Although this does apply to some other industries, it is particularly in the selling of technology that prospective customers can most of the time be divided in to two groups. Those customers who are intent on purchasing the cheapest solution to their problem, and those who will pay out more, as long as they feel that they are receiving added value that they wouldn’t get from other suppliers. I.e. value that you have tailored to their situation.

A lot of companies haven’t realised how big of an opportunity these potential customers present, nor have they concluded exactly how to create value for consumers outside their products and services. Research has recently shown that there are some specific sales skills that can be employed to create extra value in a customers mind.

The main idea behind creating value is to provide insight into the customers situation rather than simply telling them about your solution. To achieve this, companies need to tap into their expertise, or sometimes improve upon it.

Companies that sell technology sometimes simply use information on their product as their main selling points, however companies that use this kind of selling strategy are really nothing more than human web pages as customers can find all of the information about the products online, or if they cant they should be able to.

Generally speaking there are two key ways in which sellers can create value for potential customers:

-Inform them of a problem that they had not recognised before. Demonstrate your knowledge of their market and their industry by pointing out problems which they weren’t aware of before. If you can help to point out an unforeseen problem through carefully planned questions, you can bring enormous value as well as following it up of course, with the solution to said problem.

-Offer an unanticipated solution. Offering a solution that the customer has not anticipated means helping a customer to draft a more efficient solution to their problem and/or achieve a better outcome.

The customer must fall into one of these three categories in order for you to provide them with an unanticipated solution:

-They know what their needs are and know they need to be met soon

-They have a vague idea of a solution to their problem

-They know exactly what their desired outcome is

If one of these situations exists you are in a prime position to help the customer identify a better alternative through an unanticipated solution.