SELLING THE REAL BUYERS ======================= When you own a business there's no one above you to ask for help when you get stuck or lost in a sale. Somehow you have to find the real buyers in new accounts you want to sell. With mergers, promotions, lateral moves and the oblique job titles that are given in corporate circles, it's tough to find out who can really approve your sale. Here are some ideas that may help you. Concentrate on locating the people who actually use your product or whose jobs will be influenced by it on a day-to-day basis. Sometimes this can be a number of folks. They all need to be sold. If their approval isn't sought and won they will sabatoge your sale afterwards and make it difficult for your company to do future business. Concentrate on finding the person who either signs the checks or approves orders in the price range of your proposal. In a large company certain managers have the power to approve amounts up to a certain sum. Then the responsibility is pushed up to the next level in the hierachy. In smaller companies the comptroller signs all the checks and approves all the sales. In still smaller companies the President does this. It's vital to locate the person who releases the money as early in your contact with your prospect company as possible. This is usually one person. Before you ever meet the folks who use your product on a day-to-day basis, you'll likely meet the ones whose job it is to make sure your product meets certain pre-set quality standards. Large companies especially like to hire these "bad guys" in order to get the very best suppliers. It's their job to screen you out and they do their job well. The only way to get past them is to have a superior product or an inside source of help. If you know someone, preferably within the company, who would benefit from doing business with you, ask them if they can show you the ropes for communicating with the real buyers within his company. Ask for specific advice on how to approach particular purchasers. You are going to do the real selling. To do a good job you need some guidance on the most appropriate way to deal with each person who is significant to your sale. You may need to ask more than one person for this kind of advice. Most folks who would benefit from having you make the sale are happy to demonstrate who and what they know in order to help you along. When you encounter a maze of purchasers, set your sights on their job functions, not on their job titles. Sometimes new layers of hiearchy are "hired-in" at the top, or expanded at the bottom. This may totally change the task responsibilities of a former purchaser without a visible promotion or change of status. Asking yourself these questions may help you work through the maze: 1 - Who will approve a sale in the dollar range that I'm targeting with this account? 2 - Who is the supervisor of the folks who use my products? 3 - Who will use my product from day-to-day? 4 - Who must try to screen out my company? 5 - What standards do they use for screening? 6 - Who can guide me on how to approach the various purchasers of my product? Another point of concern is to watch for people who influence the purchasers of your product but don't actually have any decision-making power. Some of these include friends, lateral co-workers, subordinates and relatives. Many of these influencers you will never see, but you need to pay attention if a buyer is taking counsel from "Uncle Joe who retired last year". "Uncle Joe" may still have enough weight to sway your sale because of his past accomplishments and credibility. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Resource Box - The following books can be found in your local library: STRATEGIC SELLING by Robert Miller, et. al; WINNING STRATEGIES IN SELLING by Roger Staubach, et. al; MAY KAY ON PEOPLE MANAGEMENT by Mary Kay Ash; ENTREPRENEURING by Dr. Steven C. Brandt. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Copyright (c) 1990 STRICTLY BUSINESS! BBS UNICOM Information Services.