I’ve discussed this topic in a couple of other thought streams, but I’d like to come back to it. If you’re a sales professional carrying a quota, overcoming budgetary barriers can be a challenge. If you’re trying to fit your solution into a CapEx or OpEx budget, this conversation can slow down your sales cycle or push it all together. Chances are you have an ROI story around your solution, but that can be a tough sell if the dollars haven’t already been budgeted for your project. Your #1 competitor is all the other vendors competing for the same budgetary dollars you’re after.
How do you overcome the budgetary stall? You can try to be like all the other vendors and make your case why your solution should be chosen for those coveted budgetary dollars. You’ll discuss value, creative price structuring, deferred payments, ROI, etc. Just know that all the other vendors are doing the exact same thing. You need to think outside of the box and differentiate from the rest of the crowd.
Instead of competing for the same dollars as everyone else, a better approach is to help your prospect or client find the additional dollars that could be used to fund your project. I refer to this as “Couch Money“. You do this by partnering. By example, I work with several vendors that operate on a contingency-based or gain share revenue model; meaning, nothing saved or earned = nothing owed. These vendors offer solutions that have no cost component and operate purely on savings or earned rebates. The fee to their clients is a percentage of the savings or rebates earned; hence, nothing saved or earned = nothing owed. These are zero risk solutions that you can introduce to your prospect or client in an effort to find additional dollars to fund your project.
For more information on these vendors visit our “Solutions” page. If your prospect or client fits the profile for any of these solutions, this may be your path to finding that additional “Couch Money” needed to fund your project.