How buyers buy in the digital age has changed. Most of the buyers know what they want and where they are going to buy it way before the sales person is aware of the requirement.
The 21st century challenge is to be able to engage with the potential buying audience in advance of the purchase and we need to fight for the opportunity to engage. The early sales process is now about building awareness, trust, preference and then loyalty and as such we need to establish a relationship with the future buyers.
Once engaged we can then begin to move the relationship from acquaintance to trusted “guru” in our area of expertise over time, helping the buyer in a consultative style and then into a longer term customer engagement.