Managing the hidden buying journey

MANAGING THE HIDDEN BUYING JOURNEY

By Martyn Lewis, Principal and Founder, Market-Partners Inc. and Anthony Rocha, Business Development Specialist, Market-Partners Inc.

In 25 years of consulting, I can safely say that our team at Market-Partners Inc. has never seen a product or service that was valueless. In fact, of the more than 200 clients who have brought us in, the majority of their offerings have had a clear, demonstrable, often proven return on investment. So why then do so many customers have second thoughts on, or even flatly turn down, what we know to be great offerings?

Our very first client engagement is what sparked our interest in buyer behavior. This initial client’s service had seemingly no downsides for customers. Since the costs to the buyer were completely tied to the savings the buyer received, if there were no savings, there were no costs. With such an obviously beneficial purchase, our client was left pondering why all their prospects were not buying. That is when we began interviewing would-be customers in hopes of finding the sources of their hesitation. From our first discussions, it became apparent why this purchase — like so many others — was not so “obvious” after all.

These conversations tipped us off to how much hidden friction there can be in the blind spots of a seller. There are key players, activities, considerations, concerns, and decisions all affecting the likelihood of a purchase that most selling organizations are not aware of or involved in. We now recognize these elements as essential parts of the buying journey.

However, these factors are not random. Oncea buying journey has been properly mapped,it becomes evident that buyers, within a specificmarket, buy in remarkably similar ways.This means firms can create strategies tohelp account managers influence these onceinvisibleelements, thus generating growth byhelping customers buy.

How Buying Journeys Have Changed

Since before the inception of Market-Partners Inc., buying has been changing — andnot in ways that make things easier for buyers,let alone sellers. The unfortunate truth is thatno matter how compelling an offering’s valuemay be, buying has been complicated by thesechanges in critical ways that cannot be overriddenby value alone.

• No Single Decision Maker Today, buyingdecisions are comprised of a dynamicnetwork of individuals, sometimes includingindividuals outside the company itself. Manyof these individuals — notably those not traditionallyconsidered key players — have thepower to slow or stop a buying journey in itsentirety. One of the most common responseswe receive when asking about how part ofa purchasing decision was reached couldbe summarized as, “I don’t know, but a lot ofpeople were involved.”

• Unprecedented Choice Even if an offering has a proven and easily demonstrable ROI, there are countless ways an organization can reduce costs, increase market share, boost employee morale, etc. It is genuinely rare for one offering to be the only conceivable solution to a problem or bar none the biggest opportunity every firm has, or for an initiative to be so timesensitive it supersedes every other plausible course of action.

• Constrained Resources Regardless of the size of an organization, there is still a finite amount of resources. Additionally, most organizations are not actively sitting on additional resources when they are available. Whether it is time, money, or people, we have found in most cases that resources are fully deployed and difficult to reallocate without substantial pushback or internal bureaucracy.

• Information Overload The advent of the internet has given buyers access to an unprecedented amount of both information and misinformation. This bottomless well means would-be buyers can spend untold hours just doing research: reading reviews, diving into consulting reports, cross-referencing case studies, learning about your suppliers, and networking with your previous clients. This not only takes time, but also adds an additional layer of complexity to all buying journeys — especially when multiple stakeholders come back with different, or even conflicting, information.

It Doesn’t End With the “Buying”

There is one more point that cannot be overemphasized: buyers are not focused on “buying,” they are focused on using and benefiting.

A significant amount of the activity across the buying journey is then naturally dedicated to how the organization will use the proposed product or service and how they will realize their investment’s benefit. This is why many firms have transitioned to a more inclusive approach, one that brings in stakeholders and end users across departments who, as stated previously, would not be imaged as buyers. These are instead the parties that would be impacted in some capacity by the offering’s envisioned use and adoption.

We see these stakeholders given a more prominent voice throughout the buying journey as they plan for adoption, oversee changes in workflow, train users, mitigate risk, and manage integration with existing systems, technologies, and processes. As they are the ones preparing for an offering logistically, they are frequently seen as experts in the implications of any offerings a firm is evaluating, including next steps, potential barriers, additional requirements, and impact on suppliers and approaches.

The Hidden Buying Journey

A market’s end-to-end buying journey therefore encompasses numerous players, activities, and decisions both big and small. Some of these players, activities, and decisions will be clearly visible to an account manager, and accordingly, we have found that account managers usually do their best to play an active role in these parts. That said, there is often more going on behind the scenes. Almost every account manager has heard that their champions or key contact needs to “get folks onside,” “gain alignment,” “do some internal work,” or “solve a few issues.” These casual comments clue us into the hidden buying journey.

Why Are Buying Journeys Hidden?

There are two central reasons why key contacts share with an account manager that they “just need to sort out a couple of things” when in reality they have a mountain of effort and competing agendas to climb.

Optimism

The contact may truly believe the task is not that difficult, most likely because they have never purchased your offering before. In spite of their positive attitude though, this naivety can be costly as activities prove more challenging than originally thought. Not only does cumulative fatigue eventually set in but mobilizing an organization through interest to a purchase is one of the most taxing parts for champions during any buying journey.

