Closing the Gap Between Sales and Delivery

‘It felt like I was dealing with two different companies’, said a customer. ‘In tendering I felt like a VIP person, all my questions were answered with great attention. When it was time to start the project, suddenly some of the things were no longer possible’. ‘To be honest the sales team did a great job with impressive reference cases, but what I was mostly concerned about was how they are going to deliver the project and how I can prepare my team, said another customer.

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I had just finished a round of customer interviews for my client. It was not the first time a B2B customer was telling me about an organisational silo between sales and delivery. A silo that seems typical in B2B and often results in negative customer experience.

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In a customer journey there is always a point where one journey part ends and another one begins. In an ideal world customers would be seamlessly transferred from one journey moment into another. The process would be so smooth that customers would not even realise they have suddenly moved from one point to another. A frictionless end to end experience. What a dream. However, the reality is that most companies struggle with moving customers from one touch point to another. In B2B, where customer journeys are already complex in nature, and include multiple actors and stakeholders, it seems almost impossible to have a journey that is free of those moments that make customers sigh ‘It felt like I was dealing with two different companies’.

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I often tell my clients customer journeys are a development framework. They are not communication or marketing material but a valuable development tool – if put into action. One way how to put customer journeys into action is to identify what are the journey moments where customers typically have challenges and additional effort. I call these moments high effort customer journey moments, and these typically make customers question if the effort is worth it to continue the relationship.

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The gap between sales and delivery is a typical high-effort moment in a B2B customer journey.

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Why is this?

Let’s think about the experience from customer perspective. A decision maker customer has just spent weeks if not even months discovering, planning, comparing, negotiating, influencing, consulting, budgeting and finally deciding on a product or service. They are ready to hand over their responsibilities. The CEO will no longer be involved in the day-to-day activities once a project or installation begins but trusts that what has been promised will now be delivered. On the other hand, if issues emerge, they are the ones to whom problems are quickly escalated to.

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But what if, the project manager is told ‘we are not able to deliver’ once the installation project begins? What if the same conversations that already took place between the commercial team and customer re-begin once the technical team steps in? What if no one knows what happens next once contract is signed, and customer is left wondering how to prepare and schedule their own work?

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Most B2B companies are aware of these challenges but approach them from an operational perspective. Better documentation, internal handover meetings, representation of both technical and commercial teams in tendering are some of the examples how companies internally try to close the gap between sales and delivery.

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There is nothing wrong with these tactics, but one typical root-cause issue is that sales and delivery teams are measured with very different KPIs. Sales team performance is measured e.g. by the amount of leads while delivery is measured by project completion on time. Customer experience can act as a common nominator for both sides. Having shared customer experience targets, such as customer satisfaction or NPS, is one way how to shift the perspective from operational efficiency to customer. ?

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To ensure frictionless customer journey, we must understand what customers need, look for and appreciate in different parts of the experience. ??

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No customer has a goal to make a purchase. Customer goals relate to personal success and business outcomes. In sales phase, customers are likely looking to achieve other outcomes than a contract with you.

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Are your customers mainly concerned about your ability to deliver? Why not start the sales discussions from delivery? How is the project going to be executed, in what kind of timetable, what kind of resources are required from customer’s side, how you can help them in the resource planning. Can you identify shared targets with the customer?

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Are your customers concerned how they will internally hand over and communicate the next steps? Help customers plan and execute the handover. Who are the key stakeholders that will be involved in the next steps from customer and your side – how can you help customer in handing over the critical information and ensure teams on both sides have the needed knowledge to proceed?

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Are customers concerned what will happen once the project has been completed? Instead of focusing on a single project and personal sales targets, can you support customer in their lifecycle by already thinking what you can jointly achieve in the next 5 to 10 years?

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Combining customer understanding with internal processes helps us to achieve three things:

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1.?We get better understanding on our customers goals, not just in a single meeting or interaction, but in the whole customer journey

2.?We capture our own performance and areas where we meet or do not meet with customer goals

3.?We can identify and prioritise development efforts that have the biggest impact to both customer experience and business outcomes

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But most importantly, we can close the cultural gap between sales and delivery by having one shared target as a company: To delight the customer. ?