Trade shows, direct mail, Instagram, and phone calls are among the ways people are selling software, according to the feedback from last month’s article. Some months, the feedback comes in comments at the bottom of the article, which are always welcome, but in other months the feedback comes via email or phone calls and usually lead to interesting conversations. The discussions over the last few weeks included some pushback and some support, and all led me to want to expand on the story.

This isn’t an attempt to move you away from your favorite sales methodology. It is intended to augment your approach based on what buyers and sellers of software have shared. Let’s start with a couple of buyer stories.

Buyer A (identity protected to protect the innocent) was having bottleneck problems during 2020 and decided to do some research to see what might be available to help. He wasn’t sure what caused the bottlenecks because he was getting different stories from the CSRs, prepress team, and the production manager. He called in his primary workflow vendors, and that is where he says the problems started. Every vendor he talked to, most of whom he had relationships with for more than a decade, pointed fingers at every other vendor. Not one offered to help his assess his current workflow and not one asked about the specifics of the bottlenecks. The conversations were all about selling more software and displacing other vendors. Buyer A ended up becoming Not Buyer A. He has decided that he and his team will do more due diligence to uncover their challenges before they talk to another vendor. Based on the behavior of those he spoke with, he may look for a new vendor with a clear migration strategy. He wanted me to know that the thing that bothered him the most was the lack of respect for his time and his business.