Selling In A Gloomy Economy

Written by Sharon Drew Morgen

What is the difference between selling in a robust economy and selling in a failing economy? A lot. But not what you think.

• Your product is the same

• Your pitch/presentation is the same

• The buyer’s need is the same

What’s different is the decision making process the buyers need to go through. Has the economy has mitigated the types of solutions they seek? Can the problem be fixed with a partial, cheaper solution, or with modified internal resources? Do they wait until they’re convinced that a purchase won’t be a business risk?

NEW BUYING CRITERIA

Your wonderful product data or needs analysis are moot here. Buyers now need additional levels of buy-in before they can spend money: ‘Solution’ or ‘Vendor’ is not their criteria; ‘Preserving Assets’ is.

To help buyers choose you now means a shift in focus – from the familiar Problem Solving/solution providing outcome, to a decision-support focus that will enable a possible purchasing decision:

1. until buyer define the immediate needs they must resolve, they will take no action. That might include using a temporary solution rather than a product purchase, or reconfiguring departments, etc.

If you can eschew your need to make a sale and help buyers figure out what palliative actions they can take, and their real choices (including competitive solutions), you will be in line as the first vendor they will contact once they are ready to purchase a product.

2. until the buyer’s entire decision team agrees, no action will be taken. That means that your regular client contact now has a larger buying decision team and focus: the risk is too high for decisions to be made without agreement from the team and a focus on corporate economic factors.

If you help your buyer align with, and garner buy-in from, their entire decision team – even if their ultimate solution cannot be to purchase your product at this time - there is a greater likelihood of a quick decision to act. But it puts you in high regard with the buying decision team.

3. until the entire decision team understands the economic benefit to resolving the problem now, using an external solution, no action will be taken. After all, they have been managing the problem ineffectively in their current daily activities, and there is a case to be made for continuing the status quo until the economy gets stable.

If you help the decision team evaluate the difference between the cost and results of continuing their status quo vs. the COST (human, time, political, organizational) of reorganizing around a new solution that ensures the status quo is stable, you will become part of the buyer’s decision team. And, if the client sees that all COSTS can be mitigated, and overrides their economic concerns and leaves them better off, they will make a purchase now. But they must understand the full picture of ‘givens’ and include the human systems as well as the financial ones – their internal, hidden issues as opposed to their ‘need’.

A NEW APPROACH

If you can augment your job to include being a decision consultant, you can make good use of this time of economic uncertainty.

Buying Facilitation® is a model that facilitates buying decisions and is a perfect add-on to the sales process. In a world where buyers are inundated by choices, Buying Facilitation®, different from sales, gives sellers a leadership role as a Decision Strategist to help buyers recognize, manage, and regulate their new economic environment and choices.

Use this time to differentiate yourself. You’ll not only get more business (and faster as decision/sales cycle are shortened) than you otherwise would in a gloomy economy, but you’ll also gain access to the buying decision team, line up future business that will close once the economy turns around, and be seen as an important company resource.

Sharon Drew Morgen -
	Sharon Drew Morgen is the bestselling author bestseller Selling with Integrity and 5 other books and 800 articles on her original collaborative decision-support model Buying Facilitation. Based on supporting the buyer's internal (management) decisions, the material has been trained worldwide, in global corporations such as Coors, Wachovia, Intuit, KPMG, IBM, and Clinique. Sharon Drew is a trainer, consultant, keynote speaker, and designer of patents that help site visitors and sellers make the decisions necessary for success. She can be reached at: www.newsalesparadigm.com , This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , or 512 457 0246Read More >>
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