The Selling Race With Few Competitors
The Selling Race With Few Competitors
Let’s face facts, when a business is faced with a procession of suppliers who all seemingly sell the same products and provide the same levels of service, there is lots of room to ‘negotiate’ a better deal. You simply approach a supplier and tell them you will transfer purchases elsewhere if you don’t get a better price, or you offer one of your suppliers in a given area an opportunity to ‘expand their share’ ... in return for a better deal. Most suppliers will cooperate, and so businesses use purchasing pressure to achieve the purchasing pleasure of owning and profiting from the fax, mobile phone, lap top, Internet service or whatever new product or service is demanding their attention and investment.
The kinds of products and services that inspire customers to invest ‘saved’ cash have three great qualities:
They are seen as being relevant to the business aspirations of the customer
They are perceived to be valuable in helping the customer to achieve business progress
They are considered to be an absolute business priority to the customer
This is the business race with few competitors.
Only a handful of organisations offer the three key qualities listed. They do so because this is the essence of their business purpose. Such companies refuse to be motivated by mundane marketing goals.
Instead, they demand of themselves that the products or services they sell must represent opportunities to customers, and not just overheads!
And the critical point for organisations to appreciate concerning the ‘race’ in question is that the most dynamic competitors may be from completely different industries. Customers only have so much money to spend, and so the suppliers who offer relevance, value and priority are the chosen partners. Here are two examples:
* A man leaving a company had a ‘payout’ of some $30,000 and he didn’t know how to invest the money. He talked with four financial advisers and he told one of them that he was ‘in the lead’. However, the adviser who was leading did not get the business and he wanted to know who did, and it turned out none of them did! Instead the man was seduced into spending most of his payout on a pool and spa complex at home, because it would look nice, provide entertainment for the family and friends ... and would represent a sound investment. In hindsight, none of the financial advisers were in the race - in that they competed with each other for the $30,000, and not for the customer’s aspirations!
* A customer of mine finally decided to invest in a sales training programme I had recommended. In accepting my proposal, the customer said ‘I am delighted to go ahead with this idea, the only bad news is that I will have to tell the Unisys rep that we can’t run with his proposition.’ I asked what he meant and he explained that a Unisys consultant had been working with his company on a new, integrated computer system, however it was felt that my training programme was a more important investment ‘at this time’. I was quite taken back by this comment: what he was saying was that although the Unisys man and myself were from completely different industries, we were both competing for the same investment dollars!
In summary, the ‘race’ to supply is much bigger than most of will ever appreciate. We are up against competitors we can’t see and will never see, but what we must see is the ultimate needs of all customers: they need products and services that are relevant to their business aspirations; they need products and services that add offer valuable opportunities for progress; and they need to see products and services as key priorities in their quest for success. The only question that remains is this: are you in training for this kind of selling race?
The Selling Race With Few Competitors - To learn more about this author, visit John Lees's Website.
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Can you remember the day before fax machines, mobile phones, laptops and Internet services were introduced to business? You will not recall the actual days involved, but hopefully you will recollect that on those days most businesses did not have spare cash to spend on fax machines, mobile phones, lap tops and Internet services. So where did so many businesses find the cash, for find it they did? The answer of course is that they reduce or sever their expenditure in areas of purchasing that are predictable, pedestrian and plentiful; after all most businesses control their relationships with ‘suppliers’.
Let’s face facts, when a business is faced with a procession of suppliers who all seemingly sell the same products and provide the same levels of service, there is lots of room to ‘negotiate’ a better deal. You simply approach a supplier and tell them you will transfer purchases elsewhere if you don’t get a better price, or you offer one of your suppliers in a given area an opportunity to ‘expand their share’ ... in return for a better deal. Most suppliers will cooperate, and so businesses use purchasing pressure to achieve the purchasing pleasure of owning and profiting from the fax, mobile phone, lap top, Internet service or whatever new product or service is demanding their attention and investment.
The kinds of products and services that inspire customers to invest ‘saved’ cash have three great qualities:
They are seen as being relevant to the business aspirations of the customer
They are perceived to be valuable in helping the customer to achieve business progress
They are considered to be an absolute business priority to the customer
This is the business race with few competitors.
Only a handful of organisations offer the three key qualities listed. They do so because this is the essence of their business purpose. Such companies refuse to be motivated by mundane marketing goals.
Instead, they demand of themselves that the products or services they sell must represent opportunities to customers, and not just overheads!
And the critical point for organisations to appreciate concerning the ‘race’ in question is that the most dynamic competitors may be from completely different industries. Customers only have so much money to spend, and so the suppliers who offer relevance, value and priority are the chosen partners. Here are two examples:
* A man leaving a company had a ‘payout’ of some $30,000 and he didn’t know how to invest the money. He talked with four financial advisers and he told one of them that he was ‘in the lead’. However, the adviser who was leading did not get the business and he wanted to know who did, and it turned out none of them did! Instead the man was seduced into spending most of his payout on a pool and spa complex at home, because it would look nice, provide entertainment for the family and friends ... and would represent a sound investment. In hindsight, none of the financial advisers were in the race - in that they competed with each other for the $30,000, and not for the customer’s aspirations!
