Win the Battle for Buyer Attention
with Salesloft

How can a world of increased connection create more distance? In B2B marketing and sales, the number of channels to reach
 buyers has doubled in just five years, but engaging effectively is
 more challenging than ever. More touchpoints can lead to more opportunities – but they also add complexity.

Three key challenges tend to stand in the way of effective buyer engagement

Lack of go-to-market alignment leaves sales and marketing teams siloed, slowing revenue growth and creating friction.

Engaging buying groups becomes harder as buyers increasingly turn to self-service, causing revenue teams to miss critical signals or misinterpret buyer intent.

Scaling personal touch feels impossible when buyer groups communicate across multiple channels. Without real-time feedback, revenue teams struggle to prioritize leads and tailor their messaging.

Salesloft helps Sales and Marketing teams stay aligned. This makes
it easier to connect with buyers and respond quickly to their needs.
With these tools, you can pick up on important signals, talk to buyers
 in real time, and improve your chances of closing deals.

In this guide, we'll walk you through how to transform your
 GTM in three steps:

Step 1: Unify Sales
and Marketing

According to Gartner, "Sales organizations that prioritize alignment with marketing are nearly three times more likely to exceed new customer acquisition targets."

The symptoms of misalignment

When separate teams manage separate communication channels based on different goals, no one in the organization
gets a complete picture of buying signals. This leads to fragmented buyer experiences and lost opportunities.

Watch out for symptoms of disjointed Sales and Marketing teams, including:

Salesloft empowers CMOs and CROs to align priorities and focus on shared revenue goals. This collaboration builds a stronger partnership between Marketing and Sales, leading to more effective lead generation and nurturing efforts. With everyone on the same page, teams can work together to drive better results and close more deals.

It’s time to move beyond MQLs

In many organizations, marketers have become so focused on hitting MQL targets that they’ve lost sight of what really matters: driving revenue outcomes. This often leads to a race for quantity over quality, where capturing contact information takes precedence over understanding buyer needs.

This approach creates friction and slows down the sales pipeline. With nearly 75% of B2B buyers preferring the convenience of online self-service over engaging with sales reps, it's crucial to reduce obstacles wherever possible. (Think about it: Have you ever provided fake information just to get through a form quickly? And what lengths do you go to avoid a sales pitch?)

Let’s be honest – relying solely on MQLs isn’t working anymore. It’s time to focus on genuine engagement that leads to real conversations and conversions.

Long live Conversation Qualified Leads (CQLs)

Buyers call the shots now. They explore your website, find what they need, and expect instant, relevant answers – without waiting for a sales pitch. And 80% of their purchasing decisions hinge on those experiences.



That’s where Salesloft’s Conversational AI comes in. It’s evolved from basic chatbots into Bionic Chatbots that truly listen, understand, and adapt to your site visitors in real-time.



Marketing drives this process, shaping how Salesloft Drift handles each interaction. When a visitor shows high intent – ready for a direct conversation – Salesloft seamlessly moves them to sales.



For those still exploring, Drift continues to nurture them, ensuring they get the right content until they’re ready to talk. It’s a streamlined approach that keeps high-potential leads moving forward, while also keeping others engaged until the time is right.



This approach helps create up to 50% more pipeline without the usual hassle, turning curiosity into genuine interest, and ultimately, into action.

Case study: Emerson captures buying signals with Drift

According to Brian Fretschel, Director of Digital Customer Experience at Emerson, “We see a high level of intent with Drift leads because we’ve given that customer multiple different avenues to self-serve or branch off towards their intended resource.” 

How to build a unified lead follow-up process with Salesloft’s Revenue Orchestration Platform

Step 2: Engage buying groups effectively

“The best buying signal you will ever get is the presence of multiple individuals from the same organization researching your solutions at the same time,” said Kerry Cunningham, VP, Principal Analyst, Forrester.

Today’s B2B buyers
are buying groups

B2B buying decisions are increasingly made by groups of stakeholders rather than individuals. A revenue operations survey from Forrester found that 94% of organizations sold to groups of three or more individuals, and 38% sold to groups of 10 or more. The size of that group increases as an organization considers more vendors and as the cost of the solution goes up. That also extends the length of the sales cycle.

