Page 103 - Writing Winning Business Proposals

94 Writing Winning Business Proposals

Beyond S1 → S2 → B

Note that in using the various categories of buyers, Miller and Heiman aren’t
talking about individual people but about roles people on the selection commit-
tee play during the selling situation. An economic buyer, regardless of whom
he is personally, individually, is always concerned about your proposed proj-
ect’s bottom-line impact on the organization; therefore, he focuses on return
on investment (ROI) or good budget fit or increased productivity. A user buyer,
regardless of title, is always concerned about your service’s day-to-day impact on
her department’s operation; therefore, she may focus on the ease and effective-
ness of implementation or on improved efficiency.
The real significance of these different orientations is that individuals playing
each of the roles will expect different kinds of benefits than will others playing a
different role. Allow me to emphasize this last point. Because you, I, and everyone
else buys because of benefits, you must recognize that we have different expectations
about how we will each benefit from your proposed approach and results. We aren’t
really buying your product or service; we are buying what that product or service
delivers—benefits. Therefore, the major reason that you want to identify buyers’ roles
is this: You will better be able to identify how they, as opposed to their organiza-
tion, will benefit from your engagement. That’s why the first cell of the Psychologics
3
Worksheet, which will be discussed in this chapter’s work session, focuses on:
◉ the individual buyers and the role(s) they play
◉ the perception of benefits the buyers, based on those roles, believe will accrue
to them

When we discussed the baseline logic in Chapter 2 and Chapter 3, we did so
from the perspective of my organization, my firm. But organizations don’t buy
your services; I and my colleagues do. And I and my colleagues have different
perceptions of S1 and S2 based upon the role(s) we are playing in this selling situ-
ation. As a result, the simplified baseline logic that I used in Chapter 3 needs
to be revised when you are considering the psychologics rather than the logics,
when you are considering the people rather than their firm. Chapter 3’s simpli-
fied baseline logic would be adequate only if you were selling to a one-person
buying team with that single individual playing all the buying roles. Because
this situation almost never occurs, the formula must be expanded, as depicted in
Figure 6.6.
This second formulation is much more realistic (and strategic) for three reasons:

1. The perception of S1, the current situation, and of S2, the desired result,
varies by buyer and is conditioned by buying role. Never assume a groupwide