Chapter 13
Asking for the Order
IN THIS CHAPTER
Maintaining your professional, straightforward manner
Handling the procurement department
When your sales cycle reaches a natural conclusion, hopefully aligned to your prospect’s buying cycle, the time to ask for the order arrives. This needs to be a smooth and natural progression of the sales cycle and not some momentous event that you build up in your head. Asking for the order — the topic of this chapter — generally marks the end of the sales cycle and the beginning of the implementation phase, and you need to make it as seamless as possible.
Don’t forget, though, that you do need to ask for the order, or you risk never getting it or at least delaying it. Surprisingly, many new business salespeople trip over on this one simple point and build it up into a huge obstacle. But if you’ve done your qualification correctly (see Chapters 9 and 19), it’s a simple step to achieve.
As the sales cycle has moved through the stages and you’ve been qualifying all along, you understand the criteria that your prospect is buying against, and you have an in-depth understanding of both his problem area and of your solution. You’ve discussed and overcome any objections, you’ve clearly defined the budgets and made sure they’re in line with your proposal, and you’ve met and covered the decision-making unit (see Chapter 19). The order is yours, and all you need to do is conclude it. Check that your prospect is happy, shake his hand, and get on with the paperwork and then implementing the solution.
Both parties are exactly the same as they have been throughout the sales cycle, and you have long ago set the standard and ground rules for the way you work, so asking for the order is no different. You’re simply following through to a natural conclusion.
Being Professional and Straightforward
During the sales cycle, you built a relationship with your prospect that’s based on professionalism and established a position of trust with him (see Chapter 3 for details on how to perform these tasks). This relationship needs to continue right through to the order being placed and beyond because it’s based on reality and not an act that you’ve been presenting. Anything short of that standard and you’ll have failed yourself and will be seen as shallow and unprofessional, with all the untold damage that comes with it.
As the deal reaches its climax, guard against a sudden switch into salesperson mode, and continue to be yourself. If you fail to do so, you’re doing yourself and your prospect an injustice, and you risk the deal collapsing at the last minute. Inappropriate closing techniques, sudden changes in attitude, and a breakdown of professionalism can do damage to your credibility and the trust you’ve built and ultimately put the deal at risk.
Some ways of asking for the order are better than others, and you need to find your own style, making sure it’s still you — the new business sales professional who drove the deal to reach this stage and not some new, strange closing machine that scares your prospect away.
Of course, you have a right to expect the same professionalism from your prospect as the sale enters its final stage; he should continue to behave in the same manner and not switch into some form of tough buyer mode.
The following sections provide basic guidelines on how to ask for the order in a straightforward, professional manner that avoids mind games.
Professionalism works both ways, and you and your prospect have the right to expect it of each other. It’s how you got to the order stage in the sales cycle because the deal would have likely been killed off before this stage if a lack of trust or transparency on either side had occurred.
Asking whether you’re the solution of choice
When it comes to buying options, choice isn’t always a good thing for your prospect because it can lead to confusion and delay. How many times have you pondered an ice-cream menu or a wine list and been indecisive as the waiter or shopkeeper stood ready to take your order? The same principle applies in winning new business. Your prospect needs help narrowing down his choices, and that’s part of what the buying cycle is about. Your role is to assist him in making the choice, ensuring that your solution is the one that rises to the top.
How do you know when your solution has become the preferred one? Your qualification should go a long way to confirming this. And having built real trust and interaction with your prospect over time, you can ask where your solution fits in his plans and how he sees it fitting into his workflow.
Your prospect is looking for a solution that meets a business need, and that need may not have been clearly defined, even in his own mind, at the beginning of the process. Having guided him through the options and demonstrated how and why your solution fits the need, you’re in a strong position be able to ask searching questions aimed at establishing when the time is right to ask for the order. The response to a question such as “How do we progress this to get started?” will quickly show you where you are in the preferred solution hierarchy, and if at the right place, press on and get the deal done.
Your contact reports will confirm for you that everything has been covered and that the choices facing your prospect have been eliminated, one by one. (Check out Chapter 3 for a sample contact report.)
