Who’s responsible for #salesenablement?
It’s a common question across sales-driven orgs.
Where do responsibilities lie across sales leadership, revenue enablement, and product marketing?
Here’s how I think these three functions should work together 👇
Sales Leadership
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If you’re a small startup, sales leadership may do everything.
They onboard new reps, provide ongoing coaching and training, and create messaging, pitch decks, and other collateral.
They evaluate and purchase sales tools, and measure and benchmark performance across the team.
But as organizations grow and add dedicated teams for product marketing and sales enablement, many of these responsibilities change hands.
Sales leadership will still drive training and guidance around “how” to sell. Best practices for navigating deals, sales methodology, and 1:1 coaching.
But positioning, product messaging, collateral, and competitive enablement shift to product marketing.
Product Marketing
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Enter #productmarketing — a function dedicated to positioning, messaging, sales collateral, release marketing, and competitive differentiation.
PMM should drive enablement related to all that 👆
Launching a new product? PMM is responsible for ensuring reps can explain the value, demo it, and differentiate it from competitors.
Competitor launched a new product? PMM is responsible for ensuring reps have the messaging they need to handle objections and position your product accordingly.
But PMM still needs to collaborate with sales leadership often. Seek their input on which projects and resources to prioritize, and how to deliver effective training.
Reps also provide valuable intel and feedback. What are we hearing from buyers? What are competitors doing? What talk tracks are resonating?
Most of our enablement training at Klue includes real call recordings of reps delivering messaging, handling objections, and de-positioning competitors effectively.
Without them, our training would be way less effective.
Sales Enablement
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Enter Sales Enablement — a function that owns the full lifecycle of onboarding, coaching, and ongoing enablement.
They play a key role in scaling the sales organization. I think of them as enablement architects. 🏗
They make sure that every rep has access to the best practices, knowledge, tools, and resources they need to be successful.
They're NOT on the hook to create and deliver everything. They are, however, the ones mapping the process, facilitating learning, and ensuring everyone can access the training and resources they need.
For example, at Klue, our enablement team facilitates rep onboarding, coaching, and ongoing enablement. They work with sales leadership and product marketing to map out the most effective enablement calendar.
They also help define and track success metrics across our enablement activities, including sales performance and benchmarking across the team.
So that's my take at a very high level.
How does this compare to your company?
