Why your customer needs to balance risk with trust
As sales you need to put yourself in the shoes of your potential customer in order to understand his thinking and reasoning.
Business need – problem
A prospect has a problem to be solved or a need to be fulfilled.
A problem doesn’t need to be a technical problem but can also be the problem of a lower cost or the need of obtaining a higher service level.
As salesman your first risk is to access the problem or need by very accurately taken into account all possible parameters, influencing facts and people.
Then you need to present the suiting solution at the right moment.
Business and personal risk
Any buying decision involves risk for both the company as well as the decision maker and even the influencer.
A bad decision can lead to an operating loss for the company and in a severe case can lead to career change for the decision taker.
What level of risk is the potential customer or decision taker willing to take ?
He needs to do a risk assessment of the supplier, the product or solution and the salesman.
Any indication of increased risk compared to your competitors can mean you are not getting the deal. This can originate from simple events like not answering the telephone quickly, handing over less nice documentation to presenting a not matching solution at first.
Also the decision of his peers will influence his subjective measurement of risk.
Balancing risk with trust
On the other hand what level of trust can your company as a supplier or vendor offer and how trustworthy are you and your sales engineer?
The decision maker needs to balance the company and his personal risk with the trust framework consisting of:
- your trustworthiness
- the trust the vendor brings
- the trust in the solution
- the trust in the decisions of his peers
How he does this balancing is often subjective and personal.
This balancing of risk and trust is why selling in B2B is a complex sale as many factors will influence the purchase decision.
How trustworthy are you and your company ?
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