Introduction
The appetite for mergers in the SaaS business is hot, with dealmaking volumes predicted to grow at 13% in 2024. Yet between 70% and 90% of M&A transactions fail to meet their objectives.
5 min read
Why SaaS M&A's Fail: Strategies for Sales and Marketing Leaders
Topics: B2B selling sales enablement Saas JTBD M&A
5 min read
The importance of culture fit in B2B Saas selling
Introduction
If you Google culture fit, you will find scant references to B2B selling and hundreds of references to the suitability of candidates in an organisation, but the concepts are related.
Topics: Saas B2B selling process culture fit
7 min read
Five Reasons Why SaaS customers churn
This article, first published on Linkedin has been substantially enhanced and will interest founders and sales and marketing leaders in early-stage SaaS companies.
Topics: Saas customer success JTBD
4 min read
The Future of B2B Selling
Today, AI-powered buyers have equal or greater access to information than sales professionals. It's time for your company to shift away from discussing product features and solutions and instead focus on understanding the needs, struggling moments and desired outcomes of your customers. No one cares about them... except your product team.
Features, Benefits and solutions are Dead
My first article on this topic, buried features and benefits back in 2011. Yet, they are like a zombie apocalypse (a dreadful movie from the same year) and refuse to die, haunting the Website pages and .pdfs of B2B technology companies along with another artefact from the past, solutions, which my friend and colleague Bob Apollo wrote about recently.
Ditch the Pitch
Another 20th-century relic that I cringe upon hearing is "sales pitch".
Today, we are laying sales-pitch to rest. The term "sales pitch" should be barred from the sales lexicon as it carries a connotation of manipulation and insincerity, reminiscent of sideshow spruikers or pitch-men of the 19th century, whose aim was to sell without regard for the customer's needs. Using the term "pitch" demeans the integrity of the sales profession, reducing it to a mere performance rather than a meaningful exchange of information and understanding. Today's buyers seek intelligent conversations with well-informed sales professionals who can provide valuable insights about the industry and share compelling stories of how they've helped others.
This shift in buyer expectations means we must ditch the outdated PowerPoint pitch and move towards authentic, value-driven interactions that prioritise customer needs and interests.
BANT
The BANT framework, long ingrained in sales culture, is outdated and inappropriate for prospect qualification. I shudder to think of SDRs using BANT on a first call with a prospect trying to get a commitment for an initial meeting, yet it still happens. This article from Dave Kurlan, "Improper use of BANT will cause you to kill opportunities", clearly explains the problem with BANT and why it is neither an effective qualification tool nor a valuable sales methodology and deserves to be laid to rest along with the other villains.
Topics: B2B selling Saas
2 min read
The End of the Beginning of SAAS Sales
David Brock is a senior sales and marketing performance consultant whom I know and trust and whose blog I read. David correctly identified our B2B SaaS zeitgeist - and the end of the way we used to do things in outbound and inbound sales and marketing.
David contends in his blog, Outbound is Dying, “Outbound is dying because it is drowning in the volume of messages, mostly bad, but some good, that we are inflicting on everyone through every channel. However, good the quality of the message, it no longer matters because it is lost in the volume of garbage that fills our inboxes”
Topics: Saas
3 min read
Are Marketing People Needed in Selling SaaS Solutions?
This is the second part of an article Are Sales People needed in Selling SaaS solutions written in response to conversations with three entrepreneurs who have created, or are creating SaaS solutions to serve very specific needs for a well-defined market opportunity. In conversation it emerged that none of them were planning on having any sales people in their business.
Topics: inbound marketing Saas
4 min read
Are Salespeople Needed in Selling SaaS Solutions?
In the past couple of weeks I have spoken to three entrepreneurs who have created, or are creating SaaS solutions to serve very specific needs for a well-defined market opportunity. In conversation it emerged that none of them were planning on having any sales people in their business.
The thinking here is that since the products are so strong and the market need exists, by offering a free trial, the prospect will learn to use and love the product and convert into a customer; all without needing a human touch. Who needs sales people anyway?
This approach is similar to the "Field of Dreams" (if you build it, they will come) strategy; popular with entrepreneurs who are long on product engineering skills but underestimate the importance of marketing and selling in the lifecycle of successful products. This attitude has led to the premature death of many killer-products.
