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Help Buyers Buy: Facilitate The Buy Path, Then Sell

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Your solution is the last thing a buyer needs. Literally.

The sales model is a solution placement model. It does a fine job assessing needs, pitching, presenting, and placing solutions. Yet we close no more than 7% of prospects from first call, spend huge amounts of money creating presentations, sites, and marketing materials bring that in a fraction of the business they were designed to, spend inordinate amounts of resource responding to RFPs that fail, and attempting to make appointments with prospects who either reject us or don’t buy. We waste at least 90% of a sales professional’s time. As a result we hire more people and set our budgets accordingly.

We have great solutions. Our sales folks are professionals. What’s the problem?

The problem is that buyers don’t buy the way we sell. In fact, a purchase is the last step buyers take along their buy path, and we sit and wait for them to traverse their steps without having the proper skills to influence their journey from the start.

A Buying Decision is a Change Management Problem

To understand how buyers buy, we must understand systems and change. Buying anything, from a shirt to a company, a training program or a piece of software, is a change management activity. Something that has existed, and worked well-enough for a period of time, will be replaced by a relatively unknown entity. Change. And change is systemic: anything that touches the new element will be affected in an unknown way and potentially mess up the system. And systems won’t abide by disruption; we learned that in 6th grade chemistry.

Like all of us, buyers live in systems; everything within them chugs along together like a set of gears so the system remains stable. Stability – the status quo – gets maintained with rules and processes and job descriptions and relationships. Whatever doesn’t fit within the system gets chucked out because the system is sacrosanct. When there is a problem, the system creates workarounds so it can continue functioning; the problem then becomes part of the tapestry of the system. Only when there is no other option will the buyer face the potential disruption of bringing in something that is outside the system.

In order for buyers to buy and be willing to have something foreign enter their system, they need to first manage systemic change: they must get buy-in for the change, design new rules or roles, replace the old solution in a way that insures equilibrium is maintained, and last but not least, involve the managers, department heads, and sundry people who will touch the ultimate solution – folks not necessarily direct stakeholders or decision makers, but folks whose jobs will be effected by the change. Without managing this change, they will buy nothing, regardless of their need or the efficacy of your solution.

A buying decision is a systems problem. And sales acts as if the buyer’s problem were an isolated event.

Buying Includes a 13 Step Buy-in Change Process

There are unique change management issues that must be addressed before a purchase can occur. Indeed: until there is a clear path to change, there is no way to even know who is a prospect; before every appropriate voice is assembled and heard, there is no way to define a need. As outsiders focused on placing solutions, we have no ability to enter into the buyer’s environment and facilitate these activities because they are idiosyncratic and personal. And the time it takes them to figure out how to manage the backend change is the length of the sales cycle.

We’re currently entering at the end of the decision path: the very last thing a buyer needs is your solution. The last thing. But we can enter earlier. Here’s what we should be facilitating that is currently outside our purview and skill sets:

1. All – ALL – who will touch the new solution must have their voices heard. Usually it takes buyers a while to understand who must be included on the Buying Decision Team. In a small sale, it’s easier than a larger sale, but the process is the same.

It’s possible to facilitate our buyers in both assembling the full Buying Decision Team on the first or second call, and their discovery of the types of systems change they would need to address. They have to do this anyway: helping them speeds up the buying process and gets everyone at the table for an appointment.

2. Before a purchase, every element that would be disrupted needs to know how to compensate for change: tech folks must figure out their new scheduling or find outsourced support; sales and marketing must have a unified strategy to share budget; HR must get the right groups together, etc. It’s unique in each situation, although totally independent of need.
Sellers can use a facilitation model to navigate buyers through their change before they sell, so all areas that will be affected will know how to manage the change and be ready to buy. This speeds up the sales cycles and makes the seller a part of the Team.

9 out of the 13 steps in a buying decision involve systems change and include idiosyncratic, historic, and personal activities. Using only the sales model or marketing, a seller has no place at the table until it’s time to choose a solution. But we’re missing great opportunities to become real relationship managers and trusted advisors and suffering much longer sales cycles than necessary.

Use Buying Facilitation® with Sales

Selling and buying are two different activities. Change the way you are entering. Stop:

  • pitching, presenting, or discussing solutions before buyers have defined their route to change;
  • trying to get an appointment until the entire Buying Decision Team is assembled;
  • assuming because you’ve spoken to one or two people there is a need;
  • assuming that because there’s a need it’s a prospect;
  • basing your sale on your solution;
  • basing your sale on price (it has nothing to do with anything).

