If you want to sell more IT services, products and solutionsto your prospects and clients (assuming you DO) it helps to know why they’d want to do business with you (or your competitors) in the first place.

Sales 101… I know but in the complex world of IT sales it  helps to get real clear on the basics so you can more effectively position yourself as the ideal partner for your clients.

So what exactly can you do to make these businesses become YOUR client instead of choosing other providers?

QUALIFICATIONS

Your technical expertise is going to make all the difference. With so many different IT qualifications, you will want to target companies that use your skills. Make sure that your skills are going to be beneficial to the company by providing reliable and up to date technology without reworking a company’s entire computer system.

Being able to advise on what types of servers the company should use (for example) and how to store data… fundamental advice that owners want. Most business owners don’t need to understand the entire technical process, but by breaking down the basics into understandable material, you will sell your technical knowledge. When presenting your marketing and sales collateral make sure that your technical jargon is translated into easy to read laymans terms so the prospect won’t feel like they have to suffer through a technical manual.

If you can’t even pitch your services in a language they want to digest how can they trust you to tame the oceans of technical know-how for them?

CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIPS

Your clients WANT a high level of interaction with you!

   …Obviously you have to make sure its the right kind of interaction.

By employing a high level of customer interaction, you will be making an impression that will create trust with the business owners. Once you have established a professional and personal interaction with your clients, you can count on repeat business. For a business owner, it is important to know that the IT Technician will be available to respond in a quick and professional manner.

UNDERSTAND YOUR CLIENT/PROSPECT’s BUSINESS

At surface level your prospect and client businesses may appear very similar and have similar needs.

But your prospect/client isn’t viewing their business at surface level.  They have a very granular perspective of their point of view their unique objectives, challenges and requirements.

When working with your clients, it is important for you to understand what the end customer business is. By listening to the business owner and allowing him or her to explain what the company’s objective is, you can more effectively recommend the right products and services to your clients.

Being able to present yourself as an IT partner that can “plug in” to the clients total vision is a very powerful trump card.

PRICE

Don’t position yourself as a price competitor.  Any prospect that constantly positions you against the competition to beat you up on price will likely be a lousy client and you should probably fire them early.

That said… you want to be fair to the client as well as yourself.  To justify higher margins and prices you need to work harder at being the expert they need you to be.

Once you’ve established yourself as the expert solution provider for your clients “specific” business you’ll be more insulated from the commodity based price competition your competitors will be subject to.

This will help you create a more profitable business, providing more to reinvest, enabling you to provide higher quality services, further establishing your status as “The Expert”.

That doesn’t necessarily mean you NEVER make price concession.  As an IT VAR you have MANY opportunities to sell into your client base.  It may be advantageous to slash your margins on an initial deal so you can establish and nurture a relationship and provide them with  a more robust service down the road.

VAR’s (your competitors) are increasingly trying to position themselves as a “one stop shop” while your prospects are simultaneously trying to limit the number of IT partner contacts they have to manage.

If you lose the first deal… it could very well mean you’ve lost every deal after that.

Be very strategic when considering price concessions but make sure you aren’t slashing your prices to land a blood-sucking-vampire client.  That’ll most likely hurt far more in the long run than lost revenue now.

ONGOING SUPPORT

Your clients don’t want to just buy a product or solution and then be left to their own to maintain it.  Even if they have an in-house IT department, unless they’re a large enterprise, their in-house IT will most likely have a very general knowledge to provide broad based network support.

Be sure to highlight your solution specific technical expertise and availability/solutions for ongoing support.

Make your SLA’s very clear as an added benefit (in layman’s terms).   You might even consider rephrasing SLA as 100% uptime guarantee, 0 downtime guarantee (depending on your SLA), etc… when addressing non-technical contacts so they fully understand the benefits of working with you.

STRATEGIC BUSINESS EXPERTISE

Again… your prospect/client isn’t in business to buy IT.   Your solution is a means to an end and the better you understand what “end” your prospect client has in mind and plug your company and solutions into that picture the more successful you’ll be.

Offer your clients strategic business expertise. Help them employ programs and products that will streamline marketing, printing, and filing issues. Create business plans that will give them more time to focus on the customers and end business results. By understanding your customer’s business from the inside out, you can provide your customers with an invaluable service that they won’t get anywhere else.

Remember, your customers are depending on you to come up with a genuine solution. Listen to the problem, and diagnose it completely before offering a solution. Don’t throw the first option at them too quick, but spend a little time qualifying your diagnosis.

Practice sales methods to create a need in the customer’s mind. Give an appropriate value proposal to the business so it doesn’t seem too big, explain the value and financial returns from the product and service, and don’t give the option to do nothing. Your customer needs to act.

Establish your reputation and value, create that need, and then follow through with top-notch customer service. Following these steps will help you find clients that want to work with you and want to compensate you well as

About the Author



John Tanner is a marketing consultant and founder of VAR
Strategy. 
After a career in military intelligence John helped grow businesses in various
industries through sales and marketing, eventually finding a passion for
challenges and opportunities for business development in the IT channels.

VAR Strategy is a product of this passion and was created to provide
helpful information and resources to assist VAR's in growing their businesses. 

Visit his blog and signup free to get tested marketing and business
development strategies by email, along with blog updates, news, and more! Go now
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