A Former Buyer`s Thoughts and Free Tip Sheet On Selling High-Tech And Why Busy, Time-Stressed Buyers Avoid Meeting High-Tech Salespeople
Released on: July 21, 2008, 12:39 pm
Press Release Author: Tom \"Bald Dog\" Varjan
Industry: Marketing
Press Release Summary: There is a huge gap between the ways high-tech sellers try to sell and the way buyers want to buy. Many high-tech sellers are stuck in old fashioned sales practices, which ultimately position them as dreaded peddlers and fungible vendors not respected technology experts. This tip sheet shed lights on 10 selling mistakes from the buyer\'s perspective.
Press Release Body: Vancouver, BC - High-tech salespeople spend some 73% of their times and efforts on prospecting for new business, and some 97% of this prospecting time and effort are wasted on tyre-kickers and self-important junior- or mid-managers and peddler fodders (purchasing and procurement departments) who are in search of the lowest bidders.
Sadly the most often practised sales method high-tech companies use to find new clients is the traditional cold-calling, pavement pounding and door knocking ugly, filthy, stinky, dirty and sweaty manual labour grunt work, which also positions these companies as dreaded peddlers and pain in the butt that most prospects are running and hiding from. And when they want to sell more, these companies just hire more peddlers and put more feet on the streets and try to motivate them using various carrot-and-stick methods, including the unethical commission structure. Hence the 43% annual attrition rate among sales staff.
\"Over a decade as a buyer for million-plus dollar high-tech solutions, I met probably five salespeople. For the rest, I asked them to send me all the information that can help me to make the right decision.\" - says former engineer and technology buyer, Tom \"Bald Dog\" Varjan, a Vancouver-based high-tech marketing strategist and copywriter, specialising in helping privately held high-tech companies to sell their solutions to premium clients at premium prices without resorting to cold-prospecting drudgery. \"And pushy salespeople who went for the quick sales were quickly disqualified themselves. Both my buyer colleagues and I focused on sellers that were willing to educate us and helped us to make the best decision, as opposed to manipulating us to make the instant sale.\"
Decisions-makers are being pressured to produce more results with less, so they want to focus on the 20% of work that gives them 80% of the results. And meeting salespeople is NOT on the top of their agendas. So, there are five reasons why they avoid meeting salespeople...
1. Buyers are worried about being cornered by hard-nosed, glib, smooth-talking, manipulative, commission-hungry salespeople who don\'t take no for an answer
2. Buyers can obtain all the information they need on any product or service without ever talking to salespeople
3. Buyers\' plates are already full of mission-critical issues and initiatives. They simply don\'t have time
4. Buyers are tired of sitting through 99%-identical dog and pony show sales presentations
5. Buyers, most often high-level, highly trusted and respected and reliable folks, don\'t have peer-level relationships with the seller company\'s lowest level, least trusted, least respected and most rapidly coming and going people: The sales force.
In most cases cold prospecting approaches can connect sellers with opinion-makers but not real decision makers, the \"guardians of the purse string\".
\"Trying to increase sales by hiring more peddlers is the same as a doctor\'s trying to save her patient, who is bleeding faster and faster, by increasing the speed of blood transfusion?\" - says Varjan. To help high-tech companies to better sell their solutions at premium fees and prices, and eliminate traditional stinky, sweaty back-breaking prospecting slavery, Varjan has compiled a complimentary Tip Sheet: Ten Ways Technology Companies Slaughter Their Bottom Lines, Brands and Reputation Through Obsolete Sales Strategies. It can be downloaded from http://www.varjan.com/articles/tip-sheet-high-tech-selling.pdf
For the other eight mistakes, information or interview, visit Varjan\'s website visit http://www.varjan.com or contact him tvarjan@gmail.com.
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