When Is A Sales Opportunity Truly Lost

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One of the companies I’ve been working with recently landed a £70K+ contract to design and build a customised piece of advanced manufacturing technology, after they were told that the buyer was going to place an order with another supplier just before Christmas last year because they were too expensive.

Now, most companies at this point would have given up, or started to panic, but I knew their was a deal waiting to happen and it just need the right moves.

The reason I felt confident was because we had done some objective analysis of the situation which included how the supplier compared to other alleged suppliers (competition) alongside the needs and habits of the prospect (now customer).

First this customer was a technology leader and was releasing a new product into the market which required a part of the process to be automated. There was no alternative but to automate to ensure throughput, quality and consistency and they had to automate using a system similar to the one that this supplier (my customer) had proposed as it had to meet certain process conditions.

The prospect was already buying in product which had already been processed from another supplier but the cost was high and they were at the mercy of the suppliers capacity and capability to ensure they could meet market demand which was risky and costly.

During numerous meetings this potential customer had also told us how they had recently invested in a number of new injection moulding machines which happened to be one of the most expensive and reliable on the market. There were site expansions going on and big investments, so this was a company that was committed to making investments that would help it to gain a competitive advantage and maintain its position as a leading manufacturer.

Price was not the issue, but reliability and capability to deliver was.

We had also worked on developing relationships in the market with various complimentary manufacturers, especially the consumable materials suppliers that these machines applied and through discussions with them it confirmed our beliefs about the company, the people involved and some of the misleading information being fed back.

So, just before Christmas the prospects sends over the alleged competitive quotes. One was from the USA which when you ran the numbers actually worked out more expensive with transportation, VAT and duty costs and was far more riskier than a more localised investment. Neither was it a customised machine, more of a “this is what we do that is near to what you want” and we knew the prospects specification was tight and this proposal was not a good fit.

The other quote which was indeed a lower price and came from a design house that had no specialist expertise in this area of automation and build. On closer inspection they were unable to meet the process conditions and demands of the prospect and from experience we knew that most of these companies got it wrong.

Having seen numerous projects scrapped and lay dead on the floor, it was just unbelievable that a company like this would waste £50K worth of their money along with the wasted time in trying to make it work only to eventually be forced to relegate it to the factory floor and later the scrap heap just because somebody said his mate down the road could do that job.

That’s a painful lesson that prospects and customers do not want to repeat. What we are really selling is a guarantee that there money is being invested where they are exposed to less risk and their is higher value. The Change Paper demonstrates why this is so important.

So their price (my customers) was actually in-between the alleged competitors but their value was considerably higher as they had over 100+ successful installations, therefore the risk of a system not working was very low, invested over £100K in research and development, meaning they produced the most effective and reliable systems, the design could meet the processing conditions and they had been finalists in the BEEA (British Engineering Excellence Awards) meaning their engineering skills were recognised as being amongst the best.

This prospect was not going to make a decision to buy elsewhere as it just did not make sense but needed to feel in control. We gracefully bowed out as the price reduction they wanted was too aggressive and then re-entered the game to see how the alleged new investment had gone……it hadn’t and with some additional discussions and demonstrating them how they (my customer) could help their prospects business with other automation and services a deal was closed Jan 2010.

Never walk away from an opportunity unless you are sure you are not in the running, but don’t pester your prospect if you cant truly meet their needs. Being a clear leader in your field make a massive difference if you position it correctly. Don’t focus on the technical details of the product when responding to your customer, as once it reaches these stages its not a technical issue it a commercial issue.

From Business Growth Development, post When Is A Sales Opportunity Truly Lost