Why Reps Strike Out with Customers

Does this sound familiar—your rep just came back from a meeting with a Mobilizer, who you’ve painstakingly identified as able to build consensus and drive change in the customer organization. You ask your rep how it went and he replies, “Well it was a mess from the start, I tried to sell the benefits of our product, but he didn’t seem interested in listening at all. By the end of it he was so disengaged that he cut our meeting short and left!” You are surprised because both you and the rep felt confident about securing this deal before the meeting. So what really went wrong?

Most reps feel challenged when engaging Mobilizers. And, it’s easy to see why. Our research shows that reps follow the same strategies to engage all types of customer contacts—they communicate product features and benefits, ask probing questions, and push them through the sales process.

While this approach might work with some types of customer contacts, it puts off the most important ones, Mobilizers, that can actually move a purchase decision forward. This is because Mobilizers don’t go out of their way for suppliers—instead they focus on the organizational agenda. Your reps need to engage Mobilizers on their own terms—guiding them to take ownership of the change in the customer organization, while leading that vision of change back to you as a supplier.

Our research finds that engaging Mobilizers requires leveraging specific Mobilizer strengths and compensating for potential weaknesses at each stage of the customer buying process. Each Mobilizer profile—The Skeptic, Teacher, and Go-Getter—can be categorized across two main behavioral spectrums that reps can use to coach Mobilizers on how to take the sale forward:

Rationally-Driven Vs. Emotionally-Driven: The degree to which the Mobilizer’s decisions can be predominantly influenced by logic or emotions. Skeptics and Go-Getters are rationally-driven, and come across as analytical, logical, and objective. In contrast, Teachers are emotionally-driven, and are often subjective, intuitive, and thoughtful.
Detail-Oriented Vs. Vision-Oriented: The degree to which the Mobilizer prefers to focus on the details and specifics of an idea vis-à-vis the bigger picture. Skeptics are detail-oriented and like to work with facts, data, and well laid-out plans, while Go-Getters and Teachers are vision-oriented and prefer to work with ideas, patterns, and potential possibilities and implications.

Armed with this information, reps can tailor their communication style and the nature of support they provide to Mobilizers at each stage of the customer buying process.

CEB Sales Members, visit our new web page on How to Engage Mobilizers in the Sale to learn how reps can actively guide Mobilizers through the customer buying process. Also, read the key findings from the study, and listen to the webinar replay, Mobilizer 2.0: Working with the Right Stakeholders.