Solution Selling – Grow your sales and profits by selling a solution rather than a product!
What is Solution Selling?
Simply put, it’s presenting a solution to a customer that has a calculated financial benefit to the customer. “Mr. Manufacturer CEO, our automated case erector will increase your net profit by ,250 per year and has an ROI of 82%”.
Doesn’t this sound like a more promising sales pitch than, “Mr. Buyer, the price on our automated case erector is ,000. Do you have any other questions?”
So what does it take to be a solution seller? A little training and practice is all.
First, you need to have the communication skills to overcome the buyer objections to letting you gather enough information to present a solution rather than just a price. You need to be able to get past the administrative office and onto the shop floor to conduct a plant audit. You are looking for bottlenecks, and asking people what is causing them problems. You also want to find out about recent changes in packaging or volumes. You may need to bring along additional resources, like a mill rep, you sales manager or in-house specialists like packaging engineers.
Once you have the basic information, you need some financial skills to be able to place a dollar value on the problem and the solution. If you don’t know (or remember) anything about business finance, sign up for one of the many options for courses out there. Invest a ½ day or so in your skills. You need to be conversant in this to be able to present to key decision makers in your customers, as this is terminology that they are familiar with and will respond to much more favorably than features, advantages and benefits. You’ll need to consider what is your relationship with the customer. Don’t expect to get a huge opportunity if you’re unknown to them. You earn the right to bigger opportunities by solving smaller problems first.
Finally, the scary part. You’ll need to do a presentation of the information that you’ve gathered. Based on your relationship with the customer, structure your presentation appropriately. If you’re unknown or a peripheral player with them, be sure to give a good introduction to your company and your capabilities to solve their problems. If you’re in a shared or preferred positions, be sure to remind them about all the great things you’ve done for them such as percentage on-time, number of deliveries, how much credit you provide, how much inventory you have dedicated to them, etc. Br sure to protect your intellectual property in the presentation by asking “If I can show you how to make $x by doing business with you, will you give us the order?” You don’t want your hard work simply turned over to your more-established competitor to match the price.
Practice your solution selling skills on safe customers with smaller opportunities. As you get better with the skills, start to swing for the fences! I have seen sales reps gain millions in dollars of sales, an push out very entrenched competitors using this technique to create a solution for the customer that others had not contemplated.
Gordon Koury is a Partner with Foris Consulting. They specialize in profitability improvement consulting for wholesalers. Visit their website for more information, www.forisconsult.com
Gordon Koury is a Partner with Foris Consulting. They specialize in profitability improvement consulting for wholesalers. Visit their website for more information, www.forisconsult.com
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