When do buyers like to hear from you during the sales process? Early on or later? Email or direct mail? A phone call or text? When and how you connect with your customers during the sales process is critical. According to the RAIN Group’s “5 Sales Prospecting Myths Debunked” survey, 71 percent of B2B buyers like to hear from vendors early in the buying process. The report, which queried 488 global B2B buyers and 489 B2B sellers, showed that 62 percent are interested in hearing from vendors when they are actively looking for solutions.

If you can’t communicate, you can’t succeed – period. Don’t tell that to today’s sales and marketing professionals. They know the drill. According to InsideView’s “Top 3 Reasons Sales and Marketing Alignment is Off!” report, 49 percent of sales and marketing professionals agree that communication is a critical issue on the road to success. Still, the breakdown is causing them to miss out on conversations on how to convert and close leads, among other things. Here’s what both groups say they want from each other. See where your team’s needs fit in:

This article appears in the new July/August 2018 issue of Connect magazine published by NextPage, which can be found online here. If you would like a free print subscription to Connect, please click here.