The Sales Archaeologist

Let me start by saying that I really enjoy working with Technology companies. Given the fact that most of my clients are in tech rich geographies like Boston and the San Francisco Bay Area this is probably a good thing. That said I have also come to appreciate that there are a few common mistakes that I see these companies making from a sales perspective, if you are a CEO, a VP of Sales or a Sales Person yourself and you find yourself selling a new or innovative technology then perhaps you find yourself succumbing to some of these issues.

1)      Failure to Speak in the Vernacular – so often the founders and developers at companies lead the charge with a new product and that is great and how it should be internally. But when we take that new product to the street, to the consumer and to the end user that messaging has to go away. If you don’t have a simple way to explain what the technology does, and I mean really simple – then you probably are not ready to launch it.

2)      Failure to Connect the technology with a problem, issue or compelling event – neither people or companies will buy something just “because”, there must be something that triggers that response to buy and it is not going to be a new feature, bell or whistle. What problem do you solve? If there is no answer to that question then you probably should go back to the drawing board.

3)      Not appealing to the rightpeople – chances are the people that will be most excited about the actual technology itself are the wrong people – they will be the end users, the technophiles and the simply curious. True decision makers will not have the interest in the how but be concerned with the why? Too many new technology companies get bogged down with a bloated pipeline that is simply full of the wrong people. Successful companies have a top down sales approach that requires a different conversation than many are comfortable with.

4)      Underestimating the human element – so many Technology companies are founded by and full of brilliant people. However some of these brilliant people have a tendency to be abrasive or gruff, they don’t know how to build relationships or can’t even understand why that is important. They don’t buy that way themselves, if the product is great who cares if the people are not pleasant – Answer, most of the population cares!

5)      They attempt to Engineer Sales – If you approach your sales process, especially when launching a new innovation or technology, the way you might approach the engineering of a new software or hardware there will be major problems when you try taking that to the street. Processes built by engineers always tend to be presentation heavy and out of sequence. An effective sales process and sales language is usually counterintuitive.

If you would like to see how your current sales force might measure up to the task consider a complete Sales Force Evaluation

My next post will focus on another aspect of sales that is relevant to Technology companies – The challenge of selling something that is entirely new, no track record, no customers and limited references. You can subscribe using the box in the side bar to ensure you don’t miss it!

picture credit: cheshirelibrary.org