Sales development vs buisness development
Is business development only sales department’s responsibility
A business acts just like the human body, with various systems coordinating with different organs to sustain and live ahead. In order to ensure the smooth flow of an organisation, executives should realise the interdependence between the various arms and departments functioning there, thus assuring maintenance of the brand value of the organisation. Each unit under the body should operate at equal efficiency in order to deliver successful products in the market.
Business development stands for an amalgamation of various ideas and initiatives practised to ensure a smooth-flowing business. It includes maintaining revenues and cash-flow, strategic planning of expansions and other major business decisions etc. Thus, we might say the sales department has to be the pioneers of business development. Well we can’t completely neglect this fact, since the sales department holds the reins to the organisation’s steering wheel, in terms of generating revenues, but we can’t fully stick by it. The sales department doesn’t control the entire flow and to balance the scales there are various other departments that play a crucial role in the business development of an organisation.
Now let’s analyse the various departments that lie under the umbrella of an organisation, which play an equally important role as the sales department for churning profits for the company:
MARKETING:
The role of marketing involves the promotions and advertisements required to establish the product in the market. At this stage, the marketing doesn’t have a direct relation with the clients but they surely help in providing the route required to establish client relations. Market analysis and research is quite a crucial field, which requires studying markets and clients from various different angles. It includes surveys, questionnaires etc. to ensure the product is market friendly.
Marketing plays a complementary role in achieving sales targets. The results and output gathered by the marketing department through market researching is fed directly to the sales department. This helps the sales staff in analysing the density of the markets, helping them set targets for various regions. This will help them to approach different regions of the market with different tactics, enabling them to connect with the client easily.
For a company to have sustainable revenue, it should take the proper strategic moves in order to stay competitive. Strategic moves include business expansion plans, opening of new facilities, import-export strategies etc. Such important activities are also conducted by the marketing department.
PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT:
The brand value of an organisation lies in its product. The quality of the product defines the standards of the organisation. Product development involves not only maintaining regulatory standards but also assessing and meeting market’s requirements from the product. These requirements, channelised by the business strategy, drive the work of product design and manufacturing departments. Cost consideration, legal approvals, and regulatory adherence are all assessed as a part of this product development plan.
The product development team has the crucial responsibility of collecting customer insights and implementing them in the product design. This will help the organisation to stay up-to-date with the market and will also help them stay ahead of the competitors.
FINANCE:
This is the department that is responsible for driving the company through the right route, without avoiding any crashes. Stability in accounting will allow the company to maintain a healthy balance sheet. Strong financial strategies can not only help keep the company in the good eyes of the shareholders but also help in executing plans for further business development. The finance department is responsible for looking out for any hurdles that can bleed the company in any situation, thus policing the company motives in a way.
CUSTOMER SERVICE:
The sales department has to look after the client’s needs but their role doesn’t entirely depend upon the continuous welfare of the client. In order to maintain a long and healthy relationship with the customer, an organisation needs an efficient customer service department. Their major responsibility lies in maintaining active relations with the customers and to gain insights from the customer regarding the product and its quality. The complaints and feedback received by them are reverted back to the marketing department, who can analyse the situation and come up with a solution that best satisfies the customer’s demands. In this way, a huge inter-dependency is created and we can witness the mutual roles played by each of these departments to ensure the maintenance of the brand value of the company.
HUMAN RESOURCES:
For successful business development in an organisation, you need qualified executives and brains to brainstorm ideas and put them on the table. The responsibility of picking out the best from the market lies on the shoulders of the HR. Human resource sounds like something that doesn’t matter much when you talk about business development, but it lays the foundation for charting out an efficient task force for the organisation. Thus, the HR department plays a vital role in balancing the brain and brawn of the organisation, coordinating the strengths and skills and polishing the brand of the employers.
DISTRIBUTION MANAGEMENT / LOGISTICS
The distribution management is responsible for overseeing the movement of goods from supplier or manufacturer to point of sale. It has the vital responsibility of connecting with vendors for the transportation and availability of the product. This is a very crucial factor for business development to happen, as this is how the product is connected with the market. Logistics management is, thus, an important part of the business cycle not only for manufacturers but also for distributors, wholesalers and other downstream players involved. Majority of the profits of an organisation is churned out by an efficient distribution system.
Even though we can go on and discuss about a multitude of other important departments, the above mentioned ones clarify our primary question and provide a reasonable solution as to why the sales department is not solely responsible for business development. The smooth functioning of an organisation is like weaving out a piece of fabric. The different fibres that are woven together are like different departments acting together to deliver the desired output.
The process of business development still remains complex in the corporate world. It is evolving at every stage, with executives cracking their skulls to bring in new initiatives and strategies. These strategies never revolve around any particular department in an organisation and they can only be incorporated if everyone put in their share of effort. Through this progress, we can visualise the gap between these different departments getting diminished.
We can conclude with an inspiring quote by the revered Napolean Hill-“Strength and growth come only through continuous effort and struggle.”
The market is full of people trying to make it big in the game. And since there is a ton of competition out there you better want yourself to be ahead of others. And You can find such important information for SMEs, sales, and market-related strategies and a lot of such blogs which will help you to be ahead of others with us on Insellers.
