Why should I do business with you rather than one of your competitors?
This is one of my favorite questions to ask when I first meet a business owner or sales professional. It is no longer surprising that most will tell me it is their customer service that makes them different. However, nearly all businesses strive to provide customer service and all customers expect it from everyone with whom they choose to do business.
Thus, even though customer service is an important part of any retention strategy, it is not much of a business development strategy for most businesses.
In the b2b world, the reason people do business with you is that you are UNIQUELY able to help them directly or indirectly make money, save money, or mitigate risk.
More specifically, you must demonstrate to prospects that you have ...
Unique products or services
Uniquely creative ideas
Unique and relevant experience
or Useful connections
that will help them to make money, save money, or mitigate risk.
Determining why anyone should do business with you as opposed to your competitors is easy for some and extremely frustrating for others. If you do not have anything Unique to demonstrate to your prospects, then put your entrepreneurial mind to the task of coming up with something.
Sales activity leads to sales. More sales activity is likely to lead to more sales. After all, sales is merely a numbers game. Right?
Many "good" business owners, sales professionals, and sales managers believe that to be the case and they are completely wrong. However ...
in sales (and in life), "good" activity is often the enemy of "great" activity.
The key is to LASER FOCUS. Here are some steps to take.
Focus on a smaller target market. Some examples include picking a few vertical markets, narrowing your geographic scope, or narrowing the size of company you target.
Refine your brand or value proposition to be specifically relevant to this narrowly defined market. The process of becoming "relevant" will help you to brand yourself as an expert and a trusted adviser.
As you grow your expertise in specific target markets, focus how you and where you do your sales activity. In other words, get your refined "relevant" brand in front of the right people. At the same time, stop doing "good" sales activity that does not target this narrower focus.
You regular "good" sales activity will become "great" just from narrowing your focus. You will get better referrals. You will waste less time seeing "unqualified" prospects. Your pipeline ratios will improve.
Going from Good to Great is easier said than done, but worth the effort!
How has getting Laser Focused changed your business?
If you have been in sales for long, it is likely that you have probably been sold at one time or another that you should "always be closing." "Focus on ABC!" This statement is as tired as the manipulative closing techniques that fill books and sales training workshops.
It is more effective and fun to focus on ABS ... Always Be Sharing.
What does this mean? Well ask yourself, as a member of the business community, what do you have to share with your prospects and those who can influence your business?
You can share ...
How your products or services make or save business money or mitigate risk
Your network through referrals
Resources such as articles or white papers
Your insight or experience by speaking to groups
Creative ideas (unrelated to your products or services) to help the business of others
Facilities. Let others borrow a meeting room for example.
In a nutshell, find ways to be a valuable resource to your prospects and those who can influence your business and they will pay more attention to your sales message and will be more likely to buy from you when they are ready.
If my father told me once, he told me a thousand times. "Jeff, remember, business is for making money." He usually said this in the context of a "keep your fixed expenses low" speech. Now I find myself repeating this mantra, but in the context Personal Business Brand discussions with business owners and sales professionals.
Specifically, when creating and heralding your Personal Brand Message, one needs to make sure their message is "relevant."
The key to doing this successfully is to come from the right perspective. Most people tend to ask themselves, "Why do my current customers do business with me?" They may go so far as to ask their current customers the same question. The answers are likely centered around issues such as customer service, reliability, relationship, and trust.
The problem with this is that the answers to this question are based upon their experience that since becoming a customer rather than what beliefs they had that made them consider doing business with the business owner or sales person in the first place.
Look at it this way. If you ask a happily married person why they love their spouse,they are likely to tell you that their spouse is loving, supportive, that they listen, that "they make me laugh," and so on. These are answers based upon their "experienc with the brand" so to speak.
However,if you ask that happily married person what attracted them enough to go out on that first date, it is likely to be a completely different list such as we had shared interests or perhaps it was more visceral.
In a nutshell, what is relevant to existing customers is not necessarily what is relevant to a prospect . To put it another way, the Corporate Brand Experience makes for a happy marriage, but the first date most often happens because of the Personal Business Brand of the business owner or the sales person.
Now, getting back to my father's advice that "business is for making money." When it comes to Personal Business Brand relevance in the B2B market, one has to keep in mind that advice. To be relevant, one's personal business brand needs to satisfy at least one of the three following criteria. Your prospects must believe that you personally have things like skill, expertise, experience,and desire such that you can either ...
Help make them money
Help them save money (or time)
Help minimize risk (which potentially saves money)
Who do you know with a Personal Business Brands that makes you certain they can meet the above criteria? What is it about them that causes this belief?
Recently I participated in a conversation with a few sales people during which one was asking the other, "How do you sell a product that is twice the cost of mine? I can't get anyone to buy in this economy."
In "this kind of economy," the danger for business owners and sales professionals is that they start to buy into statements like "nobody is buying" or "nobody can afford our products or services." The truth is that tragically, many businesses have been devastated by this economy. But thankfully, most businesses are surviving and some are thriving.
