Guest Author

Ronan Gavin

Following on from my last blog post on the role of procurement I wanted to share some insight and strategies to help identify a win-win outcome with procurement.

Procurement Managers are under increasing pressure at present to deliver real cost savings. When positioning a solution make sure you can show a savings benefit that he can position with the business i.e. make him look good amongst his peers. Also try and get a clear view on procurement’s relationship with the business as you could win a useful ally if you can bolster his position internally by arming him with new innovative ways to tackle a problem that he can sell to the business.

Understand the process that procurement go through internally with the business from detailing specifications, assessing the market, going through formal evaluation process and selection and negotiation with preferred supplier. Understanding this is as important for you in setting expectations internally in your own organisation as to the effort involved and timelines of a sales opportunity.

Getting procurement to map out their sourcing process from start to finish will also enable you to identify and plan how and where you can differentiate yourselves from the competition. It is important to remember that evaluations carry a price and non-price element and a good relationship with procurement will enable you to get an indication in some instances how the evaluation is weighted.

My final conclusion is that traditional selling approaches of selling to the business and then defending your position at the very end of the cycle is not effective, particularly in today’s economic climate where the spotlight is on procurement. Be brave – invest the time with procurement as early as possible in the cycle and you can reap the benefits of selling through and not at procurement.

What are your views and experiences on the above? Let’s hear from Procurement people as well!

Ronan Gavin is Business Development Manager with Supplierforce. With over 16 years experience in the technology and financial services industries, Ronan has a unique combination of solution selling and procurement knowledge. With a career which has spanned sales, marketing, consultancy and corporate banking, Ronan has extensive experience in new business development and global account management roles across multiple industries internationally.

Guest Author

Ronan Gavin

Amongst senior sales professionals, the word “procurement” typically brings an emotive response, usually in the negative. There are two reasons for this;

1. Sales professionals do not understand the role of procurement within their organisation and the internal challenges that procurement face with their own business stakeholders.

2. There is a great variance in the professional capability of procurement professionals in the Irish market in particular and a lack of awareness amongst senior sales professionals how to recognise the role procurement managers play within the target organisation. This is a contentious point but a very valid one.

On the first point, it is important to understand that procurement grapple with an ongoing challenge to prove their personal value to the business. From experience I advocate engaging with Procurement at the outset as a very useful strategy. This is because capable procurement managers will always look for new innovative ways from suppliers to bring enhanced value to the business (and budget holders). They are primarily compensated on cost savings but delivering increased value and lower cost on a sustained basis is what maintains and increases their value to the business.

On the second point, bear in mind that procurement managers are not all the same. Some procurement managers are only brought in at the end of the sales cycle as a matter of policy to extract lower pricing from you and it is important to recognise these tactical practices. As a general rule the level of sophistication of procurement usually drives how early the business get them involved. By engaging early in the sales cycle with procurement or even when there is no sales cycle in place, this enables you to decide on the most appropriate sales strategy to adopt with Procurement.

There are different approaches and strategies I have adopted over time to ensure the most successful outcome, but the main advice I would give is to clearly understand the role procurement play within their organisation as early as possible in the sales cycle. You may be surprised to know that procurement can be of assistance in some organisations to position new solutions to the business.

Ronan Gavin is Business Development Manager with Supplierforce. With over 16 years experience in the technology and financial services industries, Ronan has a unique combination of solution selling and procurement knowledge. With a career which has spanned sales, marketing, consultancy and corporate banking, Ronan has extensive experience in new business development and global account management roles across multiple industries internationally.

Apologies for not blogging in a while, it’s not an excuse but this is easily the busiest I have been since I started the business. I know it’s a great complaint in the present environment.

Wow! What a week this week was, I am both excited and exhausted as a result. I have so many people to thank, it’s not funny

My dear friend and mentor “Dave Brock” was in Ireland all week to help us kick off The International Partnership. Dave is a genuine thought leader on sales and biz development. He has more experience and wisdom in his little finger than most of us could hope to achieve in a lifetime.

Monday: Sales Leadership Ireland – The Buyers Perspective

John O Gorman of the ASG Group and I organised the second SLI event. John is currently writing a book that will no doubt prove an invaluable sales resource. More about that in the coming months.

Dave Brock kicked off the event and talked about “adopting an outward in perspective in conversations with clients will help us all understand our clients a bit better”. Dave has been called “the conversation starter” and the resulting dialogue was wonderful. “We tend to talk a lot about putting the customer first but then forget to put ourselves in their shoes, the question what keeps your customer up at night is as still as valid as ever”

Dave Coffee from Supplierforce was next up. Dave is an expert on procurement and after hearing him talk, I can’t recommend the guy highly enough. The insight he provided was a salesperson’s dream.  “Buying has changed and procurement people within orgs are under immense pressure to help drive the business forward”

Dave’s 10 tips for salespeople.

1.    Seek to understand the level of strategic procurement that is taking place in the organisation you are targeting
2.    Beware of coming in late in the sourcing process
3.    Focus on the total cost of the solution and understand the overall investment that needs to be made
4.    Segment yourself
5.    Don’t oversell
6.    Listen and engage in conversations
7.    Engage across multiple levels before you propose
8.    Don’t stop once you get the sales ensure implementation is successful
9.    Consider your clients efficiency ratio
10.    Make sure you know how to speak to the CFO

When someone of the calibre of Sean Weafer says that he found it “more stimulating that anything I’ve attended in selling here to date” you know something good went down. Thanks to everyone that attended live and on Twitter, the interaction and insight was brilliant.

This is what I had intended SLI to be, when I started the group.

Still to come…..

3 more great events
Talks from 3 of Ireland’s most successful entrepreneurs.
One of Ireland’s leading experts for Tech companies.
The spanking new bloggers network for business in Ireland.
The greatest sales resource on the planet
Why many Irish companies are born International
And a whole lot of networking

Join me next time to find out more