The Traditional View of the Seven Steps of the B2B Buying Process

You are probably familiar with buying as a consumer. But did you ever think about how Aéropostale decides what products will be in their stores for the spring season, how a restaurant determines which beverages it will offer, or how Hewlett-Packard (HP) identifies which parts it will use to manufacture its printers? The buying process outlines the steps that the B2B customer goes through when he is making a purchasing decision on behalf of the company. This process applies whether the buying decision is being made by an individual or by a buying center.

1. Recognizing the need. The buyer realizes there is a need for the product or service.^[1] In the B2B environment, this might occur because of an internal need (e.g., the company needs more office space) or because of a customer need (e.g., green tea is becoming more popular, and so we want to offer it on our menu). This is the ideal opportunity for you to learn about your customers’ needs, although it may be difficult to know exactly when a customer or prospective customer is beginning this step. That’s why it’s important to engage your customer in dialogue to understand their current and future needs. Sometimes, you can help your customer see an opportunity that he didn’t realize.

2. Defining the need. This step usually involves users as well as initiators to put more definition around the type of product or service that will help meet the need.^[2] For example, in the case of office space, the head of facilities would ask the head of human resources about the types of new positions that will be needed and the type of workspace each requires. He might also ask for insight from each hiring manager or department head in the company, such as the head of operations, marketing, finance, and other areas. This will help him more fully understand the general type of product or service that is needed. Salespeople can play a role in this step of the buying process by sharing information and insights from other customers, without divulging any confidential information.

3. Developing the specifications. This is the step at which the exact needs are outlined.^[3] For example, if Target identified the need to create its own brand of DVD player, the appropriate people in the company would determine the exact specifications of the product: what functions it will have, how large it will be, what materials it will be made of, how many colors will be offered, and all other attributes of the product. When a salesperson has a good relationship with a customer, the buyer might ask the salesperson for insights and advice on different features, functionality, and production costs to finalize the product or service specifications.

4. Searching for appropriate suppliers. This step is focused on researching potential suppliers. This research can be conducted online by doing a Google search for suppliers of the desired product or service.^[4] Trade associations are also an excellent source as many provide unbiased evaluations of suppliers; for example, Forrester Research publishes a report on Web site analytic tools.

And industry trade shows can be an excellent source of information about prospective suppliers. One of the best ways to identify suppliers is by referrals; use your business network, including LinkedIn, to get feedback about reliable suppliers that might be able to meet your needs.

5. Requesting proposals. This is when the buyer or buying center develops a formal request for proposal, often called an RFP, and she identifies several potential vendors that could produce the product or service.^[5] For example, if Home Depot decided that it wanted to upgrade its bags, the buyer would have determined the specification, quantity, shipping points, usage, and other requirements (e.g., being environmentally friendly), and put the information into a formal document that is sent to several bag manufacturers along with questions about the history of the company, key customers, locations, manufacturing capacity, turnaround time, and other relevant information. Each manufacturer would have the opportunity to respond to the RFP with a formal proposal, which means that each company would provide information about their company, capabilities, delivery, and pricing to manufacture the bags. This is an opportunity for a salesperson to respond with a complete proposal that addresses the customer’s needs and concerns. See the sample RFP template for a nonprofit organization below.

6. Evaluating proposals. After the proposals are submitted, the buyer or buying center reviews each one and determines whether the company would be a good fit for the project. At this point, the number of potential vendor choices is narrowed to a select few. Usually, salespeople from each of the chosen companies are invited to meet with the buyer or buying center to discuss the proposal, capabilities, and pricing. Negotiation for pricing, quality, timing, service, and other attributes may also take place during this step.^[6] This is the step where a salesperson may need to overcome objections, or the reasons why the customer may not want to choose her as the company of choice.^[7]

7. Making the buying decision. The buyer or buying center chooses one (or the necessary number) of companies to execute the project, finalizes details, negotiates all aspects of the arrangement, and signs a contract. This step requires perseverance and attention to detail on the part of the salesperson. Once the decision is made, the real business of selling begins: delivering the product or service as agreed upon and building the relationship.

8. Postpurchase evaluation. Throughout the buying process, the buyer is provided all the good news: how the new product or service will solve her company’s problems, increase demand, reduce costs, or improve profitability. It is the postpurchase evaluation that tells the tale. Did the product or service perform as promised? Was the delivery and installation done correctly and on time? Are the business results in line with expectations? Is the relationship growing? Do the salesperson and his company really care about the performance of the buyer’s company? Does the salesperson add value to the buyer’s company? This is where the rubber meets the road; it presents an opportunity for the salesperson to communicate, anticipate, and solve any problems that may have arisen.^[8]

The process makes sense and is a flow of systematic steps that leads a B2B buyer through a logical buying process. But there are two flaws in this thinking that significantly impact the buying process and, as a result, the selling process: (1) the Internet changes everything and (2) emotions dominate B2B buying.^[9]

The Internet Changes Everything

It used to be that B2B buyers relied on salespeople to get information, demonstrations, and cost about products and services. Salespeople sold, and buyers bought; the world was a simpler place.