What is certainly true across the board is that b2b buyers are seeking more value for their dollar.
So, that begs the question, why have some sales professionals experienced a much steeper drop in sales than some of their peers and competitors? Here are four possible reasons.
Paradigm
Some business owners and sales professionals have an abundance paradigm. They believe that there is enough business to go around for those who are good at what they do. Thus, they have maintained or perhaps even increased their sales activity. They are the sames sales professionals who still make phone calls even though "nobody ever answers their phone anymore" and they are the same people who get out and network even though "networking doesn't generate business anymore."
On the flip side, those with a scarcity paradigm, deep down, don't believe that they can sell in this economy. They prefer to just go through the motions every day until things get better.
Disciplined Focus on Margin
Some business owners and sales professionals focus on margin per sale. They expend most of their energy on clients and prospects to whom they can provide the most value. For many reasons such as internal efficiency and client appreciation, this work is the most profitable.
Business owners and sales professionals that focus on gross sales are apt to chase opportunities that are not as closely aligned with their competencies, thus they expend disproportionate amounts of energy on marginally profitable clients.
Branding
Business owners and sales professionals with a strong personal business brand (one that has F.O.R.M.) tend to get more and higher quality referrals and they are able to build trust and credibility faster. This results in a faster sales cycle and higher margin.
Those business owners that focus on pure "sales activity" and ignore or put little effort into their own brand tend to get fewer referrals. Those referrals that they do get tend to be more price sensitive rather than focused on ultimate value. Furthermore, because their own brand is not distinct, they are poorly positioned to command "full price" in a weak economy.
Sales Process
Finally, business owners and sales professionals with a solid sales process are able to demonstrate a greater understanding of the impact they have on their client businesses. They design better solutions for their clients thus they can close more deals at higher margins.
Those business owners and sales professionals with a poor sales process struggle to understand and demonstrate the full impact that they can have on client businesses. They tend to provide undifferentiated solutions, thus they must compete upon price rather than value.
What other thoughts do you have as to why some business owners and sales professionals find it harder to compete in a weaker economy?
Being an authority (i.e., having subject matter expertise) will increase referrals, sales opportunities, and ultimately ... sales.
The fact is, the perception that obedience to authority constitutes correct behavior has been instilled in us through systematic socialization. It is so strong, that we respond to mere symbols of authority rather than to its substance.
For example, imagine observing a group of people at a busy downtown intersection. If a teenager in droopy jeans and a t-shirt decides to cross the intersection when the traffic signal reads "don't walk," it is unlikely that anyone will follow him. However, if a fifty year old male dressed in a suit carrying a briefcase does the same thing, many people will follow him. (For a fascinating look at how people will blindly follow authority,
read about the Milgram
experiment.)
What's the difference? He looks like someone who knows what he is doing.
Every business owner and sales person needs to ask themselves, what percentage of my prospects perceive me to be a true authority? How do I compare to my competitors?
First, do you look like an authority? Do you dress and act like someone who is successful and knows what they are talking about?
More importantly, however, how you demonstrate that you are an authority?
Questions--Lots of people can "tell" you what they do and what they know. A real authority likes to ask intelligent questions (and listen to the answers). Intelligent questions are refreshing. They provoke thinking. They can cause people to attribute authority to the one asking the questions.
Writing--Few people are inclined to get their thoughts written down in order to share with others. Just by doing so you can become an authority. Write an article and submit it to a trade magazine, newspaper, or a blog. Write a short white paper to distribute to prospects and customers or to make available on your website. Write something new at least a few times a year.
Become a Resource--It is harder to get in front of prospects in the internet age because the information the salesperson used to provide is accessible online. Ironically, this is also an opportunity. Find relevant information online and point your prospects and customers to it. Find ways to make smart introductions among people in your network. The person who helps others leverage their time (instead of wasting it) will be perceived as an authority.
Public Speaking--Being a GOOD public speaker is perhaps the best way to position yourself as an authority. First, it forces you to figure out what people would like to hear about. Second, it forces you to organize your expert thoughts in a relevant and interesting way. Third, if you have done one and two well, you instantly become a credible and authoritative resource.
Passion--Love what you do. This leads to conviction. Conviction leads to confidence. We attribute authority to those who are confident.
Everything I have mentioned above is about establishing real, transparent authority. If you are new in your industry or in your role, don't fake it. It only takes one person offended by your act to make a comment on twitter or facebook to really hurt your reputation.
The business community will be patient with a rookie ... for a little while. For many jobs, it takes around six months before you have seen maybe 80% of everything you are ever going to see. It is a short time before you reach that fork in the road. One path leads to becoming average. The other path, the one less traveled, leads to establishing your authority.
Why do you perceive certain people to be authoritative in their industry? How have you established your own authority?
