Relationship-based selling is dead.
It’s been a bonkers year. Mind-bending, in fact. And we know you’re probably up to your neck in busyness beyond belief, trying to get back on track to have a successful end of year, salvaging 2020….
Could we ask you to hang on a sec though? Just, stop for a moment?
See, we’ve seen a change over the last six months that could have profound effects on your sales in the here and now AND for the foreseeable future. That change is a move from the supplier-client relationship being the mainstay of differentiating and winning new business, to a much more transactional state of affairs.
Why?
That’s easy. Virtual interactions are sucking the colour out of relationships.
There are a LOT of plus points to virtual interactions, don’t get us wrong. Saving the environment, saving time, generally being more efficient, saving money, people can come together from multiple locations in the world….all brilliant positives of everyone being forced to do it. And the positives are incredibly easy to quantify.
But there is a price being paid for all this. Check it out:
Having spoken to clients, there are big numbers of them doing back-to-back 20- or 30-minute meetings with suppliers. In those meetings they are literally ticking off checklists of functional stuff that needs to be done. It’s totally action-focused.
You may even have subconsciously slipped into this way of working if you manage a remote team - far more talk about tasks and far less talk on a human level.
And with all the objective cost and time savings, it’s now so much easier and quicker for your client to have an exploratory conversation with one of your competitors - takes up far less time, no skin off the client’s nose etc. They get the chance to look at things they simply didn’t have the time to look at before. They can go ahead with projects without you even knowing it was a consideration, receive more competitive proposals than ever and generally be more knowledgeable about what’s available to them in your market.
And while this is all happening, it reduces room for the depth of the supplier relationships that they had. They probably don’t even notice this is happening, but you might be seeing some of the fallout if you have strong client relationships. Is it harder to book an hour or longer with them? Less chance to run through your proposal with them, or discuss briefs? These can be indicators that your relationship is changing, and you need to act fast to ensure you stay relevant, win business and retain your share of wallet.
How can you do this?
That’s something we’re drawing up our thoughts on right now and in the coming weeks. Stay tuned for more on that and sign up to our email list for further thinking.
In summary, at this point in time maybe it’s not fully shuffled off it’s mortal coil. And certainly in many industries there has been little change to the way business is done in 2020. But in others big things are changing, and fast, and the way we used to sell and manage client relationships is changing too.
