The Evolution of B2B Sales

Image courtesy of kazexchange.wordpress.com

In almost all my client engagements, success requires coordination with the sales team. This is necessary to quantify prospect movement through the sales process and establish the program’s ROI. It’s also important to get feedback from sales on the type of content we should be producing, addressing issues prospects care about and using their language.

In those meetings, there is almost always someone who pushes back on using content marketing and social media to support sales. You know the type — “I’ve been doing this for xx years, I know my customers” etc. and so forth. Fair enough — it’s on me to clearly explain how I’m helping the sales process.

This week I read a good story in Forbes that is a tailor-made response for that kind of objection. Scott Gillum of the consulting firm gyro writes about the disappearing sales cycle, the fact that the average B2B consumer has completed 57 percent of the sales process before ever contacting a company rep. This means that consumers have taken control of the qualifying process. They are qualifying companies, not the other way around.

That in a nutshell is the evolution of B2B sales. Consumers are forming opinions about your company and your services long before sales ever talks to them. No salesman controls this process, they aren’t the gatekeeper any longer. If they can’t add value to the prospect in a trusted, consultative way they become irrelevant.

So what can you do about it? Here are my two favorite nuggets from Gillum:

• Changing buying behavior – A former manager of mine used to say that technology changes fastest, then consumer buyer behavior and eventually, organizations. The 57 percent stated in the research makes for a good sound bite; the fact is, that number will vary, greatly by customers, transaction, industry, etc. The point is that change is a constant; the question is how far ahead or behind are your sales and marketing efforts? Are you keeping pace?  The second question is, how would you know?
• Time to take social media seriously – With well-informed prospects, sales reps have to quickly learn what buyers know or perceive about the organization, products/services and competitors. Social media can help them better understand what is motivating buyers to take action, what buyers believe to be true, and perhaps most important, who they believe.

I really like that line about change — first technology changes, then consumer behavior and then, finally, organizations are forced to change. I’ve got to fine tune this a bit, but these points are an effective reply to the change resistant sales guy.

The 57 percent number cited comes from research on B2B sales done by the Corporate Executive Board (CEB) and Google. Click here for a full presentation of their findings – good stuff.