Now let me say here that I would not advocate putting a salesperson in the way of a buyer who was motivated to buy and did not require interaction with a salesperson. Dell recognized this desire early on and enabled people to self-serve PC’s and Laptops nearly ten years ago and cut billions out of their cost of sale. Dell had a couple of things going for it that early stage SaaS companies don’t; - brand equity and market dominance in a mature buying category.
Killer-products, and especially software products don’t sell themselves unless they fulfill the following criteria
- A mature, clearly defined buying category exists,
- Market demand exists for the products/services,
- Acquisition is as simple as buying a book on Amazon,
- Implementing the products is seen as risk-free and the vendor is trusted,
- The products are easy to use, learn and deploy,
- The buyer knows what they want and it's really a matter of what color and how many.
- The market price is established and the vendor offerings are within an acceptable range.
Topics: inbound marketing Saas value creation
1 min read
Top 5 Ranked Sales and Marketing Performance Blogs for 2009
Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year to my friends colleagues and fellow group members.
Topics: sales performance differentiation Saas
2 min read
SaaS Selling Skill - Reversing the Security Question
If you are selling, marketing or supporting SaaS solutions, the number one buyer concern and a question that will come up in every conversation is
"how do you handle security?"
Nothing short of excellence is required in handling this question - but before you can answer it, you need to reverse it to figure out where the buyer is coming from.
Buyers often ask surface-structure questions, which conceal their underlying concerns either consciously or unconsciously and if we don't reverse them, they often reappear later in the sale as objections. The following Flash illustration is excerpted from the Advanced Marketing Concepts, Selling in the Internet Age eLearning course and may take a few seconds to load.
Reversing is a linguistic concept and one of the most important concepts for sales, marketing and customer-facing support people to master. Anyone familiar with the Sandler selling method will be very familiar with reversing.
Reversing enables us to understand the buyer's context or underlying reason for their question prior to giving an answer by simply answering their question with a question.
We are trained in school and by our parents to answer whatever question we are asked to the best of our ability, unfortunately in sales and in customer-facing support roles, this can create many difficulties, unless we understand the context of the buyer’s question.
In customer-facing roles, whether in sales, marketing or technical support, the most important question you will ever ask is the one you ask to reverse a prospects question...same applies for managers and executives.
Marketers and sellers on Webinars please take note: Reversing is critical when handling Q&A in front of an audience or in a live Webinar…we have all witnessed sales, marketing and technical people digging holes for themselves in front of large groups by answering what they thought was the buyers question; - only to get completely sidetracked and potentially irritating the buyer, certainly wasting valuable audience time.
Reversing is a Salescraft skill and like most valuable sales skills it takes deliberate practice to master. We need to get into the habit of reversing around the office and with our loved ones until it becomes ingrained.
There is probably no other language technique that will provide such a dividend as reversing. Simple to learn, but needs practice - please take the time and effort to master this discipline.
Nothing short of excellence is required in handling this question - but before you can answer it, you need to reverse it to figure out where the buyer is coming from.
Buyers often ask surface-structure questions, which conceal their underlying concerns either consciously or unconsciously and if we don't reverse them, they often reappear later in the sale as objections. The following Flash illustration is excerpted from the Advanced Marketing Concepts, Selling in the Internet Age eLearning course and may take a few seconds to load.
Reversing is a linguistic concept and one of the most important concepts for sales, marketing and customer-facing support people to master. Anyone familiar with the Sandler selling method will be very familiar with reversing.
Reversing enables us to understand the buyer's context or underlying reason for their question prior to giving an answer by simply answering their question with a question.
We are trained in school and by our parents to answer whatever question we are asked to the best of our ability, unfortunately in sales and in customer-facing support roles, this can create many difficulties, unless we understand the context of the buyer’s question.
In customer-facing roles, whether in sales, marketing or technical support, the most important question you will ever ask is the one you ask to reverse a prospects question...same applies for managers and executives.
Marketers and sellers on Webinars please take note: Reversing is critical when handling Q&A in front of an audience or in a live Webinar…we have all witnessed sales, marketing and technical people digging holes for themselves in front of large groups by answering what they thought was the buyers question; - only to get completely sidetracked and potentially irritating the buyer, certainly wasting valuable audience time.
Reversing is a Salescraft skill and like most valuable sales skills it takes deliberate practice to master. We need to get into the habit of reversing around the office and with our loved ones until it becomes ingrained.
There is probably no other language technique that will provide such a dividend as reversing. Simple to learn, but needs practice - please take the time and effort to master this discipline.
