Filed in archive Sales by Jim Logan on August 19, 2006

This has to top the list of mistakes in B2B sales - not knowing how a purchase decisions is going to be made.

In my experience, the most common sales mistake in B2B sales is not understanding how decisions are made in the account. Salespeople waste countless time educating, persuading, meeting with, and presenting to the wrong person. Why? Because they don't understand how the decision is going to made, both by whom and how.

If you're a sales manager this is the thing you ought to focus on with your salespeople. If you can't map how a decision is to be made, then you can't map your activities against it. In short, if you don't know how a purchase decision is going to be made, you might as well stay home.

What do you think? Is there a greater sales mistake than this? If so, what...and why?

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Vote for The Biggest Mistake In B2B Sales:

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Rating: 8.40 out of 5 vote(s) cast.

Response from: steve (08/20/06 9:27am)

That is one of the key qualifying criteria for defining a qualified opportunity in my opinion and key of course. So is timeframe, budget, and competition which are usually learned from the CORRECT decision maker as you point out.

Response from: Jim (08/20/06 11:57am)

Thanks for the comment Steve! I think everything flows from first understanding how and by whom a decision is made. As you know, you can't trust a title or position to tell you how decisions are made. Especially in complex sales, the senior manager or executive very well is not the decision maker...they may sign, but may not decide.

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