Brent Adamson is a former Harvard professor turned Wall Street Journal award-winning author and sales researcher. He co-authored "The Challenger Sale" and "The Challenger Customer" with my former guest Matt Dixon, and these days is challenging us to concentrate on making products easy to buy, not easy to sell.
Here are some of the highlights of our discussion:
1. The Challenger Sale shook up the world of sales, but The Challenger Customer was the inevitable follow upThey did further research after the first book and identified a new protagonist, the "Mobilizer", who can be your best advocate within the company (but not a champion!)
2. It takes 5.4 people within an organisation to make a purchase decision & the number's risingIt's getting more & more complicated selling into organisations, and the buying journey has become like spaghetti. Finding the "economic buyer" is no longer enough to land the sale.
3. There's a difference between emerging demand and established demandIf you're going after established demand and known solutions you're going to get dragged into a price-based bake-off. Challengers find unknown pains, challenge the status quo & break the frame
4. Some customers don't even know how to buy any solution, let alone your solutionBuyer journeys are complex & some customers can be surprised when things get held up. But you're not, you've seen it all before! Give them the info they need to help close the sale from their side.
5. It's not good enough to just be insightful anymore, The smartness arms race ended in a drawBeing really insightful is table stakes. You need to be able to help your customers frame their decision and give them confidence in the decisions they're making for their company.
.. And much more!
Check out Matt's episodeI interviewed Brent's co-author and co-conspirator Matt Dixon about his work and how customer indecision is a critical problem for B2B sales. Check out the episode here.
Buy "The Challenger Sale"Check it out on Amazon.
Buy "The Challenger Customer"
Check it out on Amazon.
Contact BrentYou can hit Brent up on LinkedIn.
Going Beyond Idealistic Book Principles & The Myth of Unicorn Product Managers (with Emily Tate, Managing Director @ Mind the Product)
Product Management in Africa & Dreams of an African Silicon Valley (with Layo Ogunbanwo, Founder @ Practical Product)
Build What Matters with Vision-Led Product Management (with Rajesh Nerlikar, CEO @ Prodify & author "Build What Matters")
Retail Product Management in a Global Pandemic (with Rhiana Matthew, Senior PM @ Publicis Sapient)
Reducing Waste by Only Spending Time on Really Good Ideas (with Julia Shalet, author "The Really Good Idea Test")
Maintaining Radical Focus and Staying on Strategy with OKRs (with Christina Wodtke, Author "Radical Focus" & "The Team That Managed Itself")
The Philosophy of Product Design (with Udhaya Kumar Padmanabhan, Global Strategic Design Director at Designit)
From Engineer to Product Leader & Getting Away from the "How" (with Rekha Venkatakrishnan, Senior Manager, Group PM @ Walmart)
Data-Driven Decisions & the Product Engagement Score (with Stephanie Tanzar, Director of PM @ Pendo)
Is this Seriously Game Over for Scrum? (with David Pereira, Head of PM @ Virtual Identity, Editor @ Serious Scrum)
From Physiotherapist to Product Manager (with Samuel Ogunkoya, Product Manager @ ProducteevTech)
Product-Led Growth - Game Over for the Sales Team? (with Wes Bush, author "Product-Led Growth" & founder @ ProductLed)
Purposeful Product Transformation & Setting Leaders Up For Success (with Stephanie Leue, CPO @ MindEx & Product Leadership Coach)
Defeating Bias, Prejudice and Bullying in the Workplace (with Kim Scott, author "Radical Candor" & "Just Work")
Sustainable Entrepreneurship & Escaping Hustle Culture (with Polina Marchenko, Founder @ SIDE PRJCT)
Plan your Product Journey via Strategy, Roadmaps and OKRs (with Nacho Bassino, CPO @ Best Day Travel & author "Product Direction")
Surviving a Lack of Product Thinking & Riding the Product Maturity Curve (with Nis Frome, Co-founder & VP Product @ Feedback Loop)
Treating your Career as a Product & Making a Wicked Impact as a Product Leader (with Gibson Biddle, former VP Product @ Netflix)
Growth Marketing & Reshaping the World of eCommerce (with Nichole DeMeré, CMO @ Reeview)
Cleaning Up After Professional Services & Becoming Truly Product Led (with Paul Ortchanian, Founder @ Bain Public)
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
The Commercial Edge: Unleash the Power of People
The emPOWERed Half Hour
NABOR® TALKS
U.S Property Podcast
Aligned Money Show
The Ramsey Show
Planet Money