11/02/2022

Becoming A Master At Selling For Businesses

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Despite recent disruptions, enterprise selling remains a vital part of many businesses. What are the essential things you should know to be successful? This guide contains all you need to know about enterprise selling.

What’s Enterprise Selling?

Enterprise selling is the act of convincing business owners that you offer products and services to their customers. Enterprise Selling relies on the relationships between sales reps and customers. It is important to identify potential customers and discover their needs before convincing them that your product/service is right for them.

It’s about getting to know your client so that they feel they are not just another vendor when they meet you. To be able to help them, you must understand their business.

Enterprise selling is, in essence, about building relationships and helping customers to understand their needs. It’s not about trying to sell products or services. You’ll build trust and be able to help your client make informed decisions when they decide to purchase from you shortly.

Benefits of Enterprise Selling

Enterprise sales have many benefits, including higher revenue growth, lower cost of goods sold (COGS), and improved profitability. This is mainly due to volume discounts offered primarily by manufacturers who want more repeat customers.

These benefits include:

1. Finding new clients – This is the most important aspect of enterprise selling. There are many ways to do this, but it is best to build relationships with people who are interested in your products and services.

If you are an IT company, other companies likely offer similar solutions to their customers. Therefore, it might not be a good idea to sell directly to them.

This is why potential business partners and customers are important.

2. Building relationships with customers – Once you’ve established a relationship with your customer, it’s important to continue that relationship and grow these relationships. This will result in more sales, which in turn, will lead to revenue growth.

If there were only one IT company looking after their systems, it would not make sense for them to buy from you. However, if they could purchase software through your company, they might be more inclined to do so.

3. Creating new products or services – This is an effective way to increase revenue without making additional investments or hiring more staff.

If you could develop software solutions that can be used by other companies, for example, this would give them access to your customer base. They may not need to start their own IT company but still want to use your services.

They can thus purchase an essentially identical product from a different supplier and save money.

The whole process can be accomplished through many channels including:

1. Direct Sales – You talk to the customer directly and offer them the chance to buy something (e.g. over the phone).

2. Marketing – Where you use advertising and publicity to promote your product/service and create interest among potential customers. If you are selling software packages to companies, some marketing campaign will likely be used to increase interest in your product.

3. Referral – You use third parties to sell your products/services, and then you receive a commission for each sale they make on behalf of the customer. (e.g. through an affiliate marketing program).

4. Subscribe – A subscription service allows you to offer a product or service that is unavailable every month. Software updates are only released once per month so customers need to pay again each time it happens.

5. Commissions – Where you pay a commission for every transaction they do on behalf of a customer (e.g. through an affiliate marketing program).

If I was selling a financial product and my salesperson was paid $100 per sale, I would expect them to make at minimum 100 sales to earn this amount. These people will likely be more willing than others to sell your products/services.

There may be other reasons you want to promote your product/service. If you are trying to sell a new software package, an existing marketing campaign may have already been put in place which has generated interest from potential customers (e.g. through advertising).

Are startups able to sell enterprise products?

It is important to recognize that there are many types of sales. Enterprise sales may not be the best for startups. This is a strong argument against it.

1. Enterprise customers tend to have more money than individual customers. Therefore, it’s likely that you will get a better return on your investment (ROI), if you sell your product/service directly, rather than through an intermediary like an affiliate marketing program or another third party (e.g. via referral).

Direct selling can result in higher profit margins without additional costs.

2. Enterprise customers will be more interested in the product/service quality than the commission. Likely, they won’t be willing to test something if it’s promoted by an affiliate program or another third party (e.g. via referral).

This could mean that you may have fewer sales and lower profit margins if you sell directly; however, this is not the case for all enterprise customers. Before you decide how to best promote your product/service, it is important to know what kind of customer you are.

3. Enterprise customers are less likely to spend money marketing than individual customers. It is possible to make more sales if you sell direct, rather than through an affiliate marketing program or another third party (e.g. via referral).

4. Some businesses have high brand awareness. They are therefore much easier to contact and find. This means it is easier to find enterprise clients by creating your website than using search engines that may not be suitable for all situations.

What are the problems of Enterprise Selling?

Selling an enterprise is not easy.

1. Enterprise customers might require a different approach than individual customers. An example of this is an organization interested in purchasing a product/service for its employees. It’s important to understand these requirements before you make your sales pitch.

They could choose to work with another supplier if you don’t know their requirements. If you don’t know who your customer is when trying to get in touch with them, it may be difficult or impossible to tell them about your products/services.

2. You may not get as many responses from enterprise customers as you would from individual customers. They are less likely than individual customers to be interested in your product/service, so it is important to provide compelling reasons for them to purchase. This can only be achieved through effective marketing that will engage their curiosity.

3. Enterprise sales take more effort and time than individual sales because there must be an initial contact before any sale can occur. Each organization has its preferences. Some prefer face–to–face meetings while others prefer phone calls and email.

Effective sales pitches will require that you understand the preferred contact method for your enterprise customers.

4. Enterprise clients might not be able to afford to make a large upfront outlay for their product/service. This could lead to them having to buy it on an ongoing basis.

If you are selling something that has a high initial cost, it is important to inform the customer before they make any commitments.

5. Enterprise customers might not have the same marketing budget as individual customers. Enterprise clients will be more interested in services/products that provide tangible advantages, so they may spend less on advertising than individual customers.

6. How you present your product/service can make a difference in a sale. This means that even if the item is very low-end, you must understand how to market it to potential buyers. ).

However, if your product/service costs a lot, you should make sure it looks great and is high quality to prevent potential buyers from passing on your product.

7. Enterprise customers are more concerned about security than individuals and are more likely to make online purchases. This could lead to them feeling anxious.

SMB vs Enterprise

SMB and Enterprise customers have different requirements when it comes to shopping online. They are more concerned about the following:

1. The speed at which they purchase it –SMB customers want it delivered quickly, while enterprise customers need it to be usable in a work environment. This means that if the upfront cost of your product is high, customers may be reluctant to commit immediately. You could offer a discount.

2 The quality of the products they buy – Small and Medium Business clients value more quality in their products than Enterprise customers.

  • What they pay for – Because enterprise businesses can be very large, this could mean that your customer might not feel comfortable purchasing an item that is too expensive or has high upfront costs. If you show your customer how much they can save by using your product over another on the market, this might help convince them to buy.
  • SMB clients have higher expectations of reliability about their products. Enterprise customers are more concerned about the warranty of what they purchase. Enterprise businesses often have large budgets, so if your product has an upfront high cost (such as a new computer system), it may be uncomfortable for them to buy such an item. If you can show your customer how much they can save using your product over another on the market, or from another company within their organization, that will be a great help.

About the author

Kobe Digital is a unified team of performance marketing, design, and video production experts. Our mastery of these disciplines is what makes us effective. Our ability to integrate them seamlessly is what makes us unique.