Sales Chump

What do you do when the sale comes down to price? First, you should probably ask yourself, “How did I let it come to price?”

In basic economics class, we learn the sprit of capitalism. Charge what the market will bear. This means that if find a diamond on the ground and pick it up, that I shouldn’t simply sell it for $1.00 just because it was free to me. The object has value and it is entirely fair and ethical for me to charge what the market “buyers” will pay me for it. Even, if that means selling it for thousands of dollars!

Before going into your presentation and talking 80% of the time, ask them lots of questions first. You want to know what their situation is, how long it’s been that way and what they want to accomplish with you or any other vendor. Is your product or service a part of a larger strategy that you may possible to offer something entirely different?

By uncovering the needs of the prospect, you are creating value. This accomplishes two major wins in your direction. 1, the customer is thinking about their situation being better with your product or service and 2, they are beginning to believe that you are sincere in helping them look good to their superiors. Even top executives have to answer to someone (i.e.: shareholders) and everyone wants to look good to those they answer to.

When you are asked, “How much is it?” or “What’s your price?” you should confidently tell the prospect the amount. Do not hesitate, obviously the prospect will sense your uncertainty and will lose confidence with you and worst of all, your offer. Customers buy from people they trust and like. Even in a bid situation, the customer will feel better about paying a higher price, if they believe in you. Sell value, not price.

This poem is from Jill Konrath’s Selling to Big Companies:

       The Buyer’s Lament

Don’t waste my time, please go away.
I will not talk with you today.
You call me up, you want to sell.
But all you do is tell, tell, tell.

I do not want to hear your spiel.
I will not play let’s make a deal.
So listen up, take my advice.
Discover how you can entice.

If you aspire to earn my trust,
Research is an absolute must.
Know my goals, the issues I face.
Use this to build your business case.

What have you done for firms like mine?
How have you helped their bottom line?
Can you cut my costs or help me grow?
Now that’s the info I want to know.

If you can help me solve my plight,
I’m wide open to fresh insight.
I need to find new perspectives
So I can reach my objectives.

Want me to remember your name?
Launch an account entry campaign.
Ten contacts is what it may take,
When there’s so much business at stake.

Just think of this next time you phone
And you’ll get past my no-entry zone,
Once you get your foot in the door,
I guarantee you’ll sell lots more!

This is my own personal success story.  This sale didn’t look like it was coming in at all even though I completed a full sales process and everything made sense.  I was getting a little flustered as it didn’t make sense to me why they weren’t signing the paperwork.  I had to take a new look on the prospect and think to myself “What am I missing? Why haven’t they signed yet?”

The answer wasn’t the standard reasoning.  They liked the product, they trusted me, it saved them money and made sense.  The reason was I hadn’t related to what was going on in their business.  I called on a Monday and my goal was to figure out what was going on with them, what was at the top of their priority list.

Come to find out they were back logged with year end reporting and had just received September reports in December.  I immediately changed my tone and my approach with this.  I showed sincere thoughts about what the person must be going through with this backed up paperwork they had to sift through.

I said “I can only imagine what your desk must look like right now.  I apologize that I’ve been trying to get you to look at something like this at a time where you have many more important things to get done first. I know you’re going to have to get this paperwork for your other reports done before the holidays before even taking a look at my paperwork so I’ll contact you after the holidays and give you a chance to get caught up”.

Low and behold, the next day I had my agreement delivered the next morning.  It was unexpected.  What caused this to happen?  The sincere approach about was important to them got my paperwork moved to the top of the list.  They realized I didn’t care just about myself that I had genuine interest in what goes on in there business and was willing to push my items to the back burner while they took care of things that were more high priority.  This in return resulted in getting attention.

Now this approach doesn’t always work and wouldnt’ be something that you should try out of the gate.  But when you’ve done everything else and they want to do business with you, sometimes taking a step back and letting them know that you aren’t desperate for their business can have the reverse effect and have them pushing you.  In this instance it worked.

There are certain consistencies that you can find amongst the majority of successful people. They plan, act, revise and repeat. There’s an old adage that says, “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail…” With the recent happenings of the financial crisis and bankruptcy scares of just about every major industry, these words have never rung truer.

In order for a plan to work, it must be realistic and adaptable. If you don’t have these two attributes incorporated into you plan, you might as well not have a plan. The ability to adapt along the way gives you power. There is no doubt that changes will have to be made. There will also be times that you just can’t change something. In this case, focus your energies on what is possible and don’t get caught up and what you can’t change. It’s the end result that matters the most, not the turns and speed bumps along the way.

“The ends justify the means…” – Machiavelli, The Prince

Sales can be lowest paying easy work, but it is also the highest paying hard work. Planning to make a lot of money in sales? You better work hard, because there is always someone who is ready, willing and able to work a bit harder. Time management and planning is what will make you or break you. The bar is always raised a little bit the more successful you and others become. You must learn not only what is working, but the why, when, where and how.

Anyone can have a stellar month, quarter, year, etc. But, in order to survive in a sales environment and make a successful career out of it, you must plan, act, revise and repeat. Planning makes the hard work easier and acting teaches you what to change and what to keep doing for success. By acting on a solid plan, you can justify to yourself, peers and bosses why you are successful or not. By revising it along the way, you make your plan stronger and by repeating the new plan, you have strong recipe for success. Book It!!!

“What are you doing right this second to reach your goals?” – The Negotiator

We see it all along the internet but what does it mean?  B2B Sales (Business to Business) can be defined from Wikipedia as:

Business-to-business (B2B) is a term commonly used to describe commerce transactions between businesses, as opposed to those between businesses and other groups, such as business-to-consumers (B2C) or business-to-government (B2G). More specifically, B2B is often used to describe an activity, such as B2B marketing, or B2B sales, that occurs between businesses and other businesses.

Depending on your industry your primary contact may be with other businesses (B2B Sales).  There is nothing wrong with B2C (Business to Consumer) sales but we will focus on selling to other businesses for a moment.  The type of buyer is different.  There are different needs that motivate each and within each different business there are different motivators or needs that will cause a business to buy.

I will sound like a broken record but it is important to realize what is important to the business when selecting the service that you offer.  Do you make it about price?  Well you should stop making it about price.

A consulting firm I know surveyed 1000 Canadian CEO’s two years ago. They asked: “What are the criteria you look at when making a buying decision. The first criterion was “trust”. Number six on the list was “price”.

There you have it, price is not a deciding factor in most circumstances.  While there are ultimate times where price is a factor, there are several other things.  As above, trust is a big concern.  It looks to me that if the person you’re dealing with trusts you, the price is the least of their worries.

So how do we figure out what compels them to make their decision?  We ask!  Yes it really is that simple.  If you don’t ask, they won’t tell. 

B2B Sales is normally a longer sales cycle than B2C due to the fact that you’re working with businesses rather than individuals.  Now that’s not always going to be true depending on the industry, customer, etc.  There will be short sales cycles time to time but be prepared for longer sales cycles with businesses.

What has worked for me in the past is not even talking business the first couple times.  Get to know the business and the person you’re working with and gain their trust.  This is the first step to a successfull B2B Sales process.  As stated above, trust was the top concern of buyers and can normally wipe out the idea of price being a factor.  Price is only an issue when you make it one.

We’ll hit many other topics in this multi part postings of B2B Sales over the next several weeks.  Please reply with topics or areas that you would like covered in this multi part saga covering B2B Sales.