What's the biggest change in sales over the last 10 years?

Nick,

I'd agree that we really are dealing with "Customer 2.0" now. When I try to nail a milestone for that change I go with Google. Suddenly we could all get what we were looking at our desk. Google was founded in 1998 so that change pretty much lines up with your 10 year horizon.

All the Sales 2.0 work we are doing now is really an effort to "level the playing field" and get us in sales and marketing aligned with the new customer.

As Miles mentions in #1 and #3 above we now have to use smart approaches to prospecting (and marketing - e.g. Inbound Marketing) to get access to buyers who expect more from us. Unprepared/low value sales people will NOT get access to the buyer's office any more - the bar is being raised.

We still have a lot to do. The customer is continuing to evolve as social media and mobile develops...and whatever else is next to come.

Nigel

I agree with the 2.0 issue. The web provides the customer with unprecedented access to information about our solutions, and access to references via social networking before they ever talk to a rep. This means the prospect is much further down the buying cycle than the sales person when they do talk.

This disjointed cycle is apparent when the prospect begins the conversation by asking to evaluate the product in some depth. If the sales person gives in to this stage of the buyers cycle (without doing a level set) they end up with smaller deals that take longer to close. Almost all of my sales effectiveness projects now focus on resetting the conversation to bring the seller up to speed so they can lead the buying process rather than follow. Results will show up in ASP and forecast accuracy.

Great discussion and solid points, but I tend to agree with Nigel's last response--even take it further. It is mandatory that sales get in earlier than the "comparing options time."

The problem with the web providing the vehicle to "inform/educate" the customer on the various solutions is it assumes the customers are asking the right questions. They will get great answers to the questions they ask, but if they are asking the wrong questions or don't know the questions, then they are down a terrible path.

This is where sales people can offer tremendous leadership--they can help the customers understand what questions the should be asking, what things they should be researching and looking for. Take for example people looking for a major software solution, I'll use ERP as the perennial favorite. How many times in their careers do most people buy and implement a major ERP system---probably very few, so they don't really know what they should be looking for or what questions they should be asking.

There is an argument for even earlier involvement than I have described. What about the customer that doesn't even know they should be questioning what they are doing, that they should be looking for improvements, that there are opportunities they aren't addressing. They simply don't know what they don't know. The role of the sales professional--who really understands his customer, their customers, the industry is to go to the customer with ideas of hot they might look at things differently,what questions they should be asking, what opportunities they should be pursuing.

Waiting for the comparing options time for sales engagement is like waiting to get a copy of the RFP that your competitor wrote. It's a prescription for failure.

How have sales changed in the last 10 years?

It comes down to four things:
1. If you're viewed as selling commodities, you're doomed. They can get those off the internet for less money because price shopping is so much easier with a quick Google search. Provide value and do it prior to selling.
2. You need to be honest with prospects. If you stretch the truth, it's quick and easy for them to validate your claims.
3. With several more communication avenues, they have less time to see you. You need to be on-point and know about their company prior to walking in the front door.
4. Because of social media, you need to expand your online presence. A prospect's first search is going to be for you or your company, if they can't find you... you don't exist.

Nick, I'll offer a few changes to get the conversation started:

1) What is valued/needed by the customer. Not too many years ago, the biggest value most sales makers provided to their customers was product knowledge. That is now of very little to no value. Buyers for most products/services can find out as much as they need to know from the web. The rep better bring industry/business expertise to the table.

2) The change from "talk" to "listen". Much of the pre-close time in the past was tied up in getting the presentation(s) ready. Customers were told how it would work. Not a successful strategy for most of us today. Listening carries a higher value by many customers.

3) Prospecting - with web tools and the web, the time to obtain almost anything you want to know about anyone is almost nil. Time spent working with the gatekeepers to get that precious direct dial phone number or the magical email address had been days or even weeks in the past. Now it is a few clicks in Jigsaw, IntroMojo or Gist and you have more than you need. Want to know what music they are listening to? Now you can know even that.

Interesting question and looking forward to read what others have to say.

Miles and Nigel did a great job kicking this off by pointing out that buyers are now hyper-informed and prodded from every angle by automated sales gadgets fighting for snippets of mindshare. Most buyers (especially in the B2B world) simply won't engage an actual breathing sales professional without a base understanding of their options. This means they enter the sales cycle later, and as much as we want to be 'educators', that ship has sailed, and we now have to be 'differentiators'.

A normal sales call used to looks like this: Rapport -- Open Ended Questions -- Education -- Solution Delivery -- Overcome Objections -- Close.

With more informed buyers, they already know what your product does and have a pretty solid estimate for what it costs. So now its Rapport -- Open Ended Questions -- Actively Address Potential Objections -- Close.

Forget talking about what your product does. They know already (although you should still confirm this...not everyone does their independent research, just most). Focus on what it does BETTER from the start. Don't wait to overcome objections as they arise. Instead, anticipate they know the finer points and address them early and often.

There's a sea of options. Always Be Differentiating.

Kevin, Brian,

Super-solid points. I do believe it's possible to get in the buyer's office earlier than "comparing options time" but some of my rationale for that is the use of relationships and trigger events. If sales people don't work to get in early, then the default will be a buyer who is comparing options to a change they've already committed to as described so well by Brian.

Good stuff.

Nigel

I love this question. Two things have changed (dramatically and irreversibly) over the last ten years.

First, the amount of business acumen that is needed to sell effectively has increased tremendously. It is no longer enough to possess only the sales acumen that might have allowed you to succeed a decade ago. To be a great salesperson now means being a great business person. You cannot sell effectively now without a far greater understanding of your client's business and how what you sell can help them to produce a better result. Your business acumen has to rival that of a business manager.

Which brings us to the second change, which is closely intertwined with the first: the responsibility for outcomes.

It is no longer enough to sell what you sell and to have it delivered. Your clients now expect (and demand) that you, the salesperson, manage the outcome. The salesperson is, now more than ever, responsible for ensuring that what they sold produces the outcome that they sold and promised. This means that your sales acumen has to be coupled with your business acumen, as well as the change management and leadership skills that are required to produce results in any company (and that are exceedingly difficult to produce in a company that is not your own).

This trend has been growing for longer than ten years, for certain. But the bookend recessions of the last decade have made these the most prominent changes in sales. I predict these two trends dominate for some time to come.

Yes, this is a great discussion - one that every sales team should be having.

Having just returned from Blogworld /New Media Expo 2010 it was amazing to see and hear sales and marketing execs from Fortune 500 companies (and smaller companies) talking about their successes (and lessons being learned) in the new world of "sales and marketing 2.0".

Reinforcing what Nigel and others said, one big change in the past ten years is that it is more difficult to get in front of a prospective customer in the early phases of their search for a solution to a problem. Without strong relationships, endorsements, and referral partners, a seller may not learn about this potential customer until they end up as one of two or three potential vendors. By then, it may be too late to have a strong opportunity to learn what the prospect really needs and have a good chance at being their solution provider. Worse, they may not even be considered because they did not stand out during the period of research on the web that the prospect conducted.

What to do? Invest in a strong, clear presence on the web. Use tools to learn who is visiting your site(s), do outreach, and build strategic partnerships where others are quick to refer you as THE solution for your niche.