There are several major selling models that most organizations chose as their core selling approach
As the primary author of Advantexe’s Strategic Business Selling curriculum, I am constantly conducting research and working with clients to fine-tune our content and methodology to give sales professionals the best tools possible to achieve their sales objectives.
Over the last few months, I have been working with several clients on the design and development of a new module for our sales curriculum called “Innovative Selling.”
Innovative Selling is an approach that takes concepts of innovative thinking and applies them to the sales process. In other words, innovative thinking doesn’t have to be something that a bunch of scientists in a lab are doing to bring new products to market; it’s a process that can transcend the entire organization including sales professionals who are trying to add value to customer in and after the sales process.
I present that Innovative Selling is a focused mindset that helps sales professionals move away from “pushing” a product / service to a customer and looks for ways to help customers achieve success through the value that your organization provides. But Innovative Selling only works if your sales professionals can think more like business people and less like transactional sales people.
Three Core Elements of Innovative Selling
Based on our current work, here are three insights on Innovative Selling that come from the foundation of our Strategic Business Selling module:
Understand Your Customer’s Business Strategy and Value Proposition to Their Customers
The first step in the process is having a deep understanding of your customer’s business strategy and their value proposition to their customers. This is accomplished through research, and business dialogues with key decision makers. Once sales people understand their customer’s business strategies, goals, objectives and value proposition to their customers, that deep understanding and knowledge becomes the foundation of the other elements of the Innovative Selling process.
Challenging Your Customer’s Status Quo
Many customer organizations develop cultures that are based on habits and a reluctance to change. Too often, things seem to be going well and there is no need for customers to modify their strategies, products, or customer focuses. But as we know, the business graveyard is filled with companies such as Kodak, Polaroid, and Digital Equipment Corporation who never challenged the status quo and ended up out of business. Great sales professionals probe, push, and ask provocative questions that should force customers and decision makers within their accounts to think about their futures and challenge the status of the current way they are doing things.
Understanding and Translating Trends
One of the most significant and innovative things sales professionals can do to help their customers is to understand and translate trends in meaningful ways that can impact their business. Trends can be technology trends, human resources trends, supply chain trends, economic trends, or other trends that customers don’t see, understand, or think about. By translating those trends into meaningful conversations, sales professionals can add incredible value.
In summary, these are three ways that sales professionals can be more innovative and add value to their customers during the sales process. As we continue to develop and deploy the new content, we will share ideas and insights with our readers.