The vast majority of prospects are SME businesses and more often than not, tailored training and books on sales focus on the blue chip businesses. At hubb we value our SME customers and we identified some key areas we feel are most important to SME business owners when they choose a service provider.
1. Radical Transparency (Pricing)
The typical SME business is extremely price sensitive and that means pricing must be 100% transparent and there can be no hidden costs.
If we stop and think about an SME business owner and their journey to starting the business, it makes perfect sense that cost is at the forefront of their mind. Consider the personal financial sacrifice and risk of starting a business. In many cases, these individuals have went to the wire and risked their families security to get the business going and they see the business’s income as their own personal income.
When selling to SME’s make them aware of any hidden costs, never hide them. Not only should this be standard practice for any business as it’s the right thing to do. It helps build credibility and long term relationships.
2. MAKE IT AN “ROI” CONVERSATION
In conjunction with the last point make sure you bring the savings you will make the customer feel real. If you can save a customer, for example £2400 a year what does that mean to them? Think about point 1 again, these decision makers might be thinking that covers my fuel costs for the year. Understanding where our customers pain points are help us relate the savings we make and show we are thinking about them and their challenges.
3. Play Where They Play
What hubb really care about isn’t social media or Facebook or Instagram , Tik Tok or any other channel– it’s under-priced attention, wherever our prospects spend most of their time.
What really matters to hubb prospects is that we offer good deal and save them time in the process. When spending time playing where your prospects play we give evidence on how we are working with other similar businesses, or a quick demo of the product to allow them to quickly evaluate whether they see value in the service. It doesn’t matter to me where it is, whether it’s online or real life. It only matters that it’s a good deal and ideally the prospects can see how well your service is working.
hubb’s growth has been astounding and while there are many factors behind this, I thought this short article might give other start ups some food for thought.
