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Marketing in Progress is a spinoff of Work in Progress that digs into what’s moving the needle in B2B. We feature marketing leaders, sales leaders, and agency owners sharing real stories, smart ideas, and no-filter perspectives—so you walk away with practical guidance to help you do your job better.
Gayle Kalvert (00:00):
Sales and marketing must be aligned. If an organization wants to have financial success, I would make it that simple. It's just something that has to happen. Welcome to Marketing and Progress. I'm Gayle Kalvert. This show is for B2B marketing leaders who are under real pressure to deliver results without a clear roadmap. Each episode is built to give you practical insight you can use right away. We focus on what actually matters, how success is measured, and the decisions and trade-offs necessary for success. If you're trying to cut through the noise, do better work and build credibility inside your organization. You're in the right place. Let's get into it.
Kristin Allaben (00:44):
Hey everyone. Welcome back to Marketing in Progress. My name is Kristin Allaben and I'll be your host today. We're doing a slightly different type of episode because I'm chatting with Gayle. She's one of my absolute favorite people to talk marketing with. Now Gayle, as you know, is the founder and CEO of Creo Collective, and she's the host and producer of two podcasts, work in Progress and Marketing in Progress. She has some very strong opinions and some seriously fun stories about a topic everyone loves to debate, but rarely nails sales and marketing alignment. We'll break down what alignment really means and why so many companies struggle to make it happen. We'll also talk about how to actually build real relationships between sales and marketing and how sometimes all it takes is a cup of coffee. We're a really strong cocktail. Let's get into it.
Gayle Kalvert (01:31):
Hi Kristin. I'm so excited to be here.
Kristin Allaben (01:34):
Thank you so much, Gayle, for being here. How does it feel to be on the other side and not hosting today?
Gayle Kalvert (01:39):
It feels amazing. I have zero responsibilities. This is great. Hit me with whatever you've got.
Kristin Allaben (01:46):
Alright, well, when we say sales and marketing must be aligned, a lot of people have gut reactions to that. How do you finish that sentence? Sales and marketing must be aligned, blank.
Gayle Kalvert (01:59):
Sure, yeah. Sales and marketing must be aligned. If an organization wants to have financial success, period, I would make it that simple. It's just something that has to happen.
Kristin Allaben (02:11):
So when you say financial success, tell me more about that. What does that look like for an organization?
Gayle Kalvert (02:17):
Yeah, some organizations, we see this with our clients, they have a lot of great financial success with very little marketing, and those are outliers. Typically for 98% of organizations out there, you've got to have marketing and sales both doing extremely well to have financial success. And what I mean by financial success is to be profitable and grow your revenues. And in order to do that, marketing and sales do actually need to be aligned, and we can talk about all the different ways you can be aligned and what alignment really means, but at a real bare minimum, sales and marketing need to be working towards the same goals.
Kristin Allaben (03:05):
So alignment seems so obvious. So why is it so hard for marketers and sales reps and associates? Why is it so hard for them to approach each other and actually build a relationship to work together?
Gayle Kalvert (03:18):
Well, I think if you step back for a second, it's not necessarily that they're afraid or don't want to approach each other. There are a couple of reasons why we see companies not aligned within sales and marketing. One is a structural issue at a lot of companies, sales and marketing report to different leadership. So that in itself creates disalignment, right? It's nothing personal, but sales is over here marching towards the orders that they're receiving from perhaps the chief revenue officer and marketing is over here marching towards the orders or the objectives set forth by the chief marketing officer. And if the chief marketing officer and the CRO, if they're not aligned, integrated, have the same goals. Again, we're talking structurally here just how the company is set up. That in itself is going to create a disconnect and a gap. You put personalities on top of that and come on, you and I have both been doing this a long time. It doesn't matter where you work, personalities have an impact. So if you are not gold by the same metrics and additionally those leaders perhaps don't love to work together or they're having political issues or any challenges are getting in the way of the teams integrating, working together and achieving working towards the same goals, it's going to make it much more difficult.
