Don't Rely On Sales People To Explain Anything

I have a complex IT service to market. Is it OK to rely on the salespeople to explain it and just supply support collateral like case studies, feature list and articles? Or do I need to go into explaining the entire process? -- Yehuda Cagen, Xvand Technology Corp.

First, sales people shouldn't explain anything, that's a huge mistake often made. You're not selling a car, but instead an offer for an abstract technical service like outsourcing IT services. In this case, sales people must start with a needs assessment.

The needs assessment determines the desires, expectations, and interests of the buyer. It further determines if the sales person is talking to a real decision maker, or if other parties are required to approve the purchase. Your needs assessment can come in marketing stages or during an initial appointment (by telephone or in person.)

If a certain level of education is required to understand the value of your solution, then here are some examples of how to augment the sales process: (You may already cover some of these areas with your case studies, white papers, and other marketing collateral.)

• Hold a conference call around a current event highlighting how your solution fits into solving a specific set of problems. Get attendees feedback before and after the event to measure usefulness, and interest in learning more.
• Provide area specific white papers focusing on key challenges faced by your customers, what solutions they have tried and failed with in the past, and how your solution uniquely solve their problem.
• Distribute through direct response marketing or lead generation efforts a white paper on the internal processes of your solution, specifically how it solves a problem from beginning to end.

Each of your decision makers will have different interests, when your sales person explains the entire process they often bore half the people in the room. It's better to get a handful of technical decision makers together to go over the technical aspects, operations decision makers together in a separate forum to go over integration, and then close the groups around their buying criteria in a meeting with everyone involved.

This "divide and conquer" requires some effort. Many sales people get lazy, just pass out literature, and cry all day that they aren't making any sales. If just handing out literature made sales, you could get your website to do that -- or some interns.

Sales people need to recognize their role in helping decision makers choose the best product for their specific needs. That means, seek out individuals who will benefit from owning your solution, educate them in terms of their own interests, and offer a solution for purchase.

Many sales managers are hung up on the education part. You aren't training users how to do their job, but instead educating them about all the horrible things that can happen if they don't have your particular solution. You don't need to be mean, but it must be clear that the prospect can't get what they want doing what they have always done.

My answer to you is not only explaining the entire process, but get into the minds of the buyer to describe the results your IT service creates for the firm. In most offers of outsourcing IT services, you'll have multiple decision makers, so tailor your message to each according to their own needs. Position your sales people as trusted advisor, not brochure distribution agents.

You'll find a more complete treatment of this subject in "Strategies For Selling Consulting Services Or Any Other Intangible Easily In Less Time" and "How Business-to-Business Sales and Marketing Management Sell the Invisible." You just missed a great seminar, "Selling the Intangible by Harry Alexander" presented by Slife Sales Training; fortunately, you can still get a CD recording of the event to share with your staff.

© 2006-2009 Ask Justin Hitt, All rights reserved.

Justin Hitt provides training and coaching to selling professionals in the intangible technical services businesses, helping them attract and keep more profitable customers. For objective answers to your business-to-business selling questions call +1 (757) 282-7779.