Believe me - we are much better than anyone else

The unfortunate thing about selling is that in most instances there are other people who offer similar solutions to the ones we are offering. Therefore, just knowing the customer's issues will not guarantee a sale, we have to convince the buyer that our solution meets their needs better than similar solutions available in the competitive market.

How do we know we are different?

Differentiation takes many forms and marketing ought to be able to provide the following:

1. Unique Product Features - Product marketing ought to be able to generate a list of unique or differentiated features versus competitors and what issues they address.
2. Unique "Delivery" or "Service" Options - Beyond the product features marketing ought also to be able to identify the difference between your delivery options and your ongoing service or after sales options and those of your competitors. These differences can also be linked to the value a customer will derive from the options available from you.
3. Competitive positioning - Marketing should provide, by key competitor, an analysis of competitive offerings highlighting where you have strengths and weaknesses, and where there are therefore opportunities and threats.

So all sales has to do is to present a list of the differences!

It is marketing's role to ensure that sales understand the differentiators, but sales also have to know how and when to use this information, and this is where the problem often lies.

"our laptop is 6 ounces lighter and 1/2 inch thinner than the model you are looking at" is only a differentiator if the customer is concerned about lightweight and size!

Key to good competitive positioning is once again effective questioning, by fully understanding what is important to the customer, and of course what is not, an effective salesperson will identify which differentiator to use.

"you mentioned that your company had a strategic objective of being carbon neutral; were you aware that we are the only manufacturer to have achieved Carbon Trust's 5 star award for energy saving on all our devices...."

Do we need to know who we are up against?
Effective differentiation relies on relevance to our customer. There is no point telling a potential purchaser of a Mini, how much more fuel efficient it is versus a Hummer if the key competitor is a Fiat 500. So again key to effective differentiation is questioning "so who or what else are you considering.....?"


So it's simple - Marketing identify our strengths and sales works out when to tell the customer

YES! Effective competitive positioning is simple

• Marketing has to
• invest time and effort in identifying why customers might want our product (the issues customers want to address)
• map these issues to the competitive offerings to identify our strengths and weaknesses and understand opportunities and threats
• Clearly articulate our strengths and how they better address the issues than our competitors
• Clearly identify our weaknesses and when we should qualify ourselves out or focus on a feature or advantage that we are better at.
• Sales has to:
• Understand what the customer really wants to achieve
• Identify how to win against the competitors
• Use the information provided by marketing to effectively position the offering
• Qualify out where appropriate

This is not theory, more marketing departments are realising that they need to link their competitive information against customer issues and not only features. The clever organisations are "testing" their sales teams abilities to use this information effectively and win more business.

Want to know more? Visit our website www.sales-accredit.com or contact me directly mark.savinson@sales-accredit.com

Next week we will examine the issues around decision making and reducing the risks for the customer.