Kristin Allaben (04:50):
And this is like lighting money on fire basically, because if you have two different groups working toward two different goals, there's always going to be a fight for budget because nothing is going to produce the ROI that they need.
Gayle Kalvert (05:02):
And then there's the non-structural issues. So you have organizations where sales and marketing do report up to the same leader, which is helpful, but that doesn't necessarily solve the problem because then even still, you really need the sales teams and the marketing teams on the ground to be working together. That can be as simple as weekly, biweekly or monthly checkpoint calls where sales teams and marketing teams who are in regions or in different geographies are coordinating their talking. They are making sure that marketing is actually coming up with the strategic and tactical things that are going to help the sales team and that sales teams are communicating back to marketing and being a partner of marketing instead of potentially being an adversary. Are you a marketing leader in B2B Tech? Do you want to hear what your peers are actually doing, what's working, what they're ditching and how they're navigating the pressure? We're all under. Well, you're in luck. We just launched the marketing and progress community. It's a space for sharing ideas, learning from your peers, and having fun along the way. Visit creocollective.io/marketinginprogress to learn more and join us.
Kristin Allaben (06:23):
So you kind of alluded to this already with your first example, but what are some other small and actionable tips that our listeners can go do right now to make marketing teams better connect their work with sales teams and sales outcomes?
Gayle Kalvert (06:38):
There are a couple of things that come to mind right away based on your level in the organization. So if you're a CMO or CRO and you are not reporting to the same person, or perhaps you have just been given directives and metrics that don't necessarily align your teams, make the effort to get together at that C level and coordinate together. Also, it's so important, especially at companies where people are worried about their bosses and what their bosses want them to do, just communicating down to your teams that you encourage and advocate for your teams to coordinate with each other. A lot of times when it's the C level who may say, don't worry about it like marketing or sales, it has to come from the top, whether it's structural or just encouraging and even making it perhaps part of the team's goals that you talk and communicate and coordinate with that other team helps.
(07:38):
The second is I know at software companies, all of our clients are software companies. I've worked at a number of software companies, QBR is quarterly business review meetings. That's where the sales teams, that's where they're getting together. They're planning the quarter, you're finding out what's in the pipeline, what is the status of these deals, how can we all help close those deals, et cetera. That is a perfect place for the marketing team or somebody from the marketing team to attend. And I always in my career got myself invitations or just showed up for those events, quite frankly.
Kristin Allaben (08:17):
I love that you get that though, because the sales kickoffs, the qbr, those are a really great, it's like a window into the culture of the sales team and what you're talking about, this alignment gap that exists. It's really a culture shift. It's a mindset shift in how organizations need to operate. Yeah, 100%.
Gayle Kalvert (08:35):
And like I said, I was not in sales when I started attending QBRs number one. You get an incredible respect for what the sales team needs to do because it's very easy as a marketer to say, oh, the sales team fill in the blank for all the reasons why the sales team is driving you crazy. You're doing great work, you're getting them leads. What's the problem? Well, the first thing all of us need to do in any situation is understand, right? Understand what it is that the salespeople have to go through. It's a really difficult job. There is immense pressure, not just from will I get a yes, but from internally their leadership. I mean, they have to stand up at a QBR and defend their pipeline. It's not an easy thing. So by attending QBRs when you're in marketing, you really understand like, oh, wow, really now I get what John goes through.
(09:30):
And also more importantly, now I understand how the marketing programs that we are working on can help Joe or Tara. And then conversely, maybe you start to think about those marketing programs that are not going to help move the needle and that those should be perhaps put to the side so that you can focus on things that are going to help the sales team move the needle. And the other thing that the QBRs do, which you alluded to in the intro, is they provide you with an opportunity to socialize, have a beer, have a glass of wine, whatever it is, have a coffee, right? But going to QBR is also time to chat and hang out and get to know these teams as people. And the minute, I mean, Kristin, have you ever gone for drinks with a colleague or a client before?
Kristin Allaben (10:24):
Yeah, I have my own stories.
