1. © SiriusDecisions. All Rights Protected and Reserved. 1
Research Brief
Music legend Bob Dylan once wrote, “That he not busy being born is busy
dying.” Today, many b-to-b organizations are looking for a rebirth of their own
through the more systematic sale of solutions vs. point products or services.
Critical to this rebirth will be the ability for sales reps to reach and effectively
sell to senior-level executives, where the business value of solutions tends to
resonate the most.
Within these organizations, sales leaders are busy planning and implementing
initiatives to improve the ability of reps to call higher; however, many have
underestimated what these initiatives must entail. In this brief, we introduce
and examine the components of our ONE (obtain insights, navigate for access,
elevate the dialogue) process for selling to senior executives, and explore the
options of segmenting the sales force and/or leveraging subject matter experts
(SMEs) when looking to reach these buyers.
Obtaining Insights
Ask senior-level executives about their expectations when they meet with reps
and you will likely hear, “they have to know my business.” In this first process
component, reps do their homework about a buyer’s industry and key business
issues. Specifics must include:
• Online information collection. To better understand buyers, reps should
start with the vast amount of data available online, including a company’s
Web site, financial reports, industry/trade sites, financial sites (e.g. Google
Finance and Yahoo! Finance), and business information sites (e.g. OneSource
and Hoover’s). The focus must be on grasping the overarching objectives,
strategies and challenges facing the company specifically and its industry in
general. It’s likely that a field force is calling across the same industries; to
avoid duplicating efforts, marketing can conduct high-level research on these
industries, then summarize, organize and post the information on an internal
sales portal or enablement system. From a skills perspective, don’t assume
that just because reps are reading financial reports that they understand
what they’re reading. Provide basic financial acumen training, including how
to read and dissect balance sheets and financial statements, and the use
of analytical skills to glean key data to utilize when meeting with a senior
executive. If the account is publicly traded, encourage reps to listen to live or
archived quarterly analyst conference earnings calls. These calls often include
top officers, and offer timely and relevant information on the company’s
performance, challenges and current strategies.
Preparing Salespeople for (a) Higher
Calling
As organizations strive to sell more
solutions, their reps will increasingly
face off against a variety of senior-
level buying roles
To improve these interactions, sales
leaders should adopt a systematic
process to help reps; our process is
known as ONE
Creating unique senior-level selling
roles and leveraging subject matter
experts are two other ways to help an
organization improve results

2. Research Brief
© SiriusDecisions. All Rights Protected and Reserved. 2
• Internal information gathering. Beyond publicly available
information, it’s vital that reps get “inside intelligence” by
talking with company employees. Ask reps to conduct a sales
call where the objective is not to close business but rather to
learn more about the company. Training should be provided
to allow reps to practice conducting these research calls,
while marketing can be enlisted to help provide dialogue
templates that reps can use in preparation.
Navigating for Access
Our second process component involves teaching a rep to
gain access to a senior-level executive who likely sees no need
to meet. Marketing can help soften the beachhead through
the use of targeted messages to senior-level decisionmakers;
while such efforts should be ongoing, they should increase in
frequency and specificity once a sales opportunity is active. It
can further enable reps by providing content assets (e.g. white
papers, case studies, testimonials) for use in engaging with
senior executives. Following are additional options for reps
looking to gain access:
• Introduction from an internal champion. The best access
strategy is through an internal referral, so reps need to
understand how to select and cultivate a champion within
the organization who can get them senior-level access.
During the sales process, a rep should look for opportunities
to negotiate for access; for example, he or she may provide
an on-site reference visit in exchange for a meeting with a
key senior executive.
• Other options. While the likelihood to succeed is certainly
less than our first option, there are tacks reps can take
to gain access. One is to send an unsolicited letter or
email requesting a meeting; it should highlight some of
the knowledge captured in the obtain insights phase,
identifying issues and challenges that your organization can
help to address. Another option is to simply wait until an
opportunity presents itself during the course of a
sales/buying cycle to engage. A rep does run the risk,
however, of having competitors get access – and mindshare
– before he or she has the chance to do so.
Elevating the Dialogue
The ONE process culminates with meeting a senior executive.
This call is very different from a traditional sales call, where
reps probe to uncover needs and link them to product
features/benefits. Here, best practices include:
• Make the call prescriptive. Reps must quickly demonstrate
an understanding of the executive’s business and potential
needs, leveraging knowledge gained about the organization
to do so. This can take the form of a structured presentation,
either formal (standing up and using PowerPoint) or
informal (sitting across from the executive using a discussion
document). Marketing should provide the template for these
presentations, which will include a review of the company’s
key objectives, strategies to meet them, and challenges they
may face in executing those strategies; reps then discuss
how their products and services can help address these
challenges.
• Vary meeting tone and cadence. Begin meetings by
reviewing an understanding of the executive’s business; the
initial tone should reflect caution in case some information
has changed or is incomplete. However, when talking
about his or her own organization and how it can help the
executive’s business, the rep should use a confident tone.
Throughout the presentation, reps should ensure that
expectations are being met; unless requested, avoid going
into a product or solution deep dive.
Other Options to Consider
Consider a typical rep with a geographic territory calling across
five to six industries, responsible for 20 to 30 companies and
two to four different senior-level buying centers within each
company. Simply put, it may be unrealistic to expect a single
person to master the vast amount of knowledge necessary
to engage intelligently with senior-level buyers across all of
these industries, companies and functions. Sales productivity
is another consideration. The time it will take a rep to execute
the elements of the ONE process is significant, and will
undoubtedly take away from other core selling activities. To
address these issues, your organization may want to consider
the following:
• Creating a special force to expand and elevate. We
have seen sales organizations create a unique field force
focused on working within existing accounts to elevate and
expand relationships. These forces are usually segmented
by industry, so they have deep domain expertise and the

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Research Brief
ability to apply this expertise to engage at a senior level. A chief consideration
to taking this step is the cost-of-sales increase, in terms of both the added
human resources required and the team compensation structure that must
be created.
• Utilizing SMEs. It’s not uncommon for companies to use a sales engineer to
sell to a technical buyer; a similar approach can be taken for a senior-level
buyer. For example, we have seen some companies keep former CFOs on
retainer to help prepare and deliver presentations to senior level financial
buyers. Again, the key consideration here is the return on investment
expected calculated vs. the added cost of sales.
The Sirius Decision
The evolution from product-centric to solution-centric selling is one that many
sales organizations must make to both sustain and create growth. While this
evolution will often have roots in marketing, forward-thinking chief sales
officers will need to quickly engage their leadership team in these initiatives,
and join forces with marketing to map out the strategy and implement an
enablement process for success. Focusing your efforts based on our ONE
framework will help to ensure salespeople get the help they need in not only
getting onto executive row, but succeeding when they do.