Customers aren’t interested in buying products or services. Their interest in products or services extends only as far as those things can help fulfill these goals:

• Operating as efficiently as possible
• Fulfilling the needs of their own customers, and
• Meeting growth and financial targets.

7 rules

Research by the Chally Group identified these seven behavioral rules customers expect salespeople to follow:

1. Salespeople must be personally accountable for customers’ desired results. Salespeople must act as the single point of contact for customers and ensure that the customers buy the best solutions to get the value expected. Sales reps must act as business agents who are responsible for every aspect of the relationship between the buyer and seller.
2. Salespeople must understand customers’ businesses. This means understanding how customers’ businesses work — including their business strategies. Salespeople must then provide sound advice based on those strategies.
3. Salespeople must be on the side of the customer. Customers expect a salesperson to be their representative within the seller’s organization. Salespeople must be advocates and expediters, representing the best interests of the customer throughout the sales process.
4. Salespeople must bring customers applications. Customers want salespeople who think beyond features and benefits to applications. Customers want to know how to use products and services to achieve their goals. The best salespeople act as consultants, assisting customers in their goals to capture the promised value of features and benefits through effective application.
5. Salespeople must be easily accessible. There’s no difference between “global” and “local” in today’s business environment. The best salespeople are travelers who leap geographic and cultural boundaries to relieve customers’ stress.
6. Salespeople must be problem-solvers. In yesterday’s sales world, the closing of the sale marked the end of the sales engagement and the salesperson’s responsibilities. Today the closing of the sale marks the beginning of a relationship. Customers expect salespeople to not only solve their problems during the transaction itself, but throughout the full term of the business relationship. The best salespeople act as troubleshooters who realize the inevitability of problems and commit to solving them quickly and effectively.
7. Salespeople must be innovative. Because change is the only constant in today’s environment, salespeople are expected to stay on top of customers’ needs and respond to them with proactive and continuous innovation.

Adapted from Achieve Sales Excellence by Howard Stevens and Theodore Kinni.

Tags: benefits, business strategies, Chally Group, features, innovative, rules