Why is Sales Performance Declining? Part 1: Buying Committees

Did you know that...?
....In 2014, only 59% of sales reps will achieve their quota?(Accenture) -this number is down sharply from 67% last year. Not only that, this number had been gradually increasing for each of the past 5 years before this drop-off.

...The #1 criteria that decision makers look for in making a purchasing decision is widespread support for you and your company across his organization? (CEB)

....At the enterprise level, there are as many as 10 members in the buying decision committee. A recent deal we were involved in needed 21 signatures before completion! As Chris Berman would say: "C'mon Man!"

The reality though is that its getting immensely complicated to sell effectively today. The number of decision makers and influencers involved in a purchasing decision has increased steadily over the past 3 years and is direct fallout from the Great Recession. Buyers continue to remain risk averse and require compelling evidence to move forward with your solution as opposed to staying with the status quo. Here's how to deal with this new selling fact of life:

1. Identify The Members of The Buying Committee- One of our senior leaders and Alinean Co-Founder, Betty McNeil, a former sales trainer and current rainmaker advises to ask the following question: "Who besides yourself will be involved in the decision?" This is a critical first step in identifying the team that will be involved in the prospect's(or current customer's) final decision. While it is great to have a champion on your side within the organization, it is very rare that this person alone can seal the deal with you. Step 1 is to create a map of all of the folks involved in this decision, the executive sponsor, budget holder, product and technical leaders, and influencers of all types.

2. Connect Deep Within The Organization- As a general rule, connecting with numerous stakeholders within your client or prospect's organization is now a must. Jill Konrath in her popular sales blog outlines a formula which heavily uses LinkedIn as a tool: http://bit.ly/1tprRJO. If you haven't already uncovered the names of the buyer decision committee, Konrath advises to search your champion's name on LinkedIn and then look for 'others at company xyz' for ideas. You can also leverage the advanced search to select specific titles at that company. Now you need to connect with these folks on LinkedIn. Konrath also advises that you may actually need to help your champion identify others who will help finalize the deal. Again, LinkedIn is a great tool for this. This must be managed tactfully and on a case-by-case basis. Work with and leverage your champion as much as possible. Let her know that you will be working to help her move your deal through the process. But the new terrain means you need to be more proactive and involved in your client's decision making process than ever before.



3. Demonstrate Personalized Value To Each Decision Maker-As you move along the process with your champion, invariably you will be called upon to meet several new members of the committee and each of them likely will have a different agenda. Their focus may be technical, operations, business, marketing, sales or financially focused. In order to be able to facilitate each of these stakeholders decision, you will need to understand what challenges are important to each unique person and then deliver a tailored and personalized identification of the pain and value message in response.

 Beyond mere value messaging, today’s buyer requires more motivation. It is key to also provide a quantification of the “cost of do nothing” and business benefits, as well as 3^rd party evidence to support the claims. The ability to connect with each buyer’s unique point-of-value is critical. 

 Our team at Alinean creates value messaging and tools that do just this.ValueStory for Sales enables sale execs to deliver tailored messages for each stakeholder in the organization. The Tools intelligently create messaging paths and personalized value conversations on the fly based on role in the decision making process, industry, company size or any other pertinent profile data. The ability to connect and build a bridge of value to each member of the buying decision committee is critical.

4. Use Social Channels To Closely Monitor The Company: In addition to connecting with as many key players from the prospect's organization on LinkedIn, there are other social tactics that are effective. Set up a Google Alert for the prospect company so you can stay up to date on everything that is happening around the organization whether its product releases, executive moves, company priorities, positioning against the competition or financial reporting.
Follow the company on Twitter and Facebook to get a sense of the company's social personality and the issues which on which it chooses to focus. Having detailed knowledge about your prospect's organization and its challenges will help you properly position your solution and also give you added confidence in future conversations.

The Bottom Line: With more stakeholders involved in each decision, your deals are getting more complex, with more deals getting stalled, and the deals that do close taking longer to close as a result.

To overcome quota shortfalls and thrive in this more complex sales environment, you need to find new ways to identify the stakeholders involved in the decision and deliver tailored value messages and quantification to all members of the buying decision committee. 
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"The ROI Guy", Tom Pisello

*Thanks to Tom Pisello, CEO & Founder of Alinean for co- writing this post. See his popular 'ROI Guy" Blog here: http://bit.ly/1ytlWH0