Sharon Drew Morgen - Buying Facilitation

Originally Posted by Houston Are the two systems compatible?

well, i'll tell you.

it's always necessary to present your product appropriately, and to gather appropriate data to ensure that what you have is what they need.

and, Buying Facilitation manages the buyer's decision. so both are necessary.

but here's what happens: once the buyer knows how to decide, the type, style, and amount of presentation or pitch data changes. when i worked with KPMG they went from a $350,000 presentation to a $35,000 presentation. lots of information may be necessary when you don't know (and they don't know) how the buyer is buying and you're seeking to get them all of the data necessary for them to choose what's most relevant. but with Buying Facilitation, the exact amount/type/style of data will be specified, and then you only need to offer exactly what they need.

so your presentation and pitch will change - and you'll even need to add new material you're not used to offering in order to help their stakeholders manage the change that will come with placing your product within their sytsem.

to make it simple: if you're selling plates, and there ends up being only so much room in the buyer's cabinet and they don't want to get rid of what they have, you'll only pitch data on the size plate that would fit - not general data. simple, but visual.

in general, my clients find they need far less data, almost never send anything out in the mail, do far fewer presentations, and do far fewer field visits. and close 3x as many sales.

we're used to pitching/positioning/presenting OUR information, and not knowing the buyer's buying criteria. once THEY know their own criteria, you only need to give them the data that matches.

remember: information doesn't teach someone how to make a decision.
sd

Originally Posted by sharondrew remember: information doesn't teach someone how to make a decision.

Excellent point.

Let's say I'm selling new cars at a Chevy dealership and a prospect drive on the lot, get's out and starts looking at cars. If I was trainined in Facilitative Buying what would I do different than traditional sales training methods?

Originally Posted by Houston Excellent point. Let's say I'm selling new cars at a Chevy dealership and a prospect drive on the lot, get's out and starts looking at cars. If I was trainined in Facilitative Buying what would I do different than traditional sales training methods?

can't go through an entire sale here; but it's about the decision. how did he choose his last car? how would it be different/the same? what would stop him from using his current car dealership/vendor to make another purchase? how would he know that one car over another would handle his criteria? how would his wife and family need to be a part of the decision and how would he help them collaborate so they could make a decision that would include all of their criteria?

nothing to do with the car. you've seen it a hundreds times: buyer with a need that doesn't purchase anything, or in a timely way, or anything sane. it's never about the product. it's always about the system that the decision needs to manage.

we just didn't know how to do this before now.
sd

Originally Posted by sharondrew can't go through an entire sale here;

Fair enough. I'm just trying to get an idea on how this would work in a familiar selling environment.

Originally Posted by sharondrew but it's about the decision

From what I've gathered it's about the decision to buy or not to buy. Once the decision is made they are or are not "willing". Is that accurate?

Originally Posted by sharondrew how did he choose his last car? how would it be different/the same? what would stop him from using his current car dealership/vendor to make another purchase? how would he know that one car over another would handle his criteria? how would his wife and family need to be a part of the decision and how would he help them collaborate so they could make a decision that would include all of their criteria?

These questions seem the same but different. It looks like your attempting to elicit a buying criteria but the intent is different. Is that accurate?

this is not exactly about the decision to buy. it's about the decisions necessary for the internal elements to agree to change. so it's about a decision to change; the decision to be willing to do something different (how would you know when it was time to change your hairstyle? is not a decision about using one hairstylist over another, but about the decision to change the way you look) and allow a change to happen in a closed system (how would you know when it was time to shift the way you've been doing sales until now? not a question about Buying Facilitation but a question about your willingness/ability to want to do something different).

once they have all of their internal decision criteria managed, then they need to decide what and how and when to buy.

and, if you are not willing to change your hairstyle, doesn't matter what a great hairdresser i am.... although i might push a bit further and say: 'i'm a noted stylist. i see you looking differently than the way you look now [this is your pitch]. i'm wondering what you would need to believe differently to be willing to reconsider your current choices about your hairstyle?' if the person said 'nothing' you're done.

if you're happy with your sales results and have no desire to change, then i doesn't matter how great Buying Facilitation is. at the top of the Funnel (see my ebook at www.buyingfacilitation.com for the latest funnel) is Where are we and what's missing. if nothing is missing, there is nothing to change. doesn't matter what the product is, doesn't matter what the seller believes.

but facilitative questions can make it possible to expand viewpoints using the buyer's own criteria.

and, again, careful here. I AM NOT TRYING TO ELICIT BUYING CRITERIA. i'm teaching the buyer how to elicit THEIR OWN buying criteria. doesn't matter if i know it or not. THEY need to know it, own it, and have all stakeholders buy-in to it and an outsideir cannot do that.

ok?? really different from sales. and yet the buyer must to it before they buy. with you or without you. and the seller is an outsider. so the buyer does it alone. or has done it alone untill now.Buying Facilitation will give you the tools to lead them through it using their own criteria, and coming up with their own answers. BF is biased only toward expanding the buyer's own unique criteria NOT selling a product.

