Salespeople Negotiating - Caught in the Double Squeeze? (Part 1 of 2)

Many salespeople don’t negotiate price very well. That’s easy to see, but the reasons why are not nearly so obvious. There’s more here than readily meets the eye.

All too often, professional salespeople see themselves fighting pressures—not just from the customer but also from their own company!

The customer is constantly trying to put them in the “commodity box,” where price is the deciding factor, where value doesn’t matter, and where every business decision is based on cutting to the bottom line.

No surprise there—we expect that from a customer. After all, it’s their job.

But what more often gets overlooked is...the pressure that salespeople feel from inside their own company. Because of inside pressures, salespeople often tell me they “need this piece of business” or “really need the sale.” And they’re right! They’re driven by sales managers to make their numbers—driven by quotas. And they’re driven by compensation systems.

With pressures from both sides—the company saying, “Make the sale! Make the sale!” and the customer saying, “The only way you can make the sale is to drop the price!”—the outcome is pretty predictable.

So, what’s the solution to this unhappy predicament? To find out, tune in for our next installment.