B2B Buyers are Changing How They Buy; Are You Changing How You Sell?

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B2B Customers have clearly changed how they conduct their buying process. Their expectations have changed as it relates to their process of evaluating product or service options, self-educating, participating in decision making groups, and ultimately deciding on and making a purchase.

Customers now spend significantly more time doing on-line research, they expect to be served up content aligned to their buying process and on their time frames. The last thing that most of them want to do is talk to a sales person.

As a result of this change, sales teams are struggling to engage with customers and meet their targets.

  • The customer is increasingly difficult to reach, leading to sales productivity metrics dropping of a cliff.
  • When sales reps finally speak with their target, they are viewed by the customer as woefully under-prepared, primarily because today’s customer is privy to endless amounts of information and perspective prior to ever engaging with sales.
  • Customers who are under-whelmed aren’t inviting sales reps back to take the process forward, which means the money and effort invested in reaching those customers has been wasted.

As a result, sales productivity is suffering, with an estimated 67% of sales reps not meeting their quotas, mainly due to a lack of digital sales coverage.

Few sales and marketing leaders view this as a new concept, as the research highlighting this change is not new. However, very few have taken direct and focused action on how to change their go-to-market models to address this shift. Fewer still are partnering across the sales and marketing function to address this challenge.

Most organizations are leaning on “tried and true” but antiquated methods for improving performance; investing in training to build capabilities which ultimately won’t scale.

Those firms who are addressing these challenges head-on and with innovative new practices are realizing out-sized returns on their investments. Double digit improvement in revenue growth, cost efficiency, and customer experience metrics are the typical outcomes they are seeing.

For digital strategies on how to approach the new buyer’s journey download our whitepaper The Ultimate Guide to the New Buyer’s Journey.