Gayle Kalvert (10:27):
Okay. Okay. Yeah. Know anybody who knows me knows I have gone for many drinks and the stories are, they're all over the place, but every good relationship is cemented by socializing, right? You just cannot get to know people in meetings. That's it. It's just not going to happen. So I don't care if you want to go play bridge, you want to have coffee, or you're like me and you want to share some tequila, just do it, right? Because once you get to know people beyond the zoom and the meeting, you're just naturally going to want to help each other out. And also salespeople have bad preconceived notions about marketing. Yeah, no, I know, right? But when they see, oh, I get this person, he or she really cares that I'm successful and is asking me questions about my success and my job, I'm going to make time for them. And all of a sudden that animosity
Kristin Allaben (11:17):
Can go away. Yeah. You're saying a lot about the importance of understanding and asking questions and having empathy for them as humans, not just that's the sales team. What advice would you give to marketers who recognize that they may be in an organization where that structure doesn't exist to enable success within an alignment? What advice would you give them to just go start building those relationships themselves?
Gayle Kalvert (11:42):
Yeah. I think it depends on your level. So if you're working in the office, go over and talk to the salespeople. When I just started out in marketing, and actually it didn't matter my level, but when you start at a new company and you're in marketing, the first thing I do always is talk to sales. It's still what we do with clients. Our clients are marketing leaders, but we always talk to sales too, because we need to know what are your customers saying? And they're simple questions. I can give you them, right? When you get a yes, why do you get a yes? More importantly, when you get a no, why are you getting a no? I think there's a lot of fear that if you go talk to the sales team, they're going to put you on the spot. You don't need to have answers.
(12:23):
You're there to ask smart questions. And then as you sort of go up in seniority and you do have more control over the marketing strategy itself, meet with those sales leaders and understand from them, who is your bestseller? Why? What are they doing? What is marketing doing to help? What could marketing be doing to better help your team? And I know I always felt concerned, what if they ask me to do things and they're just dumb ideas. There's going to be no ROI. It's like, thank you so much. Those are really great ideas. I'm going to go back to the team and we're going to think about it and we'll get back to you. And it's all just a dialogue. So you don't have to just say yes to every single thing. You really just want to get information.
Kristin Allaben (13:13):
Well, you said something really important there too, Gayle, is that it's meant to be a dialogue. It's meant to show that you are there to learn that you want to help, but you need to understand what they're doing so that way you can help them to the best of your ability. But it also begs the question or raises the question of imposter syndrome. So on both sides, there's this feeling of, well, that's just for sales to figure out because I don't want to bother them. But maybe deep down, oh God, I don't want them to ask me questions. I don't know enough. How do you overcome that imposter syndrome? So that way you do feel empowered to go ask the questions so you get the information you need so you can do your job better.
Gayle Kalvert (13:53):
So my answer to that is to ask the questions. So I actually cannot believe how many people have imposter syndrome. It's insane. So if you're listening right now and you're like, oh my God, yes, that's me, such imposter syndrome. You know why I don't get it is because we all deserve a seat at the table. Should I get all wooey right now? You are worthy. I want you to ask yourself, how did you get the job? Then you interviewed, you got the job, somebody believed that you were capable of that job. And the only thing you ever need to do to be successful, seriously, is ask questions. It's what I look for when I hire. It's what I look for in clients. None of us know everything. So all you need to do is feel confident enough to ask questions. And with AI, there is zero excuse to not know what questions to ask.
(14:46):
So if you're like, well, I don't know. I don't know what questions to ask. Well, number one, you can listen to our podcast here to tell you what those questions are. And if you don't want to go on ChatGPT and say, I work at this company, this is my role. I want to create a better relationship with sales to make sure that we're working together and we're going to achieve X, Y, z, and I'm going to be the best damn marketer and they're going to be the most successful salesperson, what should I ask him or her? So I can do that? That is the kind of stuff that AI is good at.
Kristin Allaben (15:16):
I love this because it's a shift from imposter syndrome and oh my God, how did I get here? Why am I here? I'm not good enough for this to a curiosity mindset. So instead of saying, oh, dear Lord, all of these things are internal now is external. Well, I want to learn more about or what if this? So it's a mindset shift. 100%.
