Has the state of being a sales person changed since I was last on the front line? For the past month, we’ve been sitting through countless vendor presentations listening to why X product and/or service should be:
- On the ubiquitous “Homepage”
- Emailed to everyone in our electronic database in a stand-alone email.
- First thing the agents should offer
- Heavily incentified to the consumer to buy
- Countless other suggestions/pitches without knowing a darn thing about our business
It seems that companies invest very little today in understanding a prospective customer’s complex business environment before offering a product. What happened to the consulting part of sales? The one that asks a laundry list of questions that makes the prospect feel like they want to help our business processes succeed vs offering a product to alleviate pain X which, quite possibly, could have a lot of political, cultural, and, at the very least, budgetary restrictions or challenges.
With 5+ industries represented under one roof, I have vendors who are competing with many well established relationships not only within their own sector but across very unique business categories. For instance, one financial service provider fights for the same ears and dollars trying to solve how to sell more auto insurance policies for 6 different companies. 6 Auto insurance companies are fighting for space with 10+ cruise lines. 10+ different cruise lines believe that they each are the only vendor that should be considered the number one focus for the organization. At the end of the day, I’m looking to a vendor to understand where they fall within, not only their own category, but within our decision set as to how we’re offering products and service to our customer. Pushing their product is not going to change the fundamental core of how we train our own staff to conduct business.
A good sales person requires perseverance but only in the sense that they need to prove their commitment to understanding their prospects business endeavors, environment, complexities and yes, pain points that they may be able to alleviate. Relationships are built on trust and that trust is earned over time and multiple conversations. It will not be won by offering a lower price point, bigger commissions, or by offering additional product training for the front line.
It feels like the economic times have created desperation which leads to poor salesmanship and, in the long-run, performance. We need to get back to the basics of sales and use the tools to build relationships that will be more profitable in the end. Technology has made great strides in the last 10 years to begin the quest of learning more about your customer before even stepping foot in the door.
If I were going back into direct sales, I’d connect with my contact(s) on LinkedIn. I would read about your company, about your background and credibility/expertise, maybe check out your blog, and possibly get to know a little about your personality from reading your posts on Twitter. Not that I will do all of these things, but if I were a smart sales person, I’d at least go into a conversation feeling more comfortable about my approach with you. How lucky are we today in the sales environment? Typically, we would have spent countless hours of warm calling, small talking over coffee, or in very mundane office visits only to feel like we were being herded out as quickly as we came in. Take advantage of what’s out there and be creative in understanding your prospective customer. The effort will go a long way.
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