I here by claim the end of the challenger sales era. Say hello to the collaborative sales era where the agile, collaborative sales organisation will thrive and survive. This is article about The collaborative, agile selling organisation by Jens Edgren, Solution Selling instructor. #solution_selling2.0

1. SalesMakover AB
Jens@salesmakeover.se
www.salesmakeover.se
+46707998800 / +46 8 651 25 00
The end of the challenger sales era.
What I am going to suggest to you may come as a shock. If your first thought is
”this is not true for my business”, I strongly suggest you go and ask your kids or
some one younger that 15 years to tell you how they do their research using the
internet before they buy. Do you still think there is a strong relationship between
the # of sales calls and the sales result? Game, set and match, it is over. In this
article I will explain why most sales efforts creates less sales than doing nothing
and what to do about it.
Statistics never lie. Take a look at these figures:
 93% of buyers begin their buying process using the internet for research.
Marketo.
 74% of C-level executives say the Internet is invaluable for finding
information and 53% say they prefer to locate information themselves.
Forbes Insight, The Rise of the Digital C-Suite
 72% Of B2B Buyers (2013) used social media to research a potental
solution purchase.
DemandGen
 59% engaged with a peer who had addressed the challenge.
 37% Posted questions on social networks for feedback.
 80% of the buyers find you, not the other way around.
Our tradition
Sales people are measured on sales activities, trained in how to do cold calling
and rewared for revenue. That formula of success was based on the ”information
advantage of the seller”. The seller, like a person walking between villages in
the outback country of Australia, US or Scandinavia, spread the news about
problems and solutions, often told as stories, later shown as powerpoint
presentations. Since the ”information advantage” was true, the seller knew more
about their products and how they could serve customer problems and that
information was hard to find by the buyer else were, the seller had a specific

2. SalesMakover AB
Jens@salesmakeover.se
www.salesmakeover.se
+46707998800 / +46 8 651 25 00
value to the customers. As the figures, statistics, shows, and your kids already
new 3 years ago, that advantage is now completly erased. It is all on the internt.
Try a google search on what you sell. Spend 15 minutes to read what is out on
the net, and than ask your self a question: What more can you tell a customer
about what you can do for hin/her than they could read,see and hear themselves?
Last summer an HBR article (Adamson,Dixion; The end of the Solution
Selling era, HBR 2012)(1), claimed the end of the Solution Selling era.
The authors assumed that most sellers are trying to, as the good doctor, get the
customer to share pain so they can come up with a solution and get the sale. And
they had massive research to show that it did not work. They could have saved
thousands of hours and dollars and called me. I have been in sales for more than
25 years. That approach have never worked well. I could have old them that
over the phone.
The authors recepie for success was ”challenge your customers” and with
massive surveys they could proove that sales people who are provocative sell
more than sales people who ask open questions. I also agree to that, because that
gives the customer a certain value. Based on the research done by Geoffrey
Moore (2) about 12-15% of a certain buyer community responds to this strategy
as these buyers are not risk averse, they are instead looking for sales people who
can put up a challenge, offer them innovations and lead the way to succesful
implementation. But the other 80% who are either platform buyers, defending a
proven solution or the ultra conservative buyer who rather go bankrupt than
change – how will they react to a challenging message? I think the authors of the
article should get first hand experience on that before ordering the recepie as the
formula of success.
You could argue if I am right or wrong. That will only take focus on the real
challenge: What if your sales people do not get to meet the customers? What if
your prospects do not want to spend 1 hour of their time with a sales person,
what the approach may be, challenging or not? Nearly every day I talk to sales
people who, despite a good cold calling script, never gets hold of the prospect.
And if they do – the customers turns them down, not interested. Do you think
the solution is a new script? Or longer lists of people to call? Or maybe
telemarketing to book the meetings your sales people cant do? Or a ”challenging
message”?

