Latest / Sales Pipeline Radio / Standing Out in a Commoditized Market

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Standing Out in a Commoditized Market · Sales Pipeline Radio

• 0:16
  All right.
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  Welcome everybody to another episode of Sales Pipeline Radio.
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  So excited to have everybody here.
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  We had a little hiatus beginning of the year as we sort of had to
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  catch up on a few other things.
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  But we are back, with regular episodes of Sales Pipeline Radio on Thursdays at 11:30
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  am Pacific excited to have y'all here,
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  have you back.
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  Thank you so much, for checking us out.
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  We have over 250,000 subscribers, at Sales Pipeline Radio dot
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  com so welcome you as well.
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  Very excited to have with us today, Steve Gielda.
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  From Ignite Selling.
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  Steve, thank you so much.
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  We've got a ton to talk about today, including your new book, Ignite
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  Your Sales Strategy: A Field Guide to Accelerating Your Pipeline.
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  Excited this, excited to talk about the book and just sort of
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  modern sales strategies in general.
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  So thanks for being here.
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  Well, thanks for having me.
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  It's great to be with all of your listeners and, appreciate
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  you having me on as a guest.
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  Absolutely.
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  I mean there's so many different angles we can go down on this, on this road,
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  but I think, you know, the one I'm most excited about and you know, represented
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  in your book as well, is like standing out in the sales process today, right?
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  You know, whether you're in a commoditized market or whether you're just in
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  a market that is getting inundated with messages, standing out and doing
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  that in a repeatable, predictable manner is really, really hard.
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  What have you learned about sort of selling in 2026 and what do
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  modern sellers need to know?
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  You know, it's a great, it's a great question.
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  It's a big question too, Matt.
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  I think that a lot of the clients that we're working with today, as we
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  are finding kind of in this times of uncertainty from an economy standpoint.
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  That we're hearing from our customers that buyers are now, starting to really
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  look at the decisions that are being made around buying, spending money.
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  Let's just say it, let's just put it that way.
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  Right.
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  And what's really common is that lower cost solution provider
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  is getting more attention.
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  And so therefore, creating value, which has always been important, is really
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  becoming even, even even more important.
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  But what we're really finding out is.
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  Buyers are starting to commoditize decisions rather quickly.
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  And a lot of that is because those buyers are being held to a series of
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  metrics that, have become even more important during difficult economic times.
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  So we often ask our clients that we're working with, ask the sales
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  reps, you know, what are the top three or four critical business
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  metrics that your client is trying to improve in the next 12 months?
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  And unfortunately not many of 'em know.
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  Right.
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  And in absence of knowing that they really kind of find themselves playing this
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  price game because they're not able to really align back their solutions to the
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  metrics the clients are trying to achieve.
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  What's behind that?
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  I mean, I feel like we talked about a version of this for a very long time.
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  You know, where like, you know, if, if you're, if I'm just
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  selling sand, everyone has sand.
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  Well, yes and no, but like what's the use case for that sand?
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  Is there something specific you need in that sand?
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  I can go to Home Depot right now and I can buy a, a bag of
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  like clean sand for a sandbox.
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  I don't know what clean means.
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  I don't know why I need different sand for my sandbox, but probably per pound,
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  I'm paying a lot more for that bag of sand than sand to somewhere else.
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  So like.
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  What are some of the tactics that that companies and, and
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  sellers are using to stand
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  out?
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  I think the, that's a great question.
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  I think some of the best of the best, Matt, are probably not focused
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  on how, how they're describing sand or what the product is itself.
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  What they're really doing is they're focusing on what are the outcomes
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  that client's trying to achieve as a result of buying their product.
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  Mm-hmm.
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  So it's not just about understanding who those competitors are, but it's
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  having a real clear understanding is what are the outcomes you're trying
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  to drive as a result of wanting to make a change from the sand provider
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  you're currently having today.
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  If you're currently buying sand, but you're wanting to look, you're
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  wanting to look for make a change.
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  What's driving that change?
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  You might hear the customer say, well, we believe that we
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  can get it at a lower price.
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  Well, that might be true.
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  You can always find something lower price.
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  But why don't we talk a little bit about what's the purpose of the sand
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  and what is it are you really trying to accomplish the metrics you're trying to
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  accomplish as a result of making a change?
