Many markets today have experienced a metamorphosis from once being seller driven, where the product company dictates the market dynamics, to now being consumer driven, where the shopper drives the market dynamics. This change to consumer driven markets suggests that it is a lot less vital what the selling sales groups believe the market wants, as the shopper supplies the winning plan.

And since the buyer controls the buying bucks, somebody will always deliver what they desire. So while everybody keys in on consumer wishes today, why is there still so much churn around getting selling and sales on the same page? Because the operations processes have not modified to accommodate a consumer driven model, although sales and selling maybe have on their lonesome. How frequently is it the operations groups in your company feel overpowered with sales leads that need product changes to fulfill? If this happens a lot, it suggests the bequest development and selling processes are still driving a seller driven market model. That is what causes disconnect.

Here is why. In seller driven markets, promoting groups conduct research that identifies market issues, and then they match the core competencies of the company to identify a solution. Over time this blueprint is turned into a service or product. It is launched, the sales groups are trained, and they’re going fishing for clients to shut deals. The plan is dictated by selling and obviously voiced to sales. In vendor driven markets, buyers appraise how they can adopt their solutions using the product. Now let’s investigates how buyer driven markets must be serviced.

The market problem and “specification” comes from the consumer. The sales force then takes this as a “lead” into the operations. But since it contains client requests it’s not as qualified (doesn’t match the product target) by selling. That is where the friction and disappointment starts. Sales are the lead and the buyer decides what they need, which is a role reversal for the techniques. So what does sales groups need today to be successful?

They need a support process that can rapidly research shopper requests, quickly identify if it is serviceable, and if so deliver the service to the client before the competition. Does this imply each service delivered is customized? No. But it implies that service or product management’s role has to switch to one of an aggregator of common requests coming from sales groups that drives the organization’s concerns for the highest money potential.