Getting past your client’s inbuilt bias

Procurement only seem like soulless blood sucking vampires - in reality they like to be helpful and are your best friend for learning how to position yourself in the market.

Selling product can be enormously frustrating at times.

Client representatives don’t understand what they need and don’t understand enough about the problem or the industry to know what you do or not.

Procurement staff can follow a simple checklist and screen you out if you don’t tick the exact boxes they have on the list, even if the list doesn’t make sense.

You may have years of experience in a product, but if you don’t have experience in the client’s industry then they say no, even if it is the same product that is your core business.

It may be that your client doesn’t like anyone other than the major supplier or two.

The procurement policies may prevent buying product from companies with less than 2 or 3 years trading history.

And so on.

There are a few tricks to get past it.

First off – try and look like your competitors. The reasoning for this is that if your branding, promotional literature and product descriptions are similar to that of the major competitors in your industry then your buyers will know what you do. They can then tick that part of the checklist.

Second – anticipate the biases and get on the front foot. Address any and all concerns up front. Use language like – one of the questions our clients ask are XXX, and we help them with that concern by XXX.

Third - recognise procurement policies and practices. One of the best ways to learn about what major clients are looking for is by participating in tenders. By going through a tender process you will learn a lot and even if you don’t get shortlisted by doing it you are putting your name on the radar.

If you have any friends in procurement (regardless of industry) try and seek feedback on what works or not. Also, some industries have common registers of suppliers – get on those registers.

Fourth - recognise what appeals to corporate buyers as opposed to retail buyers. Corporate buyers are looking at price, value, quality, guarantees, etc. Whereas a lot of retail marketing is emotional or aspirational. If you take retail marketing language into a corporate market you may not gain traction.