Sales and Content? It’s rare to see those two teams working together, really.
Sales and Content operate largely in silos. Most of their interaction happens through ad-hoc or reactive requests, such as Sales asking for one-off collateral or Content requesting market insights. There’s no shared rhythm of planning and few (if any) joint KPIs.
We asked our readers to rate the level of collaboration between their Content team and Sales team on a scale of 1 to 5, in which:
- 1 – Minimal (Rare contact, mostly ad-hoc requests)
- 2 – Low (Some shared information but mostly siloed work)
- 3 – Moderate (Occasional updates, limited joint planning)
- 4 – High (Frequent meetings, shared goals, joint campaigns)
- 5 – Excellent (Fully integrated workflows, co-owned KPIs)
And the survey result is quite fascinating:
But little do they know that this partnership can potentially become a rewarding one in the long run. Content can affect sales, which affects content. It is a valuable feedback loop that strengthens both teams.
Here is how Sales and Content and collaborate:
1. Your Sales team brings ideas from the trenches
Your sales team hears the same concerns over and over. They know about pricing pushback, feature comparisons, integration questions, ROI doubts, and everything in between.
If those objections aren’t reflected in your content, you’re leaving friction points unresolved until too late in the funnel.
The Sales team can log those objections and share them with Content team, who can then turn those insights into:
- FAQ-driven blog posts that answer the exact questions Sales are being asked
- Detailed competitor comparisons
- Pricing explainers
- One-pagers and case studies that proactively address customer’s concerns (before they even arise in a sales call).
This not only saves reps time but also builds trust with prospects. All you need to do is book a quick meeting with your Sales team members and just have a free discussion. Ask them what pressing content needs is the Sales team having, and develop from there.
2. Highlight collateral gaps
Salespeople know when they don’t have the right content to close a deal. If reps are repeatedly saying “I wish I had a case study for X industry” or “Customers keep asking for a one-page comparison,” that’s a signal for marketing to prioritize creating those assets.
Usually to do this, we need a structured content request system (Slack channel, Airtable form, or CRM tag) ensures these needs get logged and funneled back to marketing.
Thanks to this, the Content team can create a content library that goes beyond SEO-driven queries, but also laser-focused on enabling conversions at each deal stage.
3. You can surface industry trends and insights
Sales reps sit on the front line of evolving market sentiment.
They’re the first to notice when prospects shift focus, say, from cost savings to AI adoption, or from scalability to compliance.
They can feed these insights into content strategy so that marketing can avoid being reactive. Instead, they know that they should publish thought leadership, webinars, and guides that are aligned with what customers are already starting to care about.
4. Sales teams can surface BOFU content ideas
Most content marketers are busy building top-of-funnel assets: awareness pieces, thought leadership, “what is X” explainers.
Well…those have a place, but they’re not the only way to use content marketing. I have written an extensive article on why BOFU content is the better option for content teams here.
The conversations your sales reps are having are usually about buying decisions, implementation worries, budget constraints, and vendor comparisons. That’s all bottom-of-funnel territory, and it’s a goldmine for content ideas.
Bottom-of-funnel content are content that that answers “should I buy?”, “how do we roll this out?”, or “what ROI can we expect?”, and they are chronically underrepresented. In sales calls, people never ask “What is SaaS?”, they ask “How your solution cuts costs and improve productivity?”.
Once you start creating those assets, sales calls flowed more smoothly, and prospects arrived better prepared.
For example, imagine you are an Enterprise QA Automation software, conversations with the Sales team can help you produce assets like:
- “Why Enterprise Teams Fail at Automation Rollouts” → great for prospects struggling with internal adoption.
- “How to Budget for a Test Automation Platform” → answers the CFO’s questions before they’re asked.
- “Vendor Comparison: [Your Product] vs. [Competitor]” → gives sales an approved, shareable reference instead of ad hoc answers.
5. Sales and Content can co-create customer stories
This collaboration in the other direction, too. Sales should be trained and encouraged to feed back content gaps as they find them.
A quick Slack message or note in the CRM can spark an idea for an article that answers a recurring prospect question. Over time, this feedback loop builds a catalog of BOFU content that makes both teams’ jobs easier, while making prospects feel like you understand exactly where they are in the buying process.
