A serious selling challenge: to conform to the market…or to transform the market

In simple but also serious terms, if your sales approach ‘conforms’ to both market expectations and the behaviour of most suppliers (from any industry), then you are in danger of offering something that means nothing to customers and prospects. The selling conduct of most sales people, and consultants for that matter, is unstructured, undisciplined and unproductive. The majority of companies spend more time, effort and money on the creation of websites and advertisements, than they do on ensuring that their sales people are incisive and decisive.

Making this sad scenario much worse is the fact that nearly all sales people have ‘propositions’ to sell that are void of a real promise to improve the market’s situation. Telling prospects all about your company, your range of products, the various ‘values’ that the organization holds dear, etc., is the equivalent of sedating customers and prospects! When you go to see an eminent doctor, he or she has a framed reference on the wall displaying their credentials, not a slide show with endless bullet points…which seems to be the preferred ‘display’ for companies on the prowl. In order to make the market sit up and take notice, it is critical to quickly go through five stages:

1. A brief introduction of the person and the company, with the promise to ‘fill in details later’                                                                            2. An acknowledgement of [likely] current satisfaction with existing buying arrangements and relationships                                                               3. A promise to look for opportunities to create serious improvement in results for the prospect, and not an attempt to ‘make a case for changing supply arrangements to achieve slight progress’                                                 4. An ‘official’ service to offer that enables the sales person to perform an assessment that is aligned with the ‘promise’ of looking for much better results, supported by evidence that such a service has helped other customers                                                                   5. The execution of the ‘assessment service’ to determine if much better results can be achieved

The five stages listed represent a professional effort to ‘transform’ the ways in which business is conducted, from start to finish. I would even add that words such as these should be used at stage 3: ‘otherwise we appreciate that we do not deserve an interview, let alone the opportunity to become a supplier to your business.’

The other key factor, at stage 4., should involve a consulting device that can be seen by the prospect and used by the sales person, a device that makes it clear that the sales person’s company is serious and prepared to perform the performance assessment ‘promised’ (remember, ‘talking is silver, showing is gold!’). One such device that I recommend to organizations is called A 20, referring to an Assessment service that will aim to achieve at least a 20% improvement in results for the prospect. Inside the simple consulting document bearing the title A 20 is a list of key questions to be asked by the sales person, aimed at learning how the customer (and their supplier, without mentioning the supplier) are currently ‘doing things’. As the customer/prospect answers the questions, the sales person records the responses in one of three columns: average, above average and best. If there are 15 questions and most of the answers are in columns one and two, then the sales person knows that there is a strong chance for his company to produce better results…by ‘doing things’ best, according to the third column. At that point the sales person can either present the ‘best’ solution, or if more time is needed to prepare a formal presentation, then the proposal offered must focus on your capability to specialise in third column action.