Is a Sales Methodology needed? Only if you want to succeed!

From Dave Stein's research area five of
The Real Reasons Sales Training Fails and What To Do About It

#5 Is an inadequate or completely absent Sales Methodology

(the organising principles underlying Selling)

In more than 20 of my Clients medium and small I have discovered that there was no methodology at all to their selling. They had a Sales Department, a Sales Manager and Salespeople but NO methodology for Selling. That is usually why I get called in because: “not having a Sales Methodology”
like “not having a Sales Strategy” means that you usually fail!

Dave Stein’s ESR site has a good enough definition of Sales Methodology and how it differs from Sales Process on http://davesteinsblog.esresearch.com/2009/12/02/more-excuses-for-not-doing-...

In my view, it is also about having a Sales Process that is driven by
YOUR Product/Market BUYING METHODOLOGY.

That is Selling the way your Market wants to Buy.

“Easy to Buy From!” is always the highest rated characteristic of a Supplier in the eyes of the Buyer when you survey Buyers.
“Trusted Advice” scores low at 30%.

How do you know if you have a working Sales Methodology,
a broken Sales Methodology or no Sales methodology at all?

Well, you can retain a Sales Consultant like me, or you can ask your Customers:
“How easy are we to buy from?”

Ask some of your Lost Business Prospects:
“Were we easy to buy from, or did the difficulty in dealing with us play a part in why we lost the deal?”

Fixing a broken Sales Methodology (or a partly working Methodology), really does need a Consultant (internal or external). The output is ‘This is what we do wrong and why (PROOF),
and this is HOW through Changes we will put it right and these are the measures to prove its improving’.

Perhaps the toughest part of SALES METHODOLOGY is when you finally realize you cannot BUY one,
you have to CONSTRUCT one. Some great Companies like Huthwaite (SPIN is only a Part, you have to buy the Package), Miller Heiman, TAS, or Holden will sell you the components, BUT YOU will have to do the Assembly and the heavy lifting IMPLEMENTATION.

You can, if you are smart enough even mix and match
getting the Right, not just good enough, Components.

Sales Training without a Sales Methodology doesn’t work.

 

IBM (referring to their Structured Selling Methodology)
calls them their Cash Generating Machines!

So, save all your wasted expense on novelty courses
and one day training events, daft books, sales blogs and sales tips.
And, invest the money and time to build a Working Sales Methodology.