If You Were Dating Your Prospect, Would You Make it to First Base?

As a practitioner of sales intelligence consulting, we at Primary Intelligence have the opportunity to observe the mentality (individual and collective) of the sales professionals that work for our clients.

In our experience, much time is spent trying to understand the company’s product, value proposition, sales strategy and competitive forces. And, this use of time is beneficial and productive.

However, knowing the prospects (individually and collectively) has proven to be the most important success indicator in successful selling of business solutions. You have to build a relationship, starting at acquaintances, moving through trusted friends and into a marriage of client/vendor.

How do relationships blossom? Think about how you have worked this question in your life. When you met a person with whom you wanted to become more intimately acquainted, did you spend time studying their house, friends, other available men/women in the area? Perhaps.

But, you probably spent more time listening to that person, understanding what is important to them, figuring out their point of view and matching those ideas with yours. And, the attention you paid to that person was probably rewarded with some form of reciprocation.

If you want prospects to let you into their world and take you seriously, CSO Insights offers a list of 10 questions that a prospect is asking of a vendor:

1. Do you know me?
2. Do we have a past?
3. Do you know my internal ecosystem?
4. Do you know my company?
5. Do you know my marketplace?
6. Do you know my competitors?
7. Do you have any special value-add?
8. Do you know why you are the best choice?
9. Do you know how I can justify the purchase?
10. Do you know what is changing as we work together?

I’ll guarantee you that the answers to these questions are much more meaningful than knowing who YOUR competitors are and tactics to sell against them.

Relationships really tend to take off when you start paying attention to the one in whom you are interested more than any external factor. It works in personal relationships. It works in business relationships. And, if you are planning a marriage of your company to theirs, you probably should spend the time and effort on the right things. External factors play a role, but you have to put the right amount of priority on everything.

Spend some time evaluating your ability to answer these questions about your key prospects. Think about how these answers might have changed over time for your key accounts. Are you more or less able to answer these questions now than you were 6 months ago?

And, if you have thoughts about these points, let me know. (cdalley@primary-intel.com, 801-838-9600 x5050)