Key to Selling Value
Key to Selling Value
If you are a Sales Manager, you have heard your sales representatives at some time say, "We're getting beat on price" or "Our customers are making price-based decisions because we haven't elevated those value-based decisions." Perhaps if you're a sales representative yourself, you have even turned these thoughts over in your own head.
But what the pricing issue really boils down to is sales representatives selling to the wrong people. Instead of getting to the person who is empowered to buy value, sales representatives are selling to product evaluators who get paid to assess product, price, service and delivery ó and that's all.
When you're selling value, you want to be face-to-face with someone who can say yes when everyone else says no. Those people are the true decision makers.
John Castle, an ISO in York, PA, illustrates the point this way: "My first and only approach is, 'Cost Vs. Return.' Electronic processing is a Money Maker. I show the prospect that it is a Profit Center. I never sell monthly payment, equipment, or discount rates. I use the tax expense, write-offs and cost-of-doing-business approaches.
"When I run into a local bank that has the edge and is using a bank relationship to hold their customer, giving the store away or confusing the prospect, I keep it simple for the prospect.
"The main thing that gets the prospect's attention, from my point of view, is the difference between credit or debit and Check Guarantee, and how the prospect can 'make' and 'save' money at the same time."
Fortune Finds Those Who Look for It
I always find it refreshing to talk to ISOs and Individual Sales Representatives about what is happening on the street from their perspective.
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