7 Insider Secrets To B2B Sales Success

Data-Driven Selling By Sales Insights Lab

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1. Map out the entire sale.

This is so important in the B2B selling space because if you don't know how your entire sales process is going to work, you're going to be winging it, you're going to be all over the place. And the data shows that today's prospects, in the B2B space, are so much savvier than they were just a few years ago. These are people that have multiple degrees often, and they're getting sold to all the time.

2. Attack your entry point.

We want to make sure that we know precisely how we're going to enter into a prospective company. And this is very specific to the B2B space. Because of course, when you're selling to consumers, there are only one or two consumers in a family realistically. But when you're talking about a large enterprise or even a small business, there are often a lot of different key actors that you can go into that company by starting that conversation with or engaging in a conversation.

3. Provide real value.

This is a huge distinction from today's world of selling to even just a few years ago. Nowadays, prospects expect salespeople in the B2B space to provide real value in the selling conversation. It's not enough to have a great product or service. And it's not enough to ask a couple of good questions. We need to be establishing authority and expertise. And the best way to mainly be providing value upfront is by providing prospects with insight. You as a salesperson, with your experience, having seen many different prospective company's in this particular space, have a fantastic bird's eye view of what's going on in the lives of your prospects.

4. Don't try to close.

This may go counter to a lot of what we've heard over the years and our careers, but in the B2B space, prospects are savvy. They've been sold to many, many times. And quite frankly they've probably been sold to many times just this past week. And so if we're using some cheesy, transparent closing technique, they're going to see that from a mile away. And so the high-pressure closing techniques don't work anymore. Particularly in the B2B space.

5. Know their challenges.

This is so important in the B2B space. Again, buyers expect that you understand them. That you know what's going on. And so this is a two-part concept. One is that when we engage prospects in conversations, we need to show that we have some expertise. That we have some insight into what's going on in their world. But we also don't want to over assume that we know everything that's going on in their world. That's silly, of course, you don't know everything that's going on in their world.

6. Know everyone involved.

The latest data shows that the typical B2B, particularly enterprise-level sale, has about seven key decision-makers. And so we can't just expect that even if you're selling to the CEO of a company that that person is going to be able to pull the trigger, make the decision, and move on. It's not that simple anymore. Most even high-level executives are trying to get consensus around the decisions they make. They're trying to build that consensus so that way all the key people are on board, so that way when they move forward, they know that things are going to happen. And it's not just leadership by directive, by force. That's not how business works.

7. Always have clear next steps.

This is so important. That we are not walking away from any selling interaction without an obvious next step. A clear next step is that you get a scheduled call or a scheduled face-to-face meeting or a scheduled Zoom meeting on the books, in the calendar, a calendar invite goes out from you, and they positively reply to that calendar invite. That is a clear next step.