Successful Selling Means Knowing the Competition ~ B W C J AOMOLE

Thursday, 20 July 2017

Successful Selling Means Knowing the Competition

By BWC J A OMOLE July 20, 2017 No comments:

This is an issue that's growing in importance. Our industry is heating up and becoming more competitive. All around us things are changing at an ever-increasing rate. That means that it's more important than ever for you to be aware of what your competitors are doing so that you don't get blindsided or seriously outmaneuvered.

That happened to me. To this day, I still get a sick feeling in my stomach as I remember the day when I lost my largest account to my arch competitor. It was an account that made up 20% of my total volume. In my blissful ignorance, I was content to grow my business by calling on the end users and purchasing department, while my competition was successfully building a relationship with the administration.

The result? My best account signed a prime vendor, sole-source agreement with my competitor, and within 60 days, I was almost totally out of that account. I was totally blindsided.

That's a lesson that sticks with me, and one from which you can learn. To become good at knowing what your competition is up to, begin by thinking of yourself a little differently. I believe that distributor salespeople must see themselves as "managers of information" as well as "sellers of stuff." To be effective in the Information Age economy, you must become adapt at collecting, storing and using good information. The knowledge of what your competition is doing is one such piece of information.

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