Does Your Sales Pitch Include a Strong Value Proposition?

When you buy a house, you buy a whole house. When you buy a car, you buy a whole car. You don’t buy each individual nail on each individual board, or each individual bolt and piston. The value lies in the whole, but too often, sellers just talk about the pieces.

Sellers have a tendency to get so enamored with their stuff that they lose sight of the goal and the bigger picture. What you really need to succeed in sales is a strong value proposition, not a laundry list of product features. The value proposition is the way that you talk about what your solution will deliver. It’s a statement that includes the highlights of the investment.

With a crystal clear value proposition that explains why your solution is worth the buyer’s time, you communicate the information they actually want to hear while respecting their busy schedule.

The goal of your value proposition is to explain your solution in the context of what your customer needs to accomplish in a way that resonates positively for them — in a simple, clear way.

Tie what you have to a business outcome the customer aims to achieve by describing exactly what you can do to help them and what some of the potential financial benefits to their business would be.

You’re providing high-level insights in a value proposition, not in-depth business analysis and financial analysis. The value proposition is a high-level, scaled-back version of the business case — essentially, it’s the conversation that, done well, leads to the formal business case. We think about the value proposition as the “in person” action and the business case as the “on paper” deliverable. Such value propositions are essential. Without them, you fail to speak in a language the customer understands.

When creating your value proposition, it’s critical to focus on your customers’ needs. Value is in the eye of the customer. You might think you have the greatest product in the world, but if they don’t understand how your solution fits into the context of their needs, you don’t have a sale. Customers who don’t see the value don’t buy.

Crafting an effective value proposition requires figuring out what your customer’s really focused on. You have to cut through the noise and catch their attention with a solution to their most pressing goals and problems, not some tangential possible benefit.

Be proactive and direct in addressing their pain point. Customers are extremely busy and distracted. You’re thinking about them much more than they ever think about you. Hand them the solution on a platter, simply and clearly. We can’t stress “keep it simple” enough. When you’re working on a complex opportunity, it’s a challenge to craft a concise, simple value proposition that every stakeholder can understand.

The big picture for you and the buyer is where your solution fits into the overall desired business outcome and the value you bring by solving the problem. You don’t want them focusing on the cost of ownership.

In absence of that context, they may simply view your solution as a commodity. Once they view your solution as a commodity, they’ll focus on getting the cheapest price possible. It’s a race to the bottom. The more concretely you communicate the value of your solution, the less likely they will be to expect deep discounts.

To put it another way, if the customer’s procurement department is asking you to knock $100,000 off the price and you know your solution is going to be worth $20 million to the customer, you’ll be less inclined to give them that sizable discount and the stakeholders will understand why.

To avoid haggling over price, make sure your value proposition conveys the real value your solution brings to the customer.

Remember, the value proposition is the “in person” conversation to keep your deal’s momentum. It happens before the more formal business case, and because it’s in person, it requires confidence.

The good news is that if you have a solid product that offers real value, you won’t need to fake confidence. Simply craft a narrative that clearly communicates your value proposition in terms of what matters most to your customers.

Like selling a whole house instead of the nails, present the big picture and keep your messaging concise, and you’ll make it easy for your customers to see why they should buy from you.

Dr. Stephen G. Timme is President and Founder of FinListics Solutions, a company that helps B2B professionals develop greater customer insights and better demonstrate the value of their solutions. Before founding FinListics, Stephen was a professor of finance at Emory University and Georgia State University, an adjunct professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology, and a consultant for numerous Fortune 500 companies.

Melody Astley is FinListics’ Chief Revenue Officer. With a background that includes leadership and senior sales roles at Gartner and IBM, Melody is responsible for strategic business growth and FinListics’ sales and marketing engines. She leads workshops and presents at global conferences, such as Strategic Account Management Association (SAMA) and the RevGen Digital Summit.

Related posts:

The new and vibrant suburb of Edmondson Park provides an opportunity for a fresh start for families and a place for a new community to blossom. Amidst the growing population and evolving needs of the…

The world is a major spot loaded up with delightful things. There is no restriction to the scope of magnificence all throughout the planet. There are such countless neglected regions on the planet…

Learn how to use Enappd Ionic 4 Grocery shopping app and admin panel to create your own grocery shopping platform