The Marketing-Sales-Finance Triangle

This thesis addresses important research gaps in the literature on the marketing-finance interface. While there have been considerable research activities on marketing-finance topics such as marketing assets or marketing metrics, only few scholars have looked at the organizational interface between marketing and finance. We know surprisingly little about how marketing, sales, and finance units actually work together within organizations. In his PhD thesis Dirk Weissbrich chooses a qualitative research design to gain insight into this unknown organizational phenomenon. Drawing on 78 face-to-face interviews with managers from marketing, sales, and finance in 42 companies, the author develops a better understanding of the organizational link between marketing, sales, and finance units. Specifically, Dirk Weissbrich makes three major research contributions. First, the author introduces the idea of the marketing-sales-finance triangle and explores eight finance-related key interaction fields and decision areas: (1) Plans & Budgets, (2) Reports & Analyses, (3) Cost Optimization, (4) Calculations & Investment Management, (5) Financial Accounting, (6) Debtor Management, (7) Compliance & Risk Management, and (8) Pricing. The author describes in detail how marketing, sales, and finance cooperate in each key interaction field and decision area. Second, the author discusses each function’s value added to the respective interaction field and decision area in the marketing-sales-finance-triangle. On the basis of these interaction field specific insights, a more general picture on the role of each function in the marketing-sales-finance triangle is developed.