Comments on: Solution Selling Defined

By: Sales Pipeline Management

Sales Pipeline Management — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 08:31:53 +0000

Hi - Just stumbled across you site and have enjoyed looking through it. I’ll be coming back soon for another look. Keep up the great work.

By: Ben

Ben — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 20:59:19 +0000

This has to be the best definition of “solution selling” I’ve seen. Of course, someone advertising for a person with “solution selling skills” who also says no industry knowledge is necessary would probably disagree, but I think they’re into buzzwords and not solutions

By: Brad

Brad — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 17:52:24 +0000

To me solution based selling revolves around your relationship with the client. Even if you have a system based solution if all you present is a commodity… I can sell you XYZ product for X dollars you will never be truly successful.

The basis for solution selling as I teach it to my team involves getting to know your client, understand their issues and then making intelligent recommendations based on experience and data. If you do a good job of this price will become less of an issue. The real trick is getting them to understand Why you cost a bit more and how a slightly higher initial outlay will save them money over time because of increased reliability, reduced maintenance cost, etc…

By: Prem Gyani

Prem Gyani — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 21:02:13 +0000

Let me add my two pennies (British) to this blog. I have learnt that that a sales is a solution sales if the customer views it as such. It really does not matter an iota if the salesman thinks it’s a solution sale or a commodity sale. It’s the customer who defines it on an emotional level very early in the interaction.

If your customers perception is that it’s a commodity, don’t sell a solution and vice versa. Let your competitors try and change his mind and run aground. I believe the secret is to understand what the value is of the sexy gizzmo you are trying to sell and sell it as a commodity or as a solution based on what your customers perception is. A car is a commodity now-a-days. But they ain’t simple or cheap.

By: JWH

JWH — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 16:28:15 +0000

A couple of observations:
1) Solution sales require that you are able to predict or at least observe the problems that people are attempting to solve so that you can offer the appropriate solution with your commodity product. In order have some degree of leverage, you must be able to package the domain expertise in a way that enables the supplier to solve the problem(s) repetitively without having to deploy more salespersons.
2) They can be combined by layering the solution on top of the commodity offering (such as Home Depot offering classes in laying tile versus ACE Hardware)