Instead, before selling:

  • facilitate excellence and buy-in, from the first call with the gatekeeper;
  • be a neutral navigator throughout the steps of change;
  • help assemble the complete Buying Decision Team (even for a small sale) with you on it;
  • recognize when a system cannot change and when it’s no longer a prospect (it’s got nothing to do with needing your solution).

Buyers don’t need you: they need to solve a business problem. And the business problem involves more of a solution than just your product. It’s time to help buyer’s buy.

About the Author

Sharon Drew Morgen is founder of Morgen Facilitations, Inc. (www.newsalesparadigm.com). She is the visionary behind Buying Facilitation®, the decision facilitation model that enables people to change with integrity. A pioneer who has spoken about, written about, and taught the skills to help buyers buy, she is the author of the acclaimed New York Times Business Bestseller Selling with Integrity and Dirty Little Secrets: Why buyers can’t buy and sellers can’t sell and what you can do about it.

Need help developing content, tools, training or questions that will enable a buyer’s buying decision process? A speaker at your next conference? Contact Sharon Drew at [email protected] or visit her website: www.buyingfacilitation.com.

Salespeople have questions. Jeffrey has answers.

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I get a ton of emails from people seeking insight or asking me to solve their sales dilemmas. Here are a few that may relate to your job, your life, and (most important) your sales thought process right now.

Jeffrey, Years ago I took your advice to get into Twitter for my business. What do you think of only paid clients having access to tweets through an approved followers account? Mike

Mike, If you do it that way you need two accounts. One that you give to everybody in the world and one that you give just to an elite group of people. And if you do the elite group of people, notate on your Twitter page that, “This is for my clients only. All others, if you’re looking for this great advice, you have to become a client of mine. Here’s how…” And use it as a lead source. Best regards, Jeffrey

Jeffrey, Do you think it’s a waste of time to call a guest that has just checked out of my hotel to thank him or her for staying with us? What would be the best way to gain their repeat business? Evangeline

Evangeline, If you’re going to call a customer after they’ve stayed in your hotel, first of all, you better make it short and sweet. Second of all, the value must be for them. Don’t ask something like “How was your stay?” because they’re going to say, “Fine.” I want to know what the best thing about their stay at the hotel was. Did the hotel accomplish their goals? Oh, that’s cool. On a scale of 1-10, how was the food? On a scale of 1-10, how was the shower? On a scale of 1-10, what was the quality of your room like? On a scale of 1-10, how fast was the Internet? Those are the things that bug customers. I’m in hotels 250 nights a year. They’re the ones that bug me. So get those things. Get their opinion, based on a scale, or based on some words, not just “How was it? It was fine.” Don’t pat people on the head and ask a bunch of stupid questions. Get them engaged. And then you can say, “Well when are you coming back?” That’s all you need. Jeffrey

Jeffrey, When I send out quotes and proposals, clients seem to take their time reviewing the information and completely disregard the respond by date on the quote. I feel clients don’t respect this time frame and, in addition, I feel that we, as salespeople, end up on the defensive explaining why we’re following up. I feel clients today want everything for nothing, expect the best from a company, and yet, they just do not seem to care about the value of what they’ve requested. How do you know when to just give up on a client like that and move on? Aaron

Aaron, Clients want everything? Give them everything! Clients want value in the proposal? Put value in the proposal! Leave your prices out of the proposal so they have to call you to get it. “Oh, prices? Yea, you have to call me for those.” Come on, use your head. You’re not sending a quote out, you’re building a relationship and the quote is basically something that confirms the sale. What are you doing with your time? And don’t cast yourself with a bunch of other salespeople. This is you. Don’t be defensive when you’re following up. Do you know what a total waste of time that is and you look like a jerk, literally. Be offensive. Explain more reasons why they should buy. Talk about their motive. Talk about their value. You don’t even know why they want to buy. You’re just sending out a proposal on a wing and a prayer and hoping. Not good. Best regards, Jeffrey

Jeffrey, I’ve recently moved into cruise sales. I find that customers in the travel industry shop for prices but after the prices are given the customer will disappear before any real discussion takes place. How can I turn these prospects into a sale? Ben

Ben, The first thing you want to do is get to a real discussion before you give the price. Find out why they want to take a cruise. Is it a honeymoon? Is it a 10-year anniversary? Is it just for the heck of it? What are they trying to do? At the end of the cruise what do they want to have happen? What do they want the outcome of that cruise to be? That’s their emotional trigger for buying. And I want to know about the best cruise they’ve ever been on? I want to know if this is their first cruise or their 100th cruise.

