Michael’s Blog
Getting the Bill Through Congress
It’s never been a tougher time to get a bill through Congress. The Congress that resides in Washington, D.C. – and the “Congress” that resides in every one of your customers’ organizations. The Congress that has to be appeased and won over by any champion of any bill or offering – in Washington or in a customer’s organization – to get the votes to get the approval to get the sign off to get the “purchase order” from all the varied constituencies and power players to make what they believe is right actually happen.
And regardless your politics, regardless how you feel about health care, there is a lot to be learned about selling from what has been happening in Washington this summer with this health care mess of an offering. This health care reform offering that had a great launch with enormous fanfare, a lot of collateral, a lot of big names championing it, a lot of grandiose terms, and a lot of talking. Lots of talking.
But maybe just maybe, one of the major problems in the whole process and one of the major reasons it is facing so many obstacles, is maybe, just maybe all those big shot politicians and all their high paid consultants forgot the simple basics of selling – selling anything, anywhere, to anybody. The simple basics of you gotta let them know, simply and succinctly, what’s the point and what’s it buy them. And I don’t know about you, but underneath all the grandiose terms and eloquence, I don’t have a clue what’s the point of this health care thing – where’s it different or better than the health care I have today – or what that would buy me and my family in clear, succinct, and personal terms applicable to me and mine.
And in lieu of that clear and succinct basic selling point to build from, the thing was doomed from the start and open to all its opponents rightly or wrongly making up and attaching their points and what they’ll cost you to it. And in lieu of any positive what’s the point and what’s it buy you, the negatives are winning out. ‘Cause that’s the only clear points and what that buys you out there! Customers, any kind and any place, like to get it clear and simple when they consider the value of something before they buy it – or reject it.
What is happening in Washington happens in all of our customers’ organizations all the time. And just how that health care fiasco of a product is being sold – and defeated – is just how we far too often try to sell as well, and then wonder why our own little in-house customer champion either doesn’t even try, or fails so miserably, in getting our own little offering through his or her own little Congress.
What’s the point and what’s it buy me – simply and succinctly. Priceless.
Selling to Sellers – and Buyers
You ever bring a new friend with you to join a familiar old crowd in some kind of activity? A new couple to accompany you and your partner at the regular vacation spot with some other couples you’ve known forever? A new and unproven guy or gal to join in a long run or ride with your usual group? Someone new and untested along with the usual crowd at the usual watering hole for a few drinks after work?
There’s always a risk in bringing something new and untried into a familiar and ok as it is environment, right? The new and untried might not work out, might not fit in, might even damage what was going along good before the new ever entered the picture. Or then again, it could go the other way, and make the usual even better, and make you look great in helping it happen.
If we could all put our reseller (or direct seller) hats on for a minute, that’s how it is with them a lot of the time when they balance the potential advantage of aggressively selling our latest offering versus not. And as with them, so too with their customers in also balancing taking the risk of championing our latest offering or not. Especially in these times of economic fear and darn near customer buying and salesperson selling paralysis where the temptation has never been greater to just play it safe and do nothing.
Asking any salesperson to sell something of ours in these times is asking alot. First, the usual request for their customer’s time and attention. Then, the risk of their customer not feeling the time and attention given was worth the effort but rather more of the same old vendor show and tell time. In my years as a customer I used to give a host of vendors their fair and equal every month or so ration of show and tell time. I was always polite and somewhat attentive, but I didn’t expect a whole lot and I usually didn’t get it. I rarely got enough to get my attention and time to delve further, and even more rarely heard something that would cause me to want to risk my reputation and my company’s money on an evaluation, let alone a purchase and implementation effort.
But every now and then something caught my eye, some new thing in the midst of the usual, some new thing with a clear point where it was different or better than, accompanied by a clear what it would buy me and my company value add. And then I’d risk spending some time with that one, looking into it further, developing the case from that base point and value add, and maybe just maybe risk personal political capital and my company’s valuable time and money to go further still, and perhaps do an evaluation and even maybe a resulting purchase and implementation.
And every single time that happened, I could trace it way back to that first date, that first time a new thing showed up in the midst of the usual with a clear point and a clear what was in it for me and my company – and with that, I bit on it and kept on biting ‘till we started buying. And buying. And that salesperson that brought that new offering with a clear value add to the usual party – he started winning. Just like me, the customer, who dared to introduce that same new offering with that clear value add to the same old usual way of doing business and playing it safe at my company.
And yep, just like we said at the start, there’s always a risk in bringing something new and untried into a familiar and ok as it is environment. But it’s a risk worth taking – a risk that in fact will be taken and benefitted by hugely for having done so IF that new something has a clear point and a clear value add for both the customer and the seller who are doing the risking.
Selling to Sellers
So how do we get a salesperson, in-house or reseller, excited and eager to sell our products to their customers? How do we get their attention in the midst of all the other products and/or companies like ours also competing for their selling time? And especially how do we do this in these tight for buying and even tighter for selling crazy economic times?
If we already have relationship and history together, we can rely on that, and add whatever new offerings we have to the mix and away we go – kinda. And we can always rely on the usual variety of programs, incentives, spiffs and etc. to encourage, induce and borderline bribe and/or threaten them to sell our stuff. And we can always smother them with all the various and sundry selling materials and collateral that accompany any new offering and hope that makes for a nice package and enough of an inducement and enablement to sell.
All of that is good and necessary. But in addition to that, and maybe underlying all of that, it has been my experience that what really gets a salesperson eager to sell our offerings is some ready for the street, grab the customers attention and keep it, selling angles and hooks to accompany all the other stuff.
Some nice angles and hooks, ready to roll with, and ready to take to their customers. Customers that have little time or attention to devote to figuring out what out of all they are offered from a plethora of vendors is worth their time to consider let alone their company’s money to buy. Customers that are more skittish than ever to even consider throwing their time and credibility behind a product unless it’s value add is resoundingly clear from the start.
We give a salesperson this – a nice clear and distinct, what’s the point and what’s it buy their customer, value add angle and hook – and they might, they just might, get excited enough to spend some of their credibility and time allotment with their customers and run our latest by them wholeheartedly for consideration. We don’t, and they might just play it safe and not bother to risk the full bore effort in these avoid anything but a great deal times… just as their customers probably won’t risk it either.