We’ve all heard “Delivery does the job, and the field gets the glory “ In a world with smarter buyers, long evaluation processes, and competitors who all look and sound the same, your solution architects and tech consultants play a bigger role than ever before in your sales cycles.

Last 3 years we’ve witnessed an unmistakable trend; The smartest organisations have started to inject a consultative sales DNA in their customer-facing tech teams. Microsoft, Cisco and AWS have been at the forefront of this strategy. More than 700 customer facing tech professionals from these organisations took our “Value Selling for Tech Teams” course in 2021.

While Selling is a lone wolf, Growth is a team game.

4 Reasons why your tech teams should have a sales DNA

1. Building credible conversations

It is where the rubber meets the road and techies have a unique lens through which they view customers. Your solution architects are better equipped to manage objections, differentiate on capabilities, and overall solution understanding. The customer expects us to solve their top challenges and they do just that.

Our advice: get technical experts to think proactively about where the untapped areas of opportunity are at your accounts, and create conversations based on those ideas.

2. Crafting the best solutions

Customer facing tech teams have higher product and solution expertise than your average sales rep and they are more likely to provide solutions to your customers toughest problems at the right time and create better 2 way dialogues during the evaluation process. They understand the “WHY” better,

Our Advise: 65% of Top Performers have core consultative selling skills versus just 41% of The Rest. Train your solution architects on the fundamentals of consultative selling. You can expect a 20% higher closure rate.

3. Easily coachable

It’s easier to teach the fundamentals of consultative selling to solution architects but difficult to teach products to salespeople. Their learning approach makes them extraordinary.

4. Penetrating key accounts

When it comes to growing accounts and expanding your relationship coverage, your project managers are the most likely people to get you a seat at the table. Not only because they are closer to the end customer on a day to day basis but also they are seen as people who are “helping” and not selling.

Our Advise: To drive better penetration in key accounts, your technical expert needs to understand Strategic Account Management.