I want to assure them my cruise may not be the actual lowest price but it’s always the best value, because when people get off a cruise, they’re going to remember three things:

  1. What happened? Did anything go wrong?
  2. How was the food?
  3. What did they do? How was the view like if they went by the mountains? What were the ports like if they were adventurous?

So Ben, your job in this process is to uncover all their stuff before you give the price and set a firm meeting – I mean a firm meeting, a day and a time, not like early next week; Monday at 1:30PM – to talk to them after you give the price so you can reconnect. Got it? Best regards, Jeffrey

Reprinted with permission from Jeffrey H. Gitomer and Buy Gitomer.

About the Author

Jeffrey GitomerJeffrey Gitomer is the author of The Sales Bible, Customer Satisfaction is Worthless Customer Loyalty is Priceless, The Little Red Book of Selling, The Little Red Book of Sales Answers, The Little Black Book of Connections, The Little Gold Book of YES! Attitude, The Little Green Book of Getting Your Way, The Little Platinum Book of Cha-Ching, The Little Teal Book of Trust, The Little Book of Leadership, and Social BOOM! His website, www.gitomer.com, will lead you to more information about training and seminars, or email him personally at [email protected].

Old way or new way? Only one way works. My way.

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The old way of selling is dead.

The only people who don’t know that are other sales trainers, recently released old-world sales tactics books that are still trying to convey old messages, and several million salespeople still trying to cold call, pitch the product, overcome objections, and close the sale. Don’t forget their managers who force them to use an uncomfortable ‘system,’ a non-sales helpful CRM, and hold their salespeople accountable for their actions and numbers. It’s over. Dead and over.

What killed it?
Who killed it?

The internet and its immediate access to any information – including one’s reputation – the economy, Google and online searchability in general, social media, smart phones, one-click buying, Amazon feedback and other ratings sites, and smarter customers and consumers both B2B and B2C. WOW!

The online and smartphone evolution has become a sales and selling revolution.

The NEW big picture of selling is quite simple. Here’s what to train and teach your salespeople:

  • Teach why people buy rather than how to sell. My mantra and trademarked phrase is, People don’t like to be sold, but they LOVE to buy.
  • Teach customer loyalty, not customer satisfaction. Customers may never be satisfied but will continue to do business with you based on your perceived value.
  • Teach salespeople to ‘ask’ questions about the customer rather than ‘tell’ about their product. The old way of selling doesn’t work anymore. And no one is more aware of that than an informed customer.
  • Teach salespeople to be responsible for their actions instead of being accountable for their activity.

Here are 4.5 NEW ways of thinking, acting and selling responsibly:

1. FIND THEIR WHY. Uncover your customer’s intentions and motives for purchase before or during your sales presentation. Do online searches for why they might buy, and ask emotionally revealing questions. Their ‘why’ is your order.

2. TALK ABOUT THEIR OUTCOME. Share with him or her how they produce more and profit more AFTER purchase. Explain what happens after they take ownership Talk about how they win, not a bunch of boring crap about you that the customer could have found in less than two seconds on Google.

3. PROVE YOUR VALUE. Get several of your existing (best) customers to do video testimonials to corroborate your claims. When you say it about yourself it’s bragging, when others say it about you it is proof. Voice of customer is the proof you need to convert selling to buying.

4. DEVELOP AND MAINTAIN A PRISTINE REPUTATION. Not just your company and your products – you personally. Information and reputation arrives before you do. Google yourself right now. That’s what your customer sees before you arrive.

4.5 BEWARE AND BE AWARE OF THE INTERNET. It has changed and continues to change the face of selling, and the lives (not to mention the incomes) of salespeople. EXAMPLES: Retail sales, banking, trading stocks, buying cars, traveling, and, most important, the ability to research the opinions and outcomes of others. Get internet savvy. Get internet fluent. Then stay there.

A few months ago I wrote about the difference between aggressive selling and assertive selling. That difference is pivotal in the company’s philosophy of selling, salesperson’s method of selling, and the customer’s decision to buy your product or service.

Here is the CliffsNotes™ version of the difference:

  • Aggressive salespeople ‘tell.’
  • Assertive salespeople ‘ask.’
  • Aggressive salespeople ‘go for the sale.’
  • Assertive salespeople ‘go for the customer.’

Aggressive salespeople sell the old way. They talk, they brag, they give a demo, they manipulate to close the sale, they send proposals, and in general they fight. They fight to get an appointment, they fight price, they fight competition, and they fight for the sale – a sale that even if they win they have lost profit.

