A chilly night in the middle of spring provided the perfect opportunity to take a trip down The Rabbit Hole. At the bequest of a fellow author friend, we met for a late supper and some much-needed creative chit-chat. What better place for two bookworms to score some downtime than a restaurant boasting an Alice in Wonderland theme?
 
Situated in the middle of the sidewalk, The Rabbit Hole immediately transports you by ushering you down two flights of strangely narrow stairs. Commands like Push Me and Pull Me aid wandering patrons who happen upon the glass door entrance. Muted colored lights and smooth tunes set the mood as you find your table—a cozy atmosphere with a mish-mash collection of booths, barstools, and dark wood with plenty of secluded corners for conversation. A variety of white rabbit themed art adorns the walls and in a variety of sizes and shapes, creating the perfect fun-house, otherworldly feel.
 
A menu offering everything from local beef burgers to bacon wrapped rabbit meatloaf makes the Eat Meorder easy to follow. Eclectic Drink Mecocktails provide the perfect pairing to whichever dinner adventure you’ve chosen to partake in. While the White Rabbit--a vanilla martini with a flaming marshmallow on top—is their most popular, who could resist The Mad Hatter? A Colorado Bourbon Manhattan on the rocks? I don’t need a calligraphy label to tell me which one to choose.
 
Warm booths tucked into separate rooms with rock walls and paint splattered borders, remind me of some of the best pubs I visited in London. Food made in house, drinks created to call to any literature lover’s heart, this is one experience that shouldn’t be missed when heading downtown. 
 
Be well-prepared to lose a few hours underground indulging in the best the Rabbit Hole has to offer. The time-suspending effect was welcomed after the daily grind, and the trippy dining ambiance will leave you asking yourself: Why is a raven like a writing desk? The answer lies beneath downtown Colorado Springs, where the food transforms and the cocktails are magic. 

Cheers,

ML

​Molly E. Lee is an associate copywriter at Amy Puchaty Communications - a Denver-Boulder-based copywriting firm specializing in luxury real estate marketing and creative copy that inspires. Amy Puchaty is a luxury real estate writer and communications specialist whose marketing campaigns and copywriting work have appeared in numerous print and digital publications including The Wall Street Journal, Architectural Digest, Inman News, The Denver Post, and Dallas Business Journal. Why Amy Puchaty? Because it’s selling season. Follow Amy at www.amypuchaty.com #AtHomeWithAmy #AmyPuchaty #LuxuryRealEstateWriter

​Amy Puchaty Communications is a business that was built on strategic marketing and helping  professionals get their message out in an effective and powerful way. Today, we do much more than sell, we tell stories that engage our clients' ideal customer and help them generate leads. That's why we are excited to share with you this article from Tenfold, a company that optimizes the entire customer journey by easily integrating all customer conversations and data in real time. What does this mean? Well first, it's important to understand marketing vs. sales, their major difference, and how they work together. Since our clients range from small business owners to large corporations, we think many of you will benefit from a quick refresher, courtesy of Tenfold. 

​Marketing vs. Sales: Their Major Difference and How They Work Together 
by Tenfold.com
​
Business guru and well-known provocateur Tom Peters once addressed a crowd of over 400 sales and marketing executives saying: “I hate sports analogies. They’re just a bunch of male macho…” Yet, in the world of sales and marketing, sports analogies are de rigueur and tossed around like a basketball during March Madness.

To properly understand the difference between sales and marketing, however, another analogy seems more suitable: that of musical theater. Salespeople are the performers in a Broadway musical, whereas marketing folks are the set designers, producers, and choreographers.

On the surface, the two may present as a ‘selling vs marketing’ schema. Marketing puts the show together without a nod of the head or clap of the hand. Sales then takes the reins and earns the applause. However, this imbalanced view glosses over the meaningful difference between sales & marketing and altogether ignores the fact that the two entities can work together harmoniously with just a wee bit of effort.