Given these extended timelines and larger teams, effectively engaging each stakeholder is important to maintain momentum and keep moving deals forward.

Who’s who in a typical buying group

While buying committees vary in size and composition, you’ll often run across members in these categories:

Some buying committee members will typically engage openly as key points of contact. Others, such as the economic and legal buyers, tend to stay more anonymous until the final stages of a deal. If you can identify these individuals when they visit your website, you’ll be in a better position to anticipate their needs and move the deal forward.

Tracking and
serving individuals in the buying group

Each member of a buying committee has their own goals and research process, often progressing through the deal stages at different times.

Drift helps identify when multiple visitors from the same organization are exploring your site, giving Marketing and Sales teams a clearer view of where each person is in their buying journey. Salesloft then helps sellers track key stakeholders, keeping everyone engaged and informed. By understanding each member's stage, you can provide the right content and messaging — whether they’re just researching or ready to buy — making it easier to support their needs throughout the process.

Case study: Alteryx engages buyers with Drift Chat

"I think that engaging with us over Drift helps buyers let their guard down because they’re coming to the chat looking for someone who can be a resource to them, someone who’s more of a navigator," said Jackson Waddill, Conversation Development Representative. "That’s how I see my role. I’m here to help you get to where you want to be. I’m not going to push something on you. We’ll have a conversation, I’ll give you the sales roadmap and if you want to go that way, you can."

How to engage buying groups effectively with Salesloft’s Revenue Orchestration Platform

Step 3: Deliver personal engagement at scale

According to McKinsey, "B2B customers use an average of ten interaction channels in their buying journey (up from five in 2016). But sellers offering multiple channels isn’t enough. More than half of our [B2B buying] respondents want
 a true omnichannel experience, one in which they can interact and buy while switching seamlessly across multiple channels. They are likely to switch suppliers
 if they don’t have a smooth experience across these many touchpoints."

Genuine personalization spans all channels

Your future customers aren’t sticking to just one way of interacting with your company. They’ll engage with you across multiple channels — email, chat, phone, and more. If personalization only happens on one or two of these, it can feel disjointed, and the experience won’t resonate.

Consider these two buying experiences:

While delivering personalized experiences across multiple channels can seem challenging, the right tools can make it much more manageable.

Scaling personal interactions is easy with Salesloft

Salesloft’s Revenue Orchestration Platform helps teams scale personalized engagement without leaning on assumptions.

Case study: Brandwatch scales the personal touch with Drift Chat

“If a user can come to our site and use Drift to engage in a direct conversation with a Brandwatch rep, that really improves the brand perception and increases the chance of conversion,” said Thomas Grünberg, Director of Global Campaigns at Brandwatch. With Drift, Brandwatch saw 20x ROI, a 75% increase in engagement rate year-over-year with Conversational AI, and 8.4 day average opportunity creation time.

How to scale personal engagement with Salesloft

Reduce friction for leads by automatically recognizing return visitors and helping them bypass repetitive form-filling for known users.

Engage proactively to anticipate your buyers' needs

When you mix automation with a personal touch, you connect with buyers at the right moments with messages that actually matter to them. This doesn’t just make your conversations more meaningful – it moves deals forward faster and cuts through the usual back-and-forth.

Picture this: A visitor who is already familiar with your brand returns to your site. Salesloft recognizes them, skips the form, and offers exactly what they’re looking for. At the same time, the system keeps your team in the loop, so when a rep reaches out, they already know where that buyer is in the journey. No awkward "remind me who you are" moments.

With this setup, you can:

1. Meet buyers where they are, whether it’s through chat, email, or another channel
2. Respond in real time, like jumping into a conversation the moment they show interest
3. Keep your messaging consistent so every interaction builds upon the last one

Instead of reacting to what buyers do, you’ll be a step ahead, knowing what they need before they even ask. And you won’t be doing it alone – Sales and Marketing will finally be in sync, working together to close deals.