Value bonds the sales and buying cycles

In the last “Joy of cycling” post we looked at how smart sales people syncronize their sales cycle with their buyer’s buying cycle.

One desired result of this greater syncronization is increased contact with the buyer. Contact, whether email, phone or face to face meeting gives a chance to give and receive important information, uncover and understanding needs and communicating relevant information.
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Synchronize sales and buying cycles to keep buyers engaged

First, sales people spoke of “the sales cycle” the sequence of events that a sales person would attempt to force the prospect through in the hope that it would influence them to buy.

The pre-defined stages of a sales cycle might include;

* Initial phone conversation
* Invite prospect to factory for viewing
* Offer to create paid-for prototype
* Schedule follow up meeting
* Etc, etc
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Sales people can use fear (perceived future pain) to create results right away.

Marketing man Seth Godin understands a fundamental principle of sales in this post : fear drives buying action. As he explains, “Fear is a universal emotion, it’s viral and people will go to great lengths to make it go away.”

How can sales people use fear? “Buy it or Knuckles here will continue the negotiations” would probably be considered ethically dubious. Here’s a better approach. Most of us already sell around “pain” or “problems” (i.e. identifying, drawing out and investigating problems that a prospect has right now). For example:
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