The Sales and Marketing Relationship
​While the goal of sales and marketing are notably similar (boost company revenue), this fact seems tangential in relation to their means of reaching that goal. Would it be surprising to know that a staggering 76 percent of marketers are overlooking the importance of sales enablement? Put differently, a mere 24 percent of marketing specialists have an agreement with sales on defining lead responsibilities, according to Hubspot’s Fifth Annual Review of Inbound Marketing Trends and Tactics.

In a survey of nearly 1,000 sales and marketing specialists in the United States, roughly two-thirds of salespeople believe marketers are wasting time on fancy events and branding activities when they would be better served focusing on tactics that directly impact the sales pipeline. Similarly, the majority of marketing pros consider salespeople boastful and showmen.

This tangible sort of tension — or, often, blatant disregard for one another — leads to the many sports analogies assigned to the industry. In actuality, it should read more like a creative collaboration than a competition. The marketing and sales departments do everything possible to connect with the prospect’s story, intertwining knowledge of the prospect’s known and unknown needs, and then work collaboratively to resolve them.

In other words, this relationship is long overdue for an overhaul. Companies that manage to strengthen the ties between the two departments reap substantial rewards. Case in point: Companies with strong sales and marketing alignment enjoy a 20 percent annual growth rate.

Companies that struggle with this alignment, however, face a 4 percent decline in revenue. In other words, seamless integration means more than mere kumbayah; it means money. Additionally, studies show that a failure to align sales and marketing departments around the right processes and technologies may cost B2B companies 10 percent or more of revenue annually.

The Sales and Marketing Difference
As mentioned earlier, there is a commonality that binds sales and marketing forces: a shared goal. While that is often lost in the shuffle, perhaps it becomes ever more important to recognize the marketing and selling difference before introducing harmony.

In a nutshell, the difference between sales and marketing boils down to their respective roles in the sales pipeline. While the marketing forces do everything possible to reach and persuade prospective customers, the sales forces do everything possible to close the sale and garner a signed contract or signed check.

To return to the musical theater analogy, marketing involves the behind-the-scenes work, such as viral marketing, branding, relationship marketing, advertising, and direct mail campaigning. They are the stagehands that embody the “Lights! Camera!” phrases, wherein the sales team are the actors that initiate the “Action!” portion of that phrase. Sales involves the direct one-on-one meetings, the cold calls, and networking.

A musical production takes different characters with contrasting viewpoints and intentions, plays their conflicting goals off one another, and throws them together for a giant choreographed conglomeration of singing and dancing. While initially contentious and fragmented, the result is a crescendo of harmonious voices and synchronized spins, a performance worthy of an encore.
​
To understand the bits that each ‘character’ (aka department) plays in the musical, it helps to examine how each come to the stage. As described in Forbes magazine, “As long as you are selling to homo-sapiens, the fundamental motivations to buy and the skills to obtain purchase commitments will remain the same. People may go about selecting a consultant, a cloud-based storage system or a box of cereal in a different set of steps, but people buy emotionally and justify their decisions intellectually.”

To paraphrase, the tactics that sales teams use to convert leads into sales remain consistent year after year. The tactics that marketing teams use must change and evolve year after year, however.
In 2005, marketing was defined as a one-way communication intended to bring about interest in a product or service, and selling was a two-way communication designed to enable the prospect to do 70 percent of the talking.

In 2017, such a definition seems antiquated. Advancements in technology ensure that marketing is now a two-way street. In striking contrast to years prior, marketing can now be an exchange with the prospect doing the majority of talking for the more tech-savvy marketers out there.