Gayle Kalvert (15:35):
I just want to say one more thing. If people don't remember anything else and you're nervous and you're in a room with really senior people and you're freaking out, been there, people love to talk about themselves, just ask people about themselves. Literally your mind goes blank. You don't ever remember, you're a marketer. You can't even remember what territory that person's in. Just ask them about their kids, ask them where they've been on vacation, ask them anything about themselves. And while that's happening, you can figure out, what was it again that I was supposed to be doing?
Kristin Allaben (16:07):
Right, exactly. Reset your brain. You got this.
Gayle Kalvert (16:10):
Yeah.
Kristin Allaben (16:11):
So tell me a little bit about the stereotypes that exist between marketing and sales, because I think from both of our careers, we've seen a lot of stereotypes and what people believe are the reasons why those exist and why they drive this divide between these two groups. So let's talk stereotypes and how do you recognize them and how do you get around them?
Gayle Kalvert (16:34):
Number one, stereotypes exist because they happen to be true most of the time. So your goal is to not be a stereotype. And I'm telling you, if you talk to the other party, whether you're in sales or marketing, and you're not the stereotype, everyone at that company is going to talk about how great you are. Oh, have you worked with David? He's so great because he coordinates with us and we're all in tandem, and when we do an event, he's actually helping push it out. Well, you know why? Because that David knew that event was coming up. Actually, you both agreed it was going to be helpful, and so there was follow up. So it's like, and vice versa. But sure, I'll give you the stereotypes. I mean, there's the cocky salesperson who doesn't think that he or she needs help from anyone because they just make it rain.
(17:20):
Just make it rain. I would love to know what people think, but I think those people, you just leave them alone. I don't think there's any, it's like you say the grandparents aren't going to change. It's like the cocky salesperson is not all of a sudden going to become humble. So just let 'em be, okay, move on. And then we've got the salesperson that just wants to go to Vegas. What should we call him? Vinny goes to Vegas. The salesperson is like, oh man, I need a pass. She need a pass. I'm an amazing client. He's got this one client that he's going to close, but he's got to do it in Vegas because the trip's in Vegas and it's really just about Vinny wanting to take his wife and go to Vegas or whatever. Well, that stereotype you can push back on with ROI.
(18:08):
What is the return that we are going to get from investing in you attending this event? And as we know, if you listen to marketing in progress with our sales leader, Andre Locklin, most event-based ROI comes from people that weren't even at the event. It's from what you do before and after. So Vinny, who wants to go to Vegas? I don't know. Maybe find somebody else to get budget from. Yeah, I mean other sales stereotypes. I think the biggest is just that they don't appreciate marketing. They just don't appreciate marketing. And again, like I said, yes, these stereotypes exist. These people do exist. But also, yes, there are so many salespeople who truly love marketing, advocate for marketing, understand how valuable marketing is, and typically those are the more successful sellers. So stick with those people. Just find the salespeople that do want to work together with you and you'll have a better experience.
(19:04):
You'll have more success. On the marketing side, the salespeople will say marketing, they're getting all these leads, but they're not qualified. They're garbage, right? The lead numbers, the numbers are high, but I can't close any of these deals because they're no good. They think that marketing is not spending enough specifically in their territories, and that marketing is making decisions purely based on what fund marketing they might want to be doing instead of what is going to actually help the sales team build pipeline and close revenue. I'm sure there's a ton. Do you have any other marketing ones that I'm not thinking of right now?
Kristin Allaben (19:41):
I love the, well, you created this. Aren't you going to run it? What? No, we gave you the copy and the direction, but now it's up to you to personalize it and run with it, and then that creates this weird relationship outreach situation too. Yeah, it's this weird, we gave you leading the horse to water. We gave you everything we could knowing what we know, and now you salesperson need to take the next few feet to really close the deal.
