RSSWho are the decision makers?
Feb 12, 2010 Sales Related
I once was told that there are three things a sales person needs to know: when will a prospect buy, who are the decision makers, and how much money will they give me.
I wonder how true this is now. Or if these are the most appropriate benchmark needs of a seller. Let’s go through each of them:
1. When will a prospect buy?
People buy only when their entire decision team figures out how to bring in something new while ensuring that the status quo (the people, policies, initiatives, partners, rules, relationships, etc.) won’t be severely affected by the new solution coming in. It’s got absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with their need – they’ve done without trying to ‘fix’ the problem this long, why do they need to hurry up and potentially risk some sort of fallout? We are the ones who want them to hurry up. We notice a ‘problem’ and we have the perfect ’solution’ of course, and think that there is obviously a need for an immediate resolution.
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Tags: buy, decision makers, discuss, money, prospect
Happy New Year: what’s in store this year?
Jan 5, 2010 Random Thoughts
I suspect I’m just as eager for a new decade as anyone: I’ve barely survived through two recessions (Companies don’t want visionaries when there is a down turn – they want meat and potatoes, and predictable, albeit unnecessarily small, returns), and have certainly had days when I didn’t quite understand why I was hanging on. Retirement is definitely an option. But now it’s looking up for me. With my Buying Facilitation® material finally (finally) getting into mainstream, I’m getting the work and recognition I’ve been longing for for decades. So it looks like I won’t be able to retire quite yet.
But is it a certainty that the economy is turning around? What do I actually think about the next years? Frankly, I don’t think this country is out of the woods just yet. There are too many variables that haven’t turned around.
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Labor Day: What Do We Work For?
Sep 4, 2009 Random Thoughts
This weekend we all get a rest because we’ve worked so hard all year. Makes me wonder about ‘work.’ What is it, why do we do it, what does it mean, what could it mean. I guess I kinda feel like rambling a bit…
When I was young, I had to work myself through college. For two years I was a live in maid. One year I did dishes for my dorm (got up at 5:30 a.m…. impressed?) and was a secretary. One year I had a State car and did public opinion polls. I could really tell you some great stories about that!
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Tags: blessings, creativity, ego, jobs, money, unemployment, work
Price Objections Aren’t Price Objections
Aug 3, 2009 Buying Facilitation®, Top Posts
Recently, a CEO of a smallish company – a man familiar with my books - called me to do some work. Given the difficult market, he wanted to use Buying Facilitation® to differentiate from his competition, and have his existing customers buy more product.
As with everyone, I led him down the buying decision funnel and he figured out 1. how he needed to go about getting buy-in from his managers; 2. how he’d know before we started that he’d have a good chance of getting the results he desired; 3. how he’d recognize the value of any money expenditure.
Through the questions, he realized the managers who would have to be involved with the decisions to bring me in, what he and I would need to do prior to any training to give him the best shot at success, and what he’d walk away with when we were done.
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Tags: buying criteria, conference, identified problem, managers, money, price objections, prospects, systems
Money Objections: It Is Never About The Money
Feb 29, 2008 Buying Facilitation®, Top Posts
After having several conversations with a new prospect and his team, we all decided to move forward and get them trained in Buying Facilitation®. As per our agreement, I wrote up a contract and sent it out to “Joe”. Then I got an email from him saying he needed to put the program on hold for six months at least, so that his new hires could prove their value and start earning money.
“How can they start earning money if they won’t get their training for several months? And what skills will you offer them, given they will now be learning Buying Facilitation® after they’ve already begun selling the conventional way?”
My prospect gave me very short, almost unintelligible responses. Finally, he admitted that the COO called him in as my contract come over his desk, saying that if they were going to spend ‘that kind of money’ on sales training, they had better have a team in place that was worth it and had earned it. Joe was both angry and embarrassed: he had thought he was the decision maker, given it was his own budget, etc. and “Frank” hadn’t exhibited any interest in sales training before this.
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Tags: Buying Facilitation®, money, objections, presumptive summaries
