Contest: the 10 Steps of a Sales Cycle

I am having a contest! Ready to play? Since my Monday posts are about Buying Facilitation®, and I’ve written so extensively on it, it’s time to put some of your learning into practice. How does Buying Facilitation® fit with the sales model (especially given that both models include managing the buying decision, albeit using very different outcomes, with very different results, at opposite ends of the buyer’s time line)? When do you do what? How do you know when it’s time to visit and when to wait, time to help them manage their off-line, private decision issues and when to pitch?

Below are 12 To-Dos, including the 10 steps of a sales cycle as I see them. They are out of order, and two of them (at least – probably three) are unnecessary. Please put them in the order you think they should be in, name the 2 or 3 that are unnecessary, and submit.

The first person to have the steps in the order that I believe is accurate as per Buying Facilitation® and how to help buyers navigate their behind-the-scenes decision and change issues, will get a free book, Dirty Little Secrets: why buyers can’t buy and sellers can’t sell and what you can do about it. The winner will be announced April 26. Please submit your answers in comment section of this post on sharondrewmorgen.com. And if you want, we can have an interactive webinar about this afterwards. Let me know if you’d like to and we’ll set it up.

Note: for those who plan to use my books to get the correct order, I’ve changed some of the activities and wording so they don’t directly match other lists.

• Develop marketing materials to professionally represent your solution either on-line or in person.
• Make an appointment to get in front of the prospect
• Help the prospect choose the members of the Buying Decision Team.
• Help the gatekeeper discover who your best point of contact would be.
• Facilitate prospect’s discovery of what sorts of strategic issues they must manage to get folks on board with potential change.
• Lead prospects/buyers through tactical issues they must manage before they can choose a solution.
• Follow up to see if there is anything you can do to help the prospect/buyer decide to purchase.
• Lead prospects/buyers through the systems issues they must consider in order to determine how any proposed change will disrupt their status quo.
• Use Facilitative Questions to get into rapport and have them begin to examine how or if or why they would consider changing their status quo.
• Discuss/present your solution and show the prospect/buyer how it would fit with their need/problem.
• Discuss how your solution fits with the internal issues that they must manage.
• Manage objections and differentiate yourself from the competition.

I look forward to discussing your responses. I’m bound and determined to get us all adding new skills to the sales model, and hope this is one way we can all start thinking differently. I look forward to your thoughts. And thanks for playing with me :)

sd

For those of you wishing to learn Buying Facilitation® with me, I’ve just scheduled a public training [pdf] for May 19-21. I occasionally put these up on the site for those folks wanting to learn the whole model, with me teaching it. Unfortunately, I don’t actively solicit attendees, as there are only spots for a maximum of 18. If you have interest, and want to know more, either look on my other site www.newsalesparadigm.com under ‘events’ or call me at 512 457 0246.

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