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  People just don't make change to save money.
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  Yes, that's an easy throwaway.
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  We're trying to save money.
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  We're looking to lower costs, therefore we're gonna make a change.
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  But I think when you hear buyers say that, you start to unpack
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  that a little bit further.
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  You find out there's a little bit more behind their desire.
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  That statement that they're saying, we're trying to save money.
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  There's something a little bit more behind it that your solution
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  may actually be able to drive.
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  Well, and there's always gonna be members of the market that just like, they
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  just looking for the low price period.
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  And unless you wanna be the low price provider, that may not be
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  a good customer match for you.
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  Sure.
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  But when someone says, I need to pay less, it's often that it's not about the money.
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  Right.
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  Like, what are you really trying to get here?
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  And you and I both know that if you pay less for something, that might
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  be the most expensive thing you do, if it's not the right solution.
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  If it doesn't deliver the outcome.
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  Right.
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  Yeah.
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  People think CFO's jobs are to spend money.
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  No.
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  Their job is to buy outcomes.
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  And the reason they.
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  Push back on you when they say like, do we really need that?
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  Is not because they don't wanna spend the money, it's because they're not
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  sure they're, that is gonna buy the outcome they want versus something else.
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  And so as sellers, we have to be proactive, right at sort of helping
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  our buyers, helping our customers have those conversations internally.
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  Yeah, no doubt about it.
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  I think I'm gonna steal that phrase, buying outcomes.
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  I've never really heard that phrase before, Matt, and
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  I think that's very true.
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  Buyers, I don't care if you're an economic buyer or or technical
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  buyer, whatever it might be, but I think buyers are buying outcomes.
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  It's exactly right.
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  The question is, do you know the outcomes that they want to buy?
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  And too often salespeople are so focused on the, the features and the
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  benefits of their particular product that they're trying to push something
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  that the client doesn't really need.
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  Mm-hmm.
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  And so yeah, the question is, is what is the buyer's outcomes?
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  Here's quick, just a quick little story.
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  We bought a car recently for my wife and when we went shopping, the
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  sales representative was so quick to go ahead and demonstrate how
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  quickly you can go from zero to 60.
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  And that wasn't the issue.
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  That wasn't the outcome we were looking for.
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  They were talking about the tectonic plates that were on, on the dash,
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  I mean on, on the steering wheel.
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  Hey, that's, that's fine for you.
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  I simply asked my wife, I said, honey, sit down in the car.
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  Why don't you tell the guy what's most important to you right now?
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  And she says, I need to have a seatbelt that doesn't cut me across the neck.
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  Ha, let's start there.
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  Yeah.
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  So you're looking for us a car that's gonna be safe, but you don't wanna have
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  a seatbelt that cuts you across the neck.
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  And it's time to get a new car, and that's gonna be one of the
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  things that's important to you.
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  Sit down, sat down in the car, guess what happened?
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  The seatbelt cut her across the neck just based upon how, how tiny she is.
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  So I said, okay, we gotta see.
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  We gotta find another car.
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  But the guy didn't know my outcomes and he was so busy talking about the things
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  that marketing said, you know what really makes this particular product cool?
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  It's got these tectonic plates and it can go from zero to 60 this fast.
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  I didn't give a damn.
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  Yeah.
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  So yeah, I think you think you're right.
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  Buyers are looking for their buying outcomes.
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  Well, and I think that we, we don't reinforce enough to our sellers that they
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  need to be asking those questions upfront.
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  Yeah.
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  For those of who listening to this podcast for a while, like you probably
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  heard me tell a version of this story, like, one of my favorite things to
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  tell inside sales teams is, listen.
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  Rule number one, when you talk to a prospect for the first time, assume you
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  can't talk about your product or service.
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  Assume you can't get into features and doing demos if you knew you couldn't
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  talk about what you are selling, what's the conversation you would have and if
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  they, in your wife's example, like if I'm not, if I'm not talking about the car
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  features, I'm more saying like, what's the outcome you're looking for here?
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  Right?
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  What, where have you failed to achieve that outcome in the past?
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  Do you have any war stories or scars?
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  You wanna talk about the, the sort of, the opposite of that, and that gives
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  you insights into how to talk about.
