Modern B2B buyers don’t see a sales team and marketing team. They see one brand. One experience. One journey.
But when this doesn’t happen, buyers experience something different:
- Inconsistent messaging across touchpoints
- Friction between what’s promised and what’s delivered
- An immediate loss in confidence in the company they want to buy from
For sales leaders, this misalignment is more than a messaging problem—it’s a risk to revenue, pipeline and reputation.
And the consequences are costly:
- Deals drop before sales teams engage
- Marketing budgets are wasted when sales fail to follow up on Marketing Qualified Leads (MQLs)
- Sales cycles stall and buyer trust erodes
Every poor experience increases the risk your buyer will seek a competitor who gets it right.
At our Sales Leader Summit, CEO of B2B Marketing, Richard O’Connor, shared insights into the behaviours of high-performing teams and why alignment between sales and marketing is no longer optional.
Buyers benchmark you before you speak to them
Buyers have become empowered experts and are no longer reliant on your sales team’s intro.
Potential buyers are benchmarking you against your competitors, by:
- Using digital comparison tools
- Consuming 10 or more pieces of content from multiple sources
- Narrowing their options without ever speaking to sales
And these behaviours are not just limited to the buyer. It’s the entire buying group, including the hidden internal stakeholders who will influence the decision, but not engage directly with your sales team.
If your brand isn’t aligned from the first touchpoint to final pitch, you are losing customers from the start.
High-performing teams fix the alignment gap
Richard shared his blueprint for what high-performing, buyer-centric teams do differently. It comes down to alignment in three core areas:
1. Brand: More than marketing’s responsibility
Traditionally the domain of marketing, brand has now become a commercial lever that sales must also own.
For buyers, a strong brand helps de-risk the purchase decision and makes it easier for them to buy.
If your salespeople don’t reinforce what marketing promises, you’re creating a disconnect.
A LinkedIn study found that in 81% of cases, the brand that won, was known by the whole buying group. (The Hidden Buyer Gap Could Be Ruling Out Your Brand. Here’s How to Close It.).
A strong brand isn’t just about awareness, it de-risks decision making.
Sales leaders need to ensure:
- Messaging is aligned across marketing and sales
- Salespeople’s personal brands reflect the company brand
- Social outreach on LinkedIn positions sellers as solution experts—not just vendors
“If a buyer has done all their research, they have found out about your brand, they like it and then their first interaction with the salesperson compromises that and they have a different brand experience, it impacts their perception, and you won’t even know,” said Richard.
2. Account Based Marketing: Precision drives ROI
Account Based Marketing (ABM) is a revenue lever and growth strategy. High performing teams don’t see this as optional; they use it to:
- Align sales and marketing around shared account goals and tiers
- Personalise content and outreach to be buyer-centric at each stage of the buying journey, based on a deep sector knowledge
- Focus on quality over quantity to drive up ROI
And this method has proven results. A report by Only B2B found that 85% of their respondents reported a higher ROI of up to 208%.
And ABM is not just for new business. High-performing teams use it to retain key accounts, drive upsell, and cross-sell.
3. Data-driven selling: Enabling buyers to buy faster
Modern buyers are doing their own research, and the best teams remove friction and make it easier for them to make decisions faster.
High-performing teams:
- Provide proof points like ROIs and case studies upfront and on-demand
- Publish transparent pricing to reduce misunderstandings and friction
- Take an omnichannel approach to meet buyers across channels with a consistent experience
- Display deep insights into the buyer’s world – their pain points and priorities – not just pitching products
Sales and marketing must move together
Buyers don’t care about your org chart. They care about a buying experience that’s clear, consistent and meets their needs.
The sales leaders who stand out build:
- One commercial team
- One buyer journey
- One mission: to drive predictable revenue by aligning to how people buy today
When sales and marketing don’t act as one, buyers notice. They become overwhelmed —and go elsewhere.
Deals stall, pipeline slips and credibility is lost.
How Flume helps
At Flume, we work with sales leaders to embed the behaviours of high-performing, buyer-centric teams.
Together we:
- Shift enablement from seller-centric to buyer-centric
- Codify what “great” looks like and scale it across sales and marketing
- Create clarity, accountability and commercial alignment
The result? Aligned teams, faster sales cycles, bigger deals and predictable revenue growth.
And this is only part of the picture. High-performing sales leaders are also adopting other habits and strategies that drive predictable revenue growth.
Download our Sales Leadership Excellence Whitepaper to discover more.
Book a Strategy call to see how you can apply them in your organisation
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