The DriveSales™ | Presales vs. Sales: What’s the Difference?
It is a common saying that the destination does not matter as much as the journey itself. This saying is very appropriate for the sales business. Every salesman dreams of closing as many deals as he can. But, that does not only reflect upon the capabilities of the salesman but also on the business as a whole.
It is essential to emphasize the need for well-strategized steps to score that final “goal”. But with so much stress upon the deals, the necessary steps to close a deal successfully are often overlooked.
For every business, it is of utmost importance to always have a vision of the “long-run”. Just thinking about the present convenience can cost you your business a few years or even months down the line. Not caring about the operational ability of your business can prove to be a major hurdle for the prosperity of your business.
Hence, it is absolutely necessary to have a strong and solid foundation of a sales operation plan that your employees can work according to and bring home amazing deals without succumbing to pressure and competition.
For companies that long for broader means to increase their profit, just having a sales team and a sales plan might not be all that is required. There are several steps between the final sales destination and all those steps are of equal importance and demand equal attention and investment.
This is where a presales strategy steps in.
Presales refers to the several activities or steps that occur before the final deal is closed such as prospecting, calls, product demos, renewing deals, etc.
Presales activities:
1) Meaningful leads — In the sales business, you come across loads of leads and potential clients. However, it is important to filter out the leads according to the requirements and needs of your venture. Thus, finding meaningful leads amongst the pool of leads becomes a very important task. Without it, your sales team is rendered confused and incapacitated without any direction to go about. This creates problems for your business in the long run.
Without it, you might waste your resources such as time, capital, product, effort, etc, on a client that does not align with your business needs at all.
2) Making calls — Making calls is another one of the major presales activities. It involves conversations between your company and the potential client to feel their reason of inclination towards your product or service.
It enables you to build a level of trust and credibility with your potential client. Also, it helps you to make a perfect pitch for your leads and increases the chances of your successful partnership with your client.
3) Presentations — Your presales plan must include a strategic way of representing the collected information through research and calls. What better and professional way to do it than preparing presentations.
Even the best of propositions can fail if not conveyed smoothly and efficiently. Hence, this step cannot be stressed upon enough. It allows your team as well as your customer to understand your idea and pitch better and thus, increases chances of successful sales.
4) Competitor and customer analysis — The foundation of every successful sale is knowledge. Along with the knowledge about your product and service, it is absolutely crucial for you to know your competition and potential client well. In today’s competitive world, every client looks for an “out-of-the-box” idea. This distinct idea can only be thought, researched, delivered, and explored only if you know what the others in the market have up their sleeves.
Similarly, knowing your customers and their needs provides you an edge over all the others out there. It helps in building an emotional relationship between your product and the client. Knowing your client better would only assist you in successfully scoring the deal.
5) Buyer persona — Now that your presales team has gathered all the necessary information about your client, you can put that data to use and create an extensive buyer persona. This can help your sales team to explore all the possible strategies for client propositions and pitches and come up with the best one.
Presales vs sales
Now that you are extensively familiar with presales and sales and have a thorough understanding of what they both stand for, it is essential for you to understand how they are different from each other.
Presales is a term used for the activities that take place before the actual sales take place. All the building blocks of your initial sales stage come under this category.
Sales, however, is the act of actual pitching, presenting and, selling your product to the client.
The sole purpose of the presales plan is to make the sales more smooth, efficient, and seamless. They both are extensively different from each other and yet they complement each other perfectly. Good coordination between these two plans is absolutely necessary for the growth and success of your business.
Now, as an effective SALESPERSON! We can do three things from here.
1. Not ignoring the opportunity and blaming the situation for revenue loss.
2. Taking important notes and going back to revisit your sales strategy with the growth mindset.
3. Reaching out to The DriveSales™ if you need any specialized help for sales.
To conclude, what you choose to think also provides some idea of your development as a consultative salesperson. It is something like Brian Tracy quotes “Approach each customer with the idea of helping him or her solve a problem or achieve a goal, not of selling a product or service.”
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