Digital Marketing

What is value-added selling?

Almost all companies claim to have better people, better service, and more technical expertise than all of their competitors. The problem is that your competitors often say the same thing. And not everyone can be right.

This factor becomes even more confusing when you ask sellers what they think value added is. Some claim that their clients require more frequent visits, while others believe that this is their experience.

However, the one thing that defines value in the eyes of the customer is overlooked by most of those in the sales field, and that is that value to the buyer can only be defined by the customer, not the supplier. . Because it doesn’t matter what the seller thinks value is, it only matters what the customer thinks it is, and because customers don’t always think the same, the operational definition of value added varies from customer to customer.

Do you understand value-added selling?

Sadly, most salespeople don’t, because value-added selling is more than just a sales concept or some kind of new sales technique. Many of the people I’ve talked to seem to think they know what it is, but in most cases they don’t understand what value-added selling really is.

The reality is that value-added selling is a way to improve a packaged solution for the potential customer that tends to promise a lot, but in essence, when handled with only buyers’ needs in mind, it will generally deliver more, usually exceeding customer expectations. .

Put even more simply, value-added selling is a proactive way for the salesperson to personally take the initiative to add value. In essence, it is handled similarly to the way a professional pre-handles an objection by generating more value up front so that price becomes less of an issue during the sales process.

Selling value added is simply a course of action taken by the seller based on trust, because trust is the foundation of the relationship. The philosophy here is simple, if two people trust each other and want to do business with each other, they will work out the details. Buyers may have a preference for brands, but they will put aside their loyalty to the people they like.

Value-added selling is the desire to achieve win-win results for both buyer and seller, however, transactions should be more about the buyer than the seller because it is their problem; their money and a solution they must live with.

Also, the value-added sale should be about the customer and not about the seller. If the seller defines the value in terms of the customer, he is willing to pay a little more. But when a seller imposes “value” on the customer, the seller pays for it at a higher discount.

Because of this focus on customer value, value-added salespeople approach selling by looking for where they can help make the greatest impact on the customer’s business. By doing this, the seller helps the buyer achieve higher levels of success, because the seller’s attitude is primarily the essential motivators of customer satisfaction, loyalty, and retention.

When the salesperson understands these principles, they will also be aware that selling only the product opens the field to competition. Alternatively, caring salespeople add value with their problem-solving skills, knowledge, ability to get things done, and initiative.

THE ROLE OF THE VALUE-ADDED SELLER

In traditional selling, sellers focus on finding new business. In fact, some are so obsessed with finding new business or developing new opportunities that they often ignore existing clients in the process. While salespeople focused on customer satisfaction will follow up, and during this follow up they will discover additional opportunities for the business.

The role of the value-added seller evolves throughout the sales process and parallels the buyer’s needs for increased business opportunities through cross-selling of additional products or services. While traditional salespeople focus on selling products, value-added salespeople focus on solving problems.

Perhaps a better way to put it may be that when a traditional seller tries to create the buyer’s needs to sell a product or service, alternatively sellers focused on adding value on behalf of the customer seek to understand the buyer’s needs and take action. consequently, and where traditional salespeople focus primarily on doing business, salespeople who focus on adding value are the ones who want to make a difference for the customer.

The fundamental difference in the two groups is that the primary focus and selling skill for traditional sellers is closing, while the primary focus and selling skill for value-added sellers is to listen and adapt what they have heard, are the primary needs of customers and combining tailored solutions, whether product or service oriented solutions.

Here are some tips on added value.

By applying value added as a sales concept, effective salespeople today will not only need to create much more positive business relationships with everyone they work with, but will also need to further sharpen their current skills in asking questions, listening to constructively as well as understanding better ways to meet the deepest needs of your customers.

These are the same salespeople who want to understand what each customer finds valuable to them, and then can work on applying creative solutions to what those customers value in their day-to-day business. It is then, and only then, that the customer will view the seller as a valuable and effective value-added seller.

But what’s most encouraging here is that each of these value-added selling skills can be learned. That’s right, learned behavior that we can all benefit from. The fact is, no one is born with the ability to ask penetrating questions, create positive relationships, listen constructively, or even develop creative proposals and solutions.

Remember, there has never been a natural seller, and never will be. Some think they may have natural talents to sell, and we’ve all met many of them, but upon closer inspection they are generally fast-talking thugs bordering on unethical behavior and most don’t last anyway. a lot in the field of sales.

The good thing here is that the knowledge and processes that are applied by the best and most effective value-added salespeople can also be learned by anyone in sales today. Then once a minimum level of experience is achieved, these same (now trained) salespeople can continually improve these more enhanced behavioral skills from the rest of their sales career, and they will only improve over time to serve their customers at levels. optimal.

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