AI has made average look acceptable. The best sellers will be the ones who use it to enhance and share their thinking, not replace it. AI has changed the sales landscape, but not always in the way we expected. It’s made the average seller look better, faster, and more professional. Emails are smoother, proposals look sharper, and presentations are neatly …
Following on from my post about buyers, now it’s the sellers turn. How is AI going to impact sales and are we ready for the challenge? We’ve already seen that buyers are using AI to do the research, compare suppliers, analyse ROI, and even challenge what sellers tell them. So how can sellers respond? Here are just some of the …
I was having exactly this conversation a few days ago with a colleague and I thought it was worth sharing our thoughts. The short answer is, a lot. AI is already reshaping B2B buying, but the next couple of years are going to accelerate those changes. Buyers aren’t waiting for salespeople to educate them anymore. They’re using AI to scan …
Last time, I wrote about curiosity as one of the most underrated skills in sales. But it’s not enough to say be curious and expect something to change. Curiosity isn’t just a mindset, it’s a behaviour. And that behaviour shows up in two places: your questions, and your listening. You can’t be genuinely curious if all you do is ask …
We’ve all heard the phrase: “People do business with people they know, like and trust.” It’s been a sales mantra for decades. But lately I’ve been wondering if it still captures the full picture of how buying decisions are made. A colleague and I were talking about trust in the relationship between buyer and seller. He challenged whether trust is …
Under Pressure: Why Price Pushback Isn’t Just a Procurement Problem Buyers are under pressure. From tariff uncertainty through supply chain volatility and budget freezes. And then there’s procurement stepping in earlier, pushing harder, and asking tougher questions. And the pressure the buyer is under doesn’t stay on their side of the table – it lands squarely on yours! Your sales …
Salespeople don’t lose margin because they lack motivation. They lose it because they’re stuck on the wrong side of the Value Challenge. It’s a phrase I’ve used for years — and it sits at the heart of the Value Challenge Framework™. But the value challenge isn’t one single issue. It’s really two challenges, layered together: 🧠 The Strategic Value Challenge …
“We’ve seen this problem before.” No questions. No real curiosity. Many problems look the same. But the same problem can be very different from one customer to another. There was no attempt to understand the problem in this customer’s world, just the assumption that since they’d seen the problem before the solution would be the same. The seller thought he …
What is a Value Proposition? A value proposition is the clearest way to communicate why a customer should choose you over the competition. It’s not just about what you do—it’s about the difference you make. For a value proposition to be effective, it must: ✅ Resonate – Speak directly to your customer’s priorities and pain points. ✅ Differentiate – Show …
And hope, as we know, is not a strategy. Far too many sellers do a decent job talking about their offer, the shiny features, the benefits, the service levels, but completely miss the commercial context their buyer is living in. The risks they’re carrying. The friction they’re tolerating. The money leaking out. Worse, they assume the customer already knows the …