Bridging the Sales and Marketing Wedge
Not to underplay the very real emotions that collide when sales and marketing departments discuss one another, the way to mend such relationships and get them working in harmony can be revealed by many a Kindergarten teacher. Play nice, play together, and engage in routines that promote both. There are thus distinct steps that can be taken to create a more positive synergy between sales and marketing departments. These include:

Recognize what the other needs:
​When surveyed, sales identified the following desires from marketing:

• Better quality leads (54 percent)
• More leads (44 percent)
• Competitive information and intelligence (39 percent)
• Brand awareness (37 percent)
  ​

In the same survey, marketing identified the following needs from sales:

• More effective lead follow-up (34 percent)
• Consistent use of systems, such as Customer Relationship Management software (32 percent)
• Feedback on marketing efforts and campaigns (15 percent)
• Consistent use of messaging and tools provided by marketing (13 percent)
  
  

Engaging in face time
Note that this isn’t some hidden reference to Apple’s FaceTime. Instead, it refers to that old-fashioned form of dialogue involving people looking at one another and communicating. To clarify, it also doesn’t mean that the VP of marketing sits down with the VP of sales to have a conversation. It means that several people from the marketing team sit down with several people from the sales team and hash it out. It means bringing data to the table to support criticism and encourage celebrations. HubSpot recommends weekly meetings that last anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour.

Sitting together
Those who sit together tend to bond together—and the same principle applies to the workplace. Rather than encouraging a siloed approach to the workplace, mix it up. Place every sales team member next to a marketing person, and vice versa. When they understand what the other person is dealing with, it helps them become more effective at their own jobs.
​
While sales and marketing each present unique contributions to the musical performance that is the sales funnel, both teams are necessary for a successful production. Though sales approaches tend to remain the same over the years, and marketing tactics frequently change, their commonality rests in a shared desire to increase company revenue.

Inspired yet? We thought so. Here's a great white paper from Tenfold available for download here.

​Cheers and happy marketing...now go sell!

AP

Amy Puchaty is a luxury real estate writer and communications specialist whose marketing campaigns and copywriting work have appeared in numerous print and digital publications including The Wall Street Journal, Architectural Digest, Inman News, The Denver Post, and Dallas Business Journal. Why Amy Puchaty? Because it’s selling season. Follow Amy at www.amypuchaty.com #AtHomeWithAmy #AmyPuchaty #LuxuryRealEstateWriter

Are you following us on Pinterest? The "Amy Puchaty" Pinterest page is growing fast, and has a following of over 40,000 monthly viewers! The page is chock full of links and images to recent real estate articles, unique recipes, the latest in fashion and design, plus everything that's inspiring Amy right now on the home front.

Building a new home can be such a daunting task, but Pinterest has helped Amy curate a board - titled "New Home Designs Ideas" - to keep her design inspirations neat, tidy, and at her fingertips. Amy loves to collect images of home decor and design trends that speak to her. It's served as a great planning tool and she references it often when making decisions, from budgeting household items to deciphering what purchases will bring the most value to her home in the future. 

As someone who comes from a family of designers and artists, Amy knows it's important to start planning in advance to find the things she truly loves. If you like what you see, follow along and give us a like. You never know what might inspire you!

Cheers from the team,

AP

Amy Puchaty is a luxury real estate writer and communications specialist whose marketing campaigns and copywriting work have appeared in numerous print and digital publications including The Wall Street Journal, Architectural Digest, Inman News, The Denver Post, and Dallas Business Journal. Why Amy Puchaty? Because it’s selling season. Follow Amy at www.amypuchaty.com #AtHomeWithAmy #AmyPuchaty #LuxuryRealEstateWriter

Who else is excited for The Masters Tournament this weekend!? "Every April, the mere sight of pink azaleas and beautiful sun-soaked skies beating down on the vibrant green turf of Augusta National Golf Club is enough to make golf fans flock to their television sets in droves," says Christopher Powers of GolfDigest.com. I have to admit, I grew up falling asleep to The Masters Tournament as a kid on those lazy spring afternoons when my Dad watched the guys battle it out on the course. As an adult, a charming fellow took me on my first golf date and I fell in love...with both the sport and the guy, who is now my husband and a great golfer to boot! There is something so fun about getting dressed up, heading out on the green, and taking that first swing off the tee box.

