10 Questions Than Reveal What You Must Do To Win The Sale

The professional salesperson is a student of buying. This is particularly important at a time when buying decisions have become increasingly complex. The success of a deal depends on understanding now only how the buying decision will be made, but also the business decision that so often underlies it.

With this in mind we have put together 10 of the most important questions that salespeople need to answer in respect of each opportunity in their pipeline. Answering these questions and considering the implications of each has the potential to significantly increase your chances of success.

Questions To be Asked	Implications To be Considered
1. Who are all the stakeholders?	Do we understand the requirements of all stakeholders, not just technical, for example? How can we ensure access, without by-passing agreed channels?
2. Who are all the decision makers & influencers?	Have we had contact with all the decision makers? Do we understand their personal, as well as business drivers? How are we positioned with each?
3. Is there a clear definition of requirements?	Is the requirements definition clear? How has it been gathered? Is it complete – are there needs that we can additionally address? Has it been validated? Have requirements been prioritized, with any contradictions and tradeoffs addressed? Is the weighting of requirements reflect our strengths and minimize our weaknesses, or can be influence it to do so?
4. What is the buying process? What are the key steps? How long will it take?	How sophisticated is the buying process? What stage is the prospect at now: ·Recognition of need? · Search for a solution? · Selection of supplier?
5. What about competing projects (that includes ‘do it in-house’)?	Are there competing projects for the same budget? Could the project be delivered in-house? Could the project be delayed till next quarter, or next year? What factors will determine the selection of these options?
6. Is a business case required? What format will it take? Who will write it?	Can we provide information that will help build the business case, in terms of: Costs? Benefits? Risk? (including implementation) That includes a model to create quantify benefits and total cost of ownership.
7. What is the role of procurement?	Have we had contact with procurement? Do we understand their requirements?
8. Is there a shortlist of vendors? How many? What is the criterion?	How do we rate on the shortlist criteria? Can we help shape the criterion?
9. At what level is final sign-off required?	If this requires board level sign-off for example – how will this impact on selection? How does our proposal connect with strategy? Has our proposition being CEO proofed? Can we have access to / inform board members in advance of the decision?
10. Who is in the role of business analyst – that is the bridge between technical and business – whose role it is to create the business case?	Who has this responsibility? If there is no person (for example the IT director is creating the business case) then this raises issues regarding how the proposal will be reviewed at board level, for example.

So, for each opportunity in your pipeline, ask each of the questions outlined above, considering the implications of your answers for your next steps in managing that opportunity to the point of closing.

Are Buyers and Sellers Really on the Same Page?

You know the song 'you say tomato, I say tomatoe - let's call the whole thing off!'.  Well buyers sometimes feel that way when dealing with salespeople.

For example, when it comes to looking at orders and how they are won, there is a fundamental duality between vendors and buyers.  Here is why:

Vendors are concerned with: •        Proposals •        Negotiation •        Closing Getting the deal is the objective!

Buyers are concerned with: •        Costs •        Benefits •        Risks / constraints The objective is to establish the business case and correspondingly to make the right decision.

One consequence is that vendors enter negotiations that focus on costs, without considering the vital costs -benefits - risks equation that drives buyers.  Another is that sellers write proposals that don’t reflect the information that buyers must present in order to get the purchase approved.  Take for example the structure of the typical vendor proposal, compared to the structure of the buyer's business case, or purchase approvals document.

Vendor Proposal •        Introduction •        Problem •        Solution •        Benefits & Features •        Cost •        Team, Company & Credentials

Buyer’s Business Case •        Introduction •        Strategic rationale •        Alternatives: –       Costs –       Benefits –       Risks & Constraints •        Recommendation •        Implementation

Why is this important?  Well, as we have discussed in many articles, managers must now present a business case for purchases of as little as 10,000 or 20,000 euro.

Let’s take this further and look at some of the headings and terms buyers are likely use in writing a business case – taking the guidelines for seeking central funding for UK road projects:

Current situation	Future situation	Scope
Problems	Objectives	Targets
Exclusions	Risks	Tolerances
Assumptions	Actors / stakeholders	Assessment of alternatives
Sensitivity analyses	Consultation & participation	Option Testing
Benefit Cost Ratio (BCR)	Non-monetised impacts	Cost estimate robustness
Project Plan	Constraints	Deliverables

The question is how widely used are terms, such as; risks, benefit-cost ratio, stakeholders, assessment of alternatives, etc.  in sales proposals?  Well, the reality is not very common.    The leads to the question - how valuable is the content of the sales person’s proposal in helping the buyer in getting projects approved and building the business case?    Again the answer is not as helpful as they could be.  For those salespeople who recognize the importance of this issue, there is a real opportunity to improve win rates and success.

How to Spot Sales Opportunities in Trouble - The Tell Tale Signs

In a tighter market, there is increased pressure to maintain, if not improve win rates. This can be a challenge in the face of increased competition.

Visibility and Predictability Can Be A Challenge

Managers and their teams tell us they fell less in control of sales opportunities, or sales cycles, than at any time in the past. They complain of having less visibility and predictability in respect of what deals will close and when.