* A customer of mine finally decided to invest in a sales training programme I had recommended. In accepting my proposal, the customer said ‘I am delighted to go ahead with this idea, the only bad news is that I will have to tell the Unisys rep that we can’t run with his proposition.’ I asked what he meant and he explained that a Unisys consultant had been working with his company on a new, integrated computer system, however it was felt that my training programme was a more important investment ‘at this time’. I was quite taken back by this comment: what he was saying was that although the Unisys man and myself were from completely different industries, we were both competing for the same investment dollars!
In summary, the ‘race’ to supply is much bigger than most of will ever appreciate. We are up against competitors we can’t see and will never see, but what we must see is the ultimate needs of all customers: they need products and services that are relevant to their business aspirations; they need products and services that add offer valuable opportunities for progress; and they need to see products and services as key priorities in their quest for success. The only question that remains is this: are you in training for this kind of selling race?
The Selling Race With Few Competitors - To learn more about this author, visit John Lees's Website.
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Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
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Linda RichardsonLinda Richardson is the Founder and Executive Chairwoman of Richardson, a global sales training and performance improvement company. As a recognized leader in the industry, she has won the coveted Stevie Award for Lifetime Achievement in Sales Excellence and she was identified by Training Industry, Inc. as one of the “Top 20 Most Influential Training Professionals.” Ms. Richardson is credited with the movement to Consultative Selling and is the author of ten books on selling and sales management, including Sales Coaching — Making the Great Leap from Sales Manager to Sales Coach, and Stop Telling, Start Selling. She teaches sales and management at the Wharton Graduate School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Wharton Executive Development Center. Linda is a frequent speaker at industry and client conferences, has been published extensively in industry and training journals, and has been featured in numerous publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Nation’s Business, Selling Power, Success, and The Conference Board Magazine. Learn more about Richardson's sales training and performance improvement solutions at http://www.richardson.com web - Visit Linda Richardson's Website |
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George LudwigGeorge Ludwig is a recognized authority on sales strategy and peak performance psychology. An international speaker, trainer, and corporate consultant, he helps clients like Johnson & Johnson, Abbott Laboratories, Northwestern Mutual, CIGNA, and numerous others improve sales force effectiveness and performance. Though it's George's strategies and processes that help corporations increase productivity and performance, it's his tremendous energy and dynamism that spark the transformation. Again and again, clients remark on his amazing ability to unleash human capacity and inspire men and women to break out of their comfort zones. The result is a whole new type of salesperson. His customized presentations teach achievers to make stunning advances in their lives. From helping salespeople realize cherished dreams to helping corporations exponentially accelerate revenue streams, George Ludwig leaves audiences and individuals empowered, emboldened, and clamoring for more. George is the best-selling author of Power Selling: Seven Strategies for Cracking the Sales Code and Wise Moves: 60 Quick Tips to Improve Your Position in Life & Business. - Visit George Ludwig's Website |
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John PowerJohn Power, founder of Biltmore Franchise Consulting, has extensive experience developing and marketing franchises and business opportunities. He has been in and around franchising for over twenty years. From 1980 through 1990 he conceptualized, organized, and developed the American Video Association. He grew AVA to 2,000 national members, before selling the company it 1990. It was later merged into another home video marketing company. From 2000 to 2005 he worked as a contract marketing and human resources consultant to several local and national companies. In 2005 Mr. Power began working as a franchise development consultant on a full-time basis. Since that time he has helped more than three dozen companies initiate and develop their franchising program. He notes that there are many companies interested in developing a franchise program, and who need his specialized assistance. Mr. Power is a “hands-on” franchise consultant. He said, “I am the ‘nuts and bolts’ person who tends to the details for my clients.” Mr. Power holds a B.S. degree with a major in Marketing. See: www.biltmorefranchise.com You may contact Mr. Power at: jpower@biltmorefranchise.co - Visit John Power's Website |
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Staging DivaDebra Gould, aka The Staging Diva®, is President of Six Elements Inc., an internationally recognized home staging company. Inspired by many requests from aspiring home stagers wanting to start similar businesses, Gould created the Staging Diva Home Staging Business Training Program. Gould has trained over 1000 Staging Diva Graduates worldwide to start staging businesses. Buying decorating and selling six of her own homes in four years lead to an interest in real estate staging which she turned into a career with the launch of sixelements.com in 2002. Since then she has staged hundreds of homes in addition to teaching home staging training. Gould is the author of several home staging resources including a series of popular ebooks made up of a Design Guide, Color Guide and Portfolio Guide. For more information about Debra Gould visit stagingdiva.com. - Visit Staging Diva's Website |
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Jay Kubassek(Jay's Full Bio: EvanCarmichael.com/jaykubassek) In five years, Canadian-born entrepreneur Jay Kubassek went from selling mufflers at a Midas franchise to revolutionizing Internet marketing with the 2004 launch of CarbonCopyPRO, a online marketing education company, now worth over $20 million with customers in over 160 countries.
As an independent film producer, his upstart film fund Aliquot Films is currently producing a films with Spike Lee and Abel Fererra (starring Ethan Hawke and Dennis Hopper.)
Jay's entrepreneurial spirit is irrepressible. He’s the owner of five companies, a professional speaker and trainer, international real estate developer/investor, extreme sport enthusiast and emerging philanthropist. Jay resides in NYC with his wife Jamie, son Milo and dog Cooper. Visit Jay's official website: www.JayKubassek.com - Visit Jay Kubassek's Website |
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