If you sell complex products and services, you need to call higher in your customer’s organization.

Do you know how much high-level customer executives care about your products and services? Zero, zip, nada. How’s that for a paradox?

We were having a group discussion during one of my recent sales training workshops.

One of the participants, Darryl, said, “I’m not buying it. You are telling us that we need to find ways to help our customers accelerate their business results. Well that doesn’t work.”

When I asked Darryl to elaborate he explained, “Whenever I ask my customer about the critical issues facing his company he says, ‘Don’t worry about that. Just give me the cheapest price in the market and I will buy from you.’”

Here’s the rub. Darryl’s prices are not the cheapest in the market…and probably never will be.

Then I found out that Darryl’s customer contact is a Procurement Manager. The fact that he was not calling on a high-level executive partially explains his dilemma.

Before we go further, I should explain that “complex products and services” are those that have multiple features, a high price tag, necessitate longer sales cycles and sometimes involve difficult negotiations.

The more complex your products or services, the more you need relationships at MULTIPLE levels of the customer’s organization.

That’s because there is a chasm between lower-level and higher-level managers. That chasm exists in what they think about, what they worry about and what they are paid to do.

Lower-level managers are frequently tasked with finding products and services, which meet explicit specifications, at the lowest possible price. When you make a proposal to a lower-level manager, it usually has to be approved by a higher-level manager.

So here’s the deal: If you are stuck calling on lower-level managers, you are doomed to fighting price battles and losing some business to lower-priced competitors.

About the best you can do is to:

• Point out any REAL differences between your products and services and your competitors

• Look for ways to help the manager accomplish their personal goals (such as being promoted, being perceived positively by their management, etc.)

• Be easier to do business with than your competitors

• Look better than your competitors (in the way you dress and in your communication)

Unlike lower-level managers however, higher-ups don’t care about products and services.

They are under pressure to address complicated business issues so their company can accomplish its vision, mission and strategy.

If you can show an executive how you can potentially help them address these issues faster and more efficiently, they are likely to want to hear more.

This opens the door for you to develop a sound business case for partnering with you…which means using your products and services.

This tells you that you must cultivate relationships at higher levels of your customer’s organization.

In most cases you have to continue calling on your daily contact, but over time you have to expand your reach.

Don’t try to develop higher-level relationships INSTEAD of paying attention to lower level managers. Develop them IN ADDITION to relationships at lower levels.

Only higher-level executives can understand how your products and services can help them accelerate their business results.

And senior executives have authority to pay a premium price for your proposal. Lower-level managers don’t.

Here’s what it comes down to: If you sell complex products and services, your customer doesn’t need another salesperson. They need a business partner.

(This article may not be reprinted or copied without written permission from Howard Wallin.)