One of my client's was recently told by someone in his network that he might be focusing his brand too narrowly. The argument was that he is going to miss opportunities if he does not let prospects know about the full breadth of his expertise. Naturally, we got into a discussion focused on this question:
"Can your brand be too narrowly focused?"
First answer this question. Is your long term branding OBJECTIVE to increase profits year over year, or is it just to let everyone know what your company does? Of course the objective is to increase profits! Letting everyone know what your company does is a means to that end.
To achieve the increased profits objective, you may pursue one or more of the following STRATEGIES. Lower your expenses. Increase prices. Increase sales to existing customers. Increase sales to new customers. Focus on retention. And so on ...
Assuming that increasing sales to new customers is a STRATEGY that you intend to pursue, the next question becomes, TACTICALLY, how do you get your foot in the door? (Of course, there are several questions to ask yourself about which doors and how many that we can't address in one post.)
The answer might be to identify one or a few "hot button" issues that your target market deals with and brand your company as the "go to" company regarding those issues.
Once your foot is in the door, you will have the opportunity to discuss the breadth of your expertise and your full line of products and services.
If you are concerned about missing opportunities by being too narrowly focused with your branding efforts, ask yourself this question.
As a small b2b business describing yourself with statements like, "We can handle all of your __________ needs," how will you compete against other businesses that are pursuing a "foot in the door strategy?"
The takeaway here is that a narrowly focused sales strategy and branding tactics designed to support the sales strategy will increase sales more effectively than a broad focus or no focus.
What are your thoughts? Does this apply to your industry? Does your experience support or debunk this idea of narrow focus?
Recently I have had a few people say to me, "Where have you been? I have not seen you in a while."
I probably responded by saying something like, "Well, I have been busy working. You know, making a living."
This is true. I have been busy. However, I have not been out of town or attending fewer chamber meetings and other networking events. In fact, I have spoken at several events the first four months of the year. So I wondered, why would more than one person ask me where I have been.
Since I began blogging, twittering, occasionally facebooking, and other branding activities online, I have been very consistent ... up until a few months ago when I got sidetracked with some other projects and travel. Lately, I have not been engaged in conversation with my network.
Ironically, this most often happens in business when we experience success. Investing time in branding, lead generation, and lead nurturing activities feels less urgent and can easily get pushed aside. Like the foundation of a building, we don't always notice the cracks and the crumbling until the building itself starts to suffer damage.
Don't let that happen!
As my father, Ed Garrison, used to say, "You need to make money six months from now just like you need to make it today."
Develop a strategy and tactics for branding that you can HABITUALLY maintain even in the busiest of times and keep it high on your priority list or you may find your Brand Fading.
Perhaps the most beneficial thing about putting together a great "elevator" statement is that if done well, it will force you to really discover your relevance to your target audience.
During a Sales Habitudes workshop yesterday on personal business branding, a financial adviser shared his thoughts on the subject. He stated that because there are many "financial advisers" around, when he is networking and states that he is a financial adviser ...
In this case, we talked about two elements of a brand that has F.O.R.M., focus and relevancy.
As it turns out, this financial adviser has a background in a small, family owned business. He prefers to work with small business owners because he has a unique understanding regarding their needs
He also knows from his experience that small business owners by nature like a lot of control over their assets and,that non-liquidity is the same as being broke when growth opportunities come along or when business is slow.
Now, he works with small business owners (focus) to invest and grow their wealth while maintaining control and liquidity (relevance).
Of course, most people on an elevator won't care, but his target audience will be curious. If you are a small business owner and want to know who this focused and relevant financial adviser is, contact me.
Where do you need to focus? How can you be more relevant?
Crafting your sales value proposition or "elevator statement" well is
perhaps the most crucial element in a systematic business development
program. If done well, it becomes the foundation for all of your
branding, networking, and other marketing efforts.
It actually changes the direction that your conversations go
with prospects and clients!
If done well, it has F.O.R.M.
It is Focused. You Own It. It is Relevant.
And it is Magnetic.
Being Relevant
To be relevant to your audience in business, your value proposition must promise, to do one of the following things.
Make money for your prospect
Save money for your prospect
Minimize a negative emotion such as
fear
Maximize a positive emotion such as
joy, pride, or peace of mind
Here are some small business examples:
Suzanne Hull of Contemporary Business Solutions will make money for you by helping you to promote your next event with social media and at the same time save you money because promoting with social media can be very inexpensive.
Mike Sansone of Converstations will make money for his clients by helping them to attract a community that follows their business on-line.
Nathan Wells of Mass Mutual Insurance minimizes the fear of his business clients that they may not be able to retain their key employees as the economy heats up and hiring takes off.
Todd Guske of Guske & Associates promises feelings of joy and pride by producing highlight films for high school sports in addition to his video production for corporate clients.
Being Relevant is generally easier than being Focused and Owning It. Just make sure that you are communicating the value of what you do rather than just describing what you do.
