How selling ‘value’ influences buyer decisions
Marketing texts galore talk about the need for businesses to add or create ‘value’ for their potential or current customers. Few, however, explain what that actually means in practice. True to form, the Clearly team has done away with the waffle and written a short piece on what we mean by ‘value’ and the practical ways you can implement it.
It is fair to say that the UK economy has seen better days. An article published recently by Reuters suggested that the low level of growth is akin to the pandemic and the financial crisis of 2008. Not quite what we want to hear.
But while your target customers may be holding off on using the services you provide just now, this situation won’t last forever. Now is the time to be thinking about how to ensure you are at the front of the line when their budgets have been unleashed.
One of the most powerful ways to do this is ensuring that you sell yourself on the ‘value’ you deliver to customers. So, how to you ‘sell’ value?
What is value?
It is worth pausing for a second to explain what we mean by value. Admittedly, it does sound a tad fluffy – meaningless, perhaps. However, its impact can be profound in terms of brand building and new business development.
Essentially adding value is all about sharing rather than selling.
Take a look at your LinkedIn feed for example. You’ll note a huge proportion of businesses boasting about their latest wins and how great (they think) they are. Few share information providing tangible insights into the challenges they face in their businesses. In the main, they’re all about the selling over telling.
By considering the pains and obstacles faced by your target market and providing a sense – or even solution – on how to do tackle them, you are adding value. This makes you an incredible attractive proposition to potential customers in four key ways as we explain next.
The four ways that buyers decide who to do business with
Clients make buying decisions based on four key considerations:
- Expertise of the seller: Does the company have its finger on the pulse of what is happening in their industry? Think: thought leadership articles, piece to camera videos, owned podcasts.
- Experience: What evidence can they show of having worked in this space with similar business to ours? Think: case studies, client testimonials.
- Authority in their space: Has the company and its key people been quoted, cited, or reported on in relevant media outlets? Think: press releases, authored articles for the media, guest appearances on podcasts, speaking at events.
- Trustworthiness: What is their track record in this space, are they considered to be a go-to provider of choice? Think: percentage of current clients won via referral, public profile of the businesses’ key people.
Finally
When you consider the needs and pains of your prospects you position your business as top-of-mind. In doing so, you leapfrog your competitors to the front of the line when the time is right for prospects to engage a business like you.