Gayle Kalvert (20:09):
That's one thing I've heard from salespeople a lot just even recently. Still marketing puts together all these events and then they need us to drive attendance, and that's because there is a gap. Why is marketing putting on events that are not helping sales? There's an information gap there and go back to the beginning of the episode to figure out how to close that gap. Yeah. Overall, I think, like I said, if you stick with the sellers who want to coordinate with marketing and sellers, work with the marketers who want to be coordinated with you, you are going to have more success. And the organizations where I've worked and clients where marketing is really a powerful engine to help the company grow, salespeople are not afraid to rave about it. You are going to get credit. So if you think like, oh, you're doing all this marketing and then sales is going to take all the credit, I don't find that to be true. Salespeople are effusive. If the marketing team is doing great stuff, they tell everybody
Kristin Allaben (21:10):
That makes sense, right? When everybody works together, everything gets easier. It's more fun and just better ROI in general. So speaking of fun, Gayle, tell us one of your favorite stories about how going out for that coffee or that cocktail really helped build a strong relationship.
Gayle Kalvert (21:31):
Oh my gosh.
Kristin Allaben (21:34):
You have to pick one.
Gayle Kalvert (21:35):
I have one story. I definitely ended up at Hogs and Heifers one night. I mean, do you want to work with your friends or do you want to work with coworkers? So the more you can create fun relationships and do that, the better. It's more difficult in remote. I think we should probably talk about that for a second. We're fully remote, so it's harder, but it can still be done, right? I think it's about making sure that you're building in time in these virtual meetings to actually chat and get to know each other a little bit, know about their kids or their vacation vice versa. That in itself definitely helps. But then get out there real life. Do something with intention. So the ROI is impactful.
Kristin Allaben (22:18):
All right. If you could share with us one of the wildest stories of a sales marketing alignment scenario. You decide how to define wild here, but something that makes you laugh, thinking back on it, I can't believe I did, what?
Gayle Kalvert (22:35):
It's funny because you keep trying to get these wild stories. I have some secret past, but what I always do is lead with being a person. I happen to be a work hard party hard person, and that's who I am going to be until I die. Wait until they see me at the retirement home. But I work really hard too, right? You can't just party hard and think it's going to go well. So one of the things I share is when I was at Deloitte, I got this nickname that I was the Hammer. They're like, because you get shit done, Gayle, at a huge organization. I was working at Deloitte with IBM two, very, very large organizations that are amazing companies that aren't typically known for moving quickly, and I knew that my internal constituents at Deloitte and my clients at IBM were not going to be happy unless we hit our goals. So I just always figured out a way to get it done.
Kristin Allaben (23:27):
Alright, so last question for you, Gayle. With your experience in sales, what would be the one tip, your parting words of wisdom from this episode for marketers who want to bridge this gap and create better alignment between them and the sales team, and then part two of this question, keep growing in their careers.
Gayle Kalvert (23:47):
Well, number one, I know I've said this a bunch, but be a constant learner. Leverage that AI, I mean chat. GPT needs to be your best friend and find out everything you can about what it means to be successful in sales at the organization that you're in. So you're doing that, having those conversations. I'm telling you that even beyond the sales team, you want the CEO to know who you are. You want leadership at the company to know that Kristin who's in marketing is a rockstar. How are they going to know that? I promise it is not based on the latest and greatest campaign. It is that they know your face. They know that you are strategic, and the only way that you can be strategic and help that company grow is if you understand how sales are made. So always, always be asking those questions.
(24:44):
Why do you get a yes? Why do you get a no basic question? Really important. ChatGPT makes it much easier now to say, I'm the CEO of X, Y, Z company. Here are my goals. You're putting in your company's goals, you're pretending you're the CEO. You do sort of that role play in AI to say, what would it take to achieve these goals? You've got to get yourself out of just the thought process of being a marketer. I'm a functional marketer. Well, good for you. Then you can be a functional marketer for the rest of your life and maybe you'll tap out at a nice six figure salary and you're feeling good about that, that's fantastic. But if you're listening to this and you're like, I want more than that, you want to make sure that you are learning about the other disciplines at the company. And it's not just sales. Kristin actually, and I didn't know this until I was in sales, it's procurement, it's legal, it's finance. And again, salespeople have a lot of stakeholders. We always think salespeople are just like the masters of their own domain and they just go out there and they get it done. It's like, no, they have
Kristin Allaben (25:49):
To their stereotypes...
