Years ago, I got a call from a senior manager at a global consulting group inquiring if my Buying Facilitation model could shorten their long sales cycles. Knowing Steve would face change/risk management issues before buying new sales training, I posed a sequence of unbiased Facilitative Questions to prompt him to do what he had to do before buying: assemble a buying decision team and understand the pre-sales issues they’d need to resolve.
I asked, “How did you and your decision team decide to continue using your current model when it wasn’t giving you the results you wanted?”
Steve replied, “Hmm. I need to ask some folks. I’ll call you back.”
Steve called back a week later with answers and two colleagues. Recognizing there weren’t enough people to fully understand their need, I continued leading them to their pre-sales issues:
“What would you and your team be willing to do differently to have the success you seek?” I asked.
Again, they had no answer and said they’d call back. With them setting the time for our calls we continued this back and forth for a month, with 12 managers from four countries on the final call. As I continued posing questions one of them asked, “Steve, what is she trying to sell us?”
SR: I have no idea! Sharon-Drew, why haven’t you pitched us anything in all these calls?
SDM: I have nothing to sell unless you’ve got something to buy. Without the buying decision team on board there was no way for you to accurately define your need or understand the risks that a new sales paradigm might cause. Now that you’re assembled and ready to buy into a change of this complexity, I’m happy to pitch.
On this call (and after 90 minutes total talk time), one 10-minute pitch and no resistance or price reductions, they bought multimillion-dollar training for 6,000 people.
With no pitch I’d helped Steve assemble an international buying team and reduce a one-year sales cycle into minutes by first facilitating the buy side – helping my prospects gather, then facilitate their decision team through their necessary change/risk management issues to buy-in – before selling.
Efficient. Collaborative. Respectful. Successful. Yet companies overlook buy side training in their sales onboarding.
Two Buying Processes
Sales onboarding focuses on placing solutions. Shadowing colleagues, role plays, product knowledge. The sell side. But it overlooks buy side. Why? Without buyers there’s nothing to sell regardless of how much product knowledge sellers have or how many role plays they rehearse.
The sales model seeks folks with “need” with a solution placement goal. But with a 5% (or less) close rate, it’s obvious there’s something missing. And new sales hires aren’t given the full toolkit they need for optimal success.
We forget there are two buying processes, each with different objectives: the buy side – the pre-sales stuff that includes the full complement of decision makers to understand and manage their unique risks and agree to change – and the sell side that places solutions.
Before buying, prospects must understand the cost of change; the time it takes is the length of the sales cycle. Now they do this without us as we wait (and wait) thinking they’re facing indecision or price sensitivity. But no one – no one – starts off buying.
I suggest that sales onboarding include facilitating the buy side to help prospects:
- Assemble the full complement of decision team members to fully understand their need. Too often sellers speak with one person and assume they’ve got a prospect. This obviously isn’t true.
- Seek workarounds to avoid risk. They must do this first anyway.
- Understand their risk. If the cost/risk of change is higher than staying the same they cannot buy, regardless of need or the efficacy of your solution.
- Get buy-in from whoever will use the new solution.
With its solution-placement focus, the needs-focused sales model only closes the low hanging fruit – those who have completed their pre-sales work, understand their need, and are ready to buy.
If, instead of chasing need, we seek people trying to solve problems in the area we can help, we can find high-probability prospects on the first call and largely eliminate time wasted on those who will never buy. And sell a lot more.
Add Tools to Facilitate the Buy Side
In the 40 years I’ve been training salespeople, I’ve not met one – not one! – who understands what buyers do offline. By teaching new hires to facilitate the buy side first it’s possible to close more by:
- Helping prospects assemble everyone who touches the problem to understand the scope, who’s involved, and plans to solve it.
- Helping prospects determine the risk they’ll face when adding your solution. As research, ask existing clients what they did before they could buy.
- Using facilitative questions to lead discovery without bias.
- Changing the qualifying focus. Until the full team is assembled, until the risk is understood, they can’t understand their need.
With change as the focus, start prospecting by helping them discover how imbedded their problem is. This uncovers those on route to making a change (great for prospecting), initiates your relationship and reveals the complexity of their undertaking. Questions like:
- How are you currently adding new X skills to what you’re doing now, for those times you require Y?
- What will you and your team need to be doing differently to generate solutions for your X?
By seeking folks in the process of change and leading them through their risks and buy-in first, your new hires will sell more, waste less time and have a much shorter sales cycle. Still curious? Ask yourself if you’d rather have your new hires sell or help someone buy.
