Negotiations and sales in web studio
From the article you will learn how to negotiate with customers and partners in b2b.
Many of the thoughts in this article are inspired by Gavin Kennedy’s book “You Can Agree on Everything,” and, of course, personal experience.
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When I first started selling our website development services to our clients, I always had one unshakable and destructive thought: they don’t need us, we need them . I thought that “they” could easily go to another contractor, because the market is huge. He believed that if we did not receive this order, then this could be our end. Such thoughts put me in a weak position even before the start of negotiations. I knew what profitability we needed, but I was simply afraid to voice such figures, because I thought that the uncle in front would throw me out of my office, seeing a figure of more than 150 thousand.
In fact, everything turns out wrong. To begin with, you do not need to put yourself in a deliberately weak position. Not the fact that your company will fall apart if you do not receive this order. But with full confidence I can say that she will die slowly and painfully if you work below cost. But most importantly, you do not know what position this uncle is in front of you. This could be the head of the marketing department to whom the CEO said that the production of the site should start tomorrow. Or it could be an entrepreneur whose competitor entered the online market a week ago and began to grow dramatically. If he does not make his move online quickly, then he can be left with nothing. This could be a boss who has spent 10 hours on meetings with studios, no one has arranged him and he no longer intends to waste time. But he needs a website anyway.
Remember: you do not know the situation on the other side , with a probability of 50% will be in your favor, and, quite possibly, the client needs you, and not you.
A phrase I hear almost every time I sell a project.
What do you think is better: to give up something not very valuable for you under pressure, to create an atmosphere of benevolence, or not?
Think well, this is the first question asked by Mr. Kennedy in his book.
If you think that it is better to give in, then you definitely need to read the book. I said yes, and this is a huge mistake. If you have made a concession (and under the concession, I understand precisely the gratuitous reduction of your requirements), then any normal person will think:
Moreover, this is something not very valuable for you, it may be very necessary for your potential client. It turns out that you are already giving way is not cheap and useless.
And why would concessions create goodwill? Concessions - this is your reaction to the pressure of a person, a reward for his behavior. And once you have awarded him once, he will definitely want more. And, in the course of the project, you will only do what to give in.
Another mistake I have come across is the mitigation of my requirements and conditions before I received an offer from the other side. Now I understand that this is just awful. And I can hardly imagine how all the same my company began to grow with such a terrible negotiator.
It usually happened this way: we discussed the project with a potential customer, he saw that I was competent in site building and I know what to do. In general, he likes us. And here it comes to discuss the cost. I said something in the spirit: “To develop all the agreed functionality it will take 3 months, and it will cost 300,000 rubles.” After this phrase, the smile disappeared from the face of the interlocutor, and his eyebrows quickly flew up. I, seeing this horror, began to realize: if not to reduce the cost, he will leave. Now I certainly understand that you need to justify the cost, and not reduce it. But then, I could say something in the spirit: "But you know, I liked you so much that I am ready to give you a 10% discount." Just a disaster, will you agree?
What would I do now in place of this client? I would wait a bit to get a silly even bigger discount from myself. Then he would have made a very surprised face, and would say that I need to think. In “meditations”, I would receive a letter from a silly self with new, even more favorable conditions.
This is so trivial a mistake, but it is often found in a much more sophisticated form. Then just look at the negotiations from the side, and you immediately recognize it. I think we lost a hundred or two thousand because of this error.
So, if you are in b2b sales, do not lose your positions before the start of negotiations, do not make unilateral concessions and do not relax your conditions before receiving a counter offer.
Many of the thoughts in this article are inspired by Gavin Kennedy’s book “You Can Agree on Everything,” and, of course, personal experience.
')
Who needs whom
When I first started selling our website development services to our clients, I always had one unshakable and destructive thought: they don’t need us, we need them . I thought that “they” could easily go to another contractor, because the market is huge. He believed that if we did not receive this order, then this could be our end. Such thoughts put me in a weak position even before the start of negotiations. I knew what profitability we needed, but I was simply afraid to voice such figures, because I thought that the uncle in front would throw me out of my office, seeing a figure of more than 150 thousand.
In fact, everything turns out wrong. To begin with, you do not need to put yourself in a deliberately weak position. Not the fact that your company will fall apart if you do not receive this order. But with full confidence I can say that she will die slowly and painfully if you work below cost. But most importantly, you do not know what position this uncle is in front of you. This could be the head of the marketing department to whom the CEO said that the production of the site should start tomorrow. Or it could be an entrepreneur whose competitor entered the online market a week ago and began to grow dramatically. If he does not make his move online quickly, then he can be left with nothing. This could be a boss who has spent 10 hours on meetings with studios, no one has arranged him and he no longer intends to waste time. But he needs a website anyway.
Remember: you do not know the situation on the other side , with a probability of 50% will be in your favor, and, quite possibly, the client needs you, and not you.
Give me a 10% discount, and your project
A phrase I hear almost every time I sell a project.
What do you think is better: to give up something not very valuable for you under pressure, to create an atmosphere of benevolence, or not?
Think well, this is the first question asked by Mr. Kennedy in his book.
If you think that it is better to give in, then you definitely need to read the book. I said yes, and this is a huge mistake. If you have made a concession (and under the concession, I understand precisely the gratuitous reduction of your requirements), then any normal person will think:
- If he so easily agreed, then he initially demanded a lot
- It will be possible to put pressure on this guy during the project, he will silently agree
Moreover, this is something not very valuable for you, it may be very necessary for your potential client. It turns out that you are already giving way is not cheap and useless.
And why would concessions create goodwill? Concessions - this is your reaction to the pressure of a person, a reward for his behavior. And once you have awarded him once, he will definitely want more. And, in the course of the project, you will only do what to give in.
Mitigate conditions before receiving a response
Another mistake I have come across is the mitigation of my requirements and conditions before I received an offer from the other side. Now I understand that this is just awful. And I can hardly imagine how all the same my company began to grow with such a terrible negotiator.
It usually happened this way: we discussed the project with a potential customer, he saw that I was competent in site building and I know what to do. In general, he likes us. And here it comes to discuss the cost. I said something in the spirit: “To develop all the agreed functionality it will take 3 months, and it will cost 300,000 rubles.” After this phrase, the smile disappeared from the face of the interlocutor, and his eyebrows quickly flew up. I, seeing this horror, began to realize: if not to reduce the cost, he will leave. Now I certainly understand that you need to justify the cost, and not reduce it. But then, I could say something in the spirit: "But you know, I liked you so much that I am ready to give you a 10% discount." Just a disaster, will you agree?
What would I do now in place of this client? I would wait a bit to get a silly even bigger discount from myself. Then he would have made a very surprised face, and would say that I need to think. In “meditations”, I would receive a letter from a silly self with new, even more favorable conditions.
This is so trivial a mistake, but it is often found in a much more sophisticated form. Then just look at the negotiations from the side, and you immediately recognize it. I think we lost a hundred or two thousand because of this error.
So, if you are in b2b sales, do not lose your positions before the start of negotiations, do not make unilateral concessions and do not relax your conditions before receiving a counter offer.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/289656/
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