The Changing World of B2B Sales
By Michael J Griffin
4 minute read
Technology and Covid have accelerated changes in the B2B marketplace. How you and your sales teams adapt to these changes will determine your success in 2022. Let’s review the 10 changes that are important.
You are selling in a global marketplace. You may have a territory with a list of clients to serve, but your customer has access to solutions across the world. This means your customers are likely better informed than you on the solutions they require for their success. Be world class in your ability and attitude when selling.
B2B customers are gravitating to behaving like B2C customers. Tech savvy customers research what they need using the internet rather than relying on salespeople for information. Think about how you buy a car or handphone – you research first! B2B customers are only spending 17-20% of their time meeting with salespeople(Gartner/McKinsey). You have shrinking window to persuade customers to buy from you! Communication skills to build trust and relationships are a must.
Covid ensures that hybrid selling is here to stay. B2B salespeople must master communication and selling skills that are professional in both face to face and virtual sales meetings. Hybrid communication saves the customer time and money.
Buying committees are getting larger. Korn Ferry says the average B2B buying committee has 6.8 people. Today’s successful salespeople are willing and able to build healthy trusting relationships with different personalities, and higher levels of authority by adapting their selling skills to build relationships.
Number of preferred customer suppliers is shrinking. Many organizations are reducing their preferred supplier lists to simplify processes, drive discounts or comply with procurement directives. You want to be that preferred supplier or be locked out for a long time.
In most cultures, no trust, no relationship means no sale. Research by Dr. Fons Trompenaars says cultivating trust through effective communication can be one of your biggest competitive advantages. Customers want to buy from salespeople they like and trust. Healthy cross cultural relationships lead to the sale.
It’s not about sales enablement, but buyer enablement. Current sales “flavour of the month” is “sales enablement.” Not true! Let’s focus on “buyer enablement!” The B2B salesperson’s mission is to be a problem solver, communicator, solution expert, teacher to enable the customer to make a beneficial decision to buy your solution. Having the attitude to serve the customer is best shown through your selling skills to meet customer needs.
You are a businessperson first, a salesperson second. Customers are paid to solve their organization’s problems. Customers are paid to meet salespeople. In Asia, salespeople may be seen as low status. Change your mindset – you are businessperson who adds value to your customers. Remember, sales is an honourable profession!
Customer bias disappears when you arrive as a prepared professional. AchieveGlobal research uncovered that customers lose their bias against you when you are professional and prepared. They become “inclusive” and lose their prejudices of race, sex, looks and religion as they see you as someone who can solve their problems. With customers better prepared, salespeople’s prep and planning are even more important to move the sale ahead.
Core selling skills are still the foundation of successful selling and long term customer loyalty. A review of sales research by ELAvate indicates that the even though selling environments and technology are changing, the core selling skills taught in our Consultative Selling Skills workshop must be mastered for consistent sales success across global cultures. Learn them, apply them with the attitude of serving your customers professionally and success will be yours.
ELA has developed a focused library of selling skills that work in all cross cultural environments. Employing our 30 years’ experience conducting with well over 800 clients, we have these sales workshops available in Asia Pacific, the Americas, Europe with multilingual trainers.
All our sales training has Assessments, Workshop Training (Classroom or Virtual), Reinforcement with Coaching and Measurement of Success. Here is our core Selling Skills Library:
Consultative Selling Skills – The foundational skills and attitudes for B2B sales and buyer enablement.
Winning at Sales. Foundational Skills for the B2C environment.
ELAvate Your Sales Coaching. The key skills and process for building a productive motivating sales culture.
Key Account Strategies. The process and tactics for hunting or expanding large key accounts. A Key Account Planner provides a tangible plan to coach large accounts. These KAS processes can be linked to CRM systems.
ELAvate Negotiation Skills. Three components in this program: Sell first then negotiate, planning the negotiation and conducting the negotiation.
Selling Higher and Across the Organization. This workshop teaches salespeople how to build trusting relationships up and across the organization.
Reach new levels of success in this changing B2B world. Contact me to discuss how our ELAvate sales systems raise the skill and attitudes of your salespeople! michael.griffin@elavateglobal.com
Michael J Griffin
ELAvate Founder
Global Sales Coach
John Maxwell Team Founding Member