Ask your prospect whether he has any reason not to proceed. A simple question should result in a straightforward answer. For example, I’m currently in a buying cycle with a potential supplier. I’ve been qualified, which I always find a little amusing — that is, being on the receiving end — and if it’s any good, the qualification should show that the time is right to ask for the order because they should know that their solution is the one of choice. I haven’t yet been asked for the order, but they’ve attempted a soft close by offering a discount for a decision before month’s end. I was actually a little disappointed by the way that soft close was tried, via email almost as a throwaway line. Maybe I’m not a typical buyer, but I’m not playing games with them and genuinely want the solution. However, it’s not at the top of my priority list to do right at this moment; if they were to ask, I would tell them. To be clear, I’m a serious buyer and will buy the solution, but they have not really qualified properly in terms of timescale, and it would be fascinating to see what their qualification and forecast are.
Is winning new business an art form or a science? It has elements of both really — art in terms of how you structure a sales cycle and how you present a solution, and science because you have predictable paths and predictable outcomes to situations. It’s not formula-driven as such, but winning new business needs to follow a structure or methodology to deliver sustainable success over a long period.
Planning for implementation and resource commitment
Getting a deal over the line and converted to an order generally results in a chain reaction from your company as your colleagues gear up to implement the solution and hence deliver the benefits that resolve your prospect’s initial problem areas. This involves resource planning and is why your forecasting is so important, as I outline in Chapter 21.
You can turn resource planning to your advantage in seeking to close the deal by sharing the issues with your prospect, which should help get him involved with the solution before the deal is signed and therefore make it easier to get to the final close. Share with your prospect the resource planning that’s taking place in your company, and remember that his company also needs to supply resources. Discuss where the resources are coming from, when they’ll be ready to go at each stage, and any knock-on effects that you’ll have to mitigate against.
Getting your prospect engaged in the solution changes the language of the solution from “your proposal” to “our project.” Doing it as part of the lead-up to the deal being signed off makes sense from a planning perspective, but that is only part of the reason for doing so. The main driver is to get your prospect involved and committed, which will make getting the final yes so much easier.
Getting a letter of intent or an order in principal can help with locking in your prospect to your solution and can be a good interim step if you’re not able to secure a final order. Although not binding, a letter of intent is exactly that — an indication that you’ll be given the order at a certain point in time on successful completion of set milestones, which should be given in as much detail as possible. When these milestones are met, the order becomes final and binding. A letter of intent can be especially useful when dealing with bureaucratic organizations that have prescribed ways of doing things and place orders, for example, only once a month. A letter of intent also serves as notice that your solution is formally the preferred one and that any remaining competition has been eliminated. Figure 13-1 shows the structure of a letter of intent.
© John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
FIGURE 13-1: A letter of intent can help you ask for the order.
A letter of intent is not legally binding, but it significantly increases the likelihood of a deal being done in the near future and can be a useful tool in getting over the line as well as planning resource commitments. Be aware, however, that getting a letter of intent signed can take as much effort as getting the deal closed, so use it with care. If you have the option, always go straight for the full order, but bear in mind the letter of intent approach and have it as a tool in your new business kit.
Cutting to the chase
So much noise can surround the closing of a deal, and most of it isn’t really all that relevant. Keep your focus on the details, and don’t let peripheral issues sidetrack you.
Taking a consultative approach to the sale all along puts you in a strong position to call it as it is. You’ll have been, and have been seen to be, more concerned about meeting your prospect’s needs than getting a sale. A natural progression is to continue in this vein and tell your prospect that the solution is the right one and that all the elements are now in place and it’s time to sort out the order. Push back if you get any resistance, and call it as it is.
Having received a buying decision from your prospect but not quite an order from him, you can keep on the front foot and get the order paperwork completed while the moment is right. Don’t delay or agree to do this offline; get it done while you’re sitting in front of him and the yes decision is still firmly in his mind, because delay can lose the moment and the decision if you’re not careful.
A presumptive close is in order when you’ve run a consultative sales cycle. With this type of close, you don’t have to fear rejection because you’ve always had your prospect’s best interest in mind, and now is no different. Why should he suddenly switch tack and reject your solution? He still has to have his original problem addressed, and your stance should be one of moving things forward. The right deal is on the table, it meets the original need, the sales and buying cycles have run their course, so the next step is to ask whether your prospect is happy, shake hands to confirm the deal, and get on to the paperwork. Don’t make a huge thing of it; your mindset should be as though prospects buy your solutions every day and, having got the correct deal in place, it’s natural to close it and get on with the implementation phase.
