Marketing Times - March/April 2008 - (Page 15) salesperson should be able to pre-empt all but the most irrational objections. If he can get the customer to recognize that your product will provide a specific financial impact, such as cutting the cost of a critical process or increasing desired revenues, she will surely realize that your premium pricing makes solid business sense. It’s very difficult to argue with hard numbers. When you quantify the impact of your solution, it will quickly become obvious to your customer that your solution, at your price, makes for a solid business decision. 4. Link salespeople’s compensation to profit, not gross a fair price. That’s the recipe for strong and profitable margins. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Jeff Thull is a leading-edge strategist and valued advisor for executive teams of major companies worldwide. As President and CEO of Prime Resource Group, he has designed and implemented business transformation and professional development programs for companies like Shell Global Solutions, 3M, Microsoft, Siemens, Citicorp, IBM, Raymond James, and Georgia-Pacific, as well as many fast track, start-up companies. He has gained the reputation for being a thought leader in the arena of sales and marketing strategies for companies involved in complex sales. Thull is a compelling, entertaining and thought-provoking keynote speaker with a track record of over 2,500 speeches and seminars delivered to corporations and professional associations worldwide. He is the author of the best selling books Mastering the Complex Sale: How to Compete and Win When the Stakes are High, The Prime Solution: Close the Value Gap, Increase Margins, and Win the Complex Sale, and Exceptional Selling: How the Best Connect and Win in High Stakes Sales. Thull is also a columnist with Inc.com, an expert blogger for FastCompany.com, and his articles are published in hundreds of business and trade publications. For more information contact: Prime Resource Group, support@primeresource.com, http://www.primeresource. com, 1.800.876.0378 or 1.763.473.7529, 3655 Plymouth Boulevard, Suite110, Minneapolis, MN 55446. revenue. One of the major reasons that salespeople give discounts is because it pays off for them personally. If you base your salesperson’s compensation on gross revenue rather than net margins, he will see little negative impact if he gives the customer a 10 percent discount. That 10 percent discount may mean the difference between “winning a sale” and “no sale.” But if that 10 percent discount causes your margin to go down by 100 percent . . . well, what are you really winning? Your compensation plan should impact the salesperson’s commission as much as it impacts your profits. Money talks. If your people are coasting by and digging into your profits rather than doing the due diligence it takes to sell a complex product in a complex environment, changing the way someone gets paid encourages him to rethink his approach. The game will now be about “winning big”—not just winning. When organizations allow discounts as a way to grab sales, it often means they don’t believe they can control their sales organization. Companies have established very sophisticated processes and controls in their operations, but waffle when it comes to applying the same expertise to their sales strategy. Such organizations are handicapped and not structured for profitable growth. The bottom line is: when a customer says, “Your price is too high,” the salesperson needs to look to himself as the likely problem, not the product. There are two possibilities: 1) the customer is not experiencing a significant absence of value and the solution should never have been offered; therefore, the price is too high. Or 2) the absence of value is there and the customer does not recognize it. The burden of proof is on the salesperson, and he hasn’t done his job. There’s one more critical point to consider. Your salespeople must get over that burning desire to “get the order at any price.” Not every sale is a good sale, and not every customer is right for you. Salespeople must not only be comfortable with hearing “no,” they must actually “go for the no and move on to more profitable opportunities.” When all possibilities for “no” are eliminated, all that’s left is a confident yes—from a customer who’s willing to pay marketingtimes http://www.Inc.com http://www.FastCompany.com http://www.primeresource.com http://www.primeresource.com
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