B2B Sales Strategy: An Organized Approach to Selling

Closing a single sales deal takes time, effort, repeated touchpoints, and sometimes buy-in from several stakeholders (particularly B2B). In reality, most firms have a specific sales process or a series of repeatable actions that a salesperson can take to get a prospective customer from the first stages of awareness of a product or service to a closed sale because it's a complex and crucial process. Every business arranges and completes the sales process in its unique way.

What is the procedure for selling a product?

The sales process is a structured, multi-stage, systematic strategy to closing transactions. It gives sales teams a playbook, or a broad methodology, on how to go about closing deals for their company.

The Sales Process in Its Typical Stages

Remember that the sales process is a series of repeatable actions that a sales team can follow to get a prospective customer from the first stages of product or service awareness to a closed transaction.

The sales process gives salespeople a clear path to follow to close deals quickly and effectively. Each company's sales process will be unique based on its business, industry, market, and product/service.

Prospecting, Qualifying, Presenting, Closing, and Customer Success are steps in a B2B chain.

The first stage is prospecting.

Prospecting is the first step in a B2B chain, followed by Qualifying, Presenting, Closing, and finally Customer Success.

It would help if you first had consumers to whom you wish to sell before you can sell anything. Let's begin with leads. A lead is a person or organization who has expressed an interest in what you're selling. A lead is just another term for a customer interested or may be interested. Prospecting is identifying potential consumers, often known as lead generating.

Leads can be generated by the marketing or sales departments, or even both, depending on the company. Inbound and outbound leads are the two sorts of leads.

Inbound leads are those who approach a company directly and exhibit an interest. Inbound leads may demonstrate their interest in a company by visiting its website and downloading an eBook, subscribing to their blog, or signing up for more information. These activities deliver the contact information for the lead to the company.

Outbound leads are leads that firms seek out and reach out to sell to them. This is frequently accomplished through cold phoning. Businesses can also purchase "lead lists," essentially lead lists with contact information offered by third parties.

We'll use the terms lead generation and prospecting interchangeably. Some experts, however, think that lead generation and prospecting are two separate but related activities.

Qualifying is the second stage.

Following the generation of leads, the marketing team will assess whether the potential clients need the product or service and can afford it. This is referred to as qualifying. The marketing team handles the initial qualification round, intended to cull out prospects that aren't worth pursuing further. After a marketing team has completed a preliminary round of lead qualification, these leads are classified as marketing qualified leads (MQLs). These leads are now ready for the next step in the sales process.

Salespeople don't want to waste time selling to leads that are unable or unlikely to purchase their products or services. As a result, they go through another qualification stage with their leads to see if they need the product or service and can pay for it. In most cases, sales development representatives (SDRs) will thoroughly vet both inbound and outbound leads, sometimes by reaching out to speak with them.

The lead becomes a prospect when an SDR qualifies it, commonly using tools like an Ideal Customer Profile and the BANT framework. A prospect is a potential customer who has been pre-qualified based on criteria.

It's critical to understand the difference between a marketing qualified lead (MQL) and a sales qualified lead (SQL) in the sales and marketing world:

Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL)

A lead that has been qualified by the marketing team and is ready for a sales follow-up. When leads are ready to be handed over to the sales development team, they become MQLs.

Sales Qualified Lead (SQL)

A sales prospect is whom the sales development team has qualified as a worthwhile potential customer to pursue and move forward in the sales process. This is frequently accomplished by making contact with the lead.

Presenting & Closing (Stages 3 & 4)

Stage 3:?The Presenting phase of a B2B chain

Once an SDR has established that a lead is a qualified prospect (or SQL), they will schedule a meeting or follow-up discussion with them. The process of advancing a sales deal from start to close begins once the lead has been qualified as a prospect and a meeting has been scheduled. The lead was previously investigated and entitled as a possible customer, but now that they've been prepared, the sales team will want to start selling.

When a prospect has been qualified, they are usually passed on to an account executive (AE), who will handle the rest of the sales process.

During the presenting stage, the AE shows the prospect what the company offers. One of the most critical steps of the sales process is for AEs to portray the product or service in such a way that it solves a problem that the customer is having. AEs will plan presentations and demos, perform further stakeholder research to prepare, and develop specific suggestions for how the product or service might be used at this stage (which may occur over numerous sessions).

AEs will also deal with any objections or reservations prospects may have about the agreement. Even if they're interested in a product or service, prospects may be hesitant to commit, including pricing, timeliness, and a general fear of change. The AE's responsibility is to answer all of the prospect's concerns by proving the value of the product or service and the risk or expense of not buying.

Stage 4: The Closing piece of a B2B chain

The closing stage is everything that has to be done in the last stages of a transaction to persuade a prospect to sign a contract and become a customer. During this stage, the AE will get the client's decision on whether or not to proceed with the sale.

During this stage, an AE may deliver a formal proposal based on verbally agreed-upon conditions, finalize price negotiations, and otherwise work with the prospect to remove hurdles until the prospect is ready to sign and become a customer.

Stage 5: Customer Satisfaction

When a customer signs a contract, the relationship between the firm and the customer does not terminate. In reality, the part that happens after they sign – the actual business connection — is the one that should endure the longest! Businesses must give post-sale support during the customer success stage of the sales process so that consumers continue to want to buy from them and are encouraged to refer them to other potential customers.

Once a contract has been signed, and the prospect has become a customer, the AE will typically pass the customer off to a customer success manager (or CSM) who will co-manage the rest of the relationship. The CSM will assist the new customer with onboarding to the product or service, monitor the client's needs to help customize the product or service to best suit those needs, and proactively nurture the relationship and follow up with the customer.

Summary

The sales process stages are typical, prospecting, qualifying, presenting, closing, and customer success. Prospecting, sometimes referred to as lead generation, is identifying potential customers. Once leads have been generated, a sales or marketing team will evaluate whether those potential customers need the product or service and can afford it. This process is called qualifying. Once it's been determined that a lead is a qualified prospect, someone on the sales team, typically an account executive or an AE, will set up a meeting or a follow-up conversation. During this presenting stage, the account executive presents what the company has to offer to the prospect. This is one of the most crucial stages of the sales process. Account executives need to give the product or service in a way that solves an issue that the customer is facing. Finally, the closing stage captures everything that needs to be done in the end stages of a sale to get a prospect to sign a contract and become a customer. In this stage, the account executive will get the decisions from the client on whether they will be moving forward with the sale or not. The relationship between a business and a customer doesn't end when the customer signs a contract. In fact, what comes after they sign, the actual business relationship, is what ideally lasts the longest. In the customer success stage of the sales process, businesses must provide post-sale support so that customers continue to want to buy from the company. So they're encouraged to refer the business to other potential customers.