“The Seller Does Not Add Value”

Perhaps most crucially is that the contact — reflective of the buyer as a whole — does not perceive the account manager can assist them with these tasks in a meaningful way. Therefore, the contact is somewhat dismissive of the account manager’s ability to contribute, even if it is not intentionally exclusionary.

The perceptions in points one and two have caused a measurable disconnect between sellers and buyers. Our research shows that buyers do not reach out to salespeople until they are at least 50% of the way through their buying journey. Moreover, salespeople are typically involved in less than 10% of a buyer’s overall buying activities.

Regardless of which has had more of an impact on these statistics, in either scenario, the account manager has become detached from the buying journey. Worst of all, if the account manager does leave the journey with their contact — expecting them to manage the appropriate initiatives and convince the necessary parties to come onside — that journey is far less likely to result in a purchase.

From the Seller’s Perspective: “No Decision”

As mentioned previously, many account managers are not aware of the internal challenges their buyers are facing given the small lens in which they have to view the buying journey. This often leads to a critical situation where an account manager has received verbal commitment from a buyer and understandably forecasted the sale.

Although the account manager imagines their champion is handling things from there, in the hidden buying journey, that champion is becoming bogged down with internal resistance. As the buying process proves harder than they imagined, without someone to guide them, the contact might soon decide the offering is no longer worth the effort. This is a huge part of why we find over 50% of buying journeys end in “no decision.”

The New Role of Account Managers

Ironically, while it is probably a customer’s first time navigating the purchase of an offering, it is probably not an account manager’s first time watching a customer do so. If too focused upon why a customer should buy their offering, an account manager may miss the goldmine of insight they have in terms of how to purchase their offering. Even if they do not know every detail, they at least have a good outline of what happens, who gets involved, and where organizations get tied up.

This is why we believe account managers are in the perfect position to both support and positively influence the buying journey — and why their organizations should move to back them. Not only does a more customer-centric and buying-centric approach differentiate a business from those using more traditional sales approaches, it also capitalizes on a massive growth opportunity by way of helping customers buy.

The Solution

The good news is that every account manager does not have to work this out for themselves. As we shared, buyers in a particular market, when buying a specific offering, will behave in remarkably similar ways. This enables organizations to decode the market’s buying journey and provide an insight-driven sales playbook for account managers, describing how to navigate and support the customer through each stage of their buying journey.

As such, we are proposing a three-step action plan to bringthese ideas to fruition:

I. Map the Market’s End-to-End Buying Journey: Understand exactly how your customers buy and, most importantly, whatslows and stops their journeys.

II. Create the Market Engagement Strategy: Build an engagementstrategy based on your customer’s buying journey toeffectively support their buying activities.

III. Provide the Sales Road Map (Buying Journey Navigator):Translate the engagement strategy into step-dependent actionitems, supporting your buyer throughout their buying journey.

I. Map the Market’s End-to-End Buying Journey

Before you can overcome the hidden friction with your customer’sbuying journey, we must start by understanding how customers buy.

The Buying Journey DNA

Over our decades ofresearch, we have developed amodel to decode and developa map for any buying journey.The key is the Buying JourneyDNA, which are the six strands(or factors) that comprise andinfluence all buying journeys.

While the nature of these strands can vary greatly between markets, a similar DNA code will define a single market; conversely, if two buyers purchase the same offering in a different manner, that indicates two distinct markets.

The six strands of the Buying Journey DNA are as follows.

1. Triggers (and Dependencies): The catalysts and prerequisitesthat initiate and precede a buying journey.

2. Steps: The activities and stages in which a buyer will likelyengage.

3. Key Players: The relevant individuals and groups across all thesteps of the buying journey.

4. Buying Style: How a buyer determines what and where to buy.5. Value Drivers: The motivations of the buyer.

6. Buying Concerns: The inhibitors that can slow and/or stop thebuying journey.

It is the DNA of a buying journey that forms the basis of a comprehensive market engagement. Keep in mind that strands three through six can all, and likely will, change with each step of the buying journey. This can occur for many reasons, including buyers learning more about the offering, buyers better understanding their own needs and situation, or new players and agendas getting involved.

Avoiding Buying Journeys Slowing or Stopping

Equally relevant to how customers buy is why they do not. Our data show more than 90% of concerns go unaddressed by sales and marketing, so these hurdles are of special interest for those seeking the hidden friction within their market’s buying journey.

There are nine distinct categories of buying concerns, any one of which can derail a buying journey from its tracks. Like journeys as a whole, there is great commonality of buying concerns across each step within a specific market.

1. Process: The actual process (i.e., purchasing, sourcing, and so on) within the buying organization expressly for the acquisition of this type of product or service.

2. Priority: The urgency and timing of the purchase, and how it aligns with the organization’s current and upcoming directives, strategies, and goals.

3. Individual: The personal motivations and objections of the individual “carrying the ball” at any stage of the buying journey.

4. Organizational: The “political” friction, including all the various agendas, objections, and concerns that are likely to arise across the organization.

