The New And Improved ABC Of Selling Video Lecture | B2B Sales: Tips and Strategies

Hey, this is Ago [SP].
Welcome to another episode of Salestalk.tv.
Today, we're going to be talking about the
new ABC of selling.
In 1993, in the famous film classic "Glengarry
Glen Ross," Alec Baldwin stood up in front
of his team and said, "Always be closing."
ABC.
That became the mantra for legions of sellers
and sales people for almost two decades.
Everybody was closing left and right.
There were pre-closes, and trial closes, and
up closes, and post closes, and there were
probably closes upon closes.
Here's why that didn't work.
First off, people hate to be closed.
People hate to be artificially moved towards
a conclusion of a deal.
People want to have the time to think, to
reflect, to make a decision.
And especially in today's world, where buyers
hold more power than ever before, more decision
making ability, and are better informed than
ever before, closing too soon and closing
too often is a sure death sentence for your
sale.
Now, for complex, high-end professional services,
closing also does not work very well.
Maybe it works for relatively low-end, commodity,
price-based purchases, maybe impulse buys,
but for the kinds of services that my clients
and I sell, closing does not work very well.
And finally, maybe closing will get you one
deal, but it may end up costing you the entire
relationship.
And if you're selling complex services like
we are, well then frankly, the relationship
is what it's all about.
The relationship is what's going to get you
that position as a trusted adviser.
That is going to get you not only the deal,
but the long-term relationship as a valued
adviser that you seek.
So I promised I'd give you the new ABC of
selling.
The new ABC of selling is always be collaborating.
In rank groups most recent research on what
sales winners do differently, two factors
stood out as being highly predictive of why
buyers chose one firm over another.
The first factor was educated me with new
ideas and perspectives.
Buyers feel that sellers that come in and
tell them something new are tremendously valuable.
And that has a disproportionate impact on
your ability of this sale.
But guess what the number two factor was?
That's right.
Collaborated with me.
Buyers don't want to be sold to, they want
to be collaborated with.
Now, when I talk to my clients about this,
they'll sometimes say, "You know, does that
mean that I need to become more of a consultant?"
And where having a consultative approach to
selling is always a good idea, it doesn't
quite stop there.
So let me give you five concrete, practical
ways in which you can collaborate with your
buyer and move the sale forward.
The first great way of collaborating is to
help your buyer define the problem.
Now, I don't know about you but when I'm in
sales situations, more often than not, a buyer
has some idea of what the problem looks like
but it's almost invariably either incomplete
or incorrect.
They haven't discovered the entire extent
of the issue and the impact.
Maybe they've missed a few things.
Or, maybe they've defined the problem in a
way that's simply not the entirely correct
way.
So a great way for you to start collaborating
with your buyer is to help them clarify and
really see the problem in its full degree
and to its full extent.
A second great way of collaborating is to
develop and test solutions, potential solutions,
with your buyer.
Almost invariably for selling high-end services,
there's never just one way to solve a problem.
There's always several.
There's always a few.
And if you can come back to your buyer and
together you can develop two, three potential
scenarios or ways in which you can solve the
problem, that's a great way of collaborating
as well.
The third way is to, together with your buyer,
to build a business case.
Now, when I build a business case, almost
invariably, if I do it by myself, which I
hardly ever still do but I used to in the
past, but if I do it by myself, then I get
push back from buyers.
Because they don't accept the numbers because
they were not involved in the process.
And by definition, let's face it, if you're
trying to sell them something, they'll think
that you're trying to present the numbers
a little bit more favorable than maybe they
should be.
So a great way to do it is to do it together.
Ask them for input.
Ask them for key figures and numbers.
Ask them to validate.
Ask them for their thoughts on whether or
not your business case is correct and build
it together.
Another great way of collaborating.
And then the final two ways of collaborating
with your buyer are reducing the extent and
the possibility of risk, of risk or of something
going wrong.
Think about ways in which your project could
derail, could sidetrack, and which you could
perhaps not deliver quite the result that
you promised.
And then together with your buyer, identify
and think of ways of mitigating that risk.
That is hugely powerful.
And finally, the fifth way to collaborate
with your buyer is to help them make the internal
sale.
No sale today happens in isolation.
No sale today is a sale where someone, somewhere,
just signs off, unless it's a small sale,
but any sizable sale, especially for services,
is likely to involve more than one person.
All of whom need to be convinced.
And especially in today's world where budgets
are shrinking, decision level thresholds of
budgets are going down so more people need
to be involved.
Helping your buyer make the internal sale
is hugely important and a great way to cement
the relationship.
So there you go.
Five concrete, practical ways to collaborate
with your buyer.
Define the problem.
Identify and scenario-ize, if that's a word,
potential solutions.
Help them build the business case.
Help them identify the risks and mitigate
those risks.
And then finally, help them make the internal
sale.
Hope this was useful.
If you want to get more practical, tangible,
high-end strategies and tips for making the
complex sale for selling to senior executives,
for selling high-end complex services, professional
services, then subscribe to my YouTube channel.
If you want to get a copy of the report, you
can go to winthecomplexsale/winmore, that's
win the complex sale forward slash win more.
I'll put the link in the video notes as well.
Hope this was useful and I'll see you on the
next episode of SalesTalk.tv.