Procurement software is the automation of the procurement process across a web-based system that allows buyers and sellers to locate each other quickly and submit relevant bids for products and services.
By implementing reliable procurement software or services, it enables a company to stabilize the process of obtaining necessary materials and services at quite affordable rates. Of course, besides the obvious financial advantages, procurement software/service also helps a company to have sustainable economic growth.
Today, we’re going to talk about the ways you can effectively sell your procurement software/services.
To start it off, let’s look at the key benefits of having good procurement.
Improved Spend Visibility
All transaction details are stored and monitored regularly. It gives complete details about the passage of the money regarding the cost, suppliers, and quality and time of delivery of the products, etc.
Cost Savings
A procurement system analyzes the areas where high and low costs are required in acquiring things, which services are purchased regularly, places where the company can save costs, and suppliers who provide the best quality products at lower costs.
Minimizes time and errors
Procurement software works in an automated or semi-automated way thus eliminating the errors and time consumption by manual labor.
Improved Supplier relationships
The suppliers are highly competitive. That puts the company at the liberty of choosing the best suppliers and negotiating the terms based on the company’s demands, concerns, and constraints.
The main reason why we kicked off with the key benefits of procurement software/service is that you need to be able to make your customers understand why it’s important and how it can specifically help their business when you do your sales pitch.
Before you market your software/service, make sure that you know exactly who your key target is going to be. In this case, your key target would be the CFO as his or her imperatives such as margin, risk/controllership, cash flow are directly linked to the CPO and procurement organization of their company.
The typical resistance you will face especially when selling your procurement services is the concern of taking over people’s jobs. So to shed light on this concern, you have to let your customers know that procurement isn’t about eliminating jobs, rather it’s about creating bandwidth for the procurement organization so they can focus on more specific activities all while you, their partner, can focus on driving value on the transactional or fragmented activities.
Another key element of selling this service is to develop a compelling commercial model that shares the risk of the endeavor.
When you finally arrange a meeting with the decision-makers, plan your key points the same way you plan your discussions with marketing directors. Think through the procurement executive’s role and mindset, and make sure that your compensation discussions recognize procurement’s needs and hot buttons.
It may be tricky and it definitely has its hurdles when selling your procurement software/services, but just remember to not overcomplicate things. Be straightforward but coherent and most importantly, offer solutions rather than just trying to sell your product/service.
