Customers push the sales cycle with digital buttons now

MUMBAI, INDIA: Despite all the attention around digital marketing and its ability to connect with customers in new and meaningful ways, people selling to people is still the primary way in which business-to-business (B2B) technology purchases are made, according to a recent survey by Gartner, Inc. Gartner conducted a primary research study across 503 organizations in North America, Europe and China to understand how the marketing activities of IT providers influence organizations' decisions to select certain technologies and services, as well as the providers that supply them. The survey found that 56 per cent of respondents considered direct interaction with the provider of high importance, 42 per cent of medium importance, while three per cent considered it of low importance.

"Personal interactions with providers are still the most influential activity in B2B buying decisions," said Tiffany Bova, vice president and distinguished analyst at Gartner. "However, buyers do not value their interactions with salespeople as much as they did in the past. As a result, sales teams must adjust processes and skills to learn to guide buyers through their purchase cycle."

During the past few years, the sales organization has lost its control of the sales cycle. "In the past, sales was dictating the flow of information - cold calling, sending out corporate marketing literature, meeting with prospective customers, conducting sales presentations and arranging high-level executive meetings in more of a push selling model," said Hank Barnes, research director at Gartner. "Now customers are deciding when and where the sales engagement will actually begin as well as how and where that interaction will take place in more of a pull model."

Gartner believes that this change in customer engagement should result in providers looking closely at their go-to-market and sales models to ensure they are providing the necessary value in the buying process. Marketing and sales leaders need to understand the importance of continuing to invest in improving sales enablement, sales training and sales processes as buyers look to the quality of their direct interactions as a primary influence on their decisions during their technology buying cycles.

"Providers have been fairly consistent in how they train their sales force for decades," said Bova. "However, these practices are now at odds with the way customers actually explore, evaluate, engage and experience a provider along their buying journey. The sales force of the future will need to intimately understand the customers' environment with a greater sense of the decision levers across IT and the business units. It will also need to translate technology into industry solutions and value propositions, and guide the customers to use cases they may not have considered. The

sales force should therefore be viewed not as a source of technology products, but as a strategic partner helping the business evolve to meet their strategic objectives."