Part of B2B selling involves qualification of sales opportunities. Qualification is necessary to determine your customer’s role in authorizing the payment of your products or services. You should determine this part of the sales process right away to make sure you are not wasting your time. The key decision-maker is not always the person you would expect
To assess a potential customer’s strength on authorization and finance, you want find out who are the designated decision-makers in the company. In other words, who are the primary stakeholders? Who is the executive in charge of making the buying decisions and who, in the organization, influences that decision? Because corporate structures vary in nature, the primary decision-maker is not always the person you believe would be the key decider in the company. Someone who has another role, other than an executive, might be the person to address.
You also have to make sure that you involve all the stakeholders in the deal. While you may have one company officer sold on the value proposition made by your company, you may not have the full attention of the whole team. Because different people may have different concerns, you need to find out what those are before proceeding.
Obtaining Information on a Company’s Buying Process
Another part of qualification entails understanding a company’s purchasing process. For example, will you need the signature of one of the officers? Maybe a company likes to begin with a pilot program before it agrees to a fuller-scale initiative. To avoid asking a lot of questions in this respect then, ask the prospect how the company reaches a buying decision. When you understand their process, you’ll have the information you need to complete the deal.
Who Has Financial Jurisdiction in the Company?
During the qualification process, and after establishing authority, you will need to move onto budgeting. It is in your best interest to know who has jurisdiction in this regard. While some firms may have a marketing executive to support and manage their budget, they might be overseen by the CFO in other companies. The executive or employee who holds financial authorization can differ from one firm to the next.
How to Overcome Any Pricing Objections
A creative way to encourage buyers toward purchasing a service or product is to show them how it is an investment. This allows you to get budgetary information that can show the purchasers the types of return they can expect. You may be able to prevent price objections by using this approach.
