The Complexity of an Organisation's B2B Buying Journey

When we are responsible for sales within a business, it is easy to get consumed about what is important to us without considering what is going on in our potential client's organisation.

This point of view is completely understandable as we tend to focus on what is important in our immediate world like budget pressures, targets, financial runway, and pressures from various stakeholders within the business.

It is not uncommon for no consideration to be paid to the buying journey our potential clients need to go through in order to purchase anything of high value within a business.

I once lived in this world firsthand because I believed we were such a disruptive technology, were going to change the world to make it a much better place, and our clients would naturally see this, lining up to buy hand over fist.

In the world of high-value B2B complex SaaS sales for start-ups, this is very rarely the case if ever (I can't think of an example).

Through some tough lessons and many false starts, I needed to find a better way.

Gartner's illustration of the buying journey below, clearly demonstrates how our target client's world is complex, consisting of many competing priorities and different influences.

There are many factors that can derail sales within a business, even if it will transform their organisation for the better.

If you are a new disruptive SaaS business, this becomes considerably more challenging because you are offering a solution before they have really identified the real problem that needs addressing. It looks more like this.

SOLUTION EXPLORATION > PROBLEM INDENTIFICATION > REQUIREMENTS GATHERING > SUPPLIER SELECTION

If you are getting blockages in your sales pipeline and can't quite seem to figure it out no matter what you try, it may be because your target clients are getting caught up in their internal challenges of getting to a buying decision.

This may present as a potential deal just fizzling out and going stale.

If this is the case, it presents a great opportunity for you to create a partnership approach and lead them to better outcomes with your expert knowledge by helping them through their journey.

This is the foundation of finding your sales market fit by applying learnings from current clients and similar-sized target organisations to map out various buying journeys to create an accelerated sales machine.

Becoming an expert in how your clients buy will help your team lead client opportunities through their buying journey quicker, improve sales outcomes and outsmart the competition.