Avoiding the order-for-discount game
Getting a deal signed off now in exchange for a discount is something that all new business salespeople have to face all too often. Affordability has already been qualified so you know that in absolute terms the solution price is right. And if the procurement department isn’t involved (as I describe later in this chapter), then you don’t have its games to contend with. That just leaves your primary prospect trying to score some last-minute points. With this type of request, my standing answer is always to ask which part of the solution he no longer requires and how he’s going to cover it.
Don’t feel the need to elaborate on this question or to defend it. Keep silent, and let him see that it’s a serious question in response to his own and let him squirm for a while before he retracts it.
Of course, he may not retract it and in fact be really fishing for a discount late in the game. In this case, consider the facts:
- Affordability has been qualified.
- The price has been known for some time.
- You can demonstrate both of these facts with your contact reports.
- Yours is the solution of choice.
- Value has been consistently demonstrated through the sales cycle.
- How else is he going to address the initial problem?
You’ll see that you have all the cards stacked in your favor, so you don’t need to go rushing around trying to arrange a discount. In fact, you don’t even need to try; just say no to the request, politely but firmly. If the issue doesn’t go away, check what you have missed in qualification and postpone the close for another day. Don’t allow yourself to be put on the spot for a decision right then, even if pen is poised over contract. (Chapter 11 has more information on structuring the deal.)
Working with Professional Buyers
Professional buyers, or procurement departments, are the bane of many new business salespeople’s lives, and the majority of salespeople would be happy if they never had to deal with buyers again. The reality is that, depending on the nature of your solutions and your prospect base, you’ll likely have to deal with them at some point. Some new business salespeople have to get every deal past them, so be thankful if you’re not in that category.
First, you have to understand the role of the professional buyer. Procurement departments exist as a service within mainly large companies and aim to secure the best possible commercial terms for their internal clients. They’re often seen as an obstacle even within their own organizations, but they have a significant amount of power and, as far as new business salespeople are concerned, need to be addressed head on. There’s nothing to be gained in trying to circumvent them in a deal.
Procurements will actively try to get the best deal for their internal customer — your prospect — and will more than likely be driven by one single element: price. The value proposition that you’ve worked so hard to build up with your prospect will be ignored as irrelevant. They’ll want you to reduce the price — that’s the bottom line. Unfortunately, they can wreck a deal at worst and at best delay it considerably.
In dealing with procurements, you need to recognize that they have a valid role to play but so do you. You need to find a way to work with them and not against them; the following sections can help.
Engaging professional buyers early on
As part of your qualification, you understand that procurement departments have a role to play in the deal and that they’re therefore part of the decision-making unit. With that knowledge, you need to engage with them as part of covering the bases and not just wait for them to pop up at the end and try to change your terms. Bring them on board as part of the discussions you have with your prospect; invite them to attend meetings to enable them to understand the nature of the problem and proposed solution, and to give any input that they consider necessary. This will enable them to feel like they’re adding value and protecting their internal client’s interests and thereby have a sense of control over the buying process.
You may be able to help procurements position themselves as internal consultants on the deal to advise your prospect. Feed procurements case studies and solution- and industry-specific information and encourage them to play an active part in the decision-making unit. (Flip to Chapter 2 for details on case studies and other evidence.)
By proactively engaging with procurements, you make them part of the team and part of the solution. This makes them less likely to cause you problems as you get into the details of the final deal and ensures that you have a positive and proactive relationship with them throughout the sales cycle. Put your relationship-building skills to good use.
When the deal structure time arrives and procurements take an active role, don’t allow yourself to be bullied or have the initiative taken from you. Hold firm to your deal, and reject any attempt to sideline your value-added proposition. Keep returning the focus to the solution and how as a team you’re all going to be involved in achieving it.
I’ve often been told that, in order to proceed, I’ll need to take 20 percent off the prices, and my standard reply is always to ask which 20 percent of the solution they don’t want to implement and how they’ll fill the gap. I always say this with a serious face and a serious tone of voice, and it’s always followed by silence. I will not, nor should any new business salesperson, allow myself be pushed around.
