Did you tune in for our latest Sales GPS Roundtable? The Dec. 8 rendition of the live Zoom chat between MDM CEO Tom Gale, Indian River Consulting Group Co-Founder Mike Marks and guests Kevin Dean and Mike Moore got straight to the point: 2020 fundamentally changed the relationship between distribution sales and marketing teams and emphasized their joint obligation to customers.

You can view the event in its entirety on demand here.

In reinforcing their argument about the need for a growing collaborative relationship between sales and marketing, Dean, CEO of digital marketing agency ManoByte, and Moore, VP of channel strategy at supply chain and logistics software company E2open, landed on one example in particular that deserves further discussion. Many distributors are under the assumption that if they load a bunch of content onto their website and/or into one-off marketing emails, they’ve done their job. Dean and Moore argued that such a Create It and They Will Come strategy is a waste of time and resources.

As Dean put it, “If you believe that content is king, then for most companies the emperor has no clothes. The reason for that is because they don’t have context. You need the right content getting to the right person at the right time. That’s the value,” he said. “Do that with technology that identifies where each individual is in their buyer’s journey. Otherwise, it becomes a mess.”

Commit to the Journey

As distributors refine and enhance their digital and e-commerce strategies in 2021, I predict those who will be most successful will place an increased focus on the buyer/customer journey and make a concerted effort to put themselves in their customers’ shoes — and even in their customers’ customers’ shoes.

And speaking of targeted content, as you’ll see in this issue of Premium, MDM is committed to helping you to make a more robust digital strategy happen by sharing tactical best practices. Our cover story, “6 Website Mistakes That Are Sinking Your Sales (And How to Fix Them),” takes you step by step through the stages of your prospective buyer’s online journey and what you can do to make visiting your website better for them — and more lucrative for you.

In Senior Editor Eric Smith’s conversation with Marc Strandquist, president and CEO of Optimas OE Solutions LLC, the specialty distributor and manufacturer of highly engineered fasteners speaks broadly about bringing digital transformation to the business and how he sees Optimas growing as a result.

One last word on customer journey. MDM is practicing what we preach in emphasizing the importance of strengthening your knowledge in this area of the business. You may have noticed we recently sent out surveys on your experience with Premium (if you are a subscriber) and/or MDM Update. We are working on some exciting customer-focused innovations of our own for 2021. Stay tuned!