The buying group problem

Sales reps once sold to a single executive who could approve deals alone. Today, on average five point four people must formally sign off on each purchase, each with veto power.

Wider roles, wider conflicts

An IT supplier might once have sold to a CIO and team. Now the same firm needs buy-in from the chief marketing officer, chief operating officer, chief financial officer, legal counsel, and procurement executives.

The cost of deadlock

Longer cycle times, smaller deals, lower margins, and customer deadlock that scuttles the deal are now common. Buying groups with diverse priorities struggle to reach agreement on purchases.

Personalization backfires

Individual stakeholders who saw tailored messages were forty percent more willing to buy. But when each group member gets different messages stressing narrow needs, it highlights conflicting goals and blocks consensus.

Connect stakeholders to each other

The best way to build customer consensus is not to connect individual stakeholders to the supplier but to more effectively connect customer stakeholders to one another.

“The best way to build customer consensus isn't to do a better job of connecting individual customer stakeholders to the supplier but to more effectively connect customer stakeholders to one another.”

Consensus breaks early

B two B buyers found group decision making most difficult twice as often as individual decision making. The hardest phase is identifying a solution, before sales reps even arrive.

Customers are already far along

Customers are on average thirty seven percent of the way through a purchase process by the solution definition stage, and fifty seven percent through before engaging with supplier sales reps.

Marketing's consensus role

Marketing can reach customers during the critical early consensus building phase when sales cannot. Marketing can combine sales knowledge with market research to identify patterns and create scalable approaches.

Willingness to buy is not advocacy

A CEB survey of nearly six hundred B two B buyers found that fully half the people who reported willingness to buy a product were not willing to publicly advocate for it.

Fear stops advocates

Up to half of potential mobilizers fear losing respect or credibility if they push for an unpopular purchase or cannot attract support. Twelve percent report that advocacy could threaten their jobs.

Personal value drives advocacy

Factors like whether a solution could advance a person's career or help them be seen as a better leader were five times as potent as business value in inspiring mobilizers.

Strategy one: create common language

Cisco mines social media to track trending terms and identify priorities of various stakeholders. It found both CMOs and CIOs focused on connectivity, then developed messaging around that shared language.

Strategy two: shared learning events

Kimberly Clark Professional uses facilities assessments where experts visit sites and answer questions. Materials promise guidance on controlling costs, increasing productivity, reducing hazard exposure, and improving environmental performance.

Greif's diagnostic tool approach

Greif developed the Green Tool, a calculator that requires multiple stakeholders to evaluate environmental benefits of operational changes. In three years after introduction, sales of sustainable products increased significantly.

Make content supplier neutral

Mobilizers reject materials that make them look like shills. Information on problems and solutions should not promote any one supplier, though clarifying unique capabilities is acceptable.

Decrease perceived risk

Willingness to advocate for a purchase more than doubled as perceived organizational support for a supplier increased. Holcim uses Net Promoter Score data to show potential advocates they have allies within their organization.

Grainger's emotional connection

Grainger discovered facility managers see themselves as behind the scenes problem solvers. Its Get It Got It Good campaign connected Grainger's capabilities to managers' desire for peak performance, delivering one hundred seventy five percent of…

Equip mobilizers to persuade

Eighty percent of mobilizers surveyed wanted support from suppliers in communicating value. Marketo created a one hundred page mobilizer tool kit covering marketing automation basics and how to address concerns of different executives.

Marketo's supplier agnostic approach

The Definitive Guide to Marketing Automation walks readers through chief concerns of the CEO, CMO, CFO, CIO, and head of sales. It devotes only a single page at the end to Marketo's solution.

Sales and marketing must align

The biggest change in sales and marketing today is how customers buy. Suppliers that align sales and marketing as a single team with a common goal will outperform those that do not.