One way to prevent your clients from treating you as a commodity is to pursue a conversation that differs from your competitors’. When you look and sound like your rivals, you can expect your clients to believe you are no different. To differentiate yourself in your client’s eyes is to create value for them in the sales conversation.
In 2018, I published Eat Their Lunch: Winning Customers Away from Your Competition. In the first chapter, I introduced a sales methodology for value creation called Level 4 Value Creation (L4VC).
After selling a true commodity for many years, I found that differentiating meant changing the conversation from “Why us?” to one about my client’s desired strategic outcomes. This approach caused my clients to introduce me to their leaders, an excellent outcome that suggests you can be trusted not to embarrass your contacts.
The Four Levels
The salesperson who believes that, in conversations with prospective clients, they should prioritize their solution is selling at Level 1. Pitching the solution will ensure you are treated as a commodity.
The salesperson who believes they need to position a combination of their solution and customer service is selling at Level 2. Here, you are still likely to be treated as interchangeable with any other sales rep. To be fair, both levels will appeal to end users of the solution, but they make it unlikely you’ll get that far.
For most of your time in sales, you are likely selling at Level 3. You find a problem and pain points and you solve them with your solution and your offerings. Unfortunately, because so many of your competitors sell at this level, you cannot distinguish yourself.
If you want to move past the first three levels, you need to reach Level 4, where you prioritize the client’s strategic outcomes. No one buys a drill. They buy holes. In the third decade of the 21st century you should not sell like it’s 1967.
Examples of Strategic Outcomes
I don’t sell sales training. I sell net new revenue. In staffing, I didn’t sell temporary employees; I sold flexibility, a lower cost structure, greater efficiency, and a reduction in advertising to hire employees. As a Sales Kickoff Speaker, I don’t sell speeches; I sell entertainment, education, and practical strategies a sales force can execute when they get back to their territory.
I have a friend and client who sells the closing of open cases rather than a service. His price is higher than alternatives, but the cost is lower because he closes cases faster. Another company I know prints letters, folds them into thirds, places them in envelopes, and sends them to a list of people. Their clients aren’t trying to send mail. The strategic outcome is to cause people to fill out a form to get a credit card. They use data to determine who is most likely to act on the letter.
A Level 4 B2B Sales Professional
You may not have been aware of the four levels before reading this article. It would be unusual for you to work for a sales organization aware of the fourth level of value, the strategic outcomes.
If you want to be a better and more consultative sales professional, you would do well to identify the strategic outcomes your clients need and ask questions to ensure you understand what is most important to your client. Your contacts will find that you differ greatly from your competitors. When you look at the examples above, each looks past the solution and to the strategic outcome. This sales methodology does a lot of work by differentiating you from the field.
The Future of B2B Sales and L4VC
The future that is screaming towards us at an ever faster clip. It is already making many sales organizations, salespeople, and methodologies irrelevant. Those who are unaware of the changing environment, or would prefer not to face it, will struggle in the future. B2B buying and B2B sales will change, whether or not you respond.
We are already seeing that buyers seek a salesperson with the experience, expertise, and insights to pursue the change initiative they have embarked on. Decision makers have little patience or tolerance for approaches that don’t create the value they need in the sales conversation.
If you want to improve your sales approach, you will find Elite Sales Strategies: A Guide to Being One-Up, Creating Value, and Becoming Truly Consultative to be a resource that will speed you on your way. When combined with Eat Their Lunch: Winning Customers Away from Your Competition, it will help you increase your sales effectiveness.
On Pursuing Strategic Outcomes in B2B Sales
Your contacts and your clients are already pursuing their strategic outcomes, with or without you. If you are truly consultative, your contacts and your clients will be happy to have your help. By addressing the client’s strategic outcomes, you prove you can help them produce the results they need.
Let your competitors solve the problem while you work on generating the changes the client will need to make to acquire the strategic outcomes they need to succeed. It may take you a little time and practice to start a conversation around the strategic result that will cause your client to look at you as a trusted advisor.
Every company can create value for their clients. Every solution is likely to solve the client’s problem. This is true even if you believe your company and your solution is the best in the world. Because this is true, you must do something different, something that creates greater value. When you can address what is most important to your clients, you move ahead of your competitors.
Leaving this article, list the strategic outcomes your clients need you to help them deliver. With that done, start asking your clients which strategic outcome they are pursuing. Do good work, and if you need help, go here.
.jpg?width=768&height=994&name=salescall-planner-ebook-v3-1-cover%20(1).jpg)