One of my first golf course experiences came from Tour 18 in Dallas where you play on carefully simulated holes modeled after some of America's greatest golf holes - think Crooked Stick #15, Sawgrass #17, Augusta National #11. I was accustomed to hitting balls at the range, but navigating a course, albeit one that has some of the toughest holes in golf, was a whole other ball game! The first hole was Cherry Hills Village #1 and I shanked my first drive. We went in cold and didn't warm up so can you blame me? Lesson learned. My next swing was a rocket and the rest is history. Hooked for life!

But enough about me...onto the homes! With the Masters Tournament looming, I got inspired to see what I could buy for $1 million in Augusta, GA - a mecca for golf's greatest moments. Although the dream of living on Augusta National's Magnolia Lane is long gone, I found some pretty spectacular properties within close proximity and shared it in my recent SecondShelters.com article "What Can I Get For a Million In...Augusta, GA?" Any takers? ​Learn more about all the homes featured in this post here.

Oh, and if you are wondering about the pimento cheese, it's a southern thing. More on that $1.50 Masters classic in a fun piece by Southern Living here.

​Cheers,

AP

Amy Puchaty is a luxury real estate writer and communications specialist whose marketing campaigns and copywriting work have appeared in numerous print and digital publications including The Wall Street Journal, Architectural Digest, Inman News, The Denver Post, and Dallas Business Journal. Why Amy Puchaty? Because it’s selling season. Follow Amy at www.amypuchaty.com #AtHomeWithAmy #AmyPuchaty #LuxuryRealEstateWriter

We have been working at a feverish pitch over here at Amy Puchaty Communications this spring! From drafting up agent bios, blogs, listing copy, and press releases for clients across Texas, Colorado, and California, to our recent editorial in LIV Magazine, the premiere publication of LIV Sotheby’s International Realty - ranked the #1 Sotheby’s International Realty affiliate in the world for sales volume – things have been busy! Check out some of our best work in a round up of what’s trending now.

LIV Magazine, Volume 4 Issue 1: Spaces with Intention
 
It was an incredible experience to tour the Denver Art House, one of three extraordinary homes featured in our LIV Magazine editorial, Spaces with Intention. Amy Puchaty also landed an interview with the architect of the home, Ji​m Olson of Seattle-based design practice Olson Kundig – also known for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Visitor Center, and Denver's new Kirkland Museum of Fine & Decorative Art. The firm is responsible for significant projects around the world as wide ranging as "huts to high rises, homes—often for art collectors—to academic, cultural and civic projects, museums and exhibition design, places of worship, creative production, urban design and interior design."

​CandysDirt.com: BREAKING! EXCLUSIVE!
We got the exclusive on a 1925 Fooshee & Cheek Spanish Colonial Revival in the treasured Greenway Parks neighborhood of Dallas, TX. Amy Puchaty was enlisted by Gretchen Brasch and Elly Holder of Briggs Freeman Sotheby’s International Realty to write the property copy, and also break the news on the #1 real estate blog in the country, CandysDirt.com. It's a beauty, filled with fresh design inspiration and modern splashes of color. If you are anything like us, you'll be gushing over this property's photos for days.

Love what you’re seeing? Amy Puchaty Communications is here to make your listing or product shine. Call us for copywriting that sells today!
 
Cheers,
 
AP
 
Amy Puchaty is a luxury real estate writer and communications specialist whose marketing campaigns and copywriting work have appeared in numerous print and digital publications including The Wall Street Journal, Architectural Digest, Inman News, The Denver Post, and Dallas Business Journal. Why Amy Puchaty? Because it’s selling season. Follow Amy at www.amypuchaty.com #AtHomeWithAmy #AmyPuchaty #LuxuryRealEstateWriter