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  What you, the solution, not the product, but the solution
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  and the outcome that matters.
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  You know, one of the questions I love to ask salespeople, and we
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  do a lot of win-loss analysis.
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  In other words, when salespeople win, we kind of find out why.
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  And what we do is we go talk to the sales rep and then we go talk to the customer.
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  And whether it be a win or whether it be a loss, we ask the same five questions.
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  But one of those questions that we ask the sales representatives
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  is, why did you lose?
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  Mm-hmm.
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  We all know what the number one answer is, is when a sales
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  representative said, why did they lose?
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  They'll tell you they lost because of price.
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  But that when we go back and we talk to that particular customer, why did you
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  choose to go with company A over our particular client we come to find out is
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  price didn't even make it in the top two.
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  But what we did ask is we asked the customer, other than price.
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  What were the other critical decision criteria that matter most
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  to you in this buying decision?
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  Now we ask sales representatives that same question, other than price,
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  what is the decision criteria this customer's using to, to compare
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  you against the competition?
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  They'll give you an answer.
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  Mm-hmm.
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  It's gonna be things such as, you know, speed of, efficiency, or
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  it could be reliability of the product or whatever it might be.
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  And then I asked the sales rep the second question.
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  What unique capability does your product have that this customer is not
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  giving consideration to, and why not?
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  Mm-hmm.
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  Because if you're selling, if the customer's buying outcomes and you
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  have something that can truly help that outcome, shouldn't that unique capability
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  be part of that decision criteria?
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  So for your listeners, ask your, ask your customer these questions other than price.
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  'cause we all know price is important, Mr.
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  Customer.
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  What are the other two or three most critical criteria that you're
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  using to compare us against other, other vendors, other partners that
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  are out there, see what they have to say and find out what's missing.
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  So
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  We call this show.
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  No, I love it.
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  We, we call this show Sales Pipeline Radio on purpose, but a lot of our
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  audience is marketers, field marketers, demand marketers, those that are sort of
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  helping, supporting, their sales partners.
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  What lessons are in this book that marketers should be
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  paying the most attention to?
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  Boy, that's a great question.
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  I think that when you sit back and you look at, the marketer's role, marketer's
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  role is to help the salespeople do a better job of accelerating revenue growth.
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  So what does that really mean?
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  That means that they need to help them make sure that they're targeting the
• 10:43
  right customers and providing them with the right information at the right time.
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  So when you simply break that down, what is it that a marketing person
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  can do to help a salesperson?
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  Is to do that research ahead of time.
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  Help them kind of understand that.
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  Guess what, when we're launching a new product.
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  That key stakeholder that bought our product last time is not likely
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  to be the stakeholder this time.
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  Right.
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  The new capabilities of this product hit a different, click, a different
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  button inside the buyer profile.
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  Who we really need to be talking to now is, I'm gonna make something
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  up, is the chief technology officer.
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  You guys have been selling in distribution, but this new
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  capability that we have right now requires us to engage with the CTO.
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  That would be something that in our book we kind of talk about
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  managing the key stakeholders.
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  Mm-hmm.
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  Marketing could be very useful based upon their upstream marketing.
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  Why was this product brought to market?
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  Who does this product really serve?
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  To help the sales team recognize that, hey, the buyers that you've
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  worked with in the past are still going to be important, but not the
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  number one most important person.
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  We now need to engage with maybe the CTO.
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  Yeah, that'd be one area that the book can help in.
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  I think the other area that the book can really help in is this
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  area around decision criteria.
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  Your product was brought to market to meet some very specific outcomes.
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  Mm-hmm.
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  We most, in most cases, if you ask a customer, what's the criteria that you're
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  using to compare us against competition, it's a generic set of criteria that
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  maybe your competitor established.
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  Right.
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  Right.
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  So marketing needs to help that sales representative recognize that
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  there are three unique capabilities.
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  These aren't features or benefits.
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  These are unique capabilities that that CTO should really care about.
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  Let me help you explain what those particular capabilities are.
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  And why, or what would happen if A CTO makes a decision and
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  doesn't have this capability.
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  Mm-hmm.
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  Marketing can help salespeople with that.
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  I love that.
