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Our customers and prospects don’t need our sales help and sales skills as much as they used to. They can find much of the information they need on the Internet. The first thing most customers do before purchasing anything is to research the product or service on the Internet before talking with a sales professional. We know this is true because we do the same thing when we buy a consumer product for ourselves. Since buyers know they can easily get product information on the Internet, there has been a fundamental change in what they need from us and how to sell to them.

“In the 21st century decision makers are increasingly using a vendor’s knowledge as the key differentiator…”

What are today’s buyers looking for?
They want information that goes well beyond what is available on the Internet. Furthermore, they want it coming from someone they view as an expert. Sales professionals that can only provide information easily found on the web are viewed as order-takers. Customers view order-takers as human powered e-commerce web sites that provide little sales help or value.

How do we respond?
To set ourselves apart from the competition and demonstrate our value in this changing sales environment we have to provide something the customer can’t get without us. Expert information. Expert knowledge and experience are not available on the Internet. If they’re using our expertise then the likelihood that they will buy from us increases dramatically.

What’s next?
To put ourselves ahead of 99% of our competitors and to provide the kind of expertise that our customers are thirsting for, we need to make sure we are up to speed on the products and services we sell. We must also ensure that we are knowledgeable about our industry as well. To gain and maintain expert status we can take training available from our employer, subscribe to industry publications and subscribe to an industry specific sales blog or podcast. We can read a few books specific to our industry too. Recommending these books to customers even further enhances our expert status. VIP (Very Important Point): Don’t ever stop learning; this is an ongoing process.

What’s the bottom line? In the 21st century decision makers are increasingly using a vendor’s knowledge as the key differentiator between selecting vendor A over vendor B.

Further reading: Customers in 2008 vs. 1993. Are they really different?, Attention sales representatives, the Internet is not replacing you

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Tags: sales-training, technology

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