Black Sales Journal

I had a meeting with a buyer to discuss adding another line of business to his account.  I felt that I could save him money, and I felt I could make some money for my company and me as well.  He was always an easy person to talk to, and I measured my relationship with him at to be at the highest level.  As his need for the product was high, this might just be a matter of timing.  He was accepting proposals from three vendors in total.

I went to him, presented a ‘death grip’ (a proposal that had price and product that could not be denied) and his response was, “I am going to stay where I am on this one.  You price is good, and I like your organization, but maybe next time.

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Almost every business relationship has a limit, and it is usually because of the trust factor.  When the requisite level of trust is absent, the resulting trust deficit might be based on the sales professional, and in many cases, it will be based on the company that sales professional represents. Either way it ‘stops’ the sales process in a way that does not result in any revenue changing hands.

In the case above, the buyer did not have enough confidence in either me, or my organization, to let money change hands.  Getting the order means getting over this “hump”.  Obviously this was a learning situation for me.

The Trust Deficit

“Every sale has five basic obstacles: no need, no money, no hurry, no desire, no trust.”

Zig Ziglar

No one wants to think that they are not trusted, but usually this is not personal …this is business!  You have not necessarily done any wrong, but you may still have work to do getting rid of the trust deficit

This obstacle is seldom meant to beckon that you aren’t trustworthy, it is meant to show the relationship is not as solid and intimate as you thought.  You can overcome this lack of trust, and should not take it personally.

Are You At a Disadvantage?

Black sales professionals you should assume they are at a disadvantage until it is proven otherwise.   Let me explain that.  Being at a disadvantage means that you have work to do.  Assume you do not have all of the trust necessary to close the deal, but the good part is that you are in the game.

Trust is an essential factor to consummate a business relationship, and the raw truth is that when you are Black or another minority, you need to work continuously to make sure that trust is present as you may be lacking one of the most important aspects of a positive business relationship, something I call preference.  If you will remember from earlier of issues of Black Sales Journal, specificallyBSJ 12/27/2010 Preference, Prejudice, and Perceptions and Your Customer, and BSJ 12/12/2011 Racial Preference in Action to name an important few, preference is important.  It is at the top, and the bottom, of any business relationship.

Preference is ‘socially’ legal.  Preference is still different from “racial preference” as you will see if you read the above articles.  Racial preference is vexing, and is everything wrong with business.  Racial preference is racial prejudice!

I will speak more on this important item in a moment.

Building Trust

How do you get the trust you need.  How do you generate the most complete relationship?  Well, I am going to point you in the direction of a couple of in-depth articles on building the trustful relationship between you and the customer:

Black Sales Journal 7/11/2011- Deepening Your Customer Relationships – The Holy Grail for the Black Sales Professional

Read this to know how to construct and maintain the strongest relationships.  Remember, relationships are everything.

Black Sales Journal 1/20/2011 – Deepening Your Customer Relationships Part 2

Read this one to gain access to a simple customer profile that you can change as you see necessary, and other tools to help you record and recognize the relationship and its strength.

The Role of Racial Preference

Racial preference is essentially racial prejudice, and there is frankly no other way to state it.  Are you at a disadvantage?  The answer is ‘possibly’.

We need to face the fact that there are many buyers who could care less about your color, and believe in fairness.  Many more believe that they do, but are affected by forces that they don’t even recognize.

That is the nature of racial prejudice.  It is easily hidden from view, and with that in mind I suggest you always assume you are at a disadvantage.

Read about it in the articles I cite, you will recognize it, and learn to make the proper assumptions.

Relationship Building 101

Build a relationship for all of the reasons cited in these posts, and put your energy and resources toward making sure that you cement together a solid, enduring relationship founded in trust.  Deliver on your promises and commitments and you will create the underpinnings of a trusting relationship.

Ask the customer how you are doing…get meaningful feedback from this important relationship.  More in Black Sales Journal 3/12/2012, Ask Your Customer for Feedback.  You will be amazed at how the customer begins to start to develop an affinity for you if you will put yourself on the line like this.

Be the best at what you do, and remember you cannot win without your customer’s trust, and relationships are everything.

Your comments are appreciated.

Sounds like a dumb advertisement doesn’t it?  Anyone who believes that a sales professional should work for free has a touch of a fever, but the actual situation plays out everyday.

