Diagnostic Consultative Sales

Productive salespeople often make the difference between company success and failure. The best approach to driving sales productivity should be focused on the interaction between the salesperson and the customer.

Salespeople used to simply disseminate information about their companies, by phone, mail and in person. The Internet made that “information delivery” role almost entirely obsolete and practically eliminated the need for a salesperson, if the product was a commodity that could easily be purchased from more than one vendor. Today’s transportation, logistics and supply chain solutions customers can retrieve product information effortlessly. They can electronically optimize shipments, tender loads, schedule pick-ups, check delivery status in real time, contact customer support, bill their customers, pay their carriers and so forth. The salesperson used to play the intermediary in at least some of these activities. These activities are no longer a part of the salesperson’s domain.

Ironically, the availability of information has made buying decisions more difficult, particularly when the product or service being purchased is sophisticated or has business implications that require a certain amount of experience to understand. For example, many business owners would happily order their office supplies online, but wouldn't want to purchase their complex logistics solutions, TMS, WMS, or other enterprise software the same way.

Sales professionals today must help their customers understand and solve problems. This requires a deep comprehension of a customer’s core business issues. Sales professionals must now possess the technological savvy needed to creatively and appropriately use new tools to streamline the sales process and generate profitable transactions.

Today’s sales professionals must learn to manage the complexity created in the buying process by the explosion of information and the need to undertake more sophisticated, often strategic, purchases. Salespeople must often shoulder the burden of responsibility for the diagnosis of the customer’s problem, the design of solutions and the assurance that whatever has been purchased works well.

Consultative sales is evolving, from a model in which salespeople ask questions about the customer’s needs to one where they do not assume that the customer has a complete understanding of the problem. In the past, the role of the salesperson was to understand the customer's expressed needs and to present his or her products as the best solution to them. The underlying assumption was that customers could diagnose their own needs and describe their desired outcomes.

Recently, a newer diagnostic consultative model has been developing, that assumes customers may not recognize that a problem exists. The salesperson examines the customer’s business situation, locates the root problems that are causing that business to run less effectively (in conjunction with the customer) and proposes ways to work with the customer to address the root problems. The result is a solution that the customer would not design, or request, if it were left to them alone.

Good consultative salespeople get to know and understand the customer so well that the product or service fits him and sells itself. Ideally, a good match between needs and benefits provided should result in a customer who is ready to buy.

The Case for a Business Case in Complex Sales

For complex logistics solutions salespeople, it is usually best to deal with the executives in an organization whenever possible, in order to avoid the process of getting a budget approved.

However, quite often the manager to whom you obtain access in an organization is not someone who can approve funding for the project. They may perceive the need to use your company’s services, but must first develop consensus within their organization about the need or timing for the project and obtain funding. Quite often the transportation department is competing against other departments for limited funding and the funding decision may be based on who has the better business case.

If you are a salesperson who inspires a buyer to initiate a particular type of project within their company, then you will have a head start on your competition with this prospective customer. In order to increase the chances of obtaining this customer’s business, the salesperson should offer assistance to the prospective buyer in crafting a business case that will be presented to the executives who will approve/reject the project’s budget.

Shortening the sales cycle is important. However, it is also important to deal with each prospective customer in a way that respects the way in which their company makes decisions. Speaking to the Traffic Manager of a company first and addressing the specific details with which he/she is concerned sometimes works better than speaking with the top executive in a broad brush and generalized manner. It is important that salespeople both think conceptually in order to discuss the high-level concerns of upper management, as well as think practically to solve the nuts and bolts problems associated with moving freight efficiently.

If you do speak with the front line people first (who may see a need to get a budget approved for your company’s services), you can then help them to write a convincing business case that explains the need, costs and benefits to the people who approve the budget.

Contents of a Business Case:
Outlined below are the chapters and contents of a typical report.
Executive Summary
Summarize the salient points in no more than 2 pages
Background
Outline the problem, opportunity, and current situation.
Project Description
Describe the proposed project in terms of size, function, location, approximate cost, technology, timing, and stakeholders.
Strategic Alignment
Summarize how the project aligns with the specific and published goals and strategies of primary stakeholders, especially organizations approving funding.
Environmental Analysis
Assess what similar organizations are doing to solve similar problems.
Summarize industry trends pertaining to solutions that meet the problem or opportunity.
Impact Assessment
Identify the types and severity of impacts on stakeholders for the preferred alternative (yours) and at least one other option.
Risk Management
Identify risks inherent to the project, the seriousness and probability of the impacts and the main risk management strategies proposed to manage the risks.
Costs and Benefits
Estimate capital, operating and recurring capital costs, and revenues for each viable alternative solution over an appropriate time frame, but no less than five years.
Identify both quantifiable and qualitative benefits for each viable alternative and for the preferred alternative, and indicate which stakeholders receive the benefits listed.
Conclusions and Recommendations
Summarize key findings from previous sections leading to selection of a preferred alternative and outline specific recommendations to the funding approval authority concerning how much funding is required and over what timeframe.
Implementation
Describe how the project implementation will be organized and controlled.
Approval
Outline the approval process and prepare a signature page for the legally authorized sponsor(s) to approve the business case, include complete name, title and organization of each signer.