3. SalesMakover AB
Jens@salesmakeover.se
www.salesmakeover.se
+46707998800 / +46 8 651 25 00
What if your sales people spend the majority of their time doing sales
activities that either annoys the customers, and creates tension with
”challenging messages” that makes most of the customers defend
themselves or leads to long hours at the office, waiting for ”hot leads” from
the market department that never comes?
Think again. It is now it gets really scary. The history is paved with examples of
paradigm changes. You and I are facing maybe the biggest change since the
computer became a tool for sellers.
It is the end of the challenger sales era, because you do not get the chance to
challenge your customers.
Conclusion #1: Selling is collaboration with the customer
It is time to reveal how you can adopt to the changes I described. What is true in
todays selling world? Customers still needs to find solutions to improve their
business. Customers still need to buy things, services and products to fulfil their
needs. And customers pay for the value they see fit. The paradigm shift can be
described as the ”looking customer”. Todays customer are aware of their
problems and solutions to those problems. They exchange, through social media,
ideas how and with who how to solve their needs. And when they are ready to
move on in their buying cycle they will contact a sales organisation, not to be
”sold” but to get their needs fulfilled. And I thing most customer would prefer to
talk with a consultant, a solution architect, a craftsman or a software programer
if they had a choise. Because those people can do real things for them.
Still present in the mind of the customer are two things: Risk and value. The
customer will ask two questions before taking a buying desicion: ”is it worth
it?” and ”will it work?”. And if the customers anwers are: ”I dont now the
value” and ”not sure it will work”, 80% of the buyerers will take a ”no decision”
(Jens Edgren, SalesMakeover 2010)(3). In order to sell the sales organisation,
who can be anyone in the organisation, will have to coach the customer so
he/she can get the answers they need to make an informed buying decision. It is
not selling – it must be a collaborative apporach. I call this conslusion #1:
Selling is collaboration.

4. SalesMakover AB
Jens@salesmakeover.se
www.salesmakeover.se
+46707998800 / +46 8 651 25 00
Conclusion #2: Selling is agility, you got 48h to respond to inquiries
Assume your customer have spent enough time doing research on the net,
talking to peers, interacting with credible sources and finally coming up with a
specific wish: something you could sell. And decide to call you up, book a
meeting with you. What do the customer want? See powerpoints describing your
organisation? Answer to open questions about heir strategy? Hear a ”challenging
message”? I dont think so, if you are in doubt, play the buyer role for a change
and have some of your sales people present your stuff to you.
The customer wants you to listen to them and fullfill their needs. Only if you
truly have what we call as a differentior (used to be called ”unique selling point-
usp”) and you can relate that to the any of the customers business issues, now or
later in their implementation process, you will be able to change their mind, we
call that ”vision reengineering”. If not – proceed to do a draft proposal and and
check if your customer likes is or not. If they do they will buy, if not, you can
call them every day and ”follow up” on the proposal until you change jobs. It
will not give you the sales.
Once the customer havet old you waht they want they want a fast reply. I say
within 48 hours you must be able to respond to complex inquaries. In order to do
so your organisation must be ready to step out of the organisational chart and
work as a crossfunctional team. Sales, R&D, techguys, consultants, finance,
legal, i dont know what resources you need this time, must collaborate and
create a solution that fullfills the customer need. That will give you the sale,
everything else equal. Everyone i your organisation are, in this way, a part of the
salesorganisation. This is the conclusion #2: The agile organisation.
Conclusion #3: Find the looking buyer while he/she still is looking, fish in
the sea where the fish swims
Since the customer spends more time looking on their own, and even avoid
contacts with sellers, we have an opportunity to serve our customers in this
phase. The customers are looking for valuable content, not market b-s. Most
companies have more content than they realise, but it is hard to find. Its is like
walking into a library and seaching for a book you dont know the name of. And
what if you don teven know there is a book to look for? I call this strategy to
fish where the fish are.
LinkedIN groups, tweets, bloggposts, updates – every where valuable content
can be served to the clients. You can push content in e-mailcampaigns and /or
make it available to seaching, content hungry customers.

5. SalesMakover AB
Jens@salesmakeover.se
www.salesmakeover.se
+46707998800 / +46 8 651 25 00
If they like what they see they will, like the fish, take a bite. More hooks, larger
nets gives you a better catch. Why not trade a couple of sales calls a week for
tweets, linkedin bloggposts and updates? How about Inmails, where you both
offer a business suggestion and a link to a white paper that is easy to read while
the customer is walking to his or her next meeting, reading it in an Iphone? We
are serving, not selling.
I here by claim the end of the challenger sales era. Say hello to the
collaborative sales era where the agile, collaborative sales organisation will
thrive and survive.
 Conclusion #1: Selling is collaboration with the customer
 Conclusion #2: Selling is agility, you got 48h to respond to inquiries
 Conclusion #3: Find the looking buyer while he/she still is looking,
fish in the sea where the fish swims
Your Jens ”SalesMakeover” Edgren
1) Adamsson, Dixon¸The end of the Solution Selling era, article, HBR;
Adamson,Dixion; http://hbr.org/2012/07/the-end-of-solution-sales/ar/1
2) Geoffey Moore; Inside the tornado; 1995, McGraveHill,
3) Jens Edgren; SalesMakeover, how to create a solutiondrive sales
organisation; 2010; Brainstation Publishing,