Salespeople tell us that they are increasingly taken by surprise by events and setbacks in respect of key opportunities. We know however that in many cases however results from a failure to recognize the early warning signs of a sales opportunity in trouble. To put it another way, as salespeople focused on getting the deal across the line, we fail to see when yellow and amber lights that are flashing.

You would imagine that as organisations place more attention on managing sales opportunities, including pipeline reviews surprises would be reduced. However, the nature of most opportunity, or pipeline reviews, mean that salespeople are generally not comfortable in openly expressing their concerns, or anxieties, regards an opportunity. They can certainly be reluctant to reduce the probability figure on an opportunity in the pipeline forecast.

Looking out for red lights?

Below is a list of the most common red, or yellow flags. We encourage salespeople to openly acknowledge and proactively address these issues:
• Don’t have access to stakeholders
• Don’t have all the information you need
• Covering old ground (same issues keep resurfacing)
• Salesperson is doing all the running (buyer does not complete his actions)
• Delays, setbacks, or surprises
• Last minute, or rushed changes in requirements, or specifications
• Price issue arises too early (before requirements / scope has been set)
• The temperature of the relationship appears to have suddenly changed
• You hear conflicting stories
• Credibility questions are continually being asked about your company
• You don’t have a champion / coach
• Sudden internal changes (people, priorities, mergers, etc.)
• You don't feel you are being respected (e.g. buyer turns up late for meetings, etc.)

This is a useful checklist to have by your side when reviewing pipeline opportunities. When red or yellow flags appear the salesperson must slow down and take care. Yellow and red flags are to be welcomed, this is particularly the case when they are indentified early in the sales cycle – that is in time for the underlying issues to be addressed, or for the salesperson to decide to walk away.

What to do when you have lost the sale

So you have lost the sale…

All salespeople become emotionally involved in winning the sale.  It is not just a financial issue involving commissions and targets, but also an issue of personal pride.  So, getting a ‘no’ can feel like a bit of a slap in the face.   With this in mind here are some tips on dealing with a lost sale.

Don’t blame yourself, or anybody else and don’t moan and complain either.   For example, don’t say ‘they wasted our time’, ‘they used us only to get another quote’, ‘we cannot close’, ‘they did not know ’, Focus instead on what can be learned from the situation.  Instead of using it to beat yourself, or others up, let it help you - let it move you forward.

Don’t personalize it.  If you feel you, or somebody else ’dropped the ball’, then focus your attention on the actions as opposed to the person.  For example, it is not because John the account manager failed to close, but because the sales process employed fell short and needs improvement.  Focusing on behaviours as opposed to people is key to transforming destructive criticism into positive direction.

Accept responsibility.  That is much different to the issue of blame.  Even if the market downturn, the departure of your contact in the prospect company, the actions of a competitor, etc. have played a role in losing the sale, it is best not to focus on these things, but instead on how you and your company are/can/should deal with them.  Accepting responsibility in this way is the key to leadership, to maintaining peace of mind and to moving forward.

Learn from it.    This offers the potential to transform a set back into an event that has the potential to improve your overall win rate, or ‘batting average’.  So, ask yourself (and all the others involved):

•     What will I/we do differently next time to get the result that I want?
•           Did I/we do everything you could do?   What worked?   What wouldn’t I/we do again? 
•     Take the learning systematic, by undertaking win loss analyses in respect of ever proposal, or tender.  That means asking questions such as:
•           Why did it come as such a big surprise?  What clues did you miss? 
•          What was the gap between your solution and the prospect’s perceived needs? 
  
•          Did we fully understand the needs?
  
•          Did we ensure the prospect had all the information required? 
  
•          Did we clearly build trust and establish credibility? 
  
•          Did we identify and address all the barriers? 
  
•          Could we have made it any easier to say yes? 
  
•         Did we invest enough time in building relationships?  
  
•          Did we cover the buying unit?  Did we keep all our promises throughout? 
  
•          Were there any aspects of how we managed the sales cycle that could have been improved? 
  

 Some other pointers:

Ask for feedback and advice from the prospect who has just said no.  Make it easy for the people involved to open up and tell you the real reasons.  Take great care not to appear as a ‘sore looser’.  Swallow your pride and genuinely wish them the best in implementing their chosen solution.

Stay positive.  See the setback as an opportunity to grow, improve and become stronger.  Remember, as Winston Churchill said ‘success is moving from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm’. 

You may have lost this sale, but that does not mean that you have lost the potential customer.  So it is important to keep in touch with the customer, even though they have chosen another supplier.  Things change and suppliers, as well as managers come and go, so if you maintain the relationship you may find yourself in pole position for the next order. 

Revise the numbers.  Dealing with the implications head on is best.  As yourself:  What is the worst case scenario now that that potential sale is lost?   Can we cope with that situation if it does occur?  How can be ameliorate the situation?

Bid Losses Offer Clue to Sales Effectiveness Opportunities

The loss of a number of recent bids had heightened competitiveness concerns among the sales team of a leading IT services company.  This was compounded by fears regarding a general economic slowdown.

