Download This Special Report

Sunday, November 11, 2007

Project Management: How to Overcome Small Business Sales Objections

One of the biggest issues for those selling computer networks, IT-related products and services to small businesses is project management; and a more specific challenge related to project management is the process of overcoming sales objections that your prospects have.

Where Does this Project Management Problem Begin?

Typically, when you start trying to sell a network upgrade, a lot of small business prospects, customers and clients start to focus on cost. But what they are not thinking about are the soft costs involved in NOT installing a network. They don’t realize they can experience loss of employee productivity, downtime because fault-tolerance is thought of after the fact and services costs that result from bad solutions selected simply because they don’t cost a lot.

This is where you have to think about how to approach this from a strong project management perspective. Even if you are very thorough with your initial consultation, IT audit, site survey, reports, etc., some prospect, customer and client objections can come up right before you get the “okay” to proceed with the project.

Project Management: Overcoming Sales Objections is Critical

A minor concern can stop an entire sale, so you need to have great project management skills and be ready to address concerns when trying to close the deal. If you’re aware of the most common objections, you can anticipate them ahead of time.

The First Sales Objection: Apathy

Apathy is very difficult for those even with the best project management skills to overcome. When small business decision makers are apathetic towards installing a network, the process of selling might take weeks, months or perhaps even years. But if you can figure out the root of the apathy, you can move the process along much faster.

For example, you might come across someone that sees no problem with a P2P network. But a few big problems can cause the small business owner to see how wrong he/she is. For example, the server might be totally reliable until someone working on the computer acting as the server accidentally hits the reset button. Then everything goes down and there can be lost data and other major problems.

If you want to have great project management skills and overcome more of the common sales objections, you have to have a store of horror stories and know when to deliver them.

Network Reliability, Project Management and Overcoming Sales Objections

PC/LAN network reliability can be problematic when the P2P server “accidentally” performs an unannounced and unscheduled shutdown and restart because of a prompted reboot from a software program.

Using P2P networks means protecting data is not a concern right off the bat. If the server is not protected with hard drives, a tape backup drive, a server-class UPS and antivirus software, the P2P network is susceptible to failure. Often, some “divine intervention” in the form of a storm and blackout can make clients see the light when their “server” shuts completely down and they cannot retrieve important data.

The Fear of Catastrophic Data Loss

Catastrophic data loss is an excellent motivator for surmounting apathy and can help prospects, customers and clients see the importance of your suggestions for better project management techniques. You can show them how important centralized data protection and control is to their businesses.

The Main Idea

If you are selling IT-related products and services, you have to hone your sales skills and project management techniques in order to overcome common sales objections.

Added By: Computer Consulting Kit