Today, B2B buyers are doing the work of two or even three employees because there are fewer people working at companies due to cutbacks and restructuring. The fact is, buyers don’t have the time to meet with salespeople like they used to. And the Internet has been a game changer. Buyers can not only research product and supplier options online, but they can also see product specifications, view demonstration videos, participate in online forums, get real-time recommendations and feedback from users on social networks, and basically be smarter than any salesperson before he even calls for an appointment.^[10] The power has shifted from sellers to buyers. In fact, the Internet has had such a profound effect on how people make purchasing decisions that the Wall Street Journal has coined a new term: “new info shopper.” These are people who can’t buy anything without getting information online first. What’s even more important to note is the fact that 92 percent of new info shoppers have more confidence in the information they get online than from an ad, salesperson, or other company source.^[11]

So what’s a salesperson to do? Stop, listen, and help your customer make the best decision for her business, even if it means that she doesn’t buy your product. Despite the importance of the Internet in providing information throughout the buying process, B2B buyers still gather insight from a variety of sources that include salespeople. Successful salespeople are those that truly focus on the buyer’s needs, which may mean giving up the sale and bringing valuable feedback to your company to change the product, service, or other options that are reasons why customers might not buy from you. The new world order requires everyone to rethink the conventional wisdom. Selling used to be something you “do to” a customer; now it’s something you “do for” a customer.^[12] The salespeople who win are the ones who listen in person, on the phone, and online, then make the recommendation that is in the customer’s best interest.

Information is no longer the exclusive domain of the salesperson. But great salespeople bring value to their customers with ideas, insights, knowledge, and personal commitment that can’t be duplicated on a Web site, online forum, or even on a social network. And the role of the Internet in B2B buying decisions is changing quickly.

Sales 2.0 has changed the way people seek, receive, and interact online. The Internet used to be only an information source, a place to search Web sites for information. But static Web sites have given way to not only information gathering, but to problem solving. Crowdsourcing occurs when a company takes a job that is traditionally done by an employee and issues an “open call,” usually online, to people all over the world to solve the problem. This is a new way for businesses and individuals to leverage the Internet in an efficient and effective way.^[13] Crowdsourcing uses the wisdom of the crowd in a virtual way to make information and solutions readily available to everyone. This video describes how crowdsourcing has changed the photography business forever.

Salespeople can embrace crowdsourcing and bring the power of the crowd to solve any customer problem. Facebook, iPhone apps, and YouTube are just three examples of crowdsourcing. Consider this example of the power of the crowd: Apple offered more than 65,000 apps for its iPhone in less than two years, and the number is projected to rise to 300,000 in 2010.^[14]

The use of technology in B2B selling, especially social networking, will continue to explode as digital natives (people, probably like you, who are under the age of 27) move into the workplace and meet the digital immigrants, Generation X and baby boomers who accept technology, but developed their online habits during a different time. Processes, behaviors, communication, and decisions will occur differently in the future.

Emotions Dominate B2B Buying

Whether you look at the traditional buying process or the role the Internet plays in providing information, it appears that the B2B buying process is logical and rational, but appearances can be deceiving. Despite the implication and belief that companies make purchasing decisions based on facts, it’s a good idea to remember one of the key tenets of B2B buying mentioned earlier: business-to-business means person-to-person. That means that although a B2B buyer is making a decision on behalf of her company, she still behaves like a consumer and is subject to emotions and feelings. “People rationalize buying decisions based on facts, but they make buying decisions based on feeling,” according to Bryan Eisenberg from ClickZ.com.^[16]

The Evolving Buying and Selling Processes

The framework for the buying and selling processes has been in place for many years. The buying process changes literally every day and has dramatic impact on the selling process. As a result, the “new” processes are not yet clearly defined. One thing is for certain; the processes are no longer organized, controllable functions. “Linear is so twentieth century,” according to Michael R. Solomon, author of Consumerspace: Conquering Marketing Strategies for a Branded World.^[27] Cultural, social, and technological changes will continue to drive companies for even better performance, faster, and with ideas as currency, which will continue to drive change in the buying process.

To understand the impact of the rapid changes occurring in the buying process, it’s important to know the basic steps in the selling process. The next seven chapters review the selling process in detail and include insights into how the process is changing. A study by William Moncrief and Greg W. Marshall provides a roadmap for the evolution of the selling process in Table 6.2 “The Evolution of the Seven Steps of Selling”.

Buying Process Meets FAB

No matter how the buying process evolves, customers continue to make purchase decisions driven by emotions. You learned how motivating trust and fear are for people who are making B2B buying decisions. Comfort, vanity, convenience, pleasure, desire to succeed, security, prevention of loss, and need to belong are all emotions that motivate purchases. A company may want to build a new building that carries its brand name downtown to signal its importance to the city and business community; that would be an example of vanity as a motivator. Or perhaps the company wants to move its headquarters to a better part of town to provide better security for its employees. Maybe a prominent figure in the community donates a large sum of money to your college motivated by the desire to give back. The same types of motivations apply to B2C purchases: a woman purchases makeup in the hopes of looking as beautiful as the model in the ads, a man buys a sports car in the hopes of turning heads, a student buys a microwave for the convenience of having food when she wants it.