The assertive presentation challenges you, the salesperson, to bring forth a combination of your knowledge and value as it relates to customer needs as well as a superior ability to connect both verbally and nonverbally with the person or the group you’re addressing.

You’ll know your assertive strategy is working when the customer or the prospective customer begins asking questions to get a deeper understanding about the value and difference your product or service offers. This changes monologue to dialogue and creates the power of engagement, or should I say assertive engagement.

A FEW MORE WORDS OF CAUTION: The new way of selling requires more work on the part of the salesperson. More research, more preparation, more knowledge, better presentation skills, more value differentiation, and more proof.

This accentuates my rule of, ‘the more the more.’ The more research, preparation, knowledge, enthusiastic presentation skills, value differentiation, and proof you bring to the sales presentation, the more sales you will make.

Which type of salesperson are you?

Reprinted with permission from Jeffrey H. Gitomer and Buy Gitomer.

About the Author

Jeffrey GitomerJeffrey Gitomer is the author of The Sales Bible, Customer Satisfaction is Worthless Customer Loyalty is Priceless, The Little Red Book of Selling, The Little Red Book of Sales Answers, The Little Black Book of Connections, The Little Gold Book of YES! Attitude, The Little Green Book of Getting Your Way, The Little Platinum Book of Cha-Ching, The Little Teal Book of Trust, The Little Book of Leadership, and Social BOOM! His website, www.gitomer.com, will lead you to more information about training and seminars, or email him personally at [email protected].

The Big Picture of Business – Community Relations and Cause Related Marketing Are Business Strategies, Not Sales Promotions: Determining the Right Kind of Tie-In Causes.

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Business marries the community that it settles with. The community has to be given a reason to care for the business. Business owes its well-being and livelihood to its communities.

I recently stopped for lunch at a franchise restaurant. Nobody was at the register. A crew member told me to wait, then later took my order. She started selling donations to some cause, which I declined. When the regular cashier returned, I saw her peddling donation sales. People were blindly making donations, without understanding what they supported. The sales of those promotional pieces caused the line to grow out of the restaurant door. People were just buying the promotion in order to get through the line.

I support cause related marketing and have advised many corporations on setting up such programs. However, peddling sales to some ‘foundation’ that is named after your product and which supports only one cause is not appropriate. The store was littered with stickers. The process of selling the stickers made the waiting line longer. As a result, the iced tea had run out, and nobody checked it.

I went to their website, where franchise chains allege they want customer comments. I stated, “Having a foundation to support the community across the board is great. Who is to say that a sales promotion tied directly to your products is right? I say it is not, and I’m an expert on cause-related marketing. You people need to revise your service lines. Peddling the sales of stickers in a tackily littered store is inappropriate. I’m gravely concerned about this practice of badgering customers in support of some phantom charity; how this store does it is not right.”

The franchise owner later called. He talked all over me in a defensive manner. His voice was high-pressure, probably the result of sales training classes. Rather than addressing my concerns, he rifled over them and questioned my ability to assess community relations. I asked if he had ever heard of Thousand Points of Light. He said no. I explained what it was and that I was an adviser to the President of the United States in fostering the program. Still, he questioned my interest in community relations.

“We’re a franchise,” he admitted. “This was dictated to us by corporate. I’m sorry that you feel that way because we do so much good. You’re invited to attend when we present the donation.” I replied, “No, I’m not going to be a prop in your photo opportunity, for you to sell product.” I reminded him that it was customer donations that enabled the attention, not a corporate initiative for which they were taking the credit.

He was not listening. He was simply rationalizing a corporate marketing initiative. So too was the corporate person who later called to argue with me for daring to state my opinions. Sadly, people like that don’t care or even get that re-thinking their strategy is an option.

There are many wonderful ways where companies support the community:

  • Give percentages of sales to approved charities.
  • Offer certificates for product when people make legitimate donations.
  • Coupon book activities with schools.
  • Allow non-profit groups to present on their premises.
  • Advocate community causes in their advertising.
  • Sponsor noteworthy community events.
  • Recognize that executive time spent in the community is good for business.

No company can cure community problems by itself. Each company has a business stake for doing its part. To prioritize which spheres or causes to serve, business should list and examine all of the community’s problems. Relate business responses to real and perceived wants/needs of the community. Set priorities. There can never be a restraint upon creativity.

