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All Buying is Based on Emotion… except of course in the public sector
Posted by Colin Wilson
In Jun 08
The old adage is alive and well… people buy from people… it has to ‘feel’ right in order for them to buy… and this means all buying is based on emotion. The job of sales is to get it to ‘feel’ right for the customer… and that is where the skill comes in… identifying what its going to take to make it ‘feel’ right and then achieving it.
However, it seems my grand theory of selling does not apply to public sector buying… or so I’ve been told… again… and it seems all that can be done is for sales to follow due process and act as the proverbial ‘walking talking brochure’… what else can they do?… they can’t influence the decision… there is a process that the public sector people have to follow… it’s structured… it has to be transparent… it can be audited by the audit committee… and the people in the process can’t favour any one supplier… the right choice has to be made due to a set of criteria.
The public sector buys differently to the commercial world… I know this because I’ve been told… again. The process has been designed to eliminate the human bit… follow the process and the right answer will be found… the public sector will have value for money…. um… sounds a little like the corporate world…. can’t do, public sector is different.
I have to admit I started writing a comparison of how the public sector buys versus the corporate world… just to show they are not that different. Well, they are different in that the public sector seems to have lots of rules, regulations and laws to make sure the procurement process is open and can’t be abused. I’ve just done some research and have been reading a number of official documents and to be quite honest I got bored… and so I’ve decided to scrap all that comparison stuff from this post and get straight to the point…
At the end of the day there is a tender document sent out… suppliers respond and the public sector employees take the responses and mark the responses… award points for the answers. These points are then multiplied against the predetermined weightings (notice they are predetermined, once set, can’t be changed… clever) and then scores totalled up to give an overall score for the tender. Best and final prices are then submitted by the hopeful suppliers and the decision is given to the supplier who demonstrates the best value… Best and Final Price / Total Points… the supplier with the lowest value score is awarded the contract.
It’s a fool proof system that is fair to all those that participate and it can’t be manipulated because it’s open for scrutiny… however, there is a flaw… the scoring is done by humans… and humans have emotions… even public sector ones. Most questions have answers that are open to interpretation and are therefore subjective… it’s up to the humans to interpret the answer and give it a score… sound familiar?
I want you to think about this… have you ever read an email and taken it badly… and then the person standing next to you who reads over you shoulder says… “oh, it’s not that bad, what they probably meant to say is this…” The person helping you interpret the email has put a positive spin on it, but if they did not like the person who sent it, then they would have probably put a negative spin on it… compounding your already negative thoughts. So what do you think happens with those public sector folks who read your responses… will they put a positive or negative interpretation on your response?… depends on how well they know you… how much they trust you… and if they want you to win or not… um… sounds a little like the corporate world…. and on that point I rest my case… all… and I mean all… buying is based on emotion.
6 Comments
I agree strongly. In my blog series The Pursuit of Certainty I said:
Choosing the right supplier is actually about one overriding thing, certainty, or perhaps more accurately, the pursuit of certainty. Certainty in the buyer’s mind (emotionally) and in fact (logically) that the chosen supplier can meet or exceed their requirements.
I believe it was / is a Miller Heiman who state that ‘people by emotionally and justify logically’ so they agree with you as well!
Colin, another great article. In light of the UK governments announcement that bureaucratic procedure is going to be shortened so that major public utility infrastructures no longer have to go through decade long procedures, how do you think this may affect the public sectors ‘emotional’ input into public sector sales processes?
I think I have you! If I can take all of the humans out of the buying process then it refutes your theory. Well let me see. If I made a multiple choice only question list, had robots score the questions, then sent it to a computer to be compiled. Oh wait that is an election in Florida. Emotions were definately a part of that one….damn back to the drawing board.
Sales Trainer thank you for your comment… Sales Trainer aka Karl Goldfield the startup sales mentor from the west coast… careful… you are developing a British sense of humour!
Colin, I’ve long been an advocate of appealing to the emotional nature of buyers. I believe the overarching need of all buyers is “to feel good.” However, I have a B2B selling expert friend who argues with me about this all the time. He says “in 20 years of B2B selling, I never once gave any attention to the buyer’s emotion during the sales relationship.” My response to him was, “Then you missed something valuable that could have generated more revenue.” Even the most analytical of buyers is an emotional creature.
Colin and Skip, you both make GREAT points. At the end of the day it is humans scoring the proposals, and they will give good marks to the ones they like. While you may not be able to take them golfing or to dinner you can show that you clearly understand the organizations needs and are able to fill them better than anyone else. That should net you better scores and more deals under contract.