Originally Posted by Houston Fair enough. I'm just trying to get an idea on how this would work in a familiar selling environment. From what I've gathered it's about the decision to buy or not to buy. Once the decision is made they are or are not "willing". Is that accurate? These questions seem the same but different. It looks like your attempting to elicit a buying criteria but the intent is different. Is that accurate?

Sharon Drew why do you think salespeople haven't been taught this before?

Originally Posted by Jeff Blackwell Sharon Drew why do you think salespeople haven't been taught this before?

good question. i even think i have an answer!

at this point in history, we have a very complex business environment - global/unknown competitors; business partners in different companies and areas of expertise; vendor possibilities; quick, easy ways for our competition to catch up and look just like us and make it difficult to differentiate.

before now, we've been able to use the 'information exchange' method to sell with: what is your problem? what do you need? here's what i have to help fix it.

but buyers have much, much bigger, more complex decisions to make now. and the Identified Problem is only a tip of the iceberg in re the decisions that must be made before they can consider a solution.

and, there has been no model that actually gets INSIDE the decision making to help stakeholders.

one of the good things about this sequencing model is that it is unbiased, whereas sales tends to be biased toward an ultimate goal of product placement. the ultimate goal of Buying Facilitation is to help evoke a collaborative decision that actually teaches buyers to seek, find, and makes sense of all of the internal decisions that got them where they are. so when you ask: what has stopped you and your decision team from resolving this until now? it's not an information gathering question but a way for the buyer to gather internal, possibly hidden data in his/her brain that needs to be brought to light to add to the decision making needs for future choices. it's a question we ask about 1/3 down the funnel to direct the brain to older decisions.

another question might be: how would you and your decision team know how to choose one vendor over another when our products are so similar? they have to answer these questions for themselves anyway, and doing it WITH you puts them on your team.

so, i think the answer to the question is twofold: 1. it wasn't perceived as 'time' before now (although i've been training this material for almost 20 years); and 2. no one has designed a model such as this. and, to be honest, only a few visionaries have had the foresight to bring this in to their companies. even now not everyone thinks it's time for this.

hope this answered your question, jeff.
sd

Originally Posted by sharondrew hope this answered your question, jeff.

That does answer my question Sharon Drew. Thank you for being such a good sport.

If you don't mind me asking, You claim you can get a 200-600% increase in sales. That is a big claim how does that happen?

Originally Posted by Jeff Blackwell That does answer my question Sharon Drew. Thank you for being such a good sport. If you don't mind me asking, You claim you can get a 200-600% increase in sales. That is a big claim how does that happen?

1. kpmg had an 8 figure international deal that took 3 years to close. using BF they closed in 4 months. ibm had a 6 mo. sale with a software product. we closed in 2 calls. kaiser: from 110 face visits and 18 closed sales a month to 27 visits and 25 closed sales.

the time it takes buyers to come up with their own answers is the length of the sales cycle. they have to come up with their own answers anyway - with you or without you. so when you lead them in an unbiased way through to their own best answers,it cuts the sale dramatically.

buyers don't care how long it takes or they would have solved the problem already. they just need to get it right without causing internal stress/disruption. so they are happy to do it quicker.

2. no more time wastage; only visit prospects who want to close and they will have their entire decision team there at the meeting; get rid of tirekickers and wasted time following around prospects who will never close; use the phone more proactively and don't use your body as a prospecting tool; find more prospects than are obvious - those who didn't know they need your product but through your questions realize they do.

clearer?

Originally Posted by sharondrew 2. no more time wastage; only visit prospects who want to close and they will have their entire decision team there at the meeting; get rid of tirekickers and wasted time following around prospects who will never close; use the phone more proactively and don't use your body as a prospecting tool; find more prospects than are obvious - those who didn't know they need your product but through your questions realize they do.

Does your program show how to find more prospects too?

Something else. I have read some of your articles and you talked about rapport. Some salespeople think you should talk about pictures on the prospects walls, and trophies, you know small talk, to build common ground or rapport. What do you think?