My advice to companies as they create charity tie-in, cause-related marketing and community relations activities includes:

  • Don’t say that you want customer input unless you are prepared to hear it.
  • Franchisers should not sell sure-fire promotions to build sales as part of the worth of the franchise.
  • Community support is not a one-cause (vested interest) matter.
  • If you seek customer comment, do not talk over the customer.
  • Do not keep rationalizing flawed strategies to your customers.
  • Realize that customers’ opinions matter and that they have more buying choices than just your store.
  • If you purport to have a foundation, it cannot or should not be named directly for your product.
  • Do not run your “foundation” out of a corporate marketing department.

Every community relations program has five steps:

  1. Learn what each community thinks about the company and, therefore, what information needs to be communicated to each public. Conduct focus groups. Maintain community files. Organize an ongoing feedback system.
  2. Plan how to best reach each public… which avenues will be the most expedient. Professional strategic planning counsel performs an independent audit and guides the company through the process. Get as many ideas from qualified sources as possible.
  3. Develop systems to execute the program, communicating at every step to publics. All employees should have access to the plan, with a mechanism that allows them to contribute. If others understand what the company is doing, they will be part of it.
  4. Evaluate how well each program and its messages were received. Continue fact-finding efforts, which will yield more good ideas for future projects. Document the findings. When planning, reach for feasible evaluation yardsticks.
  5. Interpret the results to management in terms that are easy to understand and support. Provide management with information that justifies their confidence.

Companies should support off-duty involvement of employees in pro-bono capacities but not take unfair credit. Volunteers are essential to community relations. Companies must show tangible evidence of supporting the community. Create a formal volunteer guild, and allow employees the latitude and creativity to contribute to the common good. Celebrate and reward their efforts.

Community relations is action-oriented and should include one or more of these forms:

  1. Creating something necessary that did not exist before.
  2. Eliminating something that poses a problem.
  3. Developing the means for self-determination.
  4. Including citizens who are in need.
  5. Sharing professional and technical expertise.
  6. Tutoring, counseling and training.
  7. Promotion of the community to outside constituencies.
  8. Moving others toward action.

Publicity and promotions should support community relations and not be the substitute or smokescreen for the process. Recognition is as desirable for the community as for the business. Good news shows progress and encourages others to participate.

The well-rounded community relations program embodies all elements: accessibility of company officials to citizens, participation by the company in business and civic activities, public service promotions, special events, plant communications materials and open houses, grassroots constituency building and good citizenry.

Never stop evaluating. Facts, values, circumstances and community composition are forever changing. The same community relations posture will not last forever. Use research and follow-up techniques to reassess the position, assure continuity and move in a forward motion.

No business can operate without affecting or being affected by its communities. Business must behave like a guest in its communities… never failing to show or return courtesies. Community acceptance for one project does not mean than the job of community relations has completed. Community relations is not ‘insurance’ that can be bought overnight. It is tied to the bottom line and must be treated accordingly…with resources and expertise to do it effectively. It is a bond of trust that, if violated, will haunt the business. If steadily built, the trust can be exponentially parlayed into successful long-term business relationships.

About the Author

Hank MoorePower Stars to Light the Business Flame, by Hank Moore, encompasses a full-scope business perspective, invaluable for the corporate and small business markets. It is a compendium book, containing quotes and extrapolations into business culture, arranged in 76 business categories.

Hank’s latest book functions as a ‘PDR of business,’ a view of Big Picture strategies, methodologies and recommendations. This is a creative way of re-treading old knowledge to enable executives to master change rather than feel as they’re victims of it.

Power Stars to Light the Business Flame is now out in all three e-book formats: iTunes, Kindle, and Nook.

5 Pitfalls of Marketing Waterfalls

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As data-driven marketers are taking full advantage of collecting, organizing, and analyzing demand management, many are adopting the classic marketing waterfall model from leading experts such as Sirius Decisions. I am first to applaud marketers who essentially created a grassroots adoption effort to create a quasi-standard for taxonomy, nomenclature, definitions, and a weighted value across the marketing waterfall. However, like any non-universally accepted standard, there are gaps within the principle of the model itself, and even more flaws in the marketing actions taken based on the waterfall reporting structure.

Here are 5 pitfalls to watch out for when using a marketing waterfall reporting model that influence how you make decisions, execute campaigns, and ultimately spend money.

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About the Author

Jeff WinsperJeff Winsper is President of Winsper, an independent business and marketing consulting firm that helps marketing organizations to evolve into operating like a business. Jeff has been dedicated to the advertising and marketing community for over twenty years. With a breadth of strategic marketing and business expertise, he has helped a variety of companies throughout their life cycle, ranging from start-ups to the Fortune 500. To read Jeff’s complete biography, click here.