Gayle Kalvert (25:51):
They have to get their quotes approved. They have to go through a lot again to close a deal. So really just, I guess it's like learning, learning, learning.
Kristin Allaben (26:02):
Alright, some divisive questions for you.
Gayle Kalvert (26:04):
Okay.
Kristin Allaben (26:05):
Gayle? Coffee or tea?
Gayle Kalvert (26:07):
Coffee, hot or cold? It varies. Black coffee, black hot coffee in the morning, but in the summer when it's like beach time, yeah, iced coffee is great. My daughter spent the summer working at a deli and was the coffee maker, I mean the barista if we want to sound fancy. So now she makes me these really fun iced coffee situations. I'm into that, but I'm way too lazy for that. I'm like a black coffee. I can just correct it and I'm done. Yeah.
Kristin Allaben (26:41):
Pineapple, yay or no for pizza?
Gayle Kalvert (26:44):
Oh, no, no, never.
Kristin Allaben (26:47):
Pineapple on pizza is amazing.
Gayle Kalvert (26:49):
No, Kristen, disagree. I'm from New York. I'm a New Yorker. No pineapple on pizza ever. That was easy.
Kristin Allaben (26:56):
I don't know why that's so divisive, but people really feel strongly about it one way or another.
Gayle Kalvert (27:01):
Because it's gross. Yes.
Kristin Allaben (27:06):
That's so funny. It's like cilantro. Does it taste like soap to you, or is it...?
Gayle Kalvert (27:09):
Right cilantro, yeah. I get how cilantro doesn't taste great, but it doesn't bother me. I'm not like, say...
Kristin Allaben (27:14):
I'm with you on that. Yeah, I'm not in an extreme. If it's there, fine. If it's not also fine.
Gayle Kalvert (27:19):
Cilantro is not ruining my day.
Kristin Allaben (27:20):
Yeah, exactly. All right. Beach or mountains?
Gayle Kalvert (27:24):
Oh my God, the beach. No question. If anybody follows me on social, I think all I do is post the ocean and then in the winter I'm just posting about how I miss the ocean. No, truly. I mean I want people to find their happiness. The happiness is the mountains go, but the beach for me is the only place I literally can forget about everything. Laundry, work, everything. I feel like I have a free pass to relax.
Kristin Allaben (27:54):
That inspires. The next question is, where is your recharge place?
Gayle Kalvert (28:01):
I would say the beach, but no, because I don't really recharge there. I have that free pass. So sometimes I might have some cocktails at the beach. I don't know that it's typically recharging. For me, it's the massage. It's like the spot that to me is more recharging my dream. Kristin, I haven't done it yet. But you're a mom. You must have something like this. Do you ever have that fantasy where you're like, oh, if I could just go for 48 hours to a spa with no children and nothing, it would be amazing. I used to actually fantasize and be like, maybe they could check me into the hospital. You have a cold and you're like, oh, maybe I should just go in and get some IV fluids because I don't mean any disrespect to the hospital, but I literally was like, oh, nobody would bother me there. They would feed me nothing serious, just a quick respite at the hospital. No. So now it's like a spa. If I'm like, that would be a goal of mine to do a two-day spa. Nobody bother me. Airplane mode because the kids always find you.
Kristin Allaben (29:03):
Okay. Gayle, what is your hype song?
Gayle Kalvert (29:07):
I have different hype songs depending on the time of my life and what's going on. I'm actually looking at my Spotify. So we have a playlist, the Work in Progress playlist on Spotify, so everybody should check that out. I love it because people's hype songs are all over the place. It's good stuff. Okay, this is not a new one, but Demi Lovato, "Confident". That is classic. If this episode was helpful, please follow marketing and progress and tap like it helps other marketing leaders find the show. And if you know someone who's navigating similar challenges, feel free to share this episode with them. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time.