Old Sales Techniques Should Be Junked
Most of the buyer-supplier relationship which salesperson traditionally considered as ?selling situations? has changed dramatically in the last decade. With the spread of Internet and advent of e-commerce or aggregation platforms, there is an apparent concentration of buying power in few hands. And at the same time, most of the buyers have developed buying expertise through trial and failure.
Greater buying expertise coupled with higher purchasing power has led to an increased amount of interdependence between manufacturers or suppliers and distributors or users. Although the two sides still make independent warlike noises, there is a growing amount of tacit recognition that they need each other if they are to achieve their commercial objectives.
This relationship and interdependence call for subtle understanding by the salesperson of the skills they need and when they should use them. Regarding selling activity, this means that there is a greater balance of needs on both sides. The need to buy and the need to supply viewed over a period are more or less equal. We have simplified this complex task by weaving it into a sales enabler platform called ? Platformax.? Platformax fills in the skill and communication gaps that the salesperson may take years to overcome. It makes the sales process more robust and rewarding, most of our customers have seen 2x to 3x growth in their sales after using our enabler platform.
The new realities still require the conventional ?Persuasive Selling?, but they are more useful when presenting a new idea or product. However considering the emergence of commonality of needs between the buyers and sellers, it is parallel, and highly underrated skill of negotiation layered with data; that is essential to ensure that the business gained by you is profitable and at the same time adds value to your buyer.
The new kind of selling
Traditionally selling is seen as the art of persuading someone, who at the outset of sales interview is reluctant to buy, that he should do so.??The old school saw selling as being able to convince the customer to buy from you rather than say no at the prices and on the terms of business you have quoted and go elsewhere.
In many everyday transactions in retail shops and supermarkets, the selling process is simple and straightforward. On the other hand in commercial and industrial purchases, the sales process can often be quite complicated, spanning several sales interactions spread over few months. A high level of skill is required not only to persuade the customer to buy what you are offering but to do so in quantities that are profitable for you within the price bands offered by you.
The new definition of sales is the art of persuading someone to buy because it is in their best interest to do so. You can do so by using a data and process led sales approach, rather than unleashing an army of Crusaders to win the deals. The biggest challenge in this approach is the long-tenured approach to sales and our inability to make sense of hundreds of emails that we exchange in the process of sales. There is data buried in these emails and it is impossible to keep track of what?s happening or how the sales discussion has evolved over a period.
We are applying an intelligence layer to the data being generated through email interactions or sales call, we at Platformax make the sales process more intelligent and predictive by using the data generated by you.
If you would like to see how your sales process could be modernized, please take an online demo at www.platformax.com
Sr?an Mahmutovi?
Founder & CEO of Platformax.com