If your pricing structure is fair and your solution is the one of choice, then you’re in a strong position to rebuff any attempt at blanket game playing by procurements. In Chapter 10, I discuss how to walk away from a deal, and you do need to be prepared to do that when faced with a procurements blockage. If the deal is real and your qualification is accurate, your prospect will sort out some internal battles and come back to you.
Putting everything in writing
As I introduce in Chapter 3, contact reports are a valuable resource to have, and you should make a habit of writing them. Contact reports are also an important tool in dealing with procurement departments, because any dealings will result in a contact report that you’ll routinely send both to them and to your prospect. This gives your prospect ammunition to fight your corner internally. Your contact reports should specifically cover any issues that procurements have raised along with your responses, regardless of how off topic you considered them to be. This is necessary as procurements will often try to trip you up with seemingly small issues that, if not dealt with, may cause delay further down the line. Cut off their ammunition supply by addressing and documenting everything as it arises.
You need to maintain an image of professionalism at all times and not be distracted by anything thrown at you. If it becomes known that everything will be sent back in a contact report, then you may find that attitudes change quickly, so use this weapon in your new business sales armory. You can also use contact reports to build people up, so be aware of this when writing them for general meetings that also involve procurements. This minimizes the later impact that procurements can bring about to damage your deal.
Having everything confirmed in writing also provides you with the necessary ammunition should you find that the procurements become an unreasonably immovable object. Take a lesson from the old IBM sales book and go over their heads, suggesting that they’re standing in the way of having the original requirement met and that the quantifiable cost of that happening is $x.
Engagement and interaction are the preferred routes (as I explain in the preceding section) and going over their heads is a sales solution of the last resort, but you do need to be prepared to act on it. Although doing so won’t win you any friends in procurements, it will demonstrate to everyone that you’re a professional who isn’t prepared to be messed about with.
Involving the end user at each stage
When you’re dealing with professional buyers, the end user is your prospect, the linchpin in the decision-making unit and ultimately the person who has responsibility for the problems that you’re attempting to resolve. The end user is your internal champion, buying in to your solution, understanding the benefits, and doing all that he can to get it signed off quickly.
You need to involve your prospect in all interactions that you have with the procurement department and be able to support him with any information that he needs to progress the deal internally. Don’t assume that he understands all elements of the solution; provide him with anything and everything that he needs, spoon-feeding sound bites as necessary.
If your solution is technology based, for example, procurements may not realize the impact of a relational database over a flat file structure, so don’t assume that they will accept what you say if it had a higher price point. Spell out the requirement to them, and explain and document why there is a higher price element that’s required to make the solution work. Be seen as the expert but also as someone who cares about getting the correct solution for the end user.
On some occasions, your prospect will act as a buffer between you and procurement. Although this isn’t ideal (because you should be leading the way), it’s important to keep your prospect on message. For example, make sure that he knows about the importance of a relational database over a flat file structure and why it has a higher price point. Ensure that your prospect understands your solution and how it will fit with his needs, and ensure that he is able to articulate that message. Write him a script to remember if necessary.
Sticking to the original objectives
Dealing with procurement departments is really no different to the rest of your sales cycle. They have the power to try to dictate or amend terms but only if you allow them to have permission. In all other respects, they’re a normal member of a decision-making unit, and as such you should cover them during the qualification process and learn then of any potential pitfalls that may await you. You should, of course, document everything in contact reports so they don’t try to spring something on you late in the day.
You need to understand the procurement department’s motivation and processes, and it also need to understand yours. This company is likely not the first one you’ve ever sold to, and when all the branding is stripped away, it’s no different from any other business and you therefore instinctively know how to sell to it.
Stick to and revisit the original deal objectives as often as necessary. What is the company setting out to achieve with your solution, and how is your solution going to meet these needs? These are the only issues up for debate, so don’t allow procurements to attempt to introduce any new elements into the deal. If the original solution didn’t specify pricing parameters, then make sure that you cover price as part of qualifying; and if this was satisfactorily dealt with, don’t allow procurements to reopen it now. Refer to the contact reports to demonstrate that this has been addressed.
Establishing a relationship with procurements (in exactly the same way as with every other member of the decision-making unit) as early in the sales cycle as possible is key to heading off any last-minute rebellions. Give every opportunity for objections to be raised as you progress through the sales cycle, meeting and heading them off as appropriate, and then document them and move on.