Sign spinners on the street corners: enthusiastic, colorful, hard to ignore. We notice them trying to draw in the lunch crowd, advertise tax services, or convince us to get a car wash. And....to capture the attention of lawmakers? What?

The Economic Security Project, a nonprofit, recently took to the steps of the Capitol – and other major political locations – spinning signs to draw attention to the need for another government check for cash-strapped families. It was a pretty big departure from their usual tactics: pressing the flesh at the Rayburn or Russell buildings or delivering petitions signed by thousands to elected leaders in person. But it achieved its intended effect: drawing attention to an issue affecting millions of struggling Americans.

Marketing and sales in the time of COVID has never felt trickier; we can't do the normal things we know work in normal times. It's not a normal time (how many times have we heard that in the last six months?). But that change also opens the door for us to rethink how we do marketing and sales in a pretty dramatic way (as the folks at the Economic Security Project can tell you). In my conversations with CMOs at B2B companies, the refrain I hear over and over again is that marketing and sales must have better alignment right now to do that.