, the boss emphasized: “No matter what the company's product is like, the salespeople I hire should be able to sell it. Just like when I was a beer salesperson, whether the bottle contained beer or horse urine, selling the first bottle was my skill!”
What the boss said is not wrong, but it clearly reflects a mindset that values sales over marketing. Many bosses are like this, and some even still confuse marketing with sales.
“Marketing” vs. “Sales”: Which Is More Important?
In my understanding, marketing is about making products easy to sell. Specifically, it includes marketing strategy (brand positioning, target customer selection, product line design, pricing, etc.), marketing tactics (channel building, new customer development strategies, advertising, etc.), and marketing team building (organizational structure, recruitment, training, assessment, etc.).
Sales is about selling products well. Specifically, it includes understanding customer needs, product presentation, closing deals, collecting payments, customer referrals, customer service, and so on.
For different companies, the importance of “marketing” and “sales” varies. Different bosses also view their importance from different perspectives.
The author believes that “marketing” is like “blooming,” while “sales” is like “bearing fruit.” Without blooming, it is hard to bear fruit. Without fruit, blooming is useless. For SMEs, both “marketing” and “sales” are important.
However, many bosses tend to focus on one and neglect the other, creating a vicious cycle: the more you focus, the worse your performance; the worse your performance, the more you focus.
Why There Is a Bias
Although the difference between marketing and sales is clear, many bosses still fail to realize they are biased. Below are the specific “symptoms.”
Many bosses emphasize “sales” over “marketing.”
Often, once they have a good product, they start hiring a large number of salespeople, hoping to sell the product in large quantities, but they often hit a wall. Such bosses are puzzled: Why can’t I sell such a good product? Why do I hire so many salespeople but still fail to achieve results? The key reason is that they try to do “sales” well without doing “marketing” first—it’s not impossible, but it’s extremely difficult.
In recent years, Chinese companies have been very keen on learning sales techniques. The world’s greatest salesman, Joe Girard, is highly respected, and his philosophy of “selling any product to anyone at any time and any place” has deeply influenced many Chinese companies.
It is certainly good to learn Joe Girard’s sales spirit and techniques, but while learning sales, don’t forget marketing. Joe Girard’s sales success is also inseparable from the fact that he sold Chevrolet, the largest brand under General Motors, and at that time, the brand’s marketing momentum was strong.
In real marketing, the most discussed topic among marketers is “sales techniques”; owners of small and large stores and companies often ask outsiders for “good sales techniques.” They have no awareness that as a boss, you should think not only about sales but also about marketing issues, such as how to create higher added value.
In fact, the reason marketers emphasize “sales” over “marketing” is related to the background of many bosses: most bosses come from sales backgrounds, and they used to think about how to sell products. After becoming bosses, although their identity changed, their way of thinking did not. It can be said that these bosses have not changed in essence; they have just transformed from small salespeople to big salespeople, lacking the mindset of an operator.
Bosses Who Emphasize “Marketing” Over “Sales” Are Rare
When marketing is done to the extreme, sales is almost unnecessary. For example, Coca-Cola doesn’t need to sell Coke bottle by bottle to consumers; we all actively go to buy Coca-Cola.
It is unrealistic for SMEs to build their brand like Coca-Cola, so we still need a combat-effective sales team to continuously improve sales capabilities and sell our products better.
Here is a simple formula to illustrate the effect of “marketing” and “sales” on performance, hoping that SMEs will pay equal attention to both. When both marketing and sales capabilities improve, the result is not additive but multiplicative.
Performance = Marketing × Sales
[Marketing Strategy Review] If you want a result of 100 points, you have three directions:
- Marketing is only 1 point, and you push sales to 100 points;
- Sales is only 1 point, and you push marketing to 100 points;
- Strive to make marketing 10 points and sales 10 points.
Enterprises with big dreams will mostly choose the third direction.
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