HOW COLLABORATIVE SELLING WORKS IN CHALLENGING SITUATIONS
At this point you may be thinking, “Those are great examples, except what about this situation—or that? What about the scenarios I find myself in? Does the collaborative selling approach always work?”
I’d like to respond with an absolute yes, but that would be naive, and I can’t deny that there are some predicable situations where collaborative selling can be a particular challenge. What follows are some of the most common challenges you may encounter.
The Order-Dictating Buyer Challenge
While your intentions and approach may have evolved from “old school” selling, some buyers haven’t made the switch yet. Some are conditioned, or trained, to expect you to simply take their order or dictate a solution. They either tell you what they want and expect you to find a way to get it to them, or they say “Tell me what you’ve got for me—oh, and make it inexpensive and fast!”
It can be tough to switch the focus from being an order-taking solution dictator to a collaborator. Still, it is possible. In these situations, try adjusting your approach and conversation to guide the buyer, including them in each step whenever possible.
I once worked with a VP of sales who told me he knew exactly what he wanted. He had done his research and had years of experience with solutions similar to mine. At first, he seemed like a dream come true. He came to me to fill a specific need. He had prequalified himself, done his research on me and my training services, and just wanted a price quote. In essence, he wanted me to be an order-taker.
Yet, in talking with him to get the specifics needed to develop the quote, I realized that what he was asking for would not get him the gains he wanted. I asked him if he was willing to consider additional information and options, allowing me to add my expertise, earn his trust, and educate him on a different solution to accomplish what he really needed.
He was adamant he didn’t need a “consultant”; all he wanted was a price quote. I then explained that I might not be the right solution for him after all. I said I would not waste his time or money on implementing something that would not earn him the healthy ROI he needed. And, yes, I was willing to walk away if necessary. I knew I wouldn’t have been successful in the long term following his solution, and the agony along the way was just not worth my time and energy.
The VP paused, and then agreed to give me an hour to discuss his situation further. What we discovered, together, was that we could build the right implementation plan. This “right-sizing” would provide him the outcome he needed and allow my team to make an impact for his team in a shorter time frame. The sale closed the next week.
The Misfit Buyer Challenge
When a buyer does not fit your solution—whether philosophically, in terms of budget, their timing, internal processes, or with their unwillingness to disclose necessary information—collaboration is going to be tough. I’ve had prospects who wanted me to help their sales teams learn how to coerce customers into action with hard closes, even when their buyers weren’t ready. Others asked me to help their sellers pitch a solution, whether or not their buyer was qualified or interested. Neither request was in sync with my philosophy and approach. These were misfits for me and my solution.
When it’s obvious that a potential buyer is not a fit, I’ve learned—the hard way, I assure you—that I will sell more if I move on to higher-probability prospects as early as possible.
For instance, I had a local buyer at a large retail store approach me about my sales training. The first several phone calls were stiff, and it was hard to get information from him. When he agreed to a face-to-face meeting, I thought we were making progress. The meeting was productive, until he asked me to put together a recommendation for several options.
Knowing that responding to his request would take between eight and ten hours of work, I knew I had to further qualify him to save both of us time. I explained that there were many options, and to ensure I didn’t waste his time, I needed to identify the ones that fit within his budget. He was silent. I then asked, “What budget do you have for this initiative?” and he responded, “I’m not sure. I’ll know the right number when I see it.” Red flag! I again explained that I needed a range to work with, and he blurted out, “You aren’t going to break me!”
Whoa! I wasn’t trying to break him. This was relevant information that I needed to give him the most useful recommendation.
I knew that the likelihood of success with this buyer was slim, though I wasn’t ready to call it a dead opportunity—yet. So I adjusted my efforts and produced a short-format recommendation with three options that addressed his questions and illustrated, at a high level, what we could do for him. It only took me one hour, instead of the many I would have put into a detailed proposal.
The result? He never responded to my fifteen follow-up inquiries over the next six months. I now qualify those buyers out early. If they aren’t willing to discuss their budget and the viability of us working together, they aren’t worth my time and effort.
If you think you’re not in a position to walk away, look at what the most successful people do; they focus their time and energy on high-probability buyers. As one top performer told me, “When I learned the value of using the delete key, my business grew.”
Procurement Buying Challenges
For those of you in corporate sales, the dreaded procurement sale can be another potential minefield. This is the corporate sale where you work collaboratively through the sales process with the end user or supposed decision maker, and then once the initial decision is made, the procurement team takes over.
What happens next? All the collaboration up to that point is ignored—now it’s tough, old-school negotiating and getting beat up on price. The POWNs that had been addressed originally are no longer central to the final procurement decision.
Sound familiar? My company kept bumping into this kind of “vendor relations” with our larger clients. What did we do about it? We learned to collaborate with internal influencers and key decision makers. By assisting them in the sales process, equipping them to sell internally, and aiding them with any information or tools they need, we have ready-and-willing collaborators helping us navigate their internal procurement process.
This has worked so well for us, in fact, that we once had an internal collaborator tell us to prepare for procurement’s demand to always secure a 10 percent discount. We were able to price our solution accordingly, and everybody won—a Win3 was achieved.
The e-Relationship Challenge
Another complication in selling collaboratively is the buyer who wants or expects the “e-relationship.” They prefer a “Send me this” or “Click on this link” approach to communication and the selling process.
While we should take advantage of electronic tools and technology to enhance the sales process, an e-relationship presents unique challenges when it’s our main, or only, mode of communication. Instead of a two-way conversation with both parties engaged, we may end up with two streams of one-way communications and less opportunity to discover POWNs and motivations and thus more challenges in differentiating our solution from the competition.
I’ve worked with several buyers—and have existing clients—who prefer to handle most of our conversations through email. And I respect that, to a point. When we start to revisit questions and send virtually the same information back and forth, I rely on my three-back-and-forth guideline—that if we go back and forth three times on the same topic, I pick up the phone and call, or send an email saying, “Now that we’ve gone back and forth a few times with email, let’s expedite the rest with a fifteen-minute phone call. What times work for you?” What’s surprising is that often the answer is, “Call me now, I’m at my desk.”
If the buyer is resistant, or the client prefers to maintain an e-relationship, I adapt my communication to include extra documentation and follow-up. I make sure my messages are short, including questions, specific examples, and relevant attachments.
One specific situation where the three-back-and-forth guideline doesn’t always fit is when working with international buyers. Not only are there major time zone differences to work around, we may also have language differences that can best be bridged by communicating in writing. In these situations, ensure that your messages and information are supported with documentation, that they reference and recap earlier emails, and that clear action items and timelines are identified.
Time Pressure Challenges
Initial collaborative conversations can sometimes take a little longer than a “show up and throw up” sales call, and you may need to spend a little more time preparing to ensure that each conversation is productive and focused on WiifT.
If you’re in a crank-out-the-calls sales environment, it may seem impossible to take the time for a collaborative approach. Yet I can assure you that many call centers have been able to adapt the systematic conversation framework we will cover in Chapter 3 to make their conversations efficient and value-focused. And if it does take a little longer on the first call, the information exchange early in the conversation shortens the selling cycle and saves time in the long run.