• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Advertise
  • Submissions
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Mar 1, 2021
  • Startup
    • Creating a Plan
    • Funding a Startup
    • Franchise Center
    • Getting Your Office Ready
    • Making Your Business Official
    • Marketing Your New Business
    • Personal Readiness
  • Run & Grow
    • Customer Service
    • Human Resources
    • Innovation
    • Legal
    • Operations
    • Risk Management
  • Leadership
    • Best Practices
    • Communication
    • Green Initiatives
    • Open Culture
    • Strategic Planning
    • People Skills
  • Sales & Marketing
    • Advertising and Lead Generation
    • Marketing Innovations
    • Marketing Plans
    • Online Marketing
    • Relationships
    • Sales Activities
  • Finance
    • Budgeting and Personal Finance
    • Payments and Collections
    • Tax and Accounting
    • Pricing Strategy
    • Working with Investors
    • Working with Lenders
  • Tech
    • eCommerce
    • Hardware
    • Software
    • Security
    • Tech Reviews
    • Telecom
  • Shop

SmallBizClub

Helping You Succeed

efile4biz banner
Home / Sales and Marketing / Sales Activities / How Will You Justify This to Your Management?
How Will You Justify This to Your Management?

How Will You Justify This to Your Management?

1020 Views

Feb 23, 2015 By Dave Brock

Too often, our customers focus on price, consequently we focus on price—after all we want to be responsive to our customers.

 
But there are all sorts of problems our customers have when they focus on price. We tend to worry about it—after all, we want to minimize the amount of discounting we provide. But our customers face huge challenges by just focusing on price.
 
The biggest is, when they have made a decision, they have to go to management for approval. The first question they will be challenged with is, “Why should we spend this money?”
 
Ugh!
 
Here they are, they’ve gone through their buying process. They’ve invested in all sorts of time and effort into evaluating alternatives, going through confusing pitch after confusing pitch. They’ve finally made a decision, they’ve gone through the final negotiations, they’ve made a decision.
 
Now they submit a req. They need to get approval from their management, perhaps from a capital approval group, perhaps to a group of finance folks.
 
Related Article: Don’t Confuse Buying and Selling
 
They are confronted with the question, “Why should we spend this money?” (By the way, it’s management’s moral obligation to always ask this question.)
 
Even if there is money in the budget, they will be challenged with that question, “Why should we spend this money?” After all, management can always choose to spend that budgeted money on something else—or not to spend it at all.
 
Sometimes, our customers are somewhat prepared, “I need it…..” “We need to upgrade….” “We need to change…..” “We need to stay competitive…” “It will improve our efficiency….”
 
They are part way on the path to the answer, but we still aren’t making management happy, they say, “Why should we spend this money?”
 
If our customers can’t answer this question, satisfying whoever is asking it, they won’t get approval to move forward. As a result, we see, “No decision made.” We’re frustrated, we thought we had the deal. The customer is frustrated, they wanted to buy.
 
When management poses the question, “Why should we spend this money,” as they are obligated to do, what they are really asking is, “What are we going to achieve in making this investment?”
 
The answer to this question will vary—it may be to drive revenue, improve quality, reduce expense, avoid a future problem, support growth. The answer may require a complete business case with ROI, it may be as simple as, “this is the problem this purchase eliminates is….”
 
If we are to be effective, then we have to make sure our customers are effective. We have to challenge them, ideally as early in their buying process as possible. “How are you going to justify this decision to management?” We have to help them answer the question, we have to help prepare them to satisfy their management’s need to understand, we have to help them sell to their management.
 
This article was originally published by Partners in Excellence

Filed Under: Sales Activities Tagged With: Dave Brock, Sales Process

Dave Brock

Dave Brock

Dave Brock is the founder of Partners in EXCELLENCE, a consulting and services company helping to improve the effectiveness of business professionals with strategy development, organizational planning, and implementation. Dave has spent his career working for and with high performance organizations, ranging from the Fortune 25 to startups, including companies such as IBM, HP, Nokia, AT&T, Microsoft, General Electric, and many, many more. The work Dave does with business strategies is closely tied to personal effectiveness of the people in the organization. As a result, Dave is deeply involved in the development of a number of training and coaching programs.

Related Posts

  • The Five “Whys”
  • “I’m Selling As Hard As I Can, Why Aren’t You Buying?”
  • Process is the Foundation for Agility/Nimbleness

Primary Sidebar

Random

UK Food Delivery: Overly Saturated or Growth Potential?

Mar 1, 2021 By Craig Harbour

Increase Conversion Rate with Great Landing Pages

Mar 1, 2021 By Gemma Moss

What Nursing Homes Will Look Like Post-Pandemic

Mar 1, 2021 By Brian Wallace

Can You Take Your Business Online with Shared Hosting?

Mar 1, 2021 By Louise Harris

5 Tips To Enhance Personal Injury Compensation

Feb 26, 2021 By Peter MacCallister

Footer

About Us

Small Biz Club is the premier destination for small business owners and entrepreneurs. To succeed in business, you have to constantly learn about new things, evaluate what you’re doing, and look for ways to improve—that’s what we’re here to help you do.

  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • RSS
  • Twitter

Copyright © 2021 by Tarkenton Institute, Inc. All Rights Reserved | Terms | Privacy