‘I’m Happy With My Supplier’…………
Of course you are….. THIS IS NOT AN OBJECTION….. It’s simply a matter of fact and to be expected!
Every day our sales lead generation team faces this response from prospects during various campaigns, sometimes down to the scripts that our customers insist we work from. The response goes something like this……
“I am sorry but I am very happy with our current supplier/s. We have been working with them for some time now and have no interest in change.”
Many of our productive sales leads and long-term new business relationships come about following the above initial response from a prospect and one of our fitting responses as below.
Next time you come across such a response from a prospect during a sales lead generation campaign, you might want to try this……
Prospect:
“Thanks for your call but we’re happy with our existing suppliers. We’ve been working with them for years and we have no plans to change.”
Sales Person Response (suggestion):
“I appreciate your loyalty Carl and I’m not asking you to change supplier, now, but I would like to give you the opportunity to make an informed comparison with what’s available in the market……..When would be the best time for us to meet?………….Great, I’m not asking you to change now, merely consider building a relationship……..”
Now if you’re selling into a major corporate organisation you may find that procurement handles absolutely all supplier discussions and negotiations but thankfully this trend has not spread everywhere. Many senior level decision makers still have the power to introduce a supplier/partner to procurement and get them onto the preferred lists, or at least create an opportunity for them to be short-listed. New business development is undoubtedly becoming a more bureaucratic process with more stake-holders involved but many of the challenges and responses we face remain the same.
On a closing note, don’t fear the prospect that is happy with their current supplier, as they are your ideal prospect, but instead, fear the one who is not.
I hope you’ve found this helpful!
For more sales lead generation ideas and tips contact us via our website www.salesaccelerant.co.uk or call us on 0845 3058145
