There is way too much emphasis put on the funnel metaphor of the sales pipeline.
No matter how we cut it, customers do not follow a neatly programmed defined process, it is chaotic at best, and no simple diagram or ignoring human nature can change that.
Moreover, it is becoming disturbingly complicated by all the tools that are now around that automate sales processes, conjuring up algorithms that supposedly make order out of chaos.
Scott Brinker’s 2017 Martech conference was held recently in San Francisco. A terrific gathering of all those involved in the Martech space, vendors, developers, customers, and consultants (probably too many of those) but do we risk losing sight of the basics?
Let me put an alternative view.
About 30 years ago I read still the only Sales book to which I regularly recommend to my clients, SPIN Selling. This breaks down the sales process into a series of steps that 30 years later have not changed one little bit.
There are now lots of smart technically shiny tools to inform the questioning, and provide information and guidance to both seller and buyer, and a slew of tools to keep track of every thought, utterance and misstep on the web, but the basics remain.
You can only have a shot at a sale when the value of the solution to a customer’s problem you are offering is greater than the cost to that customer.
No change there, despite the shiny new tools, which do have a place, but are not the panacea to sales headaches.
