Is your sales force experiencing increasingly stalled business, extended cycle times, and inaccurate forecasts? If so, it’s time to revisit your sales process and take a hard look at how your customers buy.
Traditionally, companies have taken an inward approach to developing their sales processes—they typically only consider internal senior management requirements that make management and forecasting easier (or so they thought…). Unfortunately, the glaring problem with this approach is that it does not take into account where customers actually stand in the sale.
For most reps, following the traditional sale process is all about providing certain tools and information to the customer to quickly move them to the next step in the sales funnel. However, reps miss a key step here–they take for granted that customers are ready to move on and often end up outpacing them in the deal. As a result, many companies find their reps’ books of business bogged down with deals stuck in limbo.
Automatic Data Processing, Inc. (ADP) recognized this problem and created ‘Buying Made Easy,’ a tool that blurs the lines of distinction between the sales process and the customer’s buying process. The tool links selling activities in each step of the sales process with certain reciprocating customer buying activities.
These “Buyer Signals” as ADP calls them, are customer verifiers–stage gates in the sales process that signal customers’ readiness to move forward in the sale. A rep proceeds to the next step of the sales process only when a verifier is present, that is, when the customer indicates their readiness to move forward.
By focusing on customers’ buying process and the right customer signals, ADP not only improved conversion rates, but also realized a 500% ROI in reengagement of stalled opportunities.
SEC Members, to learn more about Buying Made Easy, read excerpts from our conversation with the creators of the tool on how they mapped out their customers’ buying processes, how they built the tool, and how such a tool can help improve your sales function.
Also, be sure to check out the Deal Verification toolkit which can serve as a foundation for the types of customer verifiers to develop to match your sales methodology and reflect how your customers buy.
on February 9, 2012
Respond
Hello Ms. Ahuja,
1. In his books, ‘SPIN Selling’ and ‘Major Account Sales Strategy’, the author Neil Rackham has recommended … the SPIN Selling process for consultative sales, and the buyer decision cycle.
For making large sales in India, are these ideas valid and useful today, … or do you think that the selling process, ideas mentioned in ”The Challenger Sale’ are more valid?
2. Being an independent consultant/sales trainer, I am unable to register as a member on the SEC website. As such, I cannot read many of the articles, research that are referred to on your/other blogs of the SEC. Could you please help in my registering as a member?
Thanks,
U L Mehta
on February 14, 2012
Respond
Hello Mr. Mehta,
Thank you for your comment.
In response to your first question, the Challenger model doesn’t replace methodologies like SPIN but rather, it’s complementary to a lot of these methodologies. Also, irrespective of whether a company follows SPIN selling or Challenger, the ADP case about the changing sales process is equally applicable. ADP realized that its reps were often outpacing its customers in the sales process. So while a customer would still be at the need recognition stage; the rep would have moved on to the exploration stage of the sales process. This meant that the deal would often not get closed or be stuck for a long time.
The key here is to introduce customer verifiers–stage gates in the sales process that signal customers’ readiness to move forward in the sale. You allow a rep to proceed to the next step of the sales process only when a verifier is present, that is, when the customer indicates the readiness to move forward.
And yes, the approach is very much valid in India as well. The factors of challenging sales environment with increasingly complex deals and higher consensus requirements, are quite global. Additionally, as the Challenger data represents almost all geographies, industries and business models, we’ve found that the Challenger model does indeed apply everywhere including India.
To your second question, SEC is a membership organization, and our client network is comprised of large organizations. Unfortunately, we don not offer individual subscriptions.
Fortunately, if you are interested in learning more about the Challenger sales model, you can buy the book here: http://www.flipkart.com/books/1591844355?_l=gWxQa0snNjHUHKJhnj_y0w–&_r=R%20X%20yBoheSiqIazYEb9q%20w–&ref=c907f0c0-f6a6-4dde-a8d6-aecb5ecf28d4.
You can also read the book excerpt here: http://www.executiveboard.com/challenger/pdf/Challenger-Sale-TOC-Foreword-&-Intro-Excerpt.pdf