Is customer dissatisfaction the real driver of your revenue lifecycle?
If you are targeting new business based on your competitor’s having screwed things up with your prospect, you can have a longer business development and selling cycle than you realize.
You are targeting more than a dissatisfied customer who needs a quick replacement for their jettisoned incumbent supplier.
Think targeting a jilted lover on the rebound from a big breakup. A sobering scenario, hmmm?
In the jilted-rebound scenario, your prospective customer is more skeptical, cautious, and dismissive of your business development efforts. You enter into their business life with serious credibility problems fueled by your predecessor’s issues, not yours.
And your sales manager is mandating that you close in 90 days. And your prospective customer is telling you about a project that’s 18 months out.
Disconnect time.
While you are blabbering your company’s value proposition at Buyers, all they hear is: “I won’t betray your trust in me. Trust me. You can trust me.”
Yeah, right. Here you both go, all over again.
Your jilted customer suffers from profound customer dissatisfaction. They opt for the easiest way out: no decision. At all.
I know. Your sales organization is telling you that a competitor misstep opens the door of opportunity for you.
That’s just a myopic view from the surface. The tip of the business iceberg.
- The impact of customer dissatisfaction can be pervasive across your prospective customer’s organization.
- If you walk into a new customer’s house without having any inkling of that information, you make yourself an easy target for early elimination in the new vendor selection process.
- When you rely on trigger events to alert you to these business opportunities, identify what you’ve just dug up.
- Stop racing off to make that appointment can lead you to a humungous business iceberg full of millions of cans of frozen business worms.
Prospecting new business based on customer dissatisfaction often resembles a condolence call more than a business opportunity with folks who are ready to buy. Your ability to research the context of their customer dissatisfaction, discuss the strategic implications for their company and listen between the lines of the conversation are what distinguish you as a Businessperson of Worth.
Slow down your business development process. Understand the implications of your Buyer’s business iceberg. Have conversations even they didn’t realize they wanted to have with you.
Overcoming customer dissatisfaction takes more time than you realize. However, once overcome, it can yield longer term business relationships because you understand the iceberg you are working with.
Babette N. Ten Haken, President of Sales Aerobics for Engineers®, LLC, is a management consultant and business coach. Babette develops business, technical and engineering professionals of worth. She remodels startups and small-to-medium manufacturing and service companies experiencing difficulty with unpredictable revenue streams. A recognized Top 50 Marketing & Sales Influencer, Babette’s blog won the 2014 Bronze Medal, Top Sales & Marketing Awards, Top Sales World. Read Chapters 1-3 of Do YOU Mean Business? available on Amazon.com, more about root causes of customer dissatisfaction.
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