Business folks love to discuss ROI or return on investment. But often, the cost of inaction or COI – of doing nothing is a more useful starting place for a sales conversation.
At the root of thinking about COI is the culture of change. How well does a company evolve, shift and adapt?
If you are selling to a company, you always want to start by understanding the appetite for change before pitching the ROI of your bright, shiny widget. Ask the prospect,
- What’s the cost if you do nothing?
- What happens if you don’t invest in new software, system, or salesperson?
- Why not keep doing what you have been doing?
Through the right questions, you can get a preview of the appetite for change before you learn about their pain points.
Before anyone can calculate the return on investment, people must be convinced of the need to change. Your back may hurt, but until it is throbbing some people (okay, mostly men) will power through it. At some point getting alignment and recognizing that the pain is hindering forward motion helps the entire body.
The cost of doing nothing can also be measured because, like limiting oxygen to the body, a corporation needs to continuously find ways to improve, grow, and achieve its goals.
In a sales process, your most significant competitor can be overcoming the desire to do nothing, not your competition.
The Last Hour
When you get toward the end of a selling process, and someone asks – “remind me why we are going to spend this money again” – you may have lost the battle. It’s critical to bring everyone along by making sure that they have stated their pain points repeatedly. And the senior team agrees to the problem.
You are reinforcing why your solution matters allow you to chip away at the pain of decision making.
There is value in getting clarity on their big pain points and how your solution addresses those issues head-on.
But if a company isn’t willing to change, grow and adapt – you may be wasting your time. When you can have a comprehensive discussion about the COI or cost of inaction, you are setting the table for success.
Make sure influencers in the decision-making process are on board with solving the same problem. When everyone is aligned on the need to change and the definition of the problem to be solved – that’s when the magic happens.
One of my clients had fantastic technology. He was built something genuinely extraordinary. When he went into software companies to sell his tech, he kept hitting a wall. They didn’t see his tech solving their problem. They admire its capabilities – but it wasn’t the enormous challenge they faced. The real problem was they never exercised their “change muscle”. They had little to no interest in anything new.
Repeat These Questions
Think about asking these questions repeatedly to everyone at the company
- How long have you had this problem?
- How does it affect the entire company?
- What would happen if you ignored this problem over the next year or two
- What’s an example of your company changing in a significant way over the last year?
When you start with understanding a willingness to change and grow, you can erode the argument that says, “we’d be better off doing nothing.”
Start with your customer’s primary problem which may be an unwillingness to learn and grow. Make sure all the decision-makers agree on the issue at hand. Only then start the rest of the sales process.
The best place to begin is by understanding a company’s appetite for change.
You can set up a time to chat with me about your marketing challenges using my calendar. Email me jeffslater@themarketingsage.com Call me. 919 720 0995. The conversation is free, and we can explore if working together makes sense. Watch a short video about working with me.