5. Alternatives: Any and all alternatives an organization may consider before they move forward with a particular acquisition, including doing nothing.

6. Business: The fiscal side of the equation — the business case. Is there a complete and compelling business reason to trigger and complete the buying journey?

7. Implications: The logical implications of acquiring a certain offering — what actually happens when someone buys something.

8. Fit: The way a potential acquisition aligns with how and what that company would usually buy.

9. Change: The intangible changes, including the very perception of change, that must occur to adopt the new offering. This concern can be especially deadly and is potential deal-breaker territory.

While some buying concerns are very straightforward and objective, others are completely subjective and emotional. Handling a long list of concerns like this may seem complicated at first, but once the DNA has been mapped, the patterns emerge. You will quickly know what to expect around each turn of the buying journey, and how to avoid or resolve these concerns every time.

II. Create the Market Engagement Strategy

With the buying journey in hand, account managers can then work to support and positively influence customers through those steps and activities. This all begins with the Market Engagement Strategy.

A good engagement strategy is built upon these four pillars.

a. When to Engage: When is the best time in the buying journey to engage in terms of ability to influence?

b. How to Bring Value: How will we meet the wants and needs of our buyers, both in style and channel?

c. How to Stay Relevant: How will we keep ourselves top of mind throughout the duration of our engagement and beyond?

d. How to Overcome Barriers: How will we avoid, bring forward, mitigate, or resolve our market’s buying concerns?

It bears repeating that these answers must come from the voice and perspective of the customer.

• Defining Value and Relevance: If an initiative is not valuable or relevant to the specific market, it is not valuable or relevant.

• Helping the Buyer Buy: The final strategy will include numerous nontraditional sales and marketing initiatives — some of which might not relate to the offering at all. These initiatives may include assisting the buyer in gaining alignment across their organization, handling process implications, preparing for adoption, and managing change.

III. Provide the Sales Road Map (Buying Journey Navigator)

Finally, these four pillars should then become the foundation for the sales playbook — what we like to call a Buying Journey Navigator. A Navigator translates the engagement strategy into a series of optimal selling activities for each step of the buying journey. As stated previously, four of the six DNA strands can change as the journey progresses, so this synchronization to each step is vital.

In no uncertain terms, this is not a sales process. While that may feel counterintuitive at first, unlike other methodologies, a Buying Journey Navigator inverts the buyer-seller relationship. We are not trying to take our buyers through our steps, our checklist, our sales process. Rather, we are now navigating and managing our buyers through their steps, their checklist, their buying process. We call this innovative approach Outside-In™.

To truly optimize selling, for each step of the buying journey, an organization needs to answer several questions about their buyers’ activities.

• What should you be doing to support and manage the customer, bringing value and relevancy at each step of the way?

• What do you need in order to complete this successfully?

• What collateral or information will be delivered?

• What resources will this require from the company?

• What tools or technology will make this effective?

• How will success be measured?

In Practice

With the Buying Journey Navigator complete, strategic account managers can now sell based on the reality of how their customers buy. This approach also reconnects sellers to buyers, addressing our key findings cited in prior sections: that account managers are invited into buying journeys late, are involved in a small amount of buying activities, and address a small number of concerns.

For that reason, a switch from focusing on sales process and value-based selling to supporting the buying journey comes with benefits for strategic account managers and buyers alike.

• A switch from a product-centric to buying-centric approachoccurs.

• Higher involvement is seen across the buying journey.

• Strategic account managers become a resource to their customersthroughout the buying journey.

• Strategic account managers provide the success pathway fortheir customers.

• Strategic account managers provide expertise on how to buy.

Results

• Sustainable market growth through helping buyers buy.

• Increased likelihood of buying journey not only ending in a purchasebut continuing onwards to successful use and benefit.

• Enhanced differentiation in the mind of the buyer.

• Added value for buyers across the buying journey.

• More intimate customer relationships.

• Greater collaboration between sellers and buyers.

• Increased dependency on the seller from the buyer.

Summary

Buying has changed, but that does not mean our account managementcannot change with it. There is an apparent opportunityto become more engaged with our accounts across the hiddenaspects of their end-to-end buying journey.

• Increase engagement in buying journeys from less than 50%.

• Increase engagement in buying activities from less than 10%.

• Decrease amount of buying journeys that end in “no decision.”

This can advantage firms not only through greater customerintimacy and differentiation, but also by growing market share viahelping our customers buy.

Once an organization has gone through our three-step actionplan, account managers will be synchronized to the reality ofhow their customers buy. This means account managers will beable to support their customers through the once hidden parts oftheir buying journey — not just towards a successful purchase,but onwards to being successful users and beneficiaries of their offerings.

Martyn Lewis is the Principal and Founder of Market-Partners Inc., author of best-selling book How Customers Buy...& Why They Don’t, and three-time SAMA Annual Conference speaker. Since 1995, Martyn and his team have been decoding the Customer Buying Journey to create actionable sales and marketing strategies for organizations across every industry. Martyn can be contacted at mlewis@market-partners.com. For more info on Market-Partners Inc., visit www.market-partners.com.