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For sake of discussion let's say that...
...the prospect trusts you, respects you and values the relationship.
...you are working with a prospect who has the authority, budget, want and need for your product or service.
...the prospect feels you have the most compelling value proposition.
...both you and the prospect understand how your solution will help him/her reach his/her desired outcome.
...the prospect has not voiced an objection.
...the prospect has not yet decided to move forward with the sale.
Given those assumptions what can you do that is in your control to shorten the sales cycle?
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... However, what is also apparent is that currently the prospect is working around all of that and will probably continue to do so until all the things behind the scene--not apparent to the seller-- are in place or resolved TO THE POINT where a purchase can be made.
Ace I found a post in a previous thread where Sharon Drew Morgen writes about this:
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I'd like to briefly say something about how buyers decide,and possibly put to rest the confusion between sales and decisioning. Sales is based on gathering/understanding needs and product placement. We've spent centuries discovering the best ways to help buyers understand our product and helping sales people understand buyers. Yet this is only half of the equation.
What we have never been taught to do is to manage what happens when buyers say "I'll call you back" and then go away and......... and... and do WHAT? Indeed, we don't know. We just have to wait (and wait and wait....) until they call us back. Sales has never known how to manage this end of the buying cycle, because it involved a mysterious decision making process that buyers go through on their own, using their own unique, and hidden, process.
But here is what they do: before they can make a change, do anything different, add something new, etc. they must make sure that the entire range of people, policies, relationships, rules, etc. (i.e. the system the buyer lives in) buy-in to adding something new to what they are already doing. Make no mistake: there is some sort of work-around happening that sits in the place of your product (For people purchasing a house, they are living in one and have a roof over their heads so don't need to decide immediately; for software sales, for example, there are programming work-arounds.). Whatever it is, it has 'worked', and if buyers truly had an immediate need they would have made a purchase already.
So buyers have to recognize and manage all of the internal issues that need to take place BEFORE they'll make a purchasing decision. But here is the tricky concept for sales people: an outsider will never, ever understand what is going on behind closed doors. We may know everyone on the decision team (and even that is a stretch); we may understand the need; our product may be a perfect, perfect fit (but we've all lost sales in which that's true). But we will never understand old relationship issues, or relevant policy issues, or old vendor/partner issues. And until those are managed, no change will happen and no decision to purchase will occur.
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... The salesperson cannot control those things. However it is possible to get through the door and lead them in management of the changes, decision making, and resolutions that have to take place in order to buy. This could be effective in shortening the buying cycle.
Ace I found a post in a previous thread where Sharon Drew Morgen writes about this:
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You can’t make the buyer’s decision for him;
You don’t have the internal relationships, the history, the team trust to effect change.
You are an outsider, and until you are hired by the prospect, you will never fully understand anything more than the area immediately around the Identified Problem.
You won’t be able to tell the CEO that he hired the wrong people, or needs to shift departments heads, etc. unless you are an Executive Coach and are paid to do this;
You won’t be able to address the entire decision team and get them to change direction, disconnect relationships, or fire the current vendor unless you are an internal change-management consultant getting paid to do this.
Unfortunately for you, the buyer just has to do this part alone. But you can help define the structure of the process for them. Not to mention that the buyer will have all of the answers and then be able to make a purchasing decision in half the time, without a price criterion. You helping the buyer know these things for himself will encourage the trust you have been seeking
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... Unfortunately most salespeople would be predisposed to stay on the selling end thinking they could speed the process in that way. But the fact is they won't speed the process.
Ace I found a post in a previous thread where Sharon Drew Morgen writes about this:
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Until now, sellers have sat and waited for buyers to call back, not knowing what they were doing. But it's possible to lend a hand, so long as they use a different method, other than 'sales'. Sellers must add a new element to their sales process. Not only must they understand need and what problem the buyer needs to resolve, but they must also help buyers manage their unique, idiosyncratic systems issues internally, to free them up to make a buying decision. The hard part here is that sellers have no way of understanding these private internal issues because they are not problem, need, or solution based.
One last quote from Sharon Drew Morgen that may provide some insight into why "Asking" for the sale and/or "Asking" why they haven't bought may not shorten the sales cycle:
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If you are lucky, and your customer/client has done all (ALL) their internal/systemic 'homework', they will call or walk in, plunk their money down, and buy. Those are those lucky sales that happen occassionally.
But if you experience customers saying they know what they want, and then they go away and don't close as quickly as you think they might, what do you think they are doing??? they are lining up their decision criteria and managing their internal people/policies/relationships so there won't be disruption.
Just because people recognize and understand their Identified Problem doesn't mean they know how to resolve it - or they would have already! once people exhibit a need, it means they haven't decided to resolve it yet. either they can't, or they don't know how. so knowing the problem, knowing the solution, having the money, being ready and willing, doesn't mean they'll buy.
... the time it takes buyers to come up with their OWN ANSWERS (which are absolutely hidden from us, and often at first hidden from them as well) is the length of the sales cycle. we've attempted to sell by understanding needs, solving problems, and placing product. but the buyer has an entire series of strange, unique issues they need to manage, and there has never been a way in to manage these issues before now.
-Jeff Blackwell
The salesperson cannot control those things. However it is possible to get through the door and lead them in management of the changes, decision making, and resolutions that have to take place in order to buy. This could be effective in shortening the buying cycle.
Unfortunately most salespeople would be predisposed to stay on the selling end thinking they could speed the process in that way. But the fact is they won't speed the process. -Ace Coldiron