Got a Technical Team? Here’s a Great Way to Help Them Sell
Recently I spoke with Burke, the VP of Business Development for an engineering firm in the material handling industry.
Unlike many people in this industry, Burke has a marketing background rather than a technical one. Since he joined the firm, their business is booming, seemingly unaffected by the recession. I asked him about that.
What he told me was really useful from a sales and marketing point of view:
“However, I discovered that was not the problem at all.
“Our prospects are warehouse managers who have to put together proposals for projects and get them approved. Some justification is involved for both business (cost) justification, and justification for technical architectures and other decisions.
“What I learned was that we were not helping prospects assemble their information in a way that was sellable up the chain of command.
“So, I put in place a process for doing that:
- “We take a consultative approach,
- “We gather the information,
- “We put the argument together,
- “We build the PowerPoint® slides
- “Literally, all the warehouse manager has to do is present it up the food chain and we’ve been winning a lot more often than we used to
“So, setting up a structure to follow for handling the customer’s information enabled them to become more productive, because it helps them partner better with the customer. They now know they should be looking for business as well as technical information, and they know what to do with that information before they give it back in the form of various documents, including proposal documents. The questions, the steps, and the documents we provide help the warehouse manager ’sell’ to others within their own company more effectively.
“You need business ROI, we got that. You need rationale for the controls architecture, we got that. You need a throughput analysis, we got that. You need a time-phased projection of the project cost, we got that too. Whoever they need to talk with inside their company, we help them do it.
"We’re easier to deal with than the other guys, and we’re winning more deals as a result."
I thought that was a great example of how sales is supposed to work. It is supposed to be simple.
Of course getting to that simplicity within your organization is not always so easy!
That’s where we can help you, hopefully a lot:
There are lots of new free materials, including articles, videos, recordings, and Read more
Got a Technical Team? Here’s a Great Way to Help Them Sell
Recently I spoke with Burke, the VP of Business Development for an engineering firm in the material handling industry. Unlike many people in this industry, Burke has a marketing background rather than a technical one. Since he joined the firm, their business is booming, seemingly unaffected by Read more
Implementing a Formal Selling Process and Performance Measures in a Sales Organization
January 8, 2009 by admin
Filed under Case Studies
Implementing a Formal Selling Process and Performance Measures in a Sales Organization[1]
Joe Vavricka and Barry Trailer
Trailer Vavricka, Inc.
Summary: This paper describes implementing a process management framework and performance measurements into a corporate sales organization. It begins with describing the traditional approach to sales management and the potential impact of improving sales performance on revenue and profits. Then, the company s process-based approach to sales management is described along with the key performance measures most relevant for monitoring sales revenue production across sales, marketing, and customer support departments. This case illustrates that viewing sales as a production process and implementing process performance measures will enable a company to significantly increase sales and improve sales predictability by increasing productivity throughout the process.
THE TRADITIONAL SALES MANAGEMENT APPROACH
Role of the salesforce
The purpose of the majority of corporate salesforces is twofold:
- Keep sales revenue coming into the company at a rate that meets or exceeds budgeted revenue and growth targets.
- Create customer expectations and relationships which will produce high satisfaction, desire to buy more in the future, and customers who are willing to act as references to influence prospects, generate referrals, and provide feedback that will help improve products and services.
The traditional sales approach
Sales departments traditionally operate informally, that is, without having a formal selling process followed by Read more
What Is Operational Excellence in Sales and Marketing?
January 7, 2009 by admin
Filed under Sales and marketing management
by Michael J. Webb (with Robert Ferguson) (pdf of this article) A reader from Microsoft recently asked me an interesting question: “What are the key parameters which define Operational Excellence in a sales and marketing organization?” I like the question, because Read more
How to build an objective management structure for your sales process
January 6, 2009 by admin
Filed under Sales Process Metrics
By Justin Roff-Marsh Imagine you were to awaken one morning suffering from a strange disorder: one that rendered your eyesight unreliable. When you open your eyes, your bedroom appears roughly as it did the night before. Your bed is below the Read more
Book Review – “The Leaky Funnel Earn More Customers by Aligning Sales and Marketing to the way Businesses Buy”
January 6, 2009 by admin
Filed under Book Reviews
by Hugh Macfarlane 2003, Bookman Media Pty Ltd (available on www.amazon.com) Submitted by Michael J Webb: HardBits (a mid-sized company in a maturing industry) is struggling because its products are being commoditized by competitors from around the world. Read more
