major account sales | Developing Your B2B Sales Skills

How to Sell the First Time Buyer

Talk about special situations, selling the first time buyer is one of your biggest challenges as a b2b sales professional. In fact, this is probably one of the more complex situations you will encounter.

Let me add to the complexity of a first time sale. The higher the price, complexity of installation, and possible political risk adds to the difficulties for first time buyer.

Face it, when a buyer has no experience in making these first time buying decisions – what do they use as a point of reference? That’s right, they have NO point of reference and there is a major factor in play – the unknown.

Who is the Father of B2B Sales Questioning Techniques

by Voss Graham

Today, I want to share who I believe is the Father of today’s B2B Sales Questioning Techniques. That person is Neil Rackham.

Rackham is a research consultant with an understanding of sales, yet, he had no factual evidence regarding what works or does not work in the world of b2b selling. So he was engaged by four multinational companies to study – what makes a successful B2B sales person successful?

He and his team of researchers took to the filed for several years following over 35,000 sales calls and measuring the techniques used during each call. Later, they connected the dots relative to who won their sales and who lost. By correlating the data, he was able to create a questioning model based upon real time research of sales calls from start to finish.

Now, some of you are asking – why is this important? Because when Rackham published his works in the form of a comprehensive sales book, many sales managers and sales people rejected his finding. Why? Because they were well educated in the traditional model of selling and their beliefs would not let them change to Rackham’s model of selling.

B2B Sales Requires Questioning Skills

by Voss Graham

One of the most interesting challenges I deal with when developing a major account or national account sales team is overcoming the Presentation Model of selling. Seems to be ingrained in the DNA of b2b sales people to use presentations as the golden key to getting the business.

And, up until the mid 1980’s every sales training and development course would discuss the need for a written and rehearsed – structured – sales presentation if you wanted to win a sale.

Then in the mid 1980 a consultant – actually a researcher – by the name of Neil Rackham turned the sales world upside down with his radical sales book – “S.P.I.N Selling.” In his book he used research to show the non-believers that questions win more business, especially in the large sales category. He later wrote a companion book entitled “Major Account Sales Strategies,” which provided detailed information in how to win major account sales – using the Questioning Model for Sales Success.

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