Emerging Disconnects in the Traditional Sales Pipeline
This trend has lead to both a shortening of the sales cycle from the vendor's perspective, and a disconnected, often frustrating, sales interaction for both parties. For those companies not understanding the newly networked customer, and engaging the customer where the new pipeline conversations are occurring, the traditional pipeline building activity of buyer and seller alignment has collapsed. This trend has increased the error rates in forecasting and, combined with the current global economic environment, only adds to business uncertainty in sales management.
The net result of this trend has implications for both buyers and sellers. Companies that cannot connect with the new socially networked sales funnel will be in a poor position to respond to perceived 'last minute' customer inquiries, when in fact due diligence activities have been occurring on the buyer side. As the networked customer has assumed and spread more upfront aspects of the traditional sales funnel than has been the historical precedent, sales must also adapt. Marketing and Sales organizations that can bridge the emerging disconnects and engage the customer wherever and whenever the sales conversations are happening, are best positioned to win.
