Decreasing the sales cycle time required

“3 call close” program

The most significant improvement companies can make toward increasing revenue is getting Marketing resources directly focused on improving the sales cycle and selling effectiveness. While Marketing campaigns certainly require focus and management, it appears obvious that an equal level of focus on the improvement of the sales cycle is warranted.
What are the “pain points” in the current sales cycle that requires the most time and effort, and where do the greatest number of lost opportunities occur? What are the primary differences in the sales cycle of the best verses average salespeople? What resources can marketing provide to addresses these pain points and differences?

Do most marketing programs get designed by starting with an analysis of the current sales cycle, or start with the product information that we think the prospects should know?

The “3 call close” program is designed to establish the foundation for designing Marketing programs that focus on improving the sales cycle cost effectiveness. For the current sales cycle the following could be identified:
- Most significant steps in the sales cycle and the effectiveness of the resources used
- The gaps in performance based on sales skill and experience
- Try different resources that could be a more cost effective substitute for a sales persons time
- The sales cycle elements that currently require the most skill, knowledge, and experience

This information is gathered by analysis of the firms CRM information where that is available and reliable, augmented with both interviews and electronic surveys of the different sales channels. Perhaps there would be direct participation in sales calls that are expected to be “tough”.

Some of the approaches and questions that are used in the interviews and surveys include:
What are the 5 things the customer needs to believe before they will buy?

When sales people describe the differences between good prospects ready to buy and prospects that need a lot of “help”, the differences can frequently be identified as the differences in what the prospect “believes”. These include beliefs about the value of addressing the opportunity, beliefs about the risk and cost certainty, beliefs about our company’s support and product capabilities, etc. Many of these beliefs are not related to our company, but more related to the prospect and the industry. Identifying these key required customer beliefs is one of the steps in broadening the marketing focus beyond just the product issues required to make the sale.

Are there measures for the claimed advantage and differentiated customer value?
Identify the current Value Proposition claims and elements including:
· The value to the customer of taking action
· The advantage being offered
· The value to the customer of the advantage
· Evidence for each of these three claims
Each of these claims should be both compelling and believable, with metrics for each

Are prospects qualified to be ready to buy the product category or the company’s product?
If only the usually prospect qualification questions [are you the decision maker, do you have sufficient budget, when do you plan on buying] are used, then the prospect is only being qualified for any provider of the capability. It is not until the advantages of the product are included in the qualification questions that the prospect start being qualified for your sales channels.

What is the level of Product/Market maturity?
The level of product/market maturity determines the extent of selling required.
For mature products/markets the prospect usually knows the features they value, and may even have some experience in the area. So the selling is limited in scope to advocating our features/capabilities and their comparative customer value.
The other extreme is that the product/market is so new the customer may not be certain that they want to address the opportunity, and certainly do not know the approach and required “bill of material”. In this case the selling effort has to include selling the right customer problem description and the solution elements required for success.

Where in the sales cycle is the largest gap in performance between the average sales person and the best sales person?
IBM describes one of the goals of Marketing as “providing the tools that will allow the average salesperson to be as productive as the best salesperson.” To develop impactful tools marketing has to know the points in the sales cycle that cause the average salesperson the most difficulty, especially relative to the best salesperson. Without this information and analysis the marketing programs lack targets and goals.

The actions identified above are some of the activities that are part of the “Concurrent Marketing” program that enable Marketing to design marketing that meets the needs of the sales channels.

"B to B" marketing is not aligned with Sales

One of the central reasons that B to B marketing is not aligned with sales is the traditional domination of Marketing by Consumer marketing. The consumer large advertising budget and its centralized decision making make Consumer marketing the focal point for consultants and agencies. Additionally the availability of LOTS of data make it much more attractive for University professors for getting papers published. [Until recently neither Harvard nor Stanford offered B to B marketing courses.]
But in many companies the Marketing responsibility is to provide leverage to the sales channels for revenue generation, which extends significantly beyond the “awareness” focus of consumer marketing.
Unfortunately in many companies the processes and criteria for B to B marketing is too influenced by consumer marketing and does not extend to the requirements of supporting the sales cycle through the close. Frequently B to B markets are referred to as “considered purchase” markets, which is different than the “impulse” markets for Consumer marketing. Using that differentiating attribute we can understand some of the requirements of B to B Marketing:
The decision whether or not to initiate a project is done by a group of managers who compare the value to the customer of one project over another. The expected values are specific and tangible. If we expect our sales channels to encourage our customer to initiate a project that could require our product we will also need to provide information on the expected value to the customer that would result from project initiation. And some indication of the project completion requirements. This program description is much more “actionable” than the usually “directional” customer values associated with impulse purchase.
The same is true regarding product/vendor selection. There will be a vendor/product comparison by the buying team! They will use real metrics to compare vendors and their advantages, And then the value to the customer of those advantages will be evaluated and compared. If we do not provide the information the customer will develop it for themselves as time permits, or perhaps your competitor will provide it. “Directional” metrics that are not comparable are not very useful in this stage of the sales cycle. And each claim will probably be assessed for accuracy, so evidence for each claim is a required…or else a lots of time and trust needs to be provided by the sales channel.
These elements which are needed for B to B sales efforts are not usually provided by B to B Marketing, only the traditional consumer "impulse purchase" elements, which really only impact awareness.