Reducing Friction and Improving Alignment to Get the Best Out of Your Marketing Team
In a business setting, there are employees that are from all walks of life. You will be hard pressed to find anyone with the same personality. Sometimes these differences in opinion can cause friction between employees. If you’re experiencing this in your marketing team it could be highly detrimental to the wellbeing of your business and marketing efforts.
If your marketing team don’t get along it could mean less business exposure and opportunity. Some marketing members may even become competitive with other staff members which won’t create a positive working environment.
In today’s article, we’ll discuss why it’s important for your marketing team to get along. Additionally, we’ll provide examples of what happens when you have a strong team working for you. Lastly, we’ll give you tips on how you can reduce friction between your marketing staff and create a positive working environment. Keep reading to find out more.
Why is it Important for Your Marketing Staff to Work as a Team?
Improves Customer Experience
Every touchpoint a customer has with your business is all thanks to marketing. Your marketing team creates the point of interest in products and services. Marketing also creates ways for the customers to engage with your staff. One of the most important outcomes is to create a positive experience for your customers.
If your marketing team doesn’t work together they will fall short of creating the ultimate experience for consumers. One of the ways your company can gain more customers is by word of mouth advertising.
Customers won’t provide positive word of mouth advertising if they’ve had a less than ideal experience with your website, social media pages or engagements. That’s why your marketing team must work together to create the ultimate experience for your customers.
There’s a Better Understanding of Your Brand Identity
A marketing team can spend months developing your brand identity and understanding your company’s persona through extensive research. If your marketing team worked together and have a clear identity of their own it would take them less time to determine things like your target audience.
You’ll have a better understanding of what your customers’ interests and needs are as well as their pain points if your marketing team works together to source that information. Your marketing team will also attract the right customers so you can have a higher conversion rate.
Communications Helps to Develop New Marketing Strategies
Communication in a business setting is crucial because without it no one will know what their duties are or where they are going and how. On the other hand, proper communication between your marketing staff will help develop new and innovative marketing strategies.
These strategies will elevate your business to a whole new level so you can increase profit margins and develop a unique brand that more people will want to engage with.
Examples of Teams that Were Successful in Their Endeavors
Fastest Try in World Rugby
In 2019 England scored the fastest try against the All Blacks. After 2 minutes of being on the field, the England Rugby team scored their first try and had a lead of 7-0. Reports on the event stated that the England team was precise and clean with their passing which shocked the opposing team.
Before the match, England stood in a V formation as the All Blacks performed the haka. England showed that the opposing team wouldn’t intimidate them and they worked hard to achieve their goals together.
Nevertheless, there have been some shocking rugby matches throughout sports history where teams simply didn’t make the cut. The match against South Africa and England in 1972 is the perfect example. The South African team was in the lead with a 9-6 score. But then Alan Morley scored when he kicked at a perfect 45-degree angle after cutting off his wing. England decided the match would be played on their terms, stuck to their plan and won.
The Fastest Pit Stop
Pierre Gasly’s pit stop team removed worn tires and replaced them with new ones in 1.91 seconds. But the Red Bull team did a one up on them with a record time of 1.88 seconds. In the pit stop, there is no time to argue. For the driver to be in the lead the pit stop crew has to be fast and extremely precise.
Similar to shocking rugby history matches there have been some terrible pit stop stories in Formula 1 racing. In 1999 Eddie Irvine was having some trouble with the rainy conditions on the race track. He needed wets so he pitted earlier than he had scheduled.
The pit crew took out three wet weather tires instead of four. But it was too late to rectify the mistake. Eddie was stalled for over a minute which resulted in him losing the race. The pit stop crew cost Eddie valuable champion points that day.
How You Can Reduce Friction and Improve Your Marketing Team
As you can see in the above scenarios, that it can be detrimental to your crew or team if you don’t work towards the same goal which is to succeed. So how can you manage conflict in your marketing team effectively? Let’s find out in this next section.
Find the Source of the Problem
You can’t resolve conflict if you don’t know where it’s coming from. As a team leader, you must try to understand each staff member and why they act out in certain ways. Sometimes someone could be dealing with a stressful situation at home or it could be financial problems.
In most cases, the root of the problem is what makes people argue and fight with others. Everyone deals with stress differently. Therefore find the root of the problem so that you can give your staff the proper guidance.
Conflict Resolution Training
One way you can solve conflict amongst your marketing team is to send them on a conflict resolution course. This is a training course that teaches your staff to find peaceful and respectful solutions to disagreements in the workplace.
Whether the disagreement is about finances, marketing strategies or personal conflict the course will provide the following benefits:
- Improves understanding amongst marketing team members
- Reduces stress and absenteeism
- Increases team effectiveness
- Improves motivation and production
- Develops important conflict resolution skills
As a team leader, you should also attend the conflict resolution training so you can be better equipped for handling arguments amongst your marketing team.
Ensure Everyone is Treated Fairly
Some managers tend to have favorites in the office which gives them the upper hand because you may take their side when disagreements arise. You must never take sides because the other team members may feel like they’re not being heard. It’s important for you as a team leader to listen attentively to every team member’s story so that you can provide a peaceful solution to the problem.
Final Thoughts
To get the best out of your marketing team you must establish a project workflow between your marketing team and the rest of your company. The working process of other individual departments can be influenced by how other teams request work or how they expect tasks to be completed.
You must have proper workflow between every department so that everyone knows what’s expected of them. Establish your procedures and make sure everyone abides by them to avoid conflict.
How do you resolve conflict in the workplace? Let us know what your processes are by leaving a comment below. We are always happy to hear from our readers.
