Situation 1: Technical Sales guy doing a demo for a group that also includes IT People on the other end

When the prospect brings in the IT folks / Developers, these individuals will usually voice some type of an objection. Most objections are really questions at heart but sometimes they’re really just objections for the purpose of showing that the originator is adding value to the conversation. If the IT Folks sit still the whole time, then their peers may think that they are not adding much value. Since the purpose of having these folks on the call is to hear their expert opinion, the IT Folks will in many cases be the tough prospects voicing their objections.

In such a situation, having a technical sales guy may not be the best thing. The problem that may arise is that the technical sales guy may answer objections raised in a defensive manner. This is a bad thing because it’ll usually just lead to a back and forth between the two technical folks on opposite sides to show who has more muscle. Since the goal is to align with the prospect, this is not an ideal scenario. Obviously an experienced technical sales person will not fall into this trap but it is definitely a trap that many people in the category do fall into.

A non-technical sales guy will usually not fall into this trap because they are not on the same level as the tech guy voicing the objections. They’ll answer these objections on a high-level and if pushed to answer in a more technical manner will usually say something along the lines of “that’s a great question – let me write that down and I will come back to you with an answer after speaking to our dev team.” This usually works out better.

Situation 2: Technical Sales Guy Presenting to Non-Technical Prospects

Because the technical sales guy is usually so well-versed in the product that is being sold, he can wow the prospect with all the different aspects of the product, more so than their non-technical colleague would be able to.

In this situation, a non-technical sales rep would still be able to do the job well because they’d be able to talk to the prospect of all the benefits of the products and how other customers are deriving tremendous value from it’s use.

While both can do the job in this scenario, a technical sales person usually can do a better job in convincing the end-user of the glory of the product.

Now, if a technical product is being sold, even the non-technical sales guy needs to be somewhat technical in order to be able to demonstrate the product and make the sale. He needs to know the product well enough to do the job. What I’ve noticed with most of the companies that I’ve dealt with and bought from is that the person who usually does the selling is not the most technical person and this seems to work well in the scheme of things.

Credits: Image from http://www.sales2.com

This is a continuation of cool sales techniques that I observed on my trip to Mexico (read part I here)…

Purple Cow Technique: We were walking around and, out of nowhere, little kids (5-10 years old?) would start following us while waving whatever it was that they were selling.You don’t usually see that sort of thing in North America and so it works really well… i.e. it’s so different (purple cow) that it catches your eye and once it does, it’s hard to resist! This wouldn’t work as well if we saw this type of thing all the time.

Bait & Switch: We’d see these vendors waving at us and exclaiming that they were selling their goods for only $1 and that it was “almost free”. When we’d stop and look at what they were offering, they’d show us this really tiny statue that no one would really want to buy as the $1 item rather than the big statue that we saw them waving from afar (which they would try and sell for $20). Of course when they get you to stop, you’ve stepped onto the lot and it’s just a matter of one-on-one sales from there.

Graduated sales: We went on this one day tour of the Chichen Itza and before we actually got to our destination, the tour stopped at this small shop where we could do some “shopping.” The items were nice but they were a bit expensive. Some people bought items and some didn’t. Once we actually got to our destination, there were all sorts of street vendors that would sell the same exact things but for 1/3rd the cost.

Credits: Image Courtesy of Flower Bee

I recently came back from a week long trip to Cancun and amongst the interesting things I observed were the sales tactics being used by the street vendors there.

When I asked one of the vendors how much an item was, he didn’t say anything at first. He handed me the item and asked me if I was looking to gift it or if I was going to buy it for myself. When I asked him the cost of another similar one he had on display, he handed me that one too. Before I knew it, I had both in my hands and he wouldn’t take them back! He would reply, how much will you pay for them – i.e. he was expecting that I would over-estimate the price.

These tactics were of course shared by other vendors that we approached as well. I thought that the way that they made me (the prospect) talk about the product and feel/hold the product as if I had already made the purchase (reminiscent of the puppy-dog technique) was refreshing. I also loved the fact that when I asked how much the product was, they just handed me the product and “assumed the sale”.

Ever since we finished v1.0 of our products at Chide.it about 3 weeks ago, we’ve been on the ground selling to customers. It’s tremendous fun to see how your products make a difference in people’s lives!

Something that has been very helpful to us thus far is a change of approach in our sales presentations. In the beginning, we focused a lot on what ReviewRoom (our document collaboration software) was capable of. In other words, we kept outlining the features that the tool had. The customers would then have to figure out for themselves how this tool would be useful day to day in their businesses.

After analyzing the the first series of presentations that we conducted, we realized that it’s not about the features and the power of the tool but, but rather the impact the tool will have on people’s businesses. It’s not even about the general impact, but rather the specific impact that it will have for the customer who you are presenting to.

The best way to approach these presentations, as we’ve realized, is to understand specifically how people conduct their processes today. If possible, it would be great to get the customers to admit to some of the frustrations that they experience in the process today. Armed with this information, you can then tell them about the benefits that your product will have for them. Once the customers are convinced that the benefits are worth it, they are already convinced that a product that would give them those benefits would be worth investing in. Then, of course, you can show how the features your product already has helps the customer get the benefits you sold them on.

p.s. yes, hindsight is 20/20