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Here's a list of old episodes in date order! There have been some great conversations so feel free to binge them all!
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Episode 144 - Beyond the Challenger Sale Part 2: Focus on Value & Make your Product Easy to Buy (with Brent Adamson, Author "The Challenger Sale" & "The Challenger Customer")
Episode 144: Beyond the Challenger Sale Part 2: Focus on Value & Make your Product Easy to Buy
Brent Adamson, Author "The Challenger Sale" & "The Challenger Customer"
About the Episode
Brent Adamson is a former Harvard professor turned Wall Street Journal award-winning author and sales researcher. He co-authored "The Challenger Sale" and "The Challenger Customer" with my former guest Matt Dixon, and these days is challenging us to concentrate on making products easy to buy, not easy to sell.
Here are some of the highlights of our discussion:
The Challenger Sale shook up the world of sales, but The Challenger Customer was the inevitable follow up
They did further research after the first book and identified a new protagonist, the "Mobilizer", who can be your best advocate within the company (but not a champion!)
It takes 5.4 people within an organisation to make a purchase decision & the number's rising
It's getting more & more complicated selling into organisations, and the buying journey has become like spaghetti. Finding the "economic buyer" is no longer enough to land the sale.
There's a difference between emerging demand and established demand
If you're going after established demand and known solutions you're going to get dragged into a price-based bake-off. Challengers find unknown pains, challenge the status quo & break the frame
Some customers don't even know how to buy any solution, let alone your solution
Buyer journeys are complex & some customers can be surprised when things get held up. But you're not, you've seen it all before! Give them the info they need to help close the sale from their side.
It's not good enough to just be insightful anymore, The smartness arms race ended in a draw
Being really insightful is table stakes. You need to be able to help your customers frame their decision and give them confidence in the decisions they're making for their company.
.. And much more!
Check out Matt's episode
I interviewed Brent's co-author and co-conspirator Matt Dixon about his work and how customer indecision is a critical problem for B2B sales. Check out the episode here.
Buy "The Challenger Sale"
Check it out on Amazon.
Buy "The Challenger Customer"
Check it out on Amazon.
Contact Brent
You can hit Brent up on LinkedIn.
Related episodes you should like:
- Beyond the Challenger Sale Part 1: JOLTING Customers out of "No Decision" (Matt Dixon, Author "The Challenger Sale" & "The JOLT Effect")
- Mapping your Way to B2B Product Success (Daniel Elizalde, Product Advisor & Author "The B2B Innovator's Map")
- Build Products Businesses Want with the Lean B2B Pyramid (Étienne Garbugli, Author "Lean B2B", "Find your Market" and "Solving Product")
- Going Beyond the Dreaded Product Demo and Creating the Perfect Sales Pitch (April Dunford, Author "Obviously Awesome" and "Sales Pitch")
- Fighting Fires in B2B Product Management (Rich Mironov, Author "The Art of Product Management")
- Helping Superhero Startup Founders Stay Away from their Kryptonite (Richard Blundell, Founder @ Vencha & Co-author "The Go To Market Handbook for B2B SaaS Leaders")
- Can Sales & Product Really Get Along? (Brendan McAdams, Author "Sales Craft")
- Transforming your Organisation to the Product Operating Model (Marty Cagan, Author "Inspired", "Empowered" and "Transformed")
