Marketing
Selling - More Than Face to Faceby Thomas Fee
Almost all people in sales consider themselves experts in the face-to-face art of selling. There are hundreds of techniques used to close prospects. Methodologies abound on how to prospect and sell. But even with all the technology available on face-to-face selling practices, reps still manage to lose the majority of deals they compete in.
These reasons have nothing to do with their tactical skills. They are the same reasons that sales reps lose and will continue to lose sales. It is the sales reps’ default style that kills the sale. The factors that kill sales are independently or customer-driven. Working with prospects that have no compelling reason to do business. It is the lack of competitive strategy, i.e., no way to beat the competition. It is the lack of political analysis and alignment that kills the deal.
First, to be clear, let’s categorically state that there is a difference between selling and winning. Selling is tactical. Selling is what one does in the presence of a customer. One can sell and sell and still not get the deal. Ever heard the expression that someone has been “outsold”?
Winning on the other hand is based on strategy, not tactics. As the great master Sun Tzu once said, “The key to victory is not in defeating the enemy, but in defeating the enemy’s strategy.Therein lies their vulnerability” This clearly means that it is strategy, not tactics, that wins or loses confrontations.
Secondly, the prospect is not the enemy! They are the prize. The competition is the enemy. Isn't it surprising how many sales techniques completely ignore the competition? Many technique-driven methods of selling focus on how to open, gain control (of the prospect) and the fifty best ways to close. Amazingly, they tell you nothing about how to beat the competition. They make the customer appear like they were the enemy who must be overcome using a bag of tricks that the method supplies.
Thirdly, sales is unique in that the competitors never face off with one another directly. The prize is not a question of who does the most correct things or has the best solution to a problem. Instead, the issues are made more complex by the existence of an independent third party who decides the winner based upon a set of rules they make up and which they can change or not fully reveal at will.
This situation is made even more complicated by the fact that one competitor may never vie directly in the face of another. The prospect may or may not give one competitor any information about the other but are free to control the flow of information one way or both. So if it is difficult or impossible to find out about a competitor and the prospect, what standards does one apply in order to determine a winning situation?
The one caveat is that you can’t always rely on experience. Your own experience may be your worst enemy. This experience is the default style of selling that every sales rep carries with them to the opportunity. This style is the collection of practices and intuition that have served to win business in the past, so they are applied to current and future situations.
The problem is there is no guarantee that past practices will improve your chances of winning in a new situation. In addition to facing a new prospect and competitor, there are also market changes. Need one list the giant organizations gone by the way whose practices have made them dinosaurs? In The Fifth Discipline, Senge mentions a Royal Dutch Shell survey taken in 1983 which revealed that one third of the Fortune 500 from 1970 had vanished.
What can be done to improve the chances of winning? The golf pro doesn’t instruct their students to improve their game by ceasing to hit the ball. They teach them how to do it differently. It is uncomfortable, but the option is to go back to the default style, knowing that their game will never improve. So what can be done to improve the sales game? Lots of things.
Start with how to qualify accounts. Tactical-level thinking dictates that credit information, desire to buy, need, etc., are considered. And these are relevant factors. But what about you? Is there an opportunity? Should you compete? Can you win? Do you want to win?
Is there a compelling reason for the prospect to make a decision within the foreseeable future? What if they don’t? Is there a clearly defined unique business value to going with you? What are the critical success factors for the prospect to succeed? Does the prospect have a clearly defined business plan and a budgeting process to accomplish it?
More importantly, is there a way for you to get the attention of the right people? Are you able to read the politics of the sale? This is where deals are won or lost.
Finally, is this just another opportunity to sink resources into until something better comes along? Could this be the customer from hell? And wouldn’t you rather hand them off to the competition if they are?
Next, address the competition in the same way. How do they qualify, compared to you, in the same categories? Are they a better fit, product-wise or politically?
Then you must be able to determine the strategy to win. Most battles are not won with more resources but with superior strategy. Competitive strategy means you understand what the competition will do to win and how you will overcome it with a better plan. This is a double-edged sword. Beat the competition and win the prospect. Which brings us to the next critical element of winning, that of having the right plan to win the business.
This plan must be customer focused. This is not about you;, it is about the customer. That is, you must understand the prospect’s business and their problems to succeed. Your solution is simply a tool the customer can use to successfully achieve their objectives. Furthermore, you must test your plan before the competition has a chance to test it for you.
These goals are most difficult to accomplish if you have only the know-how. You must also have the know who. You must have a way of determining the political structure in the prospect organization. Do you know the most important people? Do you have access to them? Do they want you to win? Do you know who your enemies are? Remember what the Godfather said: “Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.”
Additionally, do you have a plan that will help you align with those in the political structure? Can you tie your business value to their personal success and create a competitive advantage for yourself?
Winning accounts is not just a matter of winning the face-to-face battles. The winning of a sales campaign is the combination of good tactics driven by a coherent strategy. The art of war in the marketplace demands it.
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Thomas Fee
tomfee@procentral.com