Yet in reality, many sales professionals, and especially Black sales professionals find themselves in that situation, unintended of course.

It happens when you invest time and effort in making presentations to buyers who based on reasons beyond your control, take your presentation’s price, and your constructive ideas, and give them to your competition.  When that happens, they are actually saying you should work for free!

How It Happens

This can happen to anyone, any color, and any creed.  It is what happens when someone makes a decision to be courted and accepts the benefits of a relationship, yet not get married.  The problem arises when the fruit of your labor is used to better the position of the customer, even though they had no intention of making the move to you or your organization.

You come in with a ‘killer’ price, and a product offering that is exceptional.  You realize that based on the customer’s needs your organization can use a combination of products that are currently available on the market and couple it with some creative financing to make it palatable.   In the whole, your price and product offering is enhanced by your terms (financing, payment deferral, and other benefits) and you feel success is in the making.

As you know the customer can benefit financially and product-wise from the activities of the sales professional without ever making a real commitment to you, and certainly without putting any food on your table.  You may have felt this ‘sting’ several times before, and you do not have to be a ‘repeat’ victim.

You do all of the work, and the customer gets the benefit and any reward goes to the sales professional who followed your lead.  You have to ‘wait until next time or next year’.  Can’t buy much bacon with that! Objectively, this is part of the sales process, and a part of the process that you cannot avoid; yet you can manage.

Take Smart Precautions

To avoid this being your anthem, you have to develop your principles and rules and stick to them.  You also must work on gaining commitment before showing your complete arsenal of products and services during the process.  That commitment is based on the answers to the questions below.

When presenting, seek to get agreement on what you need to solve, and what level of price and program will “land the business”.  Logic would show that you could still be manipulated; yet this starts to get at some of the problem.  You will want to cover these bases:

Ask the all-important questions before the solicitation process.  These are the requisite questions that will define what it will take to separate them from the incumbent:

• Why are you looking for competitive quotes/bids?
• How will the quote/bid process be conducted?
• What pricing difference must be made? What will it take for you to change?
• How long have you been with the incumbent? Does the incumbent get the last shot?
• Is the playing field level with the others that are quoting (other than the incumbent)?

The purpose of these questions is clarity about the buying process and what definable difference that you must make.  Knowing the answers, if the buyer is honest, allows you to do what is necessary to be successful, whether with this customer, or another one.

An important point is that you cannot be hesitant to ask these questions.  They are part of what a true sales professional asks, and gets clarification of before the sales process.  What you learn about how the process is defined in the eyes of the customer will speak volumes.

I am sure that you sales veterans out there do this already, yet it bears mention for the new sales professionals

Don’t hesitate, ask!  Yes, the customer can still violate his/her own rules, but does so at the peril of alienating you and other sales professionals.

How Does this Affect The Black Sales Professional?

This affects all sales professionals, and it is part of the sales ‘game’.  It is what happens when customers must get competitive quotations of products and services because they want to check how they stand, or to satisfy a procedure that does the same.

Here is where it gets vexing.  Black sales professionals can easily be subject to working ‘without pay’ because of the complexities ofpreference and even prejudice (See Black Sales Journal 5/19 A Deep Dive into Preference, Perceptions, and Prejudice).  If a buyer has no intent on doing business with you as sales professional, or your organization, and is planning on taking your work and giving it to the incumbent, they are wasting your precious time and effort.   Issues regarding preference manifest themselves that way. The buyer strengthens his or her relationship with their current vendor, while at the same time improving their price and terms, thanks to your efforts.  Prolonged activities like this could obviously cost you your job.

In this way, being used is bad for your current employment health.  The above questions, if answered truthfully could save you some time, or at least help tip you off as to who the prospects are and who the ‘suspects’ are.

The Reality

You will always run the possibility of wasting time on good accounts that have no intention of moving their business because of their relationship with the incumbent.  They just want to use you for leverage to make sure they get a good price or program.  You have to make the decision of whether you want to be a willing participant, or should we call it a ‘not-for-profit sales professional’.

You have many choices that include not working with a prospect to contacting every few years to maintain the customer pending a personnel change of buyers.  The most important thing is that to increase your effectiveness, you don’t want to waste your time while you better someone else’s program.

You owe it to yourself, and it will make you more effective.

Always be effective!

Your comments are welcome.