Over the years we’ve been involved in hundreds of complex sales. Analysing our top sales people’s approaches, it turns out that the quality of their pitches contributes only around five per cent to their overall success. Sixty percent is down to the people they engage and how well they engage them. Thirty-five is down to timing.
Content? It’s almost irrelevant. Complex sales are long and important enough for prospects to want to develop their own view of your offering. They get behind the BS and work it out for themselves. You might as well supply them with all the raw data and let them get on with it.
So what matters?
Timing: Client companies go through three distinct phases when tackling important decisions. The first is developing the decision, the second is making the decision and the third is implementing it.
If you can get in early and influence development, you are vastly more likely to win the business. Ideally, you should initiate their process. If you have an innovative solution that disrupts a target market, this is the game you must play to get a decision on the prospect’s agenda.
If you come in when they are making the decision — choosing suppliers — a competitor has probably already defined the rules. In this case, it may make sense to no-bid. Better to focus on opportunities where you can take the lead. If you have a good relationship with the decision-maker, consider asking directly what you have to do to win the business. If you don’t get a satisfactory answer, ask yourself ‘am I wasting my time?’
Engagement: Of course, a good, peer-to-peer relationship with the decision-maker has a profound effect on the outcome of any sale and will mean you can accurately assess the criteria for success. It also means that if you’re not going to win, you find out earlier, qualify out and find a better deal to work on.
The best sales-focused companies do their homework about their prospects’ businesses and its markets. At this level, sales people need strong social skills to engage the decision-makers and drive where the money gets spent
Can you find deals where you initiate the prospect’s buying process? Can you fill your pipeline with these opportunities and dump the one you can’t easily predict? Let me know if you have any other tips for fellow deal-makers out there.
(Photo: Wallula Junction, CC2.0)
