Q&A with Jessica Thompson on the misalignment between Sales and Service, and how Salesforce can help bridge the gap.

Jessica Thompson is 8Squad’s COO, and she has over 13 years of enterprise leadership experience. Jessica has led many strategic transformation programs throughout her career, working collaboratively to build strong teams that thrive in complex environments.

Sales and Service play a critical role in driving customer experience, satisfaction and loyalty. So why is there still a disconnect between them?

Although Sales and Service are part of the same customer value chain, these teams often have different KPIs internally. In addition, they frequently use various tools and technologies to engage with the customer, which can also cause misalignment. 

Disconnection between Sales and Service can be the result of poor visibility of customer data and limited collaboration. Though this misalignment is not uncommon, it highly impacts the efficiency of your organisation and has a significant impact on the customer experience.

How does the misalignment between Sales and Service teams impact the customer experience?

The misalignment between Sales and Service creates unnecessary operational risks that put customers under pressure from the onset. The misalignment results in poor service and sales practices, which cause customer dissatisfaction. 

The customer experience suffers when Sales and Service teams work in silos, each having a limited view of the customer needs. For example, when your teams use various sets of systems and access different information, there is increased inconsistency in solving customer issues. 

Customers also expect an immediate and accurate response to their enquiries, regardless of who they’re talking to within your organisation. Customers need your business to understand their goals and concerns, especially if they have already communicated them to one of your team members.

How can Salesforce help organisations bridge the gap between their Sales and Service teams?

Salesforce true value comes from leveraging its powerful platform capabilities to boost collaboration and efficiency. Connecting Sales and Service teams on the same platform has fundamentally changed the landscape in which these critical functions can operate and provide a seamless experience to customers. 

Salesforce helps Sales and Service teams work better together by:

• Providing a 360 view of customers and access to a consistent data set
• Ensuring customer interactions are captured and visible in a single place
• Enabling real-time access to critical information 
• Case tracking capability
• Reducing internal handoffs and duplication of effort
• Facilitating cross-functional collaboration

Effective collaboration, streamlined processes and robust systems are fundamental to fulfilling customer needs on time. More than ever, a CRM that supports teams working together while being apart is critical for organisations to remain relevant in the competitive and ever-changing landscape.

About 8Squad:

At 8Squad, we specialise in delivering complex technology projects that put humans first. With over 1000 Salesforce projects delivered, we’re recognised for our unique ways of working and dynamic approach to digital challenges and opportunities of today and tomorrow. Whether you’re scaling up, staying up or surging ahead, we can help you achieve your business goals with Salesforce faster.