Business owner, Vicki Stone lost count of the amount of times she heard Managing Directors, Marketing or Sales people say that their sales and marketing teams didn’t understand each other and for some, they are so frustrated that they have given up trying to make it work.
Smarketing is the process of integrating the sales and marketing functions in a business. Recent research from SiriusDecisions shows that when sales and marketing is aligned, organisations can achieve a 27% faster profit growth and 24% faster revenue growth over a 3 year period.
With this in mind, growing Gosforth-based creative marketing agency, Vicki Stone Marketing launched their Virtual Marketing Manager service for growing SMEs. Many of these SMEs have excellent sales teams, but not the in-house marketing function at a senior management level.
HLA Services Ltd. are the North East’s leading Air Conditioning, Climate Systems and Temperature Control specialists. In January this year, HLA Services decided to tap into the Virtual Marketing Manager service provided by Vicki Stone Marketing and the service is already adding value to their business.
In 2014 HLA Services opened its second regional office in Middlesbrough, aiding service to clients in the southern area of the region and providing support to the Boldon-based head office.
Neil Henry, Managing Director at HLA Services Ltd. says: “Vicki and the team are already proving to be a valuable asset to our team. The service they provide aligns well with our existing sales and marketing plan. They help deliver highly targeted marketing activity for our core business as well as working with our European partners and manufacturers to launch new innovative products to market.”
Neil adds “Our business has experienced 10% year on year growth and we now employ over 100 staff. In 2014 alone we created 11 jobs, with a further 12 in 2015 so far, which we feel is a huge achievement given the current economic climate.”
Vicki Stone says: “It’s great to be working with larger businesses like HLA Services who understand the benefits of sales and marketing working together in business. By outsourcing their Marketing Manager services, HLA Services and many other of our clients reap the benefits at a senior marketing level with fresh marketing thinking and new ideas.”