If the purpose of your business is to make money, then someone on your staff is responsible for selling your product.
While (one would assume) your salesperson is most knowledgeable about who your top 10 customers are in terms of who spends the most money to make your business money, a question at Inc. magazine two years ago proved only their senior marketing manager could score 100 percent correct.
But let’s take the challenge one step further. Despite the importance of business-to-business relationships and that your customers and the money they spend are important, what of your customers’ customers? Do you even know who that second tier are?
Perusing through the first few chapters of Ram Charan’s 2008 business book, “What the Customer Wants You to Know,” he introduces a concept called value creation selling — which, if successful, transforms your sales team from selling products at better prices and better margins to being diagnosticians and solving customer problems.
How many of you work at organizations where there is a tangible product, service, or good you offer — but fail to include your salespeople in the product design? I’ll bet a large percentage of you would raise your hands. Echoing Ram’s argument, I ask why. Why don’t you include your sales team in product design? Aren’t they the only members of your staff who know best what your customers want and when they want it? But because you view your sales team in a conventional mindset and not as the knowledge conduits to explain why your sales curve curves so much, you will never know who your customers’ customers are, would you?
Until you accept that you may need to adapt your mission statement and streamline operations into business technology, you will be stuck living in the status quo of the past. And that, my friends, may be why embracing social media is a tough sell to your boss.
Thoughts?
{ 5 comments }
Twitter: kikolani
March 3, 2010 at 10:52 PM
You know, I saw the title of this post, and the first thing that came to mind was social media companies who handle their customer’s social profiles. It’s not just about knowing your client, but knowing who you client is marketing to, otherwise you don’t know who to cater the profiles towards.
I think successful salespeople really know the products or services. I was consulting a small company that was selling web design services B2B, and I thought it was great that they had their salesperson in on the consulting meeting so he could really know the ins and outs of the service he was selling from the tech side.
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great post, i think that is an interesting concept, knowing your customers customers can really give insight into what you’re model is.
I always enjoy your posts Ari, as they are very thought provoking, I think it’s just a fact that many companies fail to think outside the box and incorporate innovative ideas to grow their business, often to their own demise.
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Embracing social media is a tough sell to your boss… especially if they don’t use it. I know one CEO who gets his EA to print out his emails and then dictates the replies.
The flip side is over on Harvard Business where they highlight how John Chambers got Cisco back into shape. One nugget is this: “The hardest thing you do as a leader is to change something that is working well. And yet I believe that companies and leaders who do not change will get left behind.”
He’s got Cisco to embrace video and corporate blogs big time. Why? Because he uses them and sees the value.
Social Media is all about creating waves and the ripples have to start at the top.
This post really caught my eye because I look at our clients’ customer data often (when they finally decide to give it up that is). Clients tell you they know their customers, but when we get our hands on the data, there are things they didn’t notice that we did from who their top customers are, to best-selling industries, to potential product upsells. The value of knowing your clients’ customers better than they do is you’re able to provide an outside-in perspective that can be applied to effective campaigns or what we like to call at our company, “conversations with customers.”
Sales peoples’ insights into product development can be subjective at times. Sales people know what customers want, but can get biased based on their customers versus what works for the entire customer base. However, including sales in the product development phase also has its advantages such as injecting reality into products that customers will actually use. Companies should include input from key departments during the product development phase. Most importantly is working with customers themselves, but you would be surprised at how many technology companies have that “customers want this, they just don’t know it yet” mentality. Been there.
Wish I had more time to ponder and respond to your posts. They are always valuable Ari!
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