“Coyote and Badger” Teamwork Can Improve Your Chances of Solution Selling Success

Salespeople are not necessarily the best at working together. They are often used to working on their own with individual goals and success metrics. In fact, some really resist collaborating with team members. They don’t understand or accept the potential power of sales teamwork. 

A surprising example of teamwork in nature was first documented in the 1880s and has since been studied extensively. Field biologists write about the curious partnering of two competing predators: the coyote and the badger. Both inhabit the same territory and go after the same prey (burrowing rodents). You would think they would be arch enemies. But they have found ways to cooperate that benefit them both. They are specialized hunters. The coyote captures its prey by chasing and pouncing; the badger digs them up. If the ground squirrel runs to escape, it belongs to the coyote; if it dives underground, it goes to the badger. When these two hunters worked together, they were more successful than when they worked on their own.

Though we don’t want to overwork the analogy, our two decades of experience in solution selling training has convinced us that sales rep “hunters” and “farmers” can be more successful at capturing their prospective “prey” together than alone. It is a simple matter of recognizing the specialties or strengths each individual brings to the team and then strategizing to use them to the team’s advantage. Think about each sales opportunity and then, as a team, figure out which personality and approach would mesh best with the customer and what knowledge base would be most relevant to the solution and stage of the opportunity. 

Our bet is that once your sales reps see some success, you will win over even the most reluctant team member. Whoever thought a coyote and a badger could cooperate effectively?

Learn more at http://www.lsaglobal.com/solution-selling-training/