However it is precisely in depressed markets and among down-spirited sales teams that a focus on sales effectiveness can produce the greatest results.  In particular two key opportunities to increase sales effectiveness were identified:

1.   1.  The sales team was over reliant on proposals to sell.   Most proposals were prepared after an initial short meeting with the customer, or following a phone call or email enquiry.   As a result proposal success rates were low, with limited information gathering / needs analysis, or prequalification before submission and no gauging reaction to price.

2.      2. Hampered by an insufficient flow of sales leads – reps were responsible for generating all their own leads, as a result less than 10% of their time was spend meeting new customers, with just one new customer being met each week by each rep.

In respect of proposals new criteria regarding when they are to be prepared and a policy of greater interaction with buyers before submission reduced the number of proposal generated, but dramatically increased win rates.  

Added to a telemarketing campaign to generate leads and increase the number of prospects being met, the result was a 22% increase in sales growth.  

Top 5 Priorities for Winning Sales Orders

We have been asking managers about their challenges and priorities in
terms of sales prders and boosting win rates.

Here are the top 5 challenges:
1. Revenues falling short of target
2. A 'sure thing' deal(s) is lost
3. Win rates are 'below par', or falling
4. Too many opportunities are stalled or 'in the valley'
5. Order size, or profitability needs to be increased

Here are the top 5 Priorities:
1. Involve the customer in creating the proposal
2. Avoid surprises - trial balloon price and other aspects
3. Go back to the start with stalled decisions
4. Get feedback before submission & post submission meeting
5. Track conversion rates & analyze lost deals

Why purchase decisions get stalled

Sales people often complain that 'sure thing' purchase decisions are increasingly getting stalled – often at the last minute.  It is all the more frustrating because salespeople feel there is nothing that can be done about it. 

However, looking beneath the surface there are reasons why buying decisions get stalled and things that we, as salespeople, can do to avoid all our hard work being 'put on ice'.

Situations change – the customers priorities, needs and budget have changed and this has caught the sales person off guard.

Failure to proved the value – that is quantified the benefits and in particular gained agreement as to the business impact of the solution.  The sales person did not present a sufficiently compelling reason to buy at this time.

Getting ahead of the customer and failed to notice that he/she was falling behind.  You failed to interact sufficiently with the customer, or to incrementally build commitment and gain agreement throughout the sales cycle.

Don't surprise them!  They did not see or agree to what you were proposing and what it would cost before you submitted your proposal. 

Failure to talk to the right people – or to systematically covered the buying unit.

The leap to be made by the customer is too big – the level of risk on the part of the customer might have been reduced by means of a pilot, a phased approach, etc.

Win, Lose, or worse of all Stalled!

There was a time when the worst that could happen to a salesperson was
that he, or she would lose the sale. But, even more dreaded are those
sales cycles that are stalled.

A stage cycle gets to the stage where a salespeople needs closure.
That is a definitive yes, or no, that would enable him, or her to move
on. Instead it is a 'not now', 'we are still evaluating what to do',
or worst of all there is a deafening silence from the prospect.
For many sales people the stalled sales cycle is worse than the sales
that is lost.

Today's buying decisions are more complex – they involve more people,
information and stages. That means it is more difficult to predict
what deals will close and when. Once more in a time of great
caution, owing to the slowdown, gitters in the buying organization can
easily derail a sure thing sales deal.

A sales person and his/her team may have been working on a sale for
many months, getting all the right signals from the prospect and
increasingly confident that the deal will close. Then all is laid to
waste, with the moment of the buyer stalled and so often the
salesperson helpless on the sidelines to do anything about it.

There are a myriad of factors that can cause a sale to get stalled and
some are beyond the ability of the salesperson to control, or perhaps
even anticipate. However, it is important to say that the number one
reason for stalled decisions is a failure among the buying
organization to match the purchase with a key business imperative, for
example cutting costs, driving sales, etc.

The number two reason for stalled decisions relates to the sales
approach and in particular the sales person getting ahead of the buyer
assuming that he, or she is following. Hence the importance of;
gradually building, gauging and seeking commitment consistently
throughout the sales process, ongoing prequalification (in terms of
budget, timing, etc.) and working closely with the customer to
establish needs, implications and the ideal solution.

Top 10 Opportunities to Improve Win Rates

Half of sales managers say they can gain further efficiencies in terms
of their sales approach.

This desire is driven by longer sales cycles, the difficulty of
forecasting what deals will close and pressure on win rates.

The Top 10 opportunities identified by managers are:

1. More systematic approach to the management of sales opportunities
(ie. sales process)

2. More structured and interactive approach to needs analysis, with a
focus on implications as well as needs

3. Greater coverage of the buying unit and selling higher generally

4. More systematic pre-qualification earlier and ongoing throughout
the sales cycle

5. Working more closely with the buyer to find solutions to their problems

6. Incrementally building and gauging buyer commitment throughout the
sales process

7. Quantification of business impact and benefits

8. Trial-ballooning price and other aspects of the solution

9. Bi-lateral approach to proposal preparation

10. More systematically building relationships