5 B2B Sales Tips for Startups

You’ve identified a pressing problem for most businesses, developed an amazing solution, and built a business around it. There’s no doubt that it’s a great product, but you’re still having a hard time selling it. This article on B2B Sales Tips for Startups will help you change that.

B2B vs B2C Sales

Business-to-Business (B2B) selling is a whole different landscape from Business-to-Consumer (B2C) selling, where we are accustomed to. Because we are those consumers, every day, we encounter thousands of advertisements from companies who want to sell their products to us.

B2B is different. Its audience is businesses, and businesses have a hierarchy, budgets, and politics. Although, they both have one thing in common—people. 

It’s easy to disregard individuals when talking about B2B selling. But we must remember that in any B2B sales deal, you’ll be meeting with people, getting people’s approval, and having people as end-users for your product.

Now that we’ve established that B2B selling is still about people, we focus on them to help drive sales to your startup.

Business Owners as Salesmen

Before delving towards the 5 B2B Sales Tips for Startups, let’s discuss selling first. Several entrepreneurs say that they’re not salesmen or that they’re not comfortable with selling. Let’s change this. 

As a business owner, you should be your product’s number one salesman. Especially in a startup, you portray the brand and bring the business wherever you go. 

Although it would be great to have one, you don’t need to have a Business degree to nail these B2B sales tips. As mentioned, it’s all about focusing on the consumer.

So let’s get on it, here are 5 B2B Sales Tips for Startups to help you close your next business deal.

Tip #1: Know Your Target Market

Just like how you can’t sell the best tennis shoes to a basketball player, you won’t be able to sell your product if your audience doesn’t need it. Plain and simple. Yes, your product caters to businesses, but remember our realization earlier? You’re selling it to people. 

Start by identifying to whom do you want to sell your product by creating an ideal customer persona. What is their position in the company? Are they the ones who will use your product? What business problem of theirs is your product solving?

This point is the most important among all these B2B Sales Tips for Startups, so think about it thoroughly. Deciding on these things at the beginning helps you zero in on your target market and nail selling.

Tip #2: Learn the Inbound Strategy

Gone are the days when salesmen knock from door to door, showing up at business’ doors to meet the CEO and try to sell their product. Today, selling is a two-way street. As much as you can communicate with your potential clients, they can also respond to your communications, ask you questions, and even connect with your clients to learn more about you.

So, what is the Inbound Strategy? Basically, rather than bombarding your prospects with ads and call-to-actions for buying, you focus on giving them value from the beginning to end of their customer journey. This may be through training, eBooks, or other free resources that your target customer will find useful.

In turn, these prospects will see the benefit you bring to them and come to you to discuss business. Learn more about it here: Creating an Inbound Strategy.

Tip #3: Map Out the Customer Journey

Once you’ve established your strategy, it’s time to craft the customer journey through funnels. These are steps that a prospect will go through before they become your client.

To map out the customer journey, start with where should your ideal customer find you. From there, lay out the interactions you’ll have with them. How many emails? What is the content of those emails?

Once you’ve listed the journey, put yourself in your prospect’s shoes. How will you feel about this journey? Is it too long? Too short? Polish it and make sure it centers on the consumer and in addressing their needs.

Tip #4: Focus On the Solutions Your Product Brings; Not Its Features

A lot of salesmen make the mistake of highlighting the features of what they’re selling—my product can do this, this, and this. Your audience doesn’t care if your product has 100 amazing features. What they care about is if it can solve their pain points. 

Your product exists to solve a need, and that’s what you should focus on when selling to potential clients.

Tip #5: Track Your Results

For every deal, regardless if it’s closed, dead, or lost, data tracking is important. Information like your person of contact’s (POC) position, duration for each part of the journey, and size of the company, are great examples for this. 

These data give valuable information for your Sales Team to duplicate what you did right and improve what you didn’t. It will also help in revisiting your strategy, making sure it centers on the consumer and their needs.

At the end of the day, you’re selling to people. So, a great B2B selling strategy starts with knowing your target customer and focusing on them in every step of the sales process.