Understanding the new B2B salesperson. From the well-served customer to the well-helped one.
Posted: Mon Dec 09, 2024 6:38 am
One of the things that I have enjoyed the most in my years as an Industrial Marketing Director were the “customer” moments. Being and working with clients has always been very rewarding and very different in my work and that of my teams. Marketing that sells is only achieved through direct contact with the client. Having worked in B2B, this social experience inevitably includes colleagues from the sales department. Here I want to tell you how things have changed in a very short time in B2B and how to begin by understanding the new B2B / Industrial salesperson.
Traditionally, the sales department in jamaica phone number resource industrial companies was like the “Ministry of Foreign Affairs” of a government; nothing moved or could be moved without the permission of the “owner” of the relationship with the account, the salesperson. This was, on the one hand, very convenient for the organization, but on the other hand, dangerous due to the loss of efficiency in the customer vision and, above all, due to the lack of direct feedback. Organizations with great value propositions depend solely on the emotional relationship between the salesperson and the customer, feeling that the customer does not belong to them. Today, this is starting to be dangerous. I will tell you why I think so.
I remember a real case when I was working in Marketing many years ago. A sales colleague, Ramón, came to my desk very confident and calm and told me that he had received a call from a potential client asking him to visit him. I remember asking him what we could prepare for the visit and he told me “nothing”, that he would ask us “these 5 product questions” and then we would go to eat at Asador X. I remember his “management instructions” for the “client” perfectly. We went there and indeed those 5 product questions were asked exactly before we went to eat at Asador X. When we left there, Ramón perfectly x-rayed the possibilities, the history and the sequence that this “lead” would follow until he ended up becoming a client. He nailed it. I will always wonder why he wanted me to go with him.
Many years have passed (more than 10), I have set up my own company and I am no longer in that one, but I can perfectly imagine Ramón today going to the Marketing table, much more “restless” than then. What could have happened?
Probably that B2B client who had no choice but to call him as soon as they decided they had to look for a new supplier, will not do so today and according to Google will have interacted digitally with the brand 12 times before reaching the website (not to contact Ramón, yet). If he had only interacted with Ramón's brand, the process would be fairly controlled, but no, because he will also be interacting with the brand of two of his main competitors, as well as two new brands that the potential client didn't even know existed. We're talking about potential clients, but what about that client who we think is super loyal? He will be doing the same.
At this stage, a few years ago, Ramón would have already sold 60% of the fish, but today he doesn't even know if they are considering it as potential or if they should abandon it! Here is the first aspect, the first part of the sales work that Ramón and his colleagues did has been replaced by the digital world (Google, social networks, web, etc.). By a Marketing that sells through the digital channel and at the specific moment of the client.
Even though it will be a hard blow, this will not be the most important change that will make Ramón go to Marketing in a much more hectic situation than 10 years ago. Assuming that Marketing has done a good job in all that path prior to personal interaction (content, digital channels, etc.) attracting, informing and educating the potential client and also assuming that the client decides to call Ramón, what will Ramón find on that visit?
First of all, he is probably a digital native Millennial. According to Google, 45% of B2B decision-makers are between 18 and 35 years old. Secondly, he is someone who knows “too much” about my product. I say too much because he will know what users, distributors and even competitors think. Therefore, it is likely that when Ramón shows him his infallible product decalogue, he will not want to listen to it and will ask him about the market, sector, tools, sales methods, uses, etc. Aspects that Ramón has never had to answer. Lastly, he will prefer to eat at home than go to Asador Y.
Traditionally, the sales department in jamaica phone number resource industrial companies was like the “Ministry of Foreign Affairs” of a government; nothing moved or could be moved without the permission of the “owner” of the relationship with the account, the salesperson. This was, on the one hand, very convenient for the organization, but on the other hand, dangerous due to the loss of efficiency in the customer vision and, above all, due to the lack of direct feedback. Organizations with great value propositions depend solely on the emotional relationship between the salesperson and the customer, feeling that the customer does not belong to them. Today, this is starting to be dangerous. I will tell you why I think so.
I remember a real case when I was working in Marketing many years ago. A sales colleague, Ramón, came to my desk very confident and calm and told me that he had received a call from a potential client asking him to visit him. I remember asking him what we could prepare for the visit and he told me “nothing”, that he would ask us “these 5 product questions” and then we would go to eat at Asador X. I remember his “management instructions” for the “client” perfectly. We went there and indeed those 5 product questions were asked exactly before we went to eat at Asador X. When we left there, Ramón perfectly x-rayed the possibilities, the history and the sequence that this “lead” would follow until he ended up becoming a client. He nailed it. I will always wonder why he wanted me to go with him.
Many years have passed (more than 10), I have set up my own company and I am no longer in that one, but I can perfectly imagine Ramón today going to the Marketing table, much more “restless” than then. What could have happened?
Probably that B2B client who had no choice but to call him as soon as they decided they had to look for a new supplier, will not do so today and according to Google will have interacted digitally with the brand 12 times before reaching the website (not to contact Ramón, yet). If he had only interacted with Ramón's brand, the process would be fairly controlled, but no, because he will also be interacting with the brand of two of his main competitors, as well as two new brands that the potential client didn't even know existed. We're talking about potential clients, but what about that client who we think is super loyal? He will be doing the same.
At this stage, a few years ago, Ramón would have already sold 60% of the fish, but today he doesn't even know if they are considering it as potential or if they should abandon it! Here is the first aspect, the first part of the sales work that Ramón and his colleagues did has been replaced by the digital world (Google, social networks, web, etc.). By a Marketing that sells through the digital channel and at the specific moment of the client.
Even though it will be a hard blow, this will not be the most important change that will make Ramón go to Marketing in a much more hectic situation than 10 years ago. Assuming that Marketing has done a good job in all that path prior to personal interaction (content, digital channels, etc.) attracting, informing and educating the potential client and also assuming that the client decides to call Ramón, what will Ramón find on that visit?
First of all, he is probably a digital native Millennial. According to Google, 45% of B2B decision-makers are between 18 and 35 years old. Secondly, he is someone who knows “too much” about my product. I say too much because he will know what users, distributors and even competitors think. Therefore, it is likely that when Ramón shows him his infallible product decalogue, he will not want to listen to it and will ask him about the market, sector, tools, sales methods, uses, etc. Aspects that Ramón has never had to answer. Lastly, he will prefer to eat at home than go to Asador Y.