Airlines and Tech Companies - the Same Challenges with Different Lingo.
Posted by Frank Belzer on Tue, Jul 26, 2011 @ 11:53 AM
Right now my time seems to be split between working with Airlines and working with companies that sell some type of technology – both software and hardware.
That’s nice you think, a little variety for me you imagine. But don’t be so quick to make that assumption, there is far more in common and many more similarities than you might think.
Although it is true that Airlines and Technology could almost not be further apart when it comes to markets, offerings, consumers, problems and challenges overall – when it comes to sales the issues are very similar.
- Not Enough New Customers
- The Prospects we find are Price Shoppers
- New Competition
- Struggling to Sell More Consultatively
- Helping Prospects Feel Comfortable with Changing
- Relationship Building Challenges
- Getting to Real Decision Makers
Not suprising for us to hear quite often how different a certain industry is, but time and again and as my experience with two very disparate industries proves – the selling issues and problems are often really similar.
What does change between the two?
The solutions sometimes need to address the nuance. The way an Airline needs to work with agencies and help them select the best routes for their clients obviously needs to be handled differently than the way a sales person sells software to a CIO. But the process, the questions and the establishing of a trusted adviser relationship do not change – the fundamentals are identical.
No compelling reasons to change – no sale.
No speed on bases (trusted adviser relationship) – no sale.
No Commitment to spend money to solve a problem – no sale.
Of course there is a tendency to feel that your particular industry is different – we hear that every single time we start working with a new group of sales people*. But rather than feel that way (which actually can be a disguised excuse that prevents change) why not look for the similarities and develop the skills needed to nail down those fundamentals.
*The similarities continue and even escalate when we start to look at sales managers - the need to better coach and develop their teams is a universal need that shows up in every organization we work with.
