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Your prospects need your solution. Desperately. But they are stalling. And it makes no sense.

But are they stalling? Are they really ignoring their needs, working with sub-optimal functionality, for a reason?

No. No. No. Yes. Not stalling, not ignoring their needs. Not working with sub-optimal functionality. Yes, there is a powerful reason.

Buyers can’t buy until all of the people, policies, market drivers, partners and historic choices that maintain their status quo have bought in to, and added their voices to, the changes that will result when they make a purchase. The time it takes them to manage this change is the length of the sales cycle. Your solution cannot be chosen until it’s all figured out.

Buyers aren’t ignoring their needs. And they are not in pain. In fact, they are operating relatively efficiently because they have developed some sort of a work-around that manages the problem well-enough. A new solution will create some sort of disruption, in and of itself, and therefore bring its own brand of sub-optimal functionality until the change is integrated.

Enough reasons?

WHY AREN’T YOU BUYING?

A question for you to ponder. From my vantage point, your selling skills offer you suboptimal results: it takes you far too long to close, you spend too much time running after non-viable prospects, and you’re only closing a fraction of the business you should be closing. It looks to me like you have a need that my solution can resolve.

I know that my solution will work in your situation, and make you far more effective. But you’d have to change – add to – what you are doing because the sales model has been your work-around . Therefore, you’d have to go through some sort of change management process internally before you’re ready to buy…. regardless of how well your need and my solution match: maintaining your status quo is a powerful deterrent to change, as you’ll note.

The sales model does not manage the behind-the-scenes change issues buyers must handle before they can buy. But using Buying Facilitation® as an additional skill you’ll have the ability to

-help buyers buy quicker as they manage their internal change issues,
-find the best prospects on the first call,
-get onto the Buying Decision Team on the first call,
-avoid time wasting,
-be able to forecast effectively – i.e. know who is closing and when,
-become an integral part of the buyer’s change management activities,
-increase your current closing rate significantly.

The question is: how would you know when it was time to add a new skill set? or know in advance that new skills could make you more effective? or know in advance if it would be worth the time and effort?

HOW DO YOU KNOW WHEN IT’S WORTH THE TROUBLE TO CHANGE?

Think of yourself as a potential buyer of sales tools that can enhance your success.

When do YOU decide that what you’re doing could be better? Are you stalling? Ignoring your needs to close more and make more money? Telling yourself that your status quo has worked ‘well enough’ for years and you’re making ‘enough’ money so why change? How do you decide when it’s time to change your status quo or add something new?

Note that your status quo – the way you sell, the way you’re paid, the way your company operates - is operating at some level of efficiency and comfort and hinders your desire to change. Note that it’s not about your need or my solution, that you would have to go through a series of decisions and get buy-in for you to change, separate from the initiating problem or potential solution.

What would you and your management need to know or believe differently to be ready, willing, and able, to add a new change management/decision facilitation capability to your current sales skills? To learn Buying Facilitation®?

Whatever thoughts you come up with, apply to your buyers. You’ll note that regardless of the need, the solution, the available data, or proof that a purchase is necessary, until or unless there is a path through to the change so that disruption is avoided, buyer’s won’t buy.

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