A few years ago, when the business world was gripped by the internet boom, it was fashionable to predict an end to traditional selling done by humans meeting other humans. Michael Dell, to name but one example, was showing the world how to sell complex technology over an internet site. More recently, using social media as a sales tool has become an enduring trend. The tantalizing prospect of doing away with expensive, demanding salespeople was seriously entertained.
But today, professional selling is just as vital to the conduct of good business as it ever was. Over the twenty-five years since Michael Dell set out to eliminate costly salespeople from his sales model, the skills and techniques have evolved with the development of technology and markets, so that now, it’s a highly sophisticated profession, which cannot really be replicated by technology.
Many business people out there believe selling is a science, and want to find – or claim to have found – a mechanical formula or strict process which will always work. This can be successful if it’s applied in a very transactional or commoditised market. Although there are indeed proven techniques and methods that you can learn, selling is much more of an art – it’s about behaviours, emotions, communication and people.
It’s always worth reminding oneself of the basic concepts of selling, and for those new to sales, you can do no better than keep these core principles front and centre when you’re out meeting customers:
Buyers are just people like you and me, and if they are to be persuaded or helped to make a purchase, they have to feel that the result for them will be some kind of positive change – in their lives, or in their company’s life.
It’s amazing how many people think that selling is just about the product and its price. Offer something with a fancy new feature at an attractive price and it will sell itself. But that’s just marketing, not selling. It completely omits the role that a buyer has in considering how important the positive change will be to them – that is, what the value will be of that change. Value is the most important concept in selling.
It’s highly likely that a positive change is needed or wanted because the customer currently has some kind of problem or difficulty. It’s helpful to think about these problems as business ‘pain’ from which the customer seeks some relief. Depending on how painful the problems are, the value of solving them will increase, and our opportunity to provide a solution will develop.
There are three basic types of value: Financial value is defined in money terms, Personal value relates to the buyer’s own personal agenda or interests, and Business value relates to more general or strategic business aims, not necessarily quantifiable in money terms, such as improvements in efficiencies, quality, service levels or brand image.
Unless the customer can see that the value of your product or service outweighs its price, they are unlikely to be motivated to buy.