4 Be professional. Above everything else, clients want a professional relationship, and they want salespeople who are trustworthy, composed, and task-oriented.5

4 Display concern about the customer. The best way to show concern is to ask questions. It is difficult to be aggressive if you are asking lots of good questions. And its always better to show concern for the customer than to talk about how wonderful your product or service is.6

sales truth 1: Buyers dont like salespeople who are aggressive.

sales trap 2:

You Can Make a Complex Sale Without an Account Champion

Its a mistake to believe that you can make a complex sale without a champion inside the account-a person who wants to see you make the sale and is willing to help you do so. Research shows that complex sales cant be made without such help.7 Large corporations may have decentralized corporate structures, no clear purchasing channel, and an enormous number of people involved. This makes finding the key players in the buyers decision-making process maddeningly difficult, expensive, and sometimes nearly impossible. Its difficult to focus outside, on the customer, under such circumstances. And yet many try.

WHAT HAPPENS WITHOUT AN ACCOUNT CHAMPION

Heres a common scenario:

Heather, a three-year sales veteran for the Atlantic Storm & Casualty Company, knew a lot of people at Global Enterprises, a potentially large account. Heather knew decision makers, decision influencers, policy administrators, receptionists, and even the window cleaner. Heather had been working with the key personnel at Global for fourteen months. They had been receptive in meetings to her ideas regarding additional coverages for their offices along the Atlantic and Pacific seaboards, which were often hit by hurricanes, violent storms, and earthquakes, not to mention floods and heavy snow damage.

She had displayed concern for her customer. She had probed effectively and thoroughly to understand her clients needs. Her prices were competitive, and Globals

people liked her. But Heather couldnt secure the business relationship. She finally convinced herself that these nice people at Global were indecisive and fearful of making decisions. How else could they like her and need her policies, but still not move forward with business?

Unfortunately, this story is all too common-for both parties. Its frustrating to the salesperson or consultant who has invested her or his time with an account, but cant seem to advance the account far enough to get an order. And its frustrating to the people at the account to invest their time in meetings that end without any definite progress. Whats wrong? Although Heather knew many key people, she didnt have an internal champion inside the account. Rather than investing all her time in developing superficial relationships, she should have focused more of her energies on finding and maintaining an account champion.

THE INTRICACIES INSIDE THE ACCOUNT

In Strategic Selling, Robert Miller and Stephen Heiman reveal that top-performing salespeople have internal coaches who, among other things, help guide the salespeople over, under, and around the various political sensitivities and hidden agendas within the account.8 In Miller and Heimans terminology, coach means internal account champion. Later, I will use the term coach to refer to the role the sales manager or an outside trainer undertakes when he or she teaches a sales rep or gives one-on-one feedback about sales skills. Therefore, for the sake of clarity, in this discussion I will use internal champion instead of Miller and Heimans word coach.9

The internal champion functions as an inside salesperson for the outside salesperson. In other words, when the salesperson isnt at the account and when closed-door meetings take place, the salespersons internal champion can go to bat to support the sale. In some cases, the internal champion will even sell the outside