Emotions are the driving force in so many B2C and B2B purchases that you might not even realize it. Consider this: would you buy the product in Figure 6.10 “Nutritional Information”?

So how do you create the same type of emotional appeal with your customers? The answer is simple: FAB.

While you might not consider buying it based on only this factual information, you probably have bought this product based on the emotional appeal of the packaging, advertising, and other marketing messages that tell you that the product is the best late-night snack.

Consider this information that was on the home page of Amazon recently:

3G wireless means books in 60 seconds. No monthly fees, service plans or hunting for Wi-Fi hotspots. Over 300,000 of the most popular books, newspapers, magazines, and blogs available.^[28]

Amazon truly understands how to use FAB, a selling technique that focuses on Features, Advantages, and Benefits, to sell its Kindle electronic reader. FAB is more than a way of selling; it’s a way of thinking like your customers. Using the Kindle as an example, here are the details about how to use the FAB approach for effective selling.

• A feature is a “physical characteristic” of the product.^[29] In the Kindle example above, the feature is the 3G wireless capability. Features are characteristics of the product; a feature comparison chart between the Kindle and the Kindle DX is shown below.

• A product advantage is the “performance characteristic” of the product, or what the feature does.^[30] In the information about Kindle included at the start of this section, the advantages of the 3G service are that the user doesn’t need to hunt for Wi-Fi hotspots and that over 300,000 of the most popular books, newspapers, magazines, and blogs are available in sixty seconds.
• The benefit is the “result” the buyer will realize from the product because of the product advantage, or in other words, what the feature does or the result it delivers.^[31] The benefit of the Kindle is the fact that you can “rediscover reading anywhere, any time.”^[32]

Notice how Amazon skillfully reinforces the benefit of portability by showing someone reading on a beach or a bus.

Why does FAB work? Because customers want to know what a product or service will do for them—not just what it’s made of. B2C and B2B customers seek information before making a buying decision but are also driven by emotions. FAB helps you appeal to a customer’s rational and emotional buying behavior by providing the most compelling features and factual information and then showing how the features provide an advantage that delivers a benefit. This is how salespeople help customers establish an emotional connection with a product. You remember from Chapter 1 “The Power to Get What You Want in Life” the power of an emotional connection between a customer and a brand.

You probably use FAB sometimes without even realizing it. “My new Lucky Brand jeans have a dirty wash, fit great, and make me look thin. The best part is they were on sale for only $89.00.” The features are the dirty wash and the fact that they were on sale for $89.00; the advantage is that they fit well (no easy feat when it comes to jeans); the benefit is that they make you feel like you look thin and, as a result, make you feel good when you wear them. Your statement is much more powerful when you frame it with FAB than if you simply say, “I got some new jeans today for $89.00.”

Or maybe you stopped into McDonald’s and tried one of their new Angus Third Pounders. The product feature is that the burger is one-third of a pound and is available in three flavor options; the advantage is that it is thick and juicy; the benefit is that you will enjoy the taste and your hunger is satisfied. The FAB message is more compelling than simply saying that you had a hamburger that was one-third of a pound; that would be stopping at the feature and not offering an advantage or benefit.

If you want to be able to use FAB in conversation, simply think in terms of the following:

• Feature: what the product has
• Advantage: what the features do
• Benefit: what the features mean^[33]

Table 6.3 “FAB in Action” gives features, advantages, and benefits for some common products.

For example, if you were describing Netflix in terms of FAB, you might say something like the following:

For only $8.99 a month you can watch as many movies as you want and never be charged a late fee. You can order online and have a DVD delivered in about a day and exchange it as many times as you want without a late fee, or you can watch streaming video of your favorite movies online anytime. Now that’s total personalized entertainment.^[34]

Now look at this FAB statement with the features, advantages, and benefits in bold:

For only $8.99 a month [feature] you can watch as many movies as you want and never be charged a late fee [advantage]. You can order online and have a DVD delivered in about a day [advantage] and exchange it as many times as you want without a late fee [advantage], or you can watch streaming video of your favorite movies online anytime [advantage]. It definitely saves you time and money [benefit] and gives you total personalized entertainment [benefit].

It’s easy to remember by using the FAB framework as your guide.

[Name feature] means you [name advantage] with the real benefit to you being [name benefit].^[35]

Here’s another example, based on research about the 2009 Nissan Cube:^[36]

The Nissan Cube has funky, Japanese-like design and is friendly to the environment with a fuel-efficient 1.8-liter, 4-cylinder engine that gets over 30 miles per gallon. It’s hip, cool, and fun to drive. At $15,585, it’s a great value for the money.