How The Sales Game Has Changed – Relationships Are Crucial

What do you do in a world with to many choices and to little time? You ignore stuff. The obvious question therefore is: What does a ‘thing’ need to be in order to get your attention? It has to stand out; it has to be remarkable. It has to be unique.

Modern selling needs to adapt to today’s modern and sophisticated buyer. The marketing and sales game has changed. Very good won’t make you successful. The marketing war for consumers’ attention is heating up. Bizarre is more successful than boring.

Do you still want to keep selling your stuff to the ‘majority’?

Btw. it’s nothing wrong about that… if you decide to do so on purpose.

If the answer is Yes, than go ahead and stick to the strategy most marketers follow:

Average products and services for average people.

But don’t expect this group of people to care to much about you and your products. These are the ones to ignore your stuff the most. It’s called mass marketing.

If on the other hand you want prospects to care about your message and ideas, target the geeks aka the ‘Innovators’ and the ‘Early Adopters’.

Most of us acknowlegde the fact that the web has dramatically changed the way we do business. All the information you ever wanted to have is simply one mouse click away from you. Instead of rushing to a store and looking for items we first go to Google and hit the search button. Our buying behavior has obviously changed.

The overall consumer landscape has changed. Today’s prospects are more sophisticated than ever before. They are better informed which brings new challenges and opportunities to the marketing and sales game.

The guys at introhive collected data and insight on this topic, and created an interesting infographic showcasing the shift in sales. Modern sales professionals need to adapt their strategies and techniques, and focus more on building powerful relationships.

Here are 5 key insights from the infographic:

• 93% of buying process start with an internet search.
• 66% of sales professionals believe the buying process is changing faster than sales organizations.
• Cold calls are 60% more expensive than generating inbound leads.
• Prospects want sellers who can offer new knowledge and value.
• Conversations with leads through digital channels drove an increase in the speed of closing a deal by nearly 20%.

More than ever before, relationships matter. The key therefore is to focus on building and nurturing good relationships. People are sick and tired of being treated like a ‘number’. They want to be treated as human beings. Relationships count. Relationships are very powerful.

What are you doing to pimp up your sales game and boost your relationship marketing?