As we welcome in the New Year, we once again participate in a familiar seasonal ritual. No, we aren’t referring to the annual “I’m hitting the gym 3 times a week ” pledge. We’re talking about setting business resolutions that will stick.

In the same spirit, one of your goals may be to improve the way sales uses content developed by marketing. There is no doubt that content management helps teams internally. And, undoubtedly, it helps prospects and customers make a purchase decision. Content management even enables teams to shorten sales cycles, and increase deal sizes and Win rates.

Here are three resolutions that will put you on course this year.

Resolution #1: Make sure content is easy to find

Sales reps spend up to 40% of their time looking for content (or writing their own), according to research by the CMO Council.

In 2017, resolve to make your sales content easier to find:

• Categorize content into buyer personas, sales pipeline stages and engagement level.
• Organize content so it will be easily found by tagging it in your content repository.
• Add notes with each touchpoint so that conversations are continuously updated.

Resolution #2: Sales/Marketing alignment

The reality is that sales reps don’t use most of the content that marketing creates. As we’ve mentioned, it may be because they can’t find what they need. But is this the whole story? Many times sales reps can find content, but choose not to use it because they think It’s ineffective and not on point.

The solution: when both marketing and sales are communicating, they are able to work within the same sets of definitions of what each lead in the pipeline means. This way, they can create content that is personalized for every prospect and customer.

• Allow both teams to work together in order to align their goals.
• Give marketing the right resources so they produce content that’s trending and contains a thought leadership angle.
• Set messages for each stage of the sales pipeline – from lead, to marketing-ready lead, sales-ready lead, opportunity and Win.

When marketing and sales teams work together, they achieve a 38% increase in closing rates and reduce customer churn.

Resolution #3: Support an engaging sales process

According to Customer Experience Insights, in today’s digital landscape, customers are looking for a more personalized buying experience. While an IBM study found that 4 out of 5 customers don’t feel companies “really know them.”

To close this gap, delivering a more engaging sales process means that sales reps should be:

• Conducting more in-depth, personalized engagement that helps to work with easily accessible content aligned with the needs of each individual buyer.
• Take advantage of the right sales enablement software so that customers can easily present that content internally to see how customers interact with it.
• Use this insight to craft more refined campaigns in the future.

Key takeaway

University of Scranton research has found that only 8% of people achieve their New Year’s resolutions. Why this massive failure? The answer is that it isn’t due to willpower – instead, it’s a matter of strategy.

Want to improve sales content management this year? Try to implement these strategies– so that in the end of the year, you reflect on how 2017 has gone and realize that you’ve achieved your goals. Is this the year you’ll make a real connection with your customers? Effective content management can get you there.