Enterprises have dramatically changed their buying practices in recent years. Have you changed your sales approach accordingly?
Buying organisations are much better informed. They do not want salespeople educating them. They don't want to spend time answering a string of questions. In fact they want to spend less time with salespeople - see
McKinsey's Research Paper. But when they do meet with a salesperson they want value delivered every time "or don't waste my time".
If suppliers are not adapting to this they may lose considerable business. How can suppliers respond?
One way is to review and update your selling methods - there are new sales methods being implemented to help adapt to the buyer changes -
The Challenger Sale and
RSVP Selling just to name two. The implementation of these methods by salespeople require considerable support from their organisation. New sales tools might need to be considered as well.
The following interview John Smibert discusses the buyer changes in more depth and explores some of the sales methods and tools you can deploy to respond positively.
Interview of John Smibert by Don Easter, IT Supplier Advocate, Australian Federal Government.