A client asks us for a proposal. That’s a good thing, right? We do as they ask and provide a proposal. What’s next? We all know the first offer is likely not going to be the last. In fact, what many of us have done with that response is to give the client a price for products and services. The very natural inclination is for the customer to then begin the negotiations at this phase. We have DNA going back 1000 years saying that the buyer should never accept the first offer. We know what the conversation is going to be and where it’s headed, so how do we change that conversation and take control?

After 22 years consulting on over 25,000 business negotiations in over 46 countries, we’ve heard a lot of negotiation tactics. All are attempts at commoditization and driving more concessions from the seller; some are more difficult than others.

A recent client was negotiating with their largest customer, a $60b Fortune 50 firm in the manufacturing business. Our client produces bleeding edge tools and software for manufacturing. In fact, they very often have tools that increase yield and reduce defects ahead of the market. This position gives them real power in negotiation. However, during the negotiation, their buyer, in a very angry and aggressive manner ended the negotiation proclaiming: 

“If you don't give us what we want, we will fund a start-up competitor to you!”

In my last post, I reported my friend and colleague, Jim Dickie (https://www.salesmastery.com) recently surveyed sales leaders who stated their top barrier to achieving their 2018 revenue objectives was lack of coaching. That article focused on how to use virtual coach technology to address that issue. For this article, we will focus on the second issue for sales leaders:

My friend and colleague, Jim Dickie (https://www.salesmastery.com) recently reported sales leaders stated their top barrier to achieving their 2018 revenue objectives is:

Think! Inc.’s very own Carrie Welles has been published in SAMA’s new book: Customer Value Co-Creation, Powering the Future Through Strategic Relationship Management.

For 16 years, Carrie has been a Partner and Vice President at Think! building strategic negotiation skills and using her coaching and training talents to improve the effectiveness of salespeople across the globe.

A blog from Buyer/Seller Insights points out that there is bad buying just like there is bad selling. They go further to suggest that sellers who can help procurement buy better will achieve a competitive advantage. We couldn't agree more.

One of the core problems we see is that sellers don't understand the role of procurement professionals and therefore get anchored on the price conversation with buyers. Part of this misunderstanding is this: how procurement buyers articulate their role–and the reality of what their role is, are actually two different things.

We’ve been selling to the business stakeholders and now hear the dreaded sentence…."I need to get procurement involved.” For most of us, this is viewed as a sales death sentence! IT IS NOT!

For years we’ve been taught to sell around procurement at all costs and focus on the business stakeholders. While this may be sound advice, the reality is that procurement involvement is on the rise and most likely here to stay. We believe it’s time to start focusing on professional buyers as legitimate stakeholders, not to be avoided but to understand their needs just as we would any other buying influence.