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  Just got a few minutes to wrap up here talking about commoditized
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  marketplaces and the new book, Ignite Your Sales Strategy.
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  First of all, where can people get that book today?
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  Is that Amazon or on your website?
• 12:58
  Amazon.
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  Pick it up on Amazon.
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  I tell you what we'll do is, for any of your listeners that want
• 13:02
  a free copy of the book, they just connect with me on LinkedIn.
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  You got my name right here.
• 13:06
  Just connect with me on LinkedIn and say, Hey, I'd like to have a copy of your book.
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  We'll make sure we get a free copy of the book sent out to you.
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  Love that.
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  Thank you so much for doing that.
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  Yeah, yeah, of
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  course.
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  You're talking about this, you kind of stakeholders or talk about
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  the C-suite sometimes depending on what we're selling, you want to get
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  to, you know, what, what the, what the literature calls VITO, right?
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  The very important top officer, but sometimes she won't get on the phone.
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  She's deputized this to their team and you wanna get her attention.
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  And also I, there's some, I've heard this concept of sort
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  of perceived commoditization.
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  Right, where like, you know, there's a big difference between you and
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  other platforms, but if someone that doesn't, isn't educated in the market,
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  be like, ah, they're all the same.
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  Just pick one.
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  Just pick one and get the lowest price.
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  How do you combat that, especially with an executive that you
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  don't have face time with?
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  I think that's, there's two, there's two challenges there.
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  One is how do you get access to the person that you really need to talk to?
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  And I think sometimes sales representatives are intimidated by
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  having to go to that person, particularly if you know that person is not a fan
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  of your particular solution because of some history they've had in the past.
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  Right.
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  But they still are involved in that decision.
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  We have to recognize that we still might have some advocates inside this account.
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  We, we kinda like look at it.
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  We have a tool called the Influencer Snapshot.
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  It's simply a snapshot in time that simply just says, what is the level
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  of influence of these individuals and of those individuals who has,
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  who loves you and who doesn't, who's an advocate, who's an adversary?
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  Too often sales representatives feel as if they have to go it alone.
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  We ask them, which of your advocates can you leverage to help
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  you gain better access to those people that have higher influence?
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  Mm-hmm.
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  Leverage those advocates to get you access, but also leverage those
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  advocates to get you smart on what are the outcomes that these particular
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  influencers are wanting to achieve.
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  Mm-hmm.
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  What would they really care about if I'm in a meeting with them?
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  Use your advocates for that.
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  But let's kind of, so the one issue is do we have access?
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  The second part that you brought up really is around the commoditization when your
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  pricing is such, such a big difference.
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  Right?
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  I think the answer to that one is going back to what we talked
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  about earlier, Matt, and I'm gonna again go back to what you said.
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  Buyers buy outcomes.
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  You can, you can reduce that margin of price differential.
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  By really understanding what the outcomes your customer is buying and demonstrating
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  how your capabilities can do that, and then you might actually find that
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  they're willing to pay more for it.
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  Than what, than, I mean far more than what the, the current provider currently has.
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  They may say, I'm looking for a lower price.
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  Mm-hmm.
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  You may actually find that they're willing to pay more than what they're
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  currently paying today because you've demonstrated that you can actually help
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  them drive the outcomes that they want.
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  Love that.
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  Well, we're out of time for today, Steve.
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  Thank you very much for being here.
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  Two calls to action for folks here.
• 15:52
  If you want a copy of the book, Ignite Your Sales Strategy, connect with
• 15:56
  Steve on LinkedIn, ask him, remind him you came from Sales Pipeline Radio.
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  He'll hook you up.
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  Also, go to IgniteSelling.com.
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  You're gonna find more information on the book.
• 16:05
  You're gonna find a ton of great content for free there as well.
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  So check that out.
• 16:09
  Steve, thank you so much for doing this with us.
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  I appreciate it.
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  Yeah,
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  always enjoy being with you guys.
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  Thanks again for the opportunity.
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  Thanks for the invitation.
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  Look forward to meeting with you again in the future.
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  Absolutely.
• 16:18
  Thank you, Steve.
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  Thank you everyone for listening and watching.
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  We'll see you next time on Sales Pipeline Radio.